The sweetest time in adulthood is when you live alone. You’re out of the parents house and can afford not to have roommates. It will be a while before you even let the thought of moving in with a gf/bf or getting hitched enter your mind. For the time being, you enjoy waking up and not having to tell anyone “good morning” or wait to get into the bathroom. Life feels wide open and simple. Nobody is around to mess with your schedule or question your little routines.

Your dishes can sit in the sink for days. That used empty glass you drank from two days ago, just go ahead and pour your morning cup of orange juice in it. You know you’re the only one who used it and you know where your mouth has been. You walk around naked, scratch your ass, leave a mound of dirty clothes on the floor. Life can’t get any better. Until sickness shows up and ruins the party. At that point all the little habits start feeling less cute and more like evidence.

When you live alone and get sick you loonngggg for someone to visit and kick yourself for not giving your best friend/person you’re dating your spare key. You wish someone could at least come over and check to see if you’ve stopped breathing. The thought of you lying dead in your apartment for weeks before someone decides to call the police and have your door knocked down jolts you from your sleep. Illness has a way of making every independent fantasy look fragile.

As you lay cocooned on the couch, your over the counter drug daze has you imagining what your life would be like if you were coupled up. Your lover would tell their boss “I need to leave work early today, my sweetheart is sick.” They’d rush home with groceries and drugs, feed you, and make sure you were comfortable. Then you remember the people you’re seeing are too annoying to save you, and you slip right back into solo life. That thought lasts just long enough to make you sentimental.