“Morning, Mandy,” I said, walking past her to the beverage fridge in the corner of the room. Lucas didn’t like having our sodas and Brita filters getting in the way of his precious trays of cold cuts and marinating meats. The solution? Mandy’s old dorm fridge, which was continually packed with everything from her real-sugar Coke—imported from Mexico—to Lucas’s insulin.

She grunted her response, far more interested in inhaling waffles and bacon than in talking to her housemate. I didn’t hold it against her. Talking to Mandy before she’s had enough calories to fuel somebody five times her size is generally pointless.

Roommate number two: Amanda Reyes. Five-foot-one in her stocking feet, and incredibly fond of shoes with heels that add eight inches to her height and make her walk like she’s slightly drunk at all times. Her wardrobe consists almost entirely of cute dresses, demure, plain-colored ones for work and wild, extravagantly patterned ones for play. She likes to refer to herself as a manic pixie nightmare girl, which is not inaccurate. She also likes to talk about how her existence as a smart, successful, educated Mexican American woman in tech makes her a unicorn, which is another way of saying “a horse with a giant fucking knife stuck to its head.”

I have good roommates.

Pitcher of water in hand, I returned to the table and reached for my own plate. I was cutting my waffles when Lucas emerged from the kitchen and took his own seat.

“Morning,” I said.

“You found clothes,” he said.

“I don’t spend all my time in my pajamas.”

“You would if you didn’t have to leave your room in order to get paid. One day you’re going to find a job that lets you telecommute, and you’re never going to get dressed again.”

“Sounds good to me,” I said, and speared a chunk of waffle. “I could be a houseplant.”

“How’s the invasion going to like that?” asked Mandy.

I shrugged. “Probably not that well, but hey, if they wanted me to do something specific, they should have left instructions. Pass the butter?”

She did.

When I came back from whatever terrible, traumatic thing happened to me in the woods—a thing I have never been able to remember, no matter how much time I spend talking to experts on childhood memory recovery—I came back claiming the aliens had abducted the real Anastasia Miller, leaving me in her place. My last therapist said it was an attempt to disassociate myself from the terror of abduction, using a narrative framework I had probably picked up from something I’d seen on TV. It’s unusual for a three-year-old to come back absolutely convinced of her own inhumanity, but as it never seemed to really bother me, they eventually stopped trying to change my mind.