It didn’t bother her that Benjamin was a bit on the heavy side, or that he smelled faintly of onions and peppermint, or even that his eyes had a tendency to wander sometimes. No, what bothered her about Benjamin was he wasn’t a ‘he’, but a ‘they’, and the wandering eyes seemed fond of chasing the cat.

It has seemed a perfectly reasonable arrangement when the scientists (and politicians) ((and the ambassador that had smelt of roses and cinnamon)) had first explained it. She’d thought it a wonderful adventure at the time, living with an alien, and being the very first human to do so—what challenge! But life with Benjamin, or more accurately, the colony that made up Benjamin, was a far cry from anything resembling adventure.

“Benjamin.” Because he was off chasing the cat again and dammed if they hadn’t agreed just this morning that Max was off limits.

“We were playing.” One of the smaller digestive colonies was still nibbling on breakfast and she frowned down at it. Not that it could see her frown, those colonies were still chasing the cat.

“Well Max doesn’t think you’re playing.” She resisted the temptation to snatch the plate away. “We agreed–”

“We did not.” The colony sniffed (which was impressive considering it had no nose). “You won by judicial oversight, not by popular vote you know.”

She counted to ten. Then to fifty. Then gave up on counting and simply recited the periodic table backwards until she felt less inclined to reduce Benjamin’s component parts into component pieces.