Three Screens Later

The goldfish finned through its bowl, bubbles rising like tiny prayers. It had been three weeks since Jordan left for summer camp, and I'd been stuck feeding her fish while she lived her best life without me.

"Just text me," she'd said, shoving her old iPhone into my hands before her mom's SUV pulled away. "Keep it safe."

Safe. Like our friendship wasn't already cracking at the edges.

The iPhone sat on my nightstand, screen lighting up every few minutes with notifications I couldn't read. Jordan hadn't trusted me with her passcode. Some friend I was.

I stared at the fish. Its name was Neptune, but Jordan called it "basic" and refused to use the name I'd picked back in seventh grade when we found it at a carnival. Back when we were still the kind of friends who shared everything.

Now she was posting Instagram stories from camp. I'd seen them on my own phone—Jordan in sunglasses, Jordan by the lake, Jordan with new people who laughed easier than I ever could.

My mom knocked on my doorframe. "Vitamin time, Maya." She held out the little plastic cup with the chalky orange tablets that were supposed to help me "grow." I was sixteen and still taking Flintstones vitamins because Jordan had once said they were funny and I was desperate to be anything she found funny.

But Jordan wasn't here.

"I already took them," I lied, and my mom shrugged and walked away.

I picked up Jordan's iPhone. The screen showed a missed call from someone named "Tay☀️" with a heart emoji. A notification from Instagram: "Tay☀️ liked your story."

Tay. With a heart emoji. Some random from camp got more of Jordan than I did now.

The goldfish swam to the front of its bowl, mouth opening and closing like it was trying to say something. Like it knew.

I typed in Jordan's old passcode from eighth grade—0-9-1-1, our middle school bus number. The phone unlocked.

I shouldn't look. But I did.

The messages from Tay were about me. "why's ur friend so weird lol" and "does she ever talk??" and my stomach twisted like someone had reached inside and pulled it tight.

Jordan's response: "ikr she's been different lately i barely know her anymore"

Different. Like I was the one who changed.

The goldfish did a lazy flip, indifferent to my whole life falling apart.

I put the phone back on the nightstand exactly how I'd found it. Some secrets weren't worth keeping.

That night, I flushed the vitamins. Some things you outgrow.