“No. I feel completely normal, except everyone here seems to think I live here, and I am completely certain I have an entire other life. There are actually no words for how sure of that I am.”

Though my certainty is starting to weaken.

“You must be … I mean … you have to have had some sort of injury that you don’t remember. And like, your brain made up a story?”

“Yeah, maybe,” I say, to be agreeable. “But I am telling you, I know every detail of my real life. I remember boring days like when I had the stomach flu and stayed home pounding Pepto-Bismol and watching reruns of Vanderpump Rules. And how, actually, I’ve met like half the cast members. They’re always at The Grove. And that, I mean, I know my way around LA. I remember making tacos like five years ago and forgetting to buy the tortillas and having to go back out to Trader Joe’s and the parking at the one on Hyperion was a total mess as usual. I remember every rejection at every audition. I remember awful sunburns and bad haircuts and weird dates and—I don’t think it’s possible to make all of that up like this.”

“This is really weird,” she says.

My heart lifts. “Do you believe me?”

There’s a very long pause in which she stares at Maureen, who has now settled onto the ground with her head on her paws.

“I mean … it would be really fucked up for you to lie about something like this. That doesn’t seem like you.”

She looks thoughtful, considering me. I am glad that for all my shortcomings in Avalon, the people here don’t think I’m also a liar on top of it all.

“I know it sounds insane. But I watched the finale of Brilliance last night, and it was so strange to see it because they changed some stuff, and in the end—”

She covers her ears and makes la-la-la sounds. “I haven’t watched it yet!”

I actually laugh. The power of a spoiler is interdimensional, and yet still, after a huge HBO finale, The Cut will do a post with the twist in the headline.

“Okay, okay. But watching it—I mean, I know how cold that soundstage is when the lights are off and how boiling it gets when they’re on. I know about the director’s personal life. He has a secret boyfriend, and he takes the Rolls-Royce offset sometimes, which he is not supposed to do but he used to date the transport guy so he gets away with it. Also, that secret boyfriend is named Bob which is kind of the weirdest part of any of it. Bob.”

There’s a flit of amusement in her expression, but it’s gone as quickly as it came. “I don’t know.”