Emergency Contact

She smiled.

Sam smiled back.

She died.

Hell really was other people.

“It’s a privilege, and part of acknowledging that privilege is doing it honorably. Create diverse characters because you can. Especially ones that aren’t easy to write. A character that scares you is worth exploring. Yet if you breathe life into a character and it comes to you too easily—say you’re writing from the viewpoint of a black man in America and you’re not one? Think hard about where your inspiration is coming from. Are you writing stereotypes? Tropes? Are you fetishizing the otherness? Whose ideas are you spreading? Really consider how you transmit certain optics over others. Think about how much power that is.”

Penny wondered why “girl trouble” meant some dude had dating drama and that “women’s trouble” was about periods.

Penny was even sure he’d Facetuned at least one, which was a quality she simply could not respect in a man.

When she kissed Sam, it was closing your eyes and opening them to find yourself in outer space. Kissing Sam was the universe. It was the Internet. It was a miracle.