This Time Tomorrow

by Emma Straub

Alice and Matt hadn’t moved in together, because having two apartments always seemed like a great trick, a truly revolutionary way to be in a committed relationship, if you could afford it. She’d lived alone since she was in college, and truly sharing space with another adult every single day—kitchen, toilet, and all—was a level of commitment Alice did not aspire

One rule of thumb was that the harder it was to tell where someone’s money came from, the more of it they had.

Alice knew, not like some of her friends and acquaintances, the ones who posted rhapsodic Instagram paeans every birthday and anniversary. They didn’t like all the same things, or listen to the same music, or have the same hopes and dreams, but when they’d met on an app (of course) and had a drink, the drink had turned into dinner, and the dinner had turned into another drink, and that drink had turned into sex, and now it was a year later and the doorman didn’t ask for her name.

who actually got to die while feeling loved and supported by their spouse? Ten percent?

Matt might not have been great at cooking, or other things, but he was good at sex, and that wasn’t nothing.

She wanted Tommy to look at her and think, Oh fuck, what did I miss? She wanted that almost as much as she wanted to see him and not have the exact same thought.

The things that drive me crazy about him might not drive someone else crazy. But it’s a choice—still. We’ve been married for fifteen years. But I still have to choose it. That doesn’t stop.”