Gemotions

It arrived at lunchtime, interrupting her carefully curated online persona. The friend request, from "Brian Carter," landed on her screen, a dark stain on her carefully constructed digital canvas. She scoffed, her breath exhaling in a sharp puff.

She scrolled through his profile, the banality of it all further fueling her ire. A family photo with matching outfits, a generic corporate job, a list of "likes" that reeked of conformity. The sheer ordinariness of his life was both disappointing and infuriating. He was not special. He was not interesting.

She considered responding in kind, a curated stream of perfection designed to make him feel inadequate. The fantasy of putting him down was delicious, but she knew it would do nothing to heal. She could imagine his intentions as a bid to appear "better."

She slammed her laptop closed, the sudden movement startling the silence. She went back to eating her food. It suddenly tasted like ashes.