Figueiredo sat at a slick glass desk twirling a silver pen in his fingertips. Behind him, a sliding glass door looked out to a small stone patio clustered with ferns the size of trees. Some tropical penthouse or a private office where he felt comfortable enough to unload onto this video journal, or whatever this was.

I forced myself to study his face when I wanted to look away because of the acid his wolf eyes kicked up in my stomach. Lines radiated from the corners of his eyes—the same brown as mine—probably from so much scowling. His cheeks were a little fuller, with deep laugh lines carved into both sides of his lips like parentheses. His finance douche haircut of cropped sides and a gelled side-part in place of my buzzed head. A curving fingernail-shaped scar in one of his eyebrows in place of the pinprick scars in my ears from closed-up piercings. On his nose rested a pair of thin, gold-rimmed circular glasses—which he probably didn’t even need—that screamed I introduce myself at parties as Dr. Figueiredo.

What weirded me out the most was the hush of his voice—lower than mine and edged in gravel. His words scraped out a tired tune in the strange music of his language, unlike his clipped drill-sergeant speak I’d heard so far. I watched his lips move, squinting at the words to see if they’d make sense.

Honestly, watching twisted my gut so hard that I sometimes had to look away or I’d puke. I’d accidentally gotten blackout drunk at a birthday party for a guy I’d been dating a while back. He’d recorded me swaying on the tiny stage of the bar in front of the karaoke machine and hamming up some pop song for him. He’d shown it to me the next day because he’d thought it was cute. I very much didn’t. I had to yoga-breathe through the panic and shame. How was I that thing I was watching? How did I let some poltergeist possess my body and make me do things I had zero memory of? The Ghost of Blackouts Past poured another cocktail into my stomach.

I projected a life onto my alternate self while I watched Figueiredo’s lips move. He’d probably stayed in school and listened to all those visiting speakers blabbing about how STEM careers are cool, and you too can change the world! He’d snagged trophies while I over-slept through the race. His teeth were straight and wide without my slight front gap. His neat button-down skimmed his body. I only dressed half as nice as him, slipping white-cuffed dress shirts over the tattoos of lines of poetry and interlocking triangles at my forearms, when I filmed weddings here and there to bring in some cash.