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Layana: It was my private diary
Layana: My laptop was stolen
Layana: I would never post something like that
Layana: I’m miserable without you
Her desperation touchedthose lingering feelings I still wrestled to extinguish, feelings that had me wanting to believe our bond meant as much to her as it did to me.
But the farce was over. This whole relationship had been constructed on a carefully shaped illusion, one where she mirrored my feelings to earn my trust before exposing me to ruin.
She’d slipped past my walls and lulled me into a sense of safety with the force of her spirit, only to sear my vulnerabilities with careless fire. I knew now I would never allow someone so close again.
In time, her calls and messages tapered off, until one day they ceased altogether. No longer did she try to explain. No longer were voicemails left or notes written. No longer was I the recipient of sassy morning salutations and daily ocular assaults with strangers’ genitalia.
In the deafening silence that remained, I mourned everything we had shared and lost. I missed her ploys for control, her defiance, her warm vanilla and hazelnut scent. I missed the way her bright blue eyes lit up when I said something that amused her. I missed the contentment I’d felt in those brief moments where hope had reigned over everything else. I even missed the dick pics she’d so loved to send.
Her absence lingered as an ache in my chest as constant as the churning burn of her betrayal. A void formed where she once resided. My world was now as it was always meant to have been—cold, orderly, solitary.
Part of me wanted to believe her diary story. Believe our connection had truly touched her, that she regretted the damage she had caused. But even if releasing her accounts wasn’t her fault, that changed nothing.
She still wrote them.
The most vulnerable parts of my life that I had revealed only to her were now scattered across the digital universe, completely public for anyone to see.
The scars she’d caused would remain, no matter the specifics.
I stood in my lab, staring at the sample I was meant to be evaluating, its fluorescent shade the same hue as Layana’s Mountain Dew. In time, perhaps every stimulus around me would stop reminding me of her. Perhaps the pain would ease eventually, but it was difficult to imagine when my heart was broken so completely.
The sound of my phone ringing ripped me from my thoughts.
It was her, finally reaching out once more. I couldn’t answer, even if a deep, emotion-focused part of me wanted to.
I pulled the phone from my pocket to check for sure.
It wasn’t Layana.
Esme was calling.
We hadn’t spoken in the four days that had passed since my world had fallen apart. It was only a matter of time before she became aware of Layana’s blog post, and with it the revelation about our mother.
I should have called her sooner. She deserved to hear the truth from me before someone else. But I’d been so devastated, it was all I could do to get myself dressed in the morning. I hadn’t been strong enough to carry someone else’s grief.
It was too late now. I couldn’t put the conversation off any longer.
She already knew.
I headed out of my lab into my office and answered.
“Hello, Esme,” I said.
“Don’t youhello Esmeme like everything is fine.”
“What can I do for you?” I asked, as if I didn’t know.
“Um, how about treat me like a sister for once and spill.”
A sickening feeling settled into my stomach. “You’ve seen it.”
