Maxine called, again.
She always did on Tuesday mornings, right when I sat down to process the weekend’s wedding photos. I had rituals—Monday off, Tuesday to Thursday behind the screen, editing faces that smiled for others. Not for me.
“You don’t need to do that now,” she said, pushing like always. “Come for coffee.”
I declined, again.
It wasn’t about coffee. Maxine didn’t want conversation. She wanted confirmation—that I was alone, that she might still be in the running. Her voice lingered longer than it should, wrapping around my neck like a scarf I didn’t ask for.
I gave her the line I always did. “I’m working.”
She didn’t believe me.
She never did.
There was a storm in her, too—a volatile mess of red wine and unmet expectations. Her friendship, if that’s what you could call it, was transactional. If I couldn’t be hers, then I’d better not be anyone else’s.
But I had Nina. And Maxine knew it. That’s what stung her the most.
As I hung up, I stared at the monitor—at someone else’s perfect wedding. A fantasy captured in sharpness and light. Love, they say, is forever. But only in photos.
In real life, it’s interference. It’s pressure. It’s a voice on the phone reminding you what you’re running from.
[from SEETHINGS, downloadable and free for a limited time].
Discover more from Michael Forman – Author of Dark Fiction & Drama
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