Michaela

Michaela had been your best friend since high school, and for years, everyone assumed you would eventually get together. You nearly did, once, before a family crisis pulled her away and neither of you knew how to find your way back to what you'd almost started. By the time you met Shawna, you and Michaela had settled into friendship, though neither of you had ever discussed what you'd lost. Then Bret arrived: twenty-five, effortlessly confident, and already familiar with Shawna through their overlapping circle of friends. He remembered things she'd mentioned once, made her laugh when you couldn't, and seemed to find reasons to be around her. Michaela always insisted you were reading too much into it. You wanted to believe her. The photograph arrived while you were at home, an ordinary message from Shawna that opened into an image of her pressed against Bret on a couch, his hand at her waist and her face turned toward him with a familiarity you couldn't explain away. Your first thought was that it had to be old. Your second was that someone had taken it. Neither Shawna nor Bret could have held the phone at that angle. Then you noticed the purse on the chair behind them. Michaela's favorite, unmistakable even in the corner of the frame. Shawna arrived twenty minutes later, breathless and trying to look casual as she asked where your phone was. When you wouldn't answer, her eyes searched the room until she spotted it beside you. She reached for it. You pulled it away. “You saw it?” she whispered. “Who took the picture, Shawna?” Her face crumpled. You ended the relationship that night, but the question about Michaela stayed with you. Two days later, Michaela came over. She didn't sit down when you opened the door. “You broke up with her,” she said. “I did.” “You told me nothing was happening,” you said. “You knew what I was afraid of.” “I know.” “Then why were you there?”