She had heard the app described as addicting. And, yeah, sure, sometimes she could lose track of time when on it, but it wasn’t like she was obsessed or anything and she certainly was not addicted. She just liked it.
She enjoyed the community that was ever present. She enjoyed the outspoken anonymity. She had maybe 1000? 2000? Followers on the app. But none of them knew her. She could be an extrovert in silence and she adored it. Not to mention she could project whatever she wished onto the people, the endless faces, she saw scrolling across her screen.
He seems nice she’d think to herself as she sipped warm cider, a book forgotten on her lap and her phone firmly in her hand, thumb moving carefully over the screen. She didn’t know him. Barely seen small pieces of him, but she thought he seemed nice.
God she’s gorgeous she’d blush as a pretty girl smiled at her through her screen. She wasn’t one to date, not normally, but she fell in love with strangers on the internet everyday. And she adored it.
She had things she hated on the app too. She would admit that she was a vain person, selfish, and set in her ways, but that was fine. She could easily cater her own experience to keep the people she found distasteful away from her feed. But the app wasn’t perfect, is anything? And sometimes people who cross her screen and she would sneer. She’d laugh with cruelty, or roll her eyes.
Some unