She holds the phone like it’s heavy with unsent messages, her thumb hovering in that no-man’s-land between action and avoidance. The screen lights up, not with purpose, but with the soft glow of maybe. Apps blink for attention like needy pets, but she scrolls past them like they’re memories she doesn’t want to feed.
Pass me by on phone, she thinks, or maybe texts, or maybe never says at all. Autocorrect doesn’t know what she means, but tries anyway—“past me bone” or “paste my bowl.” She doesn’t fix it. The phone can guess like everyone else.
The signal is strong, but the connection isn’t. One bar off from meaning anything. A ping arrives from someone she didn’t want to hear from, and silence from the one she does. She turns the phone over, screen down, like a lie you don’t want to catch in the act.
“You there?”
Read. No reply.
“Okay.”
Unsent.
She opens the camera, not to take a picture, but to check her expression—somewhere between late and too late. The front camera always tells the truth too clearly. She closes it fast, back to nothing again. No calls. No pings. Just vibrations from a different world, buzzing in a pocket she’s not reaching for.
And still, she holds the phone. Like maybe if she does it long enough, it’ll explain everything.
Pass me by on phone. Whatever that means, she already knows.
