Page 19

Veronica

T he late afternoon sun casts a golden hue over the soccer field, painting long shadows across the grass.

Veronica sits by the bleacher, her gaze following the movement of the energetic players, but her mind is barely in the present.

The exhaustion of a ninety-minutes calculus exam, sixty-minutes of geography and sixty minutes of History, presses down on her, leaving her shoulders sagging, but she is sure nursing a heartache for over two weeks now is one of the reasons for that.

Deep, rich, and vibrant laughter of boys blends with the distant school bell, marking the end of another successful school day.

Veronica doesn’t move. Her only sign of life is a series of sighs as she sits with her knees drawn up, phone in hand.

The game on the field unfolds in bursts of movements—Shiro weaving through defenders, the ball sailing through the air, teammates calling out in sharp clipped tones. Potential distractions are scattered across the field; athletic boys, tall, dark and handsome. Yet none appeals to Veronica, who usually gets swept away even with just a smile. All of a sudden, none of these boys matter. Not their soft, over-gelled hair, not their boyish grin, not even the abs and muscles on display. None of them matter.

Because none of them are him.

A sigh of despair breaks out of her lips yet again, the sound getting lost in the chatter going on in the field and the echo of the whistle.

She unlocks her phone for the tenth time in the last five minutes. Raidon’s picture stares back at her from the gallery—a candid shot she took once without him looking. It was at the Golden Creek community park. He wasn’t watching, so he wasn’t aware. And she hopes to keep it that way. According to him, he doesn’t like having his photograph taken.

In retrospect, her possession of it feels almost illicit, especially considering the online search she did for him due to Shiro’s insistence on confirming his identity yielded nothing concrete—only his name, lacking a photo.

She asked him and he said he doesn’t take pictures nor allow his pictures to be taken. She asked about the time he was awarded the medal of a marshal. Surely, his picture was taken at least, for record purposes.

It must have been a big day. He was the youngest recipient of that medal in decades.

Although he admitted to having his picture taken, he emphasized his collaborations with numerous security firms and expert technical groups, and they handle that well. He always uses aggressive legal teams to issue copyright claims, privacy requests, and DMCA takedown to remove images from search results and websites.

He manipulates his online image by buying relevant domains and social media handles. And he also owns an advanced cybersecurity firm that scans for and removes his images.

Because his team manipulated search results with misleading content, burying his images, she couldn’t find anything about him when she searched him up.

The lengths he goes for privacy and invisibility really intrigue her. In essence, Raidon Ardalion Volkov is a digital ghost. A shadow where a face should be. Yet somehow, his picture is on her phone.

She traces the outline of his face on the screen, frustration curling in her chest. It’s been days, weeks, and still, she aches. Blocking him was supposed to help. It was supposed to force her heart to detach, to let go. But here she is, staring at his face like an addict hovering over a relapse.

With a sigh heavier than the thousands she has let out within fourteen days, she exits the gallery and moves over to her messages. There, Ian Petrakis’ name sits at the top, bold.

Hi

The first one came a week ago. She read it, and was shocked by it. And somehow, she couldn’t come up with a suitable reply.

Then more came some days ago.

(December 9th) Hi, again.

(December 10th) I know you are probably upset. And it’s understandable. But I wasn’t ignoring you because I was angry. I wasn’t angry at all. Not with you. Because I know you didn’t have a choice. I didn’t hold anything against you.

I promise I wasn’t seeing your messages.

(December 13th) I know you are reading the messages, Veronica.

I was getting harassed by strangers, being called all sorts of names. I imagine they’re parents of the students from the school. And then tons of your old boyfriends. It was crazy. I was teetering on the edge of depression. I had to delete my social media and messaging apps to reduce the harassment.

And I haven’t been in Pennsylvania for a while now. I was at my uncle’s in Texas. My sister was in town for a conference. She was at my house. I’m sure you must have come to my house. But I wasn’t there.

(December 14th) Please, can we meet? Talk, maybe? Please.

Veronica stares at the words yet again, ruminating over it, especially the last two, fingers tightening around her phone. This should have come 12 weeks ago. Her heart would have leaped. She would have replied instantly. Desperate for the familiarity, for the reconnection.

But now? She isn’t sure. There’s now a hollow space inside her—the space where her feelings for him used to be, burning, visceral. Yes, she still cares about him, but not in the way she once did. Not enough to make her stomach flip or her hands to tremble.

Not the way thinking about Raidon does.

Sighing, her gaze flickers back to the field. Boys are still running, shouting, laughing. She can pick any of them. Many still have a genuine fondness for her, despite her reputation. She just intentionally avoided close relationships with them to prevent upsetting Shiro, even though he repeatedly insisted it didn’t bother him. But now, she can actually toss the self-made rule into a corner. Any of them will be a perfect distraction, capable of pulling her from this endless circle of longing. Yet even as she considers it, she knows the truth—none of them will make her feel anything.

None will feel like Raidon.

Raidon.

She exits messages and moves over to pull up Raidon’s contact. Her thumb hovers over it. One tap. That’s all it will take to unblock him. To send a hi, to see if he will reply.

But what if he doesn’t?

What if, after he found out she blocked him, he concluded she wasn’t worth it after all?

If he actually truly cared about her, he would have found another means to contact her, right?

A whistle blows on the field, jolting her back to the present. Shiro has scored, so his teammates surround him, patting his back, ruffling his hair. He grins, turning his head and catching sight of her by the bleachers.

Then he waves frantically at her, his face radiating joy.

She forces a smile in return, her gaze breaking away from the field again instantly. Their emotion glaringly contrasts with hers.

Her eyes return to her screen. Raidon’s contact details still glare at her, her thumb hovering, mind reeling. All of a sudden, she wants to know, since she blocked him, has he ever tried to reach her? Texts? Calls? If he did, how many times until he gave up trying? Did he desperately hover over his phone, waiting for a hi back?

What about Ian? Are any of the things he said true? If yes, did he even miss her at all? It has been weeks. She gets that he needed a time away to heal from the pain she caused. But why now? Why didn’t he remain gone? Why is he back and confusing her like this? Why is he suddenly asking them to meet? What’s the purpose?

Does he still love her? Is he ready to get back together despite everything?

So many questions, yet so few answers. A force presses against her skull, and she feels it, a migraine about to kick in. She needs answers, oh so desperately she craves for closure, something to hold on to. Something to lean on.

Her mind bounces between the two men? Who amongst them should she say hi to?