Fate Interrupted

13. Texting Metric

Ren

Whish. There it goes again. I'm sitting on my mattress on the floor in my otherwise empty bedroom, feeling this fleeting, unnerving sensation. It feels as if I've lost something precious, or forgot to do something important, or like the bottom is about to drop out from under me again.

This strange, subtle dread has been passing over me the last month—like a ghostly breeze or a cloth trailing lightly through my body that I can't see or put my finger on, but I certainly can sense.

Until today, that is when I realize— it's my looming birthday. It's the first of December, and my dreaded birthday is tomorrow! The big 3-0.

And now I've been thinking I've felt this way before my birthdays ever since I was twenty-six. Twenty-one was the last year I looked forward to birthdays the way little kids do—Yay! I'm finally another year older!

I got engaged at twenty-five, soon after my birthday, on New Year's Eve, and married that fall. It seemed my birthdays in my late twenties went downhill from there.

I had been so happy to be engaged. Alex was everything I thought I wanted: handsome, successful, sweet, funny, and caring. Check, check, check. I loved him. I did.

But there was a moment when I was picking out my wedding band when my mind flashed to Gio, and I suddenly realized that I had always held out some irrational hope I'd wind up with him.

Life after twenty-five seemed to get a lot less... hopeful. But at least my life was checking boxes. But here I am, one day to thirty, still scrubbing off those check marks.

Starting over, older.

Hey, but at least I've semi-moved into my own place! It's a newly renovated second-floor apartment on the north side of town. It's on the top floor, which is the second floor. A low-rise community spread over fourteen acres. Very different from anything you'd find in New York. Beautiful and spacious? Yes. Walkable to anything? No.

Anyway, like I said, I'm sitting on my mattress on the floor in my bedroom, surveying the work I had done to get all my clothes hanging up in the closet. It's actually very satisfying to see them all unpacked again. But other than that, the apartment is still pretty sparse. I have all my Ikea furniture yet to be built, and my sofa isn't coming till Saturday.

But the kitchen is unpacked, and the fridge is full of food. My stomach hears me thinking of the word 'food' and rumbles, so I get up to start making dinner... for one, which will consist of my most basic of meals: Penne pasta, store-bought pesto sauce, baby shrimp meat, sautéed mushrooms, and a glass of wine to celebrate my first night in my very own place.

After my dinner (which I ate in the kitchen on the peninsula since I have no table), I return to my bedroom because it's the only place with something soft to sit on. I begin noticing how quiet my apartment is—a deadening quiet. I sit on my bed, not knowing what to do with myself.

I don't want to unpack anymore or make furniture. It is a little too late to start a movie on my laptop and a little too early to go to bed. So I just get on my phone and check Facebook, pouring myself another generous glass of wine.

An urge flashes through me to look up Alex, even though I unfriended him months ago. But I know this is a horrible idea. The last time I saw his cover photo, he and his new girlfriend smiled back at me like the happiest couple ever, and I was in a funk over it for days.

I have to physically shake my head to clear them from my thoughts. My mind wanders back to... you know who.

Why isn't Gio on Facebook?

My thumb hovers over the Facebook icon. Then I watch it move, seemingly removed from myself, to my contacts icon. I blink and I've already clicked on it and am flicking rapidly through the names till I get to M and slow.