I knew getting into it that Phil was an eccentric character. He was known for certain oddities—a fondness for shiny objects, spiky hairdos, the color red, to name a few. What should have really tipped me off to his peculiarities, however, was the night we were laying in bed and he confessed, “One of my exes became a dating columnist after we broke up. A lot of her stories were about me.”

Phil and I weren’t dating—we were hooking up. We’d slept together a few times, and who knew where things would go. We shared the same group of friends, so either way, it wasn’t as if we’d never see each other again if we decided to go separate ways.