Even before Missed Connections existed, I had this fantasy: I would go to the movies by myself, and a beautiful girl would come in and sit one seat away. We were two of maybe six people in the theater. It would be awkward. I wouldn’t be able to focus on the movie. She would sneeze. I would say, “Bless you.” She would smile. I would do nothing. Even in my fantasies, I did nothing. I wouldn’t remember the movie.

My stepbrother, Nick, threw a warm can of Busch beer into the backseat to each of us. We were probably fifteen, and he was twenty. It was the first summer we were big enough to have fun with outside of sports. We were in Henry Flynn’s car and Erik and I, unbelted, were flying from side to side as he navigated the Hamptons’ back roads with the virtuosity of an old Formula 1 driver. The beer was disgusting.

Car rides with other people aren’t always “driving pleasure”. Small talk is a hangnail in mittens in ten-degree weather to me. It can be fun, but there’s still something about traversing the roadways alone. It’s a form of extreme freedom, and often, an escape from the pettiness of our world.