Fourteen messages. Three missed calls. One voicemail.
Stan's thumb hovered over the thread for a moment.
Sacha was, at twenty-two, a person of very specific communicational economy. She said what she meant. She said it once. She did not chase her younger brother across a text thread unless something had happened that she had decided, on her own, warranted the chase.
Stan had told her before he left that he might be off-grid for up to ten days. She had accepted it and it had been three.
Which meant fourteen messages was not the volume of a worried sister. It was the volume of an older sister who had decided to worry, early, and on principle, and without waiting for the deadline to arrive. She had never thought that having her younger brother off the grid for a few days could make her this anxious.
Stan felt the small, familiar pull in his chest that only Sacha could produce.
He tapped the thread.
Sis Sacha: [Stan.]
[Hey. Just checking in.]
