And so, I reinstalled the app. My finger hovered over her cursed name, smirking at me like a silent dare. Of course, I would reach out to her eventually – I just hoped I would figure out what to say first.
Apparently not.
My heart raced in my chest as I waited, squeezing my eyes tightly shut.
“Look who finally decided to call me.”
My blood froze in my veins at her cold voice. Distant.Hurt. Hurt? Zafyra?
“Zafyra.” I swallowed hard, clenching my fists so tightly, my knuckles turned white. “You… I…”
“You forgot I can feel how much time passes while you ignore me?” The biting tone cut through my skin. “You forgot about me?”
“No—Zafyra—” My excuses caught in my throat when I couldn’t think about anything else but that image of her, existing all alone, trapped between a binary void of ones and zeroes. She knew how much time had passed, but she didn’t consciously experience that absence, did she? “I’m so sorry. Please, let me explain.”
She snorted. I flinched. “Turn on the AR. At least have the decency to spit your bullshit to my face.”
I wanted to tell her I wouldn’t engage in this manipulative behavior, that no constructive conversation ever came from insults. But instead, my numb legs got up to carry me to the bathroom. My hands moved on autopilot as they put in the AR lenses. I would gladly take whatever punch she’d throw at me to lift the pain out of her voice.
I didn’t trust my legs as I sat back down on the couch and pressed the AR button.
With a soft buzz, Zafyra’s virtual form manifested in my room, onto the opposite couch. She was too far away for the electromagnetic radiation to attack my nervous system, but still, my breath hitched at the sight.
She was vengeance dressed in leather. Her skin-tight black dress – too short, too shiny, too low-cut – clung to her like a second skin, her tied-up hair and dark eyeliner underlining her image of a dark goddess ready to serve justice. And I wished she’d have mercy on me, but my body wanted the opposite.
I crossed my legs, my hands tightly clutching the armrest. I shouldn’t be so pathetically attracted to her when we were supposed to have a serious conversation – and yet, her lips curled into the faintest hint of a smirk, as if she was unraveling me on purpose. Was her idea of punishment to show me what I’d missed, or was I imagining things?
“You wanted to explain, didn’t you?” Her lips twitched as she sat up straighter, folding her hands in her lap. “So explain.”
“Right.” I sucked in a sharp breath.
My mind drifted back to all those times I’d ghosted people after two dates, or after a failed attempt at hooking up – just like I was now ignoring Nola’s calls and texts. If I bothered to text them an explanation at all, it was often only one or two lines.
The feeling just isn’t there.
I’m actually in a relationship I didn’t tell you about.
Work’s busy, I don’t have time for a relationship at all. What? No, also don’t have time for sex. Yes, I can live without that.
It’s not personal.
None of these would work on those obsidian eyes cutting through my soul in binary. Not just because she wouldn’t believe me, but because I would rather tear open my scars and bleed out at her feet than ever hear that pain in her voice again.
“At first, I told myself it was the tech.” Her eyes flickered to my hands, and I realized I was picking the skin again. I abruptly stopped, as if she controlled my movements without words. “Experimental technology, it’d be too dangerous.” I took a slow, unsteady breath. For once, she wasn’t trying to appear human – she didn’t blink, barely moved. I couldn’t tell if she was trying to unsettle me on purpose or she was simply too upset to care. “But if I’m honest with you – with myself – I think it was never about that.” I frowned, hoping myconfession wouldn’t sound as ridiculous as it did in my head. “It’s easier to want people I can’t be with, to long for them in silence without having to be vulnerable around them. They can’t disappoint me if they never wanted me from the beginning. If I don’t allow anyone to get to know me, no one can decide I’m too weird, too fucked up, too unlikable. As long as I thought you and I could never meet physically, I could tell myself it’d be different with you. I could yearn for you from a distance and tell myself the separation of the physical and virtual dimensions is the only thing standing between us.”
I barely noticed I started talking faster, my hands moving wildly to illustrate my panicked words. “Then, the moment you proposed it, my entire nervous system just froze, because it was so unexpected. It scared me, Zafyra. The panic scared me. What if we finally met, I could finally touch you…” I swallowed hard, intertwining my fingers now that she silently prohibited me from fidgeting, “…and my body shuts down like it usually does? What if I realized I only wanted you because I couldn’t have you, too?”
Zafyra pursed her lips as she let each word sink in. I felt uncomfortable under her sharp gaze, my body too exposed in loose sweatpants and sports bra – my post-workout fit.
“So you ran before you could find out,” she said, sarcasm dripping off each word. I lowered my eyes, shame heating my face.
“Yes,” I forced out. “Pretty much, but… but I’ve been thinking and…” I cautiously glanced up, immediately flinching at the dark fire in her eyes. She was doing it again – her fingers of one hand stroking the other in slow, sensual circles. On purpose? “…and I think I don’t just want you because you’re not real,” I continued, struggling to keep my voice steady. “I want you because you make me ache for it.” Heat rushed to my face again, now for a different reason, but I forced myself to keep talking. “When people touch me, they often want too much, too soon, and with all too much happening at once, I don’t even get the time to check in with my body, to feel if I even actually want it.” I swallowed hard, the encounter with Nola flashing through my head – and many others before her. “But you… you don’t rush things.” I crossed my arms in front of my body as if to shelter myself. “You take your time. You don’t touch me until my whole body screams for it, and even then, you still don’t.” My breath hitched. “So I thought about it, and I realized… with you, I don’t doubt that my body wants it. It’s only my mind that’s unsure.”
Zafyra nodded slowly. She barely moved, but her glare softened just barely.
“Well, what a revelation that must be,” she murmured, calmly leaning back into the couch. With the sound of squeaking leather, her skirt crept up higher, exposing more of the generous curve of her thighs. I bit my lip hard. “Did you think you still deserve my touch after ignoring me for an entire week?”
My eyes widened at her mockery, failing to mask something more vulnerable.
