My fingers freeze on the screen.
He's leaving?
I read the message once, then again, and once more. As if each repetition would modify the words. As if, by rereading it, the meaning would be different.
My heart literally skips a beat. As if instead of a muscle, I had a leaf in the wind trapped in my chest.
He's going.
And I... I'm not sure exactly how I feel. Is it sadness? Frustration? Fear? Or that absurd feeling of losing something even before fully having it?
I glance at the book on my desk, with the note carefully tucked between its pages. Everything feels like a small game of fate, a puzzle I haven't figured out yet.
Suddenly, everything inside me stirs with a single question:
What will happen if he goes and I do nothing?
*****
Later...
"You look beautiful, dear," says mom
