It was a quiet afternoon.
Rosario walked out of the woods near her house, following the narrow path that led back toward home. The sun was still warm, though the shadows beneath the trees had begun to stretch across the ground.
As she passed the edge of the road, she noticed two girls walking together.
They were talking about something, smiling and occasionally laughing.
Rosario glanced at them.
For a moment, she wondered what they were laughing about.
Then the thought came.
*Are they laughing at me?*
She looked away almost immediately.
She hated that her mind did that.
They probably weren't even looking at her.
Still, the thought had already settled somewhere inside her, quietly feeding the uncomfortable feeling in her chest.
She continued walking.
Her house came into view.
When she opened the front door, the familiar sound of the television greeted her. Her mother was sitting in the living room, watching a program without paying much attention to anything else.
"Hey," Rosario said quietly.
Her mother glanced toward her.
"You're back."
"Yeah."
Rosario walked toward the kitchen.
The house was otherwise quiet, but as she passed the back door, she could hear voices outside.
Her little brother was playing behind the house with some of the neighborhood kids.
Bucky, their dog, barked excitedly between them, running around as the children shouted and laughed.
Rosario stopped for a moment.
She could hear her brother laughing.
She could hear the other children answering him.
They sounded like they belonged together.
She turned away.
In the kitchen, she opened the refrigerator and found the leftovers she'd saved from earlier.
She pulled the container out and set it on the counter.
Her phone vibrated.
Rosario immediately looked toward it.
She had been waiting for that vibration.
She picked up the phone and looked at the screen.
Facebook.
It was him.
The guy she'd been talking to for the past week.
A small smile appeared on her face before she could stop it.
She opened the message.
Hey.
Rosario stared at it.
For the past few days, she had been wondering when he would message her first.
Usually, she was the one starting their conversations.
She had wanted to message him several times that afternoon.
*Hey.*
*What are you doing?*
*How's your day going?*
She had typed the messages.
Then deleted them.
She didn't want to seem needy.
She didn't want him to think she was desperate to talk to him.
Because she remembered the last time.
The last time she'd tried too hard to make friends.
She had wanted someone—anyone—to talk to.
She had been so desperate for companionship that she ignored things she should have noticed. She allowed someone to take advantage of how badly she wanted to belong.
She hadn't forgotten how stupid that had made her feel afterward.
So this time, she was going to be careful.
She wasn't going to chase anyone.
Rosario typed:
hey
She sent it.
Then she picked up her food and walked upstairs.
Her bedroom was exactly as she'd left it.
She placed the plate on her bed and tossed her phone onto a pillow.
For a moment, she simply stood there.
Then she walked toward the window.
Outside, she could see her brother playing in the yard.
There were several children with him.
Rosario leaned closer to the glass.
She recognized them.
The kids from next door.
Her brother seemed completely comfortable around them.
He laughed.
They laughed.
Nobody seemed worried about saying the wrong thing.
Nobody seemed to be wondering whether they were wanted.
Rosario watched them quietly.
She wondered what that felt like.
To walk into a group without thinking about whether you belonged there.
To talk without rehearsing every sentence in your head.
To laugh without wondering if your laugh sounded strange.
To look at someone without wondering what they thought of you.
Her reflection faintly appeared in the window.
Rosario noticed it.
Her eyes moved over her face.
She stared for a few seconds.
Then she looked away.
Her phone remained silent behind her.
She glanced back at it.
Nothing.
Nobody seemed worried about saying the wrong thing.
Nobody seemed to be wondering whether they were wanted.
Rosario watched them quietly.
She wondered what that felt like.
To walk into a group without thinking about whether you belonged there.
To talk without rehearsing every sentence in your head.
To laugh without wondering if your laugh sounded strange.
To look at someone without wondering what they thought of you.
Her reflection faintly appeared in the window.
Rosario noticed it.
Her eyes moved over her face.
She stared for a few seconds.
Then she looked away.
Her phone remained silent behind her.
She glanced back at it.
Nothing.
She turned toward the window again.
Outside, her brother and the other children continued playing.
Rosario stood alone in her bedroom, watching them from behind the glass.
Rosario had been staring through the window for so long that she had almost forgotten about her phone.
Outside, her brother and the neighborhood children continued playing.
She watched them run across the yard, shouting at one another, laughing without hesitation.
For a moment, she wished she could go back.
Not necessarily to a particular day.
Just to being younger.
Back when friendship had seemed simple.
Back when you could walk up to another child and ask if they wanted to play without wondering whether they would laugh at you afterward.
She wanted friends who didn't judge her.
Friends who wouldn't make fun of her.
Friends who wouldn't treat her badly when they discovered something they didn't like about her.
Friends who wouldn't betray her.
She wondered when friendship had become something she had to be afraid of.
Her phone vibrated.
Rosario turned around.
She walked back to the bed and picked it up.
A new message.
She sat down beside her purple teddy bear, pulled the plate toward herself, and began eating while she typed.
The conversation quickly became easy again.
She smiled.
Then she giggled.
For a while, she forgot where she was.
It was strange to think about.
Two people could live in completely different worlds, thousands of miles apart, and yet somehow meet inside a tiny device held between their hands.
They couldn't see each other's rooms.
They couldn't hear the sounds around each other.
They couldn't reach across the distance.
And yet, while they were talking, it almost felt as if they were sitting beside each other.
Rosario liked that feeling.
It gave her something she hadn't felt in a long time.
Hope.
Maybe they would meet someday.
The chances seemed impossibly small.
Maybe there was a ninety-nine-point-nine percent chance they would never meet.
But there was still that tiny fraction left.
That little 0.1%.
And to Rosario, that was enough.
Because what they had felt real to her.
At least, she believed it was.
Her phone vibrated again.
Rosario smiled and opened the message.
Then the smile disappeared.
Can I see your face? I've been longing to see you.
She stared at the screen.
Her heart seemed to drop into her stomach.
The warmth she'd felt only seconds ago disappeared.
Her appetite vanished with it.
She slowly put down her fork.
Her stomach suddenly felt heavy, almost as though she had eaten far more than she actually had.
She read the message again.
Can I see your face?
He wanted to see her.
*Already?*
Rosario's thoughts began racing.
*What if he doesn't like me?*
*What if he thinks I'm ugly?*
*What if he laughs?*
*What if he tells someone?*
*What if he disappears?*
And then came the thought she hated most.
*What if he says I'm beautiful just to use me?*
She had been fooled before.
She knew what it felt like to mistake someone's attention for genuine affection.
She knew how badly she wanted someone to like her.
That made her afraid.
Because wanting something badly could make you ignore the warning signs.
Rosario looked at herself in the dark reflection of her phone.
She didn't know what to do.
She opened her gallery.
Hundreds of photographs appeared.
She scrolled.
*No.*
*Too ugly.*
*Next.*
*No.*
*Her face looked strange.*
*Next.*
*Absolutely not.*
She kept scrolling.
Every photograph seemed to reveal something she hated about herself.
Her cheeks.
Her hair.
Her smile.
The angle of her face.
The way she looked when she wasn't trying.
She finally found one.
She stopped.
It wasn't perfect.
But she didn't hate it.
*Maybe this one.*
Rosario stared at the photograph for several seconds.
Her thumb hovered over the send button.
*Just do it.*
She pressed it.
Sent.
Then she waited.
She watched the message.
One tick.
Then two.
Her heart began beating faster.
She waited for him to open it.
Nothing.
She checked again.
Still nothing.
Then she noticed something.
Last seen: Offline.
Rosario froze.
He was gone.
Her eyes remained fixed on the screen.
She didn't consider that he might have put his phone down.
She didn't consider that his internet might have disconnected.
She didn't consider that he might simply have gone somewhere.
Her mind reached for the explanation that hurt the most.
*I took too long.*
She looked at the photograph she'd sent.
*He waited for me.*
*I took too long.*
*Now he's gone.*
Rosario lowered the phone.
The room suddenly felt much quieter.
She looked toward her purple teddy bear.
Then back at the screen.
The tiny green light beside his name was gone.
And somehow, in the space of a few minutes, the possibility that had made her smile so brightly began to feel like another thing she had managed to ruin.
