You’re still in my contacts even though my phone is new. It’s the third upgrade I’ve made without deleting you. I might have pocket-dialed you just the other day, whether anybody has your number now my pocket didn’t say.

Gmail likes your email and auto-adds you every now and then, if it thinks I should cc you when I write a mutual friend. Where the messages to I gather no one knows; some cloud-based purgatory, protected but forgotten like abandoned embryos 

My screen saver favors images of you, when I daydream too long your pictures save my pixels more than everyone else’s do. Seeing them used to make me cry a lot but I’m finally getting stronger. I still do cry a lot, but it takes a little longer.

Facebook sends me pictures, some memory to share; some day when we did this or that, or we went here or there. Unable to resist, I look at every photograph. Your eyes twinkle like they did and I can almost hear you laugh.

My social media reminders to be social and send a note to you. Your birthday’s coming soon, they say, and I should say hello. Your birthday’s coming, as if I didn’t know. Other people write to you. Happy heavenly birthday, they always seem to say. Another year has come and gone, I think, and you haven’t aged a day. 

I still have voice messages, recorded long ago, back when we were happy, back when we didn’t know. I play them back too often, I don’t remember why. If ears made tears, each of mine would cry. We need eggs, you say in one, you left them off the list. We’ll go to some wedding, another says, as long as I insist. 

Virtually, you’re virtually right here; everywhere I look but never to be seen. You’re everywhere but here, anything but here.

I could erase the images and files that contribute to my grief; or hide them in the cloud to finally get relief, move them so I’m not reminded every day. Alleviation, after all, is just a click away. But what about inside of me, the memories that I hold, the ones I’ll probably need when I’m alone and old. Laptops and phones, those are just a start, how do I unfriend you the love that pulses in my heart.