Michelle and Anne sat next to each other on the loveseat in the living room. They shared a blanket and a bowl of popcorn.
Anne grabbed the television remote and hit the pause button. “I figured it out,” she said.
Michelle finished chewing her popcorn before saying, “It’s just Ozark. It’s easy to figure out. They kill off the men, Laura Linney breaks bad, and also Jason Bateman is there.”
“No. Not TV. Our lives.”
“Oh,” Michelle said, wondering if she was going to be proposed to while both of them were wearing pajama pants.
“I think we’re ghosts.”
“Come again?” was the only response Michelle could muster.
“I think we’ve died, and that we are now stuck in this same loop over and over again.”
“Ghosts don’t have Netflix.”
“No, for real. I mean, I love you and all-”
“Thanks, question mark?”
“And there is nobody I’d rather spend my time with, but every day is the same. Every night is couch, movie, snacks, blanket. We’re ghosts and we are in a loop.”
Michelle took a moment to gauge the how seriously Anne was proposing this hypothesis. She crinkled her face saying, “You know that real life doesn’t have twist endings, right?”
Anne was undeterred. “Tell that to my uncle Thomas who drowned in the pool of a Caribbean Cruise ship.”
“Okay, Anne: you’re taking a lot of logical leaps here. You’re being ridiculous.”
Moments later they were struck by a powerful proton stream, shot from a neutrino wand.