Lilly texts me on New Year’s Day. “He’s hungover like shit, and god knows what else,” she tells me. “I sat in the car this morning, wanting nothing more than to go home to my mom, and the darkness was full of creepy sounds. And I couldn’t get any bread rolls for breakfast, because all the shops were closed. Weird start for the New Year.”
“Wanna come over?” I ask. “It’s comfy here, and there’s freshly baked chocolate cookies.”
“Nah, I’m good,” she replies, and even though it’s just white letters on a black screen, I can see her smile. “I’ll just wait for him to recover a bit, then give him a good talk. Schadenfreude is a real thing right now, you know?”
“Go get him,” I send back.
I close my messages, and my mind starts to drift, back to another bunch of texts exchanged, just a few weeks ago, and farther back, to a phone call that left me in tears. Resolutions, I realize. Well. Maybe one.
Angelika Rust 