She woke up to sunlight cutting through her curtains and a phone with seventeen notifications.
None of them were from John.
She told herself she wasn't checking for him. She told herself she was just clearing her notifications, the way she did every morning, scrolling through emails and Instagram likes and news alerts she would never read.
But her thumb paused on the messaging app.
Nothing.
She put the phone down and went to take a shower. The water pressure was bad, like always, and the hot water ran out after seven minutes, like always. She stood there shivering for a moment before wrapping herself in a towel that was too small and walking back to her room.
The phone was still on her nightstand.
She picked it up.
Nothing.
She started making coffee. Instant coffee, because she was a college student and couldn't afford anything better, and because the machine she'd bought from a thrift store had died two weeks ago and she hadn't replaced it yet. The coffee was bitter and too hot and she burned her tongue on the first sip.
She checked her phone again.
Still nothing.
This is ridiculous, she thought. You talked to a stranger for five hours. That doesn't mean anything. That doesn't mean he's going to message you again.
But she had said tomorrow. And he had said tomorrow. And tomorrow meant today, didn't it?
She sat down at her desk and opened her laptop. The essay was still there, still half-finished, still waiting for her to care about it. She wrote two sentences. Deleted them. Wrote one sentence. Deleted that too.
Her phone buzzed.
She grabbed it so fast she almost knocked over her coffee.
It was a text from her mom. Called you yesterday. Didn't pick up. Everything okay?
Lara typed back a quick yeah sorry busy love you and put the phone down.
Not John.
She spent the rest of the day pretending she wasn't waiting. She went to the grocery store and bought ramen and bananas and a box of crackers that she would probably eat in one sitting. She sat in the common room of her apartment building and watched two girls she didn't know argue about someone named Matt. She came back to her room and stared at her essay for another hour without writing anything.
At 6 PM, she gave up and watched three episodes of a reality show she was embarrassed to admit she liked.
At 9 PM, she ordered Thai food and ate it straight from the container while sitting on her kitchen floor. The kitchen floor was cold and probably dirty, but she didn't care.
At 10:30 PM, she took a shower even though she had already taken one that morning. The water pressure was still bad. The hot water still ran out.
At 11 PM, she got into bed with her laptop and her phone and her flickering light and told herself she wasn't going to stay up waiting for a message from someone she didn't even know.
At 11:42 PM, her phone buzzed.
hey
Her heart did something stupid. Something fast and light and completely irrational.
She waited thirty seconds before replying. Just to seem normal. Just to pretend she hadn't been thinking about this all day.
hey yourself
youre awake
obviously
thought you might be asleep
nope. you still avoiding work?
different work now. new project. equally boring
what is it this time
someone wants a website for their bakery. but they want it to look like a real bakery. like with virtual pastries
virtual pastries?
yeah. i dont know. dont ask
She laughed. Her phone screen lit up her face in the dark room.
that sounds fake
i wish it was
show me
what
show me the virtual pastries
He sent a screenshot. It was a website layout with cartoon images of croissants and cupcakes arranged in a grid. The colors were warm—creams and soft pinks and muted greens. It actually looked nice.
that's cute, she wrote.
you think?
yeah. i would eat those virtual pastries
theyre not edible
i know. but they look edible
huh. maybe im doing something right then
maybe
The conversation flowed the same way it had the night before. Easy. Natural. Like they had been doing this for months instead of hours.
She told him about the essay she still hadn't finished. He told her about a client who had paid him late three times in a row. She told him about the flickering light and how the landlord said he would fix it but never did. He told her about his neighbor who played the drums at 2 AM and how he had considered committing multiple crimes because of it.
At 1 AM, he asked if she wanted to call.
She stared at the message.
a call?
yeah. like with voices
i know what a call is
so?
She hesitated. Talking in text was one thing. Talking out loud was different. Out loud meant real-time, meant no backspace button, meant hearing her own voice stumble over words she hadn't thought through.
im nervous, she admitted.
why?
i dont know. talking is different
we can keep texting if you want
no
She surprised herself with how fast she typed that.
i mean, she added. calling is fine. just give me a second
take your time
She sat up in bed. Pushed her hair out of her face. Cleared her throat. Her hands were sweating a little, which was ridiculous, because this was just a phone call with a stranger, not a job interview or a first date or anything that mattered.
She pressed the call button before she could talk herself out of it.
It rang twice.
"Hey." His voice was lower than she expected. Not deep, exactly, but calm. The kind of voice that sounded like he had just woken up, even though she knew he hadn't.
"Hey," she said. Her voice came out smaller than she wanted it to.
"See? Not so bad."
"You sound different than I imagined."
"What did you imagine?"
"I don't know. Something higher."
"Higher?"
"Like. More squeaky."
"Squeaky," he repeated, and she could hear him smiling. "You thought I would sound squeaky."
"I didn't think about it that much."
"You definitely thought about it."
"Shut up."
He laughed. It was a nice laugh. Quiet and easy, like he didn't laugh often but when he did, he meant it.
"So what do you sound like?" he asked.
"Normal."
"Normal isn't a sound."
"Then I don't know. Regular. Human."
"Very descriptive."
"I'm not good at this."
"You're doing fine."
She lay back against her pillow, phone pressed to her ear, staring at her ceiling. The light was flickering. She had almost stopped noticing.
"What are you doing right now?" she asked.
"Lying on my floor again."
"Still?"
"It's a good floor."
"It's really not."
"It's supportive. Non-judgmental. Doesn't ask stupid questions."
"Like what?"
"Like 'why are you lying on the floor?'"
"Fair point."
They fell into silence. Not an awkward silence—the kind that felt like breathing. Like they didn't need to fill every second with words because just being on the line together was enough.
"I almost didn't reply last night," she said.
"To my message?"
"Yeah."
"Why did you?"
She thought about it. "I don't know. I was bored. You seemed... I don't know. Not creepy."
"High praise."
"You know what I mean."
"I do. I almost didn't message you."
"Really?"
"Yeah. I typed it out and stared at it for like five minutes before I sent it."
"Why did you?"
"Same reason, I guess. Bored. Hoping someone would reply."
"What if I hadn't?"
"Then I would have gone back to staring at my ceiling and feeling sorry for myself."
She smiled into the dark. "That's sad."
"That's my life."
They talked for three hours. About nothing. About everything. About the bakery website and the essay she still wasn't writing and the way he organized his fridge by expiration date because he had once forgotten about a carton of milk for three weeks and the smell was so bad he almost moved out.
At some point, she fell asleep.
She didn't mean to. One moment she was listening to him describe a dream he had about flying through a grocery store, and the next moment she was waking up to sunlight and a dead phone and the faint sound of someone breathing on the other end of the line.
She checked the time. 6:47 AM.
The call was still connected.
"John?" she whispered.
"Yeah." His voice was thick with sleep. "You fell asleep."
"I know. I'm sorry."
"Don't be. I stayed."
She felt something warm spread through her chest. Something she didn't have a name for.
"You stayed," she repeated.
"You asked me not to hang up."
"I didn't—" She stopped. She didn't remember asking that. But she must have. Because she had thought it. Had felt it, somewhere in the space between sleeping and waking.
"You did," he said. "Right before you passed out. You said 'don't hang up.'"
She closed her eyes. "I'm sorry."
"Stop saying sorry."
"Okay."
"Okay."
Neither of them hung up.
"I should probably start my day," she said eventually.
"Probably."
"Same time tonight?"
"Same time tonight."
She ended the call and lay there for a long moment, staring at her phone screen. The call had lasted seven hours and twelve minutes.
She smiled.
And then she finally wrote her essay.