There’s life on other planets, and we’re fighting again.

Not so much fighting each other, me and Hazel, but rather the hundred little obstacles we confront daily in the world: electric bills, uninsured vehicles, the price of groceries—it’s a love language in itself that we’re each willing to be the other’s proxy for all these petty aggravations.

When the need for this routine is exhausted, from my phone I will play serious, dramatic music like Vivaldi or some Dies Irae thundering, and we will each see how long we can continue arguing. It’s become a playlist of losing first-smirks.