Page 45 of Offside

Surely it was just a notification from the app trying to get me to use it. I got them all the time from store and restaurant apps I hadn’t opened in a while, enticing me to try and use them again–that had to be what was going on.

So, why couldn’t I open it and find out?

My brain wanted to, but my thumb wouldn't move. The screen ended up going black from how long I was fighting myself, clicking back to life from a single tap of my treacherous thumb.

That notification was haunting me already.

Finally, after several deep breaths, I clicked the notification and opened the app. My eyes closed, and I pinched my own arm, not fully convinced I wasn’t sleeping, but then I opened my eyes.

The app was open.

And I had one new message.

MetalMonkey: Hi.

Hi?

A month of radio silence from the man, and all I got was a hi?

The ache in my chest that had been sad all month switched to anger effortlessly. It was odd–I still wanted to cry the longer I looked at the screen, but I also wanted to yell and hit something…and respond.

Even so unbelievably mad at him, I just missed him. I had been waiting for that message for a month–hoping for it. It was finally here, and I had every emotion in the book circling inside.

But the one that won?

Longing.

BaskarKnight: Hi? You ghost me for a month, and then I just get hi?

Metal typed for a minute before the bubbles disappeared again. My eyes got wide, and my breathing quickened, panicked that I just fucked up my shot with him by being mad.

The bubbles came back, and my feathers flattened, but I realized quickly that I cared a lot more about not fucking this up than I did about chastising him for leaving me.

I just didn’t want him to leave me again.

MetalMonkey: I know. I’m really sorry–I just freaked out… I cared a lot more than I should have that you got hurt, and it freaked me out really bad…but the last month of missing you so much that it hurt won.

MetalMonkey: I’m really sorry, Knight.

BaskarKnight: Why did that freak you out? You’re allowed to care about me, Metal. In fact, I liked it a whole lot that you cared about me, so why the freak-out?

MetalMonkey: Because I cared too much.

MetalMonkey: I cared more than I should have when there was no future here, Knight. I don’t even know your real name or what your face looks like, and you don’t know mine, but even if you did, what would that change? You’re not coming out ever, and we could be across the country from one another for all you know–I cared too damn much about you getting hurt when that was true in my head.

Oh, fuck this.

Before I could change my mind, I wiped the rogue tear from my face and hit call.

If I was going to get lectured or just dumped properly, then he was going to man the fuck up and do it for real.

It took too many rings for him to answer, but when he did, I just wanted to cry. I'd been waiting to hear from him for a month, but I finally did, and it wasn’t him begging me to forgive him and love him.

It was like he wanted me to agree with him–that he did the right thing by leaving me with no explanation.

“Talk, Metal. If you’re dumping me, then man up and say it–”

“I’m not doing that,” he said in a breath, his voice cracking. “I was just telling you why I did it–I’m not asking you to like it…”