Let’s Keep it Online

When “Chris, 35, commercial pilot, big into CrossFit and full-bodied Malbecs” reaches out,
you’re intrigued, the two of you going back and forth within the app, exchanging longer and
longer messages before switching to Gmail, and it’s all you can focus on, during meetings at
work, people droning on about maximizing outputs and throughputs, your eyes trained on your
phone with every vibration, and soon after you switch to text, long ones, short ones, photos of
what’s around you, around him, of you, of him, and then it’s onto Snapchat, and it’s one, never-
ending conversation, adrenalin pulsing through you with every exchange, and by now you know
how his ex slept with her dermatologist, how he likes to get even his golf shirts dry cleaned, how
his sister takes edibles and follows jam bands as though she’s still seventeen, and it’s all building
and building to the point where he suggests getting together “IRL”, asking you out for Nepalese
food that weekend, and you hesitate, but agree, and when Saturday afternoon rolls around, you’re
due to meet him in 90, 60, then 45 minutes, and you still haven’t showered, when ding, a new
notification from the app, which you slide open, see the heart on your profile from “Jacob, 37,
sculptor by trade, passionate about summiting peaks, makes a mean curry” who’s sent you a
message asking how you’re still single, followed by an angel emoji, the green dot next to his
name meaning he’s online, so you respond to his message, then him to yours, and as the time for
your date comes and goes, you having silenced notifications from bewildered Chris, the light
outside your apartment window slowly fades, you lost in your back and forth with Jacob ‘til you
fall asleep smiling, phone cradled against your chest.