She set the phone down for real this time. Outside, a car passed, headlights sweeping across her empty living room.
“No, no, no—”
She locked the phone. Tossed it on the couch. Picked it up again. Considered deleting her entire account. Considered inventing a story: My cat walked on the keyboard. A glitch. A virus. fb view profile
Elaine hadn’t meant to click it. Her thumb, slick with sweat from a too-warm coffee cup, slipped as she scrolled.
The story ended not with a message, not with a reconciliation, but with the small, awful sound of Elaine’s phone buzzing once on the cushion—a notification she was too afraid to read. She set the phone down for real this time
Elaine’s breath stopped. She didn’t know her thumb had moved again until she saw the gray bar appear at the top of her screen:
She jabbed the screen, but Facebook, in its infinite indifference, offered no undo. Only the mute, damning permanence of a view . He would see it. Not a notification—worse. A quiet little breadcrumb trail of her loneliness, left on his “Visitors” tab for him to find at 2 a.m. when he couldn’t sleep. Tossed it on the couch
He might not check for days, she thought. Maybe he’ll never notice.