Besides all of this, Patrick and I living together for the first time meant it was the beginning of a life together, that nitty-gritty one where we fight over the way he leaves the spatula on a still-hot burner, or how she always “organizes” his things in illogical piles when they were already in order according to his systems. No matter where in the world, no matter how exotic the locale, they’ll still fight over that spatula and those piles. And they’ll still notice how other couples, no matter their language, will glare at one another on the sunniest of days, skulking by the ocean that they'd just enjoyed hand-in-hand.