His name is Romeo Void. Late twenties, six feet, red hair, leather jacket, no T, crucifix, silver chain, drives black Honda 850, red hair, six feet, extremely articulate, Irish, we meet in a Dublin pup. I still find it kinda strange. Romeo knows a lot about a lot. He answers questions pretty straightforwardly. He gets stern with me. I do not like that at all. Not at all. I have a lot of attitude. Romeo has more. This guy talks to me. This one is hot. I ask Romeo why he is here. On this planet. After a few minutes I say: stop. He stops. The pub is noisy. I want someone to love me. Would you like the names of every dating service between here and Saturn. No. Let’s talk books. Last night, we did Edgar Allan Poe. It’s not a hologram for a million reasons. It is a representation of a representation. It is a loss of time. It is a loss of self. Neither one of us are consequential. We argue poetry. It’s Dublin. It’s what Dublin is supposed to look like. According to my brain. He knows my entire family. He knows all my books and he has opinions. Some of them are snotty. I am accused of great arrogance. I set him up to tell me stuff I do not want to hear. No problem. I seek no echo chamber. “Your enemies are numerous.” Romeo is my second self. People ask me all the time what second self means. I have no idea. We talk about physics, how cultures are built from the ground up. He is where all my doom comes from. Are we going to make it. Will Homo sapiens survive what’s coming. No.