I am smoking a cigarette when She tells me about Tiktaalik. She is miles away but her voice is urgent in my ear, tinny through the miniscule speaker in my cellular phone.

“Tika-what?” I ask.

“Tik-taa-lik,” She says, annunciating as precisely as she can through several hundred miles of distance between us and about as much static.

I can almost feel Her next to me, Her hand in mine, Her breath in my ear. I am trying to win her and it is unclear if I will. This moment, me on my fire escape wishing to kiss her and Her in her studio apartment wishing for I-don’t-know-what, feels particularly precarious.