But he didn’t. He kept watching.
David watched, confused. Doing what? Packing? The chat on the side of the screen scrolled in a frantic blur.
He didn’t mean to click. But curiosity, that old devil, got the better of him.
The screen flickered to life. Jenny was in what looked like a closet, a tight space wallpapered in a faded rose print. Her blonde hair was piled in a messy bun, and her eyes, even through the compression of a live stream, were wide and glossy. Mysonsgf Jenny
“You guys,” she whispered into the mic, her voice a frantic, breathy tremble. “I’m doing it. I’m really doing it.”
From down the hall, he heard the faint pew-pew-pew of Liam’s headset, the muffled laughter of online friends. David stood up. He didn’t go to his son. He went to the kitchen, poured two cups of coffee, and set one on the counter.
Five minutes later, the live stream ended. The silver locket lay back in the ceramic dish on his dresser. And at 12:31 AM, the front door creaked open. But he didn’t
He sent it before he could talk himself out of it.
The chat exploded.
He sighed, rubbing the sleep from his eyes. Jenny. Of course. For the past three months, his son’s girlfriend had been an invisible third resident in their home. She lived not in the guest room, but in Liam’s phone, on his laptop, and apparently, at this ungodly hour, on David’s own curated feed. Doing what
The notification popped up on David’s phone at 11:47 PM. @MysonsgfJenny started a live video.
Jenny turned the locket over in her palm. “He said he’d call me at ten. It’s almost midnight. He’s playing video games. He always chooses the game.” She took a shaky breath. “So tonight, I choose me.”
OMG Jenny Queen behavior Get it girl
David watched her face. Beneath the bravado, he saw the raw, bleeding truth. She wasn’t a thief. She was a girl drowning in the shallow end of the pool, and the boy who promised to teach her to swim was too busy leveling up a digital avatar to notice she was going under.
She held up a small, familiar object. A silver locket. David’s blood went cold. It was his late wife’s. The one he kept in the ceramic dish on his dresser. The one he’d shown Liam last week, telling him the story of how he’d given it to her the day they’d found out they were pregnant with him.