I read the message twice. The first time my eyes skated over the sentences, not really taking them in. The second time, I read them carefully. I looked at the white space where Daniel’s photo should be, the face-mold sitting empty. I wanted to cry, but I couldn’t. I didn’t know if any of it was true.
The smartest thing to do, I thought, might be to accept these sentences as possibilities and leave it at that. I could take Daniel at his word and never contact him again. But there was this damn word stuck in my head. The woman at Maxine’s funeral had used it and I kept hearing it over and over.
“Rupture.”
It was the closest anyone had come to describing how I felt when I learned of Jonah’s death. Something inside me had burst apart suddenly, and I was still willing to try anything I could to put it back together.
So far, things had only grown more confusing, but if there was even a small chance that some of the pieces could snap back into place again, didn’t I have to try to make that happen? An idea came to me, and the fact that I was a little scared by it, made me think it might be the right one.
I quickly typed a message. It was short, but there was no chance of misinterpreting it. I watched it sitting there inthe text box, the cursor blinking at the end of the final line. Then I hit Reply and let out a deep breath.
It read:
No more computers.
612-555-0491
15
I canceled my Facebook account later that day.
I went to the Delete Account page, entered my password, and when asked if I was sure I would like to permanently delete my account, I clicked yes. I cleared my history. I did not back up my data. All my preferences disappeared along with the version of myself that I had so carefully made.
I killed the things that defined me. Every band. Every movie. Every witty quote. Every video. Every flattering photo. Gone. I deleted Jonah’s girlfriend. I was still that person in a server somewhere, but other than that, I had disappeared. When I was done with all this I felt a little better.
Then I went to the bathroom and threw up.
Instead of looking into the toilet, I closed my eyes and tried to remember all the things from Jonah/Daniel that I had just erased. I flipped through them in my head. Song playlists, including one that just looped “Thirteen” by BigStar over and over because it was “the purest love song ever written, seriously.”
Other playlists disappeared too, including: WEEN + THE BEATLES = TRUE LOVE, SONGS MY GRANDPARENTS PROBABLY HAD SEX TO, SONGS WITH QUESTIONABLE METAPHORS, and IF YOU DON’T CRY WHEN YOU HEAR THIS THEN YOU ARE A COLD COLD HUMAN WITH AN ICY ICY HEART.
I lost the links to the videos, too. The Starlings. The supercut of Bollywood dance scenes. Sloth and Chunk fromThe Goonies. A Ted Talk about the neuroscience of love. And a barrage of strange homemade happy birthday videos scavenged from the junk heap of YouTube.
The messages were gone, too. All 788 of them to be exact.
Some of them were just a line or two. Others the equivalent of twenty typed pages. Late night manifestos full of bad jokes and melodramatic vows. Some of them from Jonah. Some of them... not. I could remember a few phrases from early on.
Just write me two more words and I’ll be happy forever.
This was never supposed to happen to me, didn’t anyone ever tell you that?
You have me in a wild way, Tess Fowler.
And always an allusion to seeing me “soon.”
Soon was always coming. How soon?Sosoon. When school was over. Over Spring break. Summer break, for sure. “We’ll work in the same place. It’s going to happensoon.” But soon never showed, and eventually even the assurances ran out.
His messages went next.
For two entire days there was no communication. No videos. No songs. No links. No chats. I wrote. I called. I got nothing in return. Then eventually, Jonah’s wall came alive with messages again. But not the kind I wanted to see.
At first, I couldn’t believe they were real. They had to be a joke. The worst joke in history. “Sweet, Jonah, I had no idea your soul was hurting so much.” “I will never understand this. Never.” “Come back. I miss you already.”
I contacted MIT and was passed from administrator to administrator until I screamed into the phone at a woman who sounded like a friendly grandmother.
“Just tell me if he’s really dead,” I said. “Please!”
And the woman said, “Yes, honey. He is. I’m so very sorry.”
