Option Four

My finger quivers above the screen and my heart pounds in my ears. The image is small but unmistakable and my options are spelled out in buttons:

ADD FRIEND | REMOVE

Friend? No. But I realise I don’t want to remove him, either.

Option three, I suppose, is to do nothing, so I continue scrolling. But the list of people Facebook thinks I may know blurs in my stunned vision. Twelve years I have grieved, wondered and finally let go, only for Facebook to decide one arbitrary Tuesday afternoon that I might want to say Hi?
I give my smartphone a timeout on the table.

Jared arrives for our lunch date. Our favourite café emits a familiar rattle and hum as he kisses me hello. He gets a steak sandwich and I have a salad. All is as it should be, except for the tingle in my gut. We talk, we laugh, we kiss goodbye and after he leaves I sit back down and stare at my phone.

Add friend, remove, or do nothing? I poke it back to life, swipe right and begin to scroll, idly at first, then faster. Where is he? He wasn’t this far down before! Oh, there he is.
My breathing slows.
This is ridiculous.
Add friend, remove, or do nothing? I know what I should do, but the tingle in my belly quietly suggests a fourth option.

Gently, so as not to disturb the demanding buttons, I caress his name with my fingertip. Dozens of images fill the screen, depicting a life in which I play no part. His humour is light, his friends all smiles, and it seems he made that trip to Egypt. Is this stalking? I grin. He’d find that hilarious. Feeling better, now I know he’s still alive, I back out carefully and resume my existence.

A month later, I have visited his profile at least a dozen times. Does he know? Does he look in on me, the way I look in on him? The thought both thrills and scares me. It’s like high school all over again, upon hearing his words, ‘You’ve been watching me.’
I shiver with the memory of stolen passion born from a desire I’d thought unrequited … until one day it wasn’t, and Teacher’s Pet took on whole new meaning.

As always, a stab of pain follows the memory. With me whisked away by appalled parents he vanished, his fledgling career in tatters. Twelve years I grieved, wondered, and learned to let go – until one arbitrary Tuesday afternoon.
Thanks, Facebook.

I swipe and touch his name again, but today is different. Today I have purpose. I tap the ‘Message’ button, then hesitate. What do I say? I start with ‘Hi’, hit send, then panic. What if he blames me? Or worse, what if he doesn’t remember me?

My phone pings and I swipe a hesitant finger across the wretched screen.

You’ve been watching me 😉

Twelve years of angst escapes in a sob. I grin like a lunatic and begin to heal.