Profile — Fb View

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 set the phone down for real this time. Outside, a car passed, headlights sweeping across her empty living room.

Tap.

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 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

But David would know. He would see her name— Elaine Park —hovering there like a ghost at a window, and he would remember everything: the last fight, the slammed door, the way she’d said “Don’t ever talk to me again” and meant it, until tonight, when her thumb betrayed her.

You viewed David Cross’s profile. 1 minute ago. Elaine’s breath stopped

The profile loaded in a crisp, cruel instant. His face, three years older and thirty pounds lighter, smiled from a beach in Thailand. Beside him, a woman with sun-bleached braids and a silver nose ring rested her chin on his shoulder.