Unavailable -

It wasn't that he didn't care. He cared so much that the weight of an "Are you okay?" felt like a boulder he wasn't strong enough to lift. Being unavailable was his armor. If he didn't answer, he couldn't disappoint. If he stayed behind the digital veil, he remained a perfect, unmoving memory rather than a messy, struggling reality.

Elias looked at his phone. For the first time in a month, he didn't see the word "unavailable" as a shield. He saw it as a door he had locked from the inside. He reached out, his thumb hovering over the screen, and began to type. unavailable

One Tuesday, a physical letter arrived—an old-fashioned, handwritten envelope. It didn't have a "read receipt." It didn't demand an instant reply. It simply said, “I’m here when the status changes.” It wasn't that he didn't care