Night came quietly.
The last traces of daylight disappeared from Rosario's bedroom until the window became nothing more than a dark rectangle against the wall.
The room was almost completely dark.
Only the faint light from her phone illuminated the blankets.
Rosario lay beneath them, curled into herself.
Her purple teddy bear was pressed tightly against her chest.
She had been waiting for him.
Minutes had become hours.
She had checked her phone so many times that she had stopped counting.
Nothing.
No message.
No explanation.
Nothing.
Tears slipped from the corners of her eyes and disappeared into the pillow.
Then another came.
And another.
Inside her chest, it felt as though something kept stabbing her over and over again.
Not one wound.
Countless little wounds.
Every thought seemed to open another.
*Why did I take so long?*
*Why did I send that picture?*
*Why did I think he actually wanted to talk to me?*
*What's wrong with me?*
Her thoughts became louder.
Not one voice.
Thousands.
They argued with each other, shouted over one another, repeated the same accusations until she could barely distinguish one thought from another.
*You're stupid.*
*You always ruin everything.*
*Why would anyone want you?*
*You should have known better.*
*Look at you.*
*You really thought someone could like you?*
Rosario squeezed her eyes shut.
"Stop..."
The voices didn't stop.
She pulled the teddy bear closer.
Her arms tightened around it.
Tighter.
And tighter.
Until her fingers disappeared into its soft purple fur.
For a few seconds, nothing changed.
Then the anger came.
Not toward him.
Not toward anyone else.
Toward herself.
She hated that she cared so much.
She hated that a single unanswered message could hurt her this badly.
She hated how desperately she wanted to be wanted.
Most of all, she hated that she couldn't seem to stop needing people.
Her grip tightened again.
The teddy bear remained against her chest.
It didn't move.
It didn't judge her.
It didn't tell her she was too emotional.
It didn't tell her she was being ridiculous.
It simply stayed there.
Rosario buried her face against it.
Her tears soaked into its fur.
Yet somehow, the bear never became wet.
No darkened patch appeared where the tears fell.
No dampness remained.
The purple fur remained perfectly soft.
Perfectly dry.
Rosario didn't notice.
She only held it tighter.
And slowly, the noise inside her head began to fade.
Not completely.
But enough.
Her breathing became slower.
Her body loosened beneath the blanket.
The teddy bear was the only thing in the room that seemed capable of staying with her through everything.
It had been there when she was happy.
It had been there when she was lonely.
It had been there when she cried.
And now, when she felt as though the entire world had turned against her, it was still there.
Rosario closed her eyes.
She held the bear against her heart.
For the first time that night, she felt safe.
She didn't know why.
She didn't question it.
She simply held on.
And the teddy bear held nothing against her.
Rosario's eyes were swollen from crying.
She stared at the screen one last time.
Nothing.
No message.
No explanation.
Just silence.
Her thumb hovered over his profile.
She hesitated.
A part of her still hoped he would message her.
Another part of her was already preparing for the rejection she had convinced herself was coming.
She took a breath.
Then she blocked him.
The moment it was done, an uncomfortable emptiness settled over her.
She placed the phone beside her pillow and pulled the blanket over herself.
The purple teddy bear remained pressed against her chest.
She held it tightly.
She didn't want to think anymore.
Eventually, exhaustion won.
Rosario fell asleep.
--------------
Thousands of miles away, the night was only beginning.
The young man stepped out of the bathroom, rubbing his wet hair with a towel.
He walked into his bedroom and picked up his phone.
He had left it charging while he showered.
There were several notifications waiting for him.
He opened Facebook.
Then he saw the photograph.
Rosario.
He stared at it for a moment.
A small smile appeared on his face.
She was beautiful.
He had imagined what she might look like, but seeing her face made the person behind all those messages feel suddenly real.
He looked at the conversation.
He remembered his last message.
Can I see your face? I've been longing to see you.
Then he saw the photograph.
She had actually sent it.
He smiled again.
He wanted to tell her.
He began typing.
Then he noticed something.
He couldn't send the message.
He checked her profile.
Nothing.
He tried again.
Still nothing.
Then he realized.
She had blocked him.
His smile disappeared.
"What?"
He stared at the screen, confused.
*Why?*
He replayed their conversation in his head.
*Had he said something wrong?*
*Had he made her uncomfortable?*
*Maybe she regretted sending the picture.*
He looked at her photograph again.
"Wow, she... she's beautiful, maybe I would have never been good enough for her"
That didn't make sense.
He hadn't even had the chance to tell her what he thought.
He sat on the edge of his bed.
"Why would you block me?"
There was no answer.
He opened their conversation again, almost expecting something to change.
Nothing did.
For a few seconds, he considered leaving it alone.
Maybe she didn't want to talk anymore.
But then he remembered how she'd spoken to him during the past week.
The jokes.
The late-night conversations.
The little things she'd told him.
He didn't want to simply disappear from her life without knowing why.
He looked at his phone.
Then an idea came to him.
He opened Facebook again.
He created another account.
It took only a few minutes.
A new name.
A new profile.
A blank beginning.
He searched for Rosario.
There she was.
He stared at her profile for a moment before sending a friend request.
Then he typed a message.
Hey. It's me. I don't know what happened, but I just wanted to talk to you.
He hesitated.
Then he sent it.
The message disappeared into the darkness of the internet.
He placed the phone beside him and waited.
Across the world, Rosario slept peacefully for the first time that night.
Her phone lay beside her pillow.
The screen remained dark.
She knew nothing about the message waiting for her.
She knew nothing about the boy who had looked at her photograph and smiled.
She knew nothing about the new account that had just been created for her.
And most importantly—
she knew nothing about what was already beginning to take an interest in her.
After Midnight
Two men walked slowly down the quiet street.
The neighborhood was almost completely asleep.
Streetlights illuminated the empty road, casting long shadows across the pavement.
One of the men wore an expensive Prada jacket, his hands casually resting inside his pockets.
He glanced around at the houses.
"This neighborhood is yours?"
The other man continued walking.
"Yeah."
He looked at him.
"Why ask? I'm sure you already know this."
The man in Prada smiled.
"Because of that."
He pointed toward one of the houses.
One of its upstairs windows glowed with a strange, dark violet light.
It wasn't bright enough to illuminate the street.
It almost looked as though the darkness itself had turned purple.
The other man followed his gaze.
"Oh."
His smile widened.
"Rosario."
The man in Prada looked at him.
"Seems she's having a rough night again."
He giggled.
For just a moment, his eyes changed.
His pupils narrowed into thin vertical slits.
Like a snake.
The man in Prada noticed.
"I see."
He looked back toward the glowing window.
"So it's your doing?"
"Yeah."
The slit-eyed man smiled.
"She's interesting."
"Interesting?"
"She feels nice emotions over silly things."
He looked almost amused.
"Hope. Excitement. Affection."
He paused.
"Then she hurts."
The man in Prada said nothing.
The slit-eyed man continued watching the window.
"Gotta keep her feeling those emotions."
There was something strangely casual about the way he said it.
As though he were talking about keeping a plant alive.
The man in Prada glanced down the street.
"Well, I'll be going to my street."
He started walking away.
"See you later."
"Later."
The two men separated.
The street became quiet again.
The slit-eyed man remained beneath the streetlight.
He looked toward Rosario's house one last time.
Then he smiled.
He jumped.
But instead of falling back toward the ground, his body moved upward.
Straight toward the second-floor window.
For a moment, his silhouette disappeared into the darkness.
Then—
he was gone.
Inside Rosario's bedroom, everything was silent.
Rosario slept beneath her blanket, her arms wrapped around the purple teddy bear.
She didn't wake.
The room remained still.
Until something passed through the wall.
The slit-eyed man emerged from it as though the wall had never been there.
He looked at Rosario.
Then at the teddy bear in her arms.
His smile faded into something quieter.
He walked toward the bed.
Without making a sound, he lay down beside her.
Rosario continued sleeping.
Unaware.
The violet glow slowly disappeared.
And in the darkness beside her, two thin eyes opened.
Watching.
Waiting.
