35

My parents and I are driving on the interstate toward Seattle. Dad rotates his driver’s seat 180 degrees, holding his phone sideways instead the steering wheel, his thumbs tapping away at a videogame. We’re flanked by cars and semitrucks on either lane. “Don’t worry, I’m still driving,” Dad says.

But I’m worrying about the demon cat hiding in the bedroom. And the classmate who saw my presentation about the history imperialist expansionism, and started ugly crying in the corner.

A strange device comes in the mail. Out of its packaging it looks like an old timey walkman cassette player, white in color with orange accents, and I understand it is for a certain conference that I’d signed on to but forgotten.