Her best friend called
every Sunday at 7. It
had been the ritual since
university — phones on
speaker while one cooked
and the other scrolled.
The friendship worked
because neither of them
had to perform.
This week, Maya let it
ring.
Not out of anger. Not
even out of being busy.
She just sat on the
kitchen floor with her
back against the cabinet
and listened to the phone
vibrate against the
countertop, rehearsing
answers she hadn't been
asked yet.
I'm okay. Yeah, work is fine. No, mum's the same.
She thought about what
she'd say if the call
ever stopped. The absence
of it. The first Sunday
she wouldn't even reach
for her phone.
The phone stopped
ringing. The voicemail
came an hour later, and
Maya realized she didn't
replay it for three more
days. By then the small
window when she could've
answered honestly had
closed. She typed back a
heart emoji, and then
nothing.
The distance between two
people, she thought,
isn't usually built by
one big fight. It's
built by all the
unanswered calls you
eventually stop trying to
return.