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The Expiration Notice

At 10:42 on Thanksgiving morning, Maya received an email informing her that her friendship had expired.

SUBJECT: YOUR FRIENDSHIP SUBSCRIPTION HAS ENDED

Dear Maya,

Your membership in Unsupervised Adults has reached its expiration date.

To avoid permanent loss of friendship privileges, you must renew your membership by 8:03 p.m. tonight.

Failure to renew may result in awkward encounters, excessive small talk and the permanent loss of your right to borrow a phone charger.

Thank you for your cooperation.

Maya stared at her phone.

“What the hell?”

She was twenty-seven years old, had a job, paid taxes and was almost certain she’d never subscribed to a friendship.

She took a screenshot and posted it in the group chat.

Maya clicked the link.

A website appeared.

At the top was a photograph of six college students sitting around a ridiculously small Thanksgiving table.

One was wearing a turkey hat.

Another was holding a bottle of sparkling cider.

And someone had managed to set fire to what appeared to be a bread roll.

Maya recognised the photograph.

It was taken at their very first Friendsgiving, five years earlier.

Beneath the photograph was a title:

THE OFFICIAL FRIENDSHIP AGREEMENT

Established November 2021.

Membership: Six idiots.

Status: EXPIRED.

She scrolled down.

There were rules.

Article 1: Members must tolerate each other’s terrible taste in music.

Article 2: Borrowed phone chargers must eventually be returned.

Article 3: Any member who gets dumped is entitled to emergency pizza.

Article 4: No member may be left alone at a party unless they explicitly request it.

Article 5: Screenshots of embarrassing messages may be preserved for historical purposes but must never be shown to future employers.

Article 6: A member may disappear for three months without explanation and still be welcomed back as though nothing happened.

Maya laughed.

She remembered making some of these rules during their first year living together.

What she didn’t remember was turning them into a website.

She returned to the group chat.

At 4:30 p.m., everyone arrived at Maya’s apartment for Friendsgiving.

Omar brought mashed potatoes.

Priya brought an extremely organised spreadsheet.

Jess brought wine.

Theo brought a laptop.

And Nina arrived forty minutes late carrying a supermarket pie.

“I made this,” she announced.

“The label is still on it,” Maya observed.

“I made the decision to buy it.”

They settled around the table.

Then all six phones vibrated simultaneously.

FRIENDSHIP RENEWAL PROCESS INITIATED.

To renew your membership, complete the following requirements.

Requirement 1: Produce evidence of your first Friendsgiving.

Theo held up the photograph from the website.

A green checkmark appeared.

Requirement 2: Identify the person responsible for the Great Oven Incident of 2021.

Everyone looked at Omar.

“What?” he protested.

“You put your shoes in the oven,” Nina said.

“They were wet!”

“YOU TURNED IT ON!”

“I THOUGHT IT WAS SET TO WARM!”

Another green checkmark appeared.

Requirement 3: Identify the member who has been late to the greatest number of gatherings.

Everyone turned toward Jess.

“That’s discrimination,” she said.

A third checkmark appeared.

Requirement 4: Confirm that at least one member still owes another member money.

Nina pointed at Omar.

“Twelve dollars,” he muttered.

“Fourteen.”

A fourth checkmark appeared.

Then the screen went dark.

For a moment, nothing happened.

Finally, a new message appeared.

FINAL REQUIREMENT: ALL SIX MEMBERS MUST BE PRESENT.

A counter appeared.

Maya counted the people around the table.

One.

Two.

Three.

Four.

Five.

Six.

“That’s wrong.”

Priya checked the member list.

Maya. Omar. Priya. Jess. Theo. Nina.

All six were there.

“Maybe somebody has to log in,” Theo suggested.

They tried.

Nothing.

A new warning appeared.

ONE MEMBER HAS NOT BEEN VERIFIED.

Expiration in five minutes.

Maya refreshed the page.

The countdown continued.

4:59.

4:58.

4:57.

Then another message appeared.

WOULD YOU LIKE TO SEE THE ORIGINAL AGREEMENT?

Theo clicked YES.

A video began to load.

The thumbnail showed their first Friendsgiving, five years earlier.

Everyone was laughing.

Everyone looked impossibly young.

And standing at the end of the table was someone wearing an enormous turkey costume.

Nobody remembered the costume.

Nobody remembered taking the video.

Then the figure in the turkey costume slowly removed its head.

And all six friends stared at the screen.

Because none of them recognised the person underneath.

Who was the mysterious seventh person? Why wasn’t the friendship agreement recognising all six members? And what exactly had they agreed to five years earlier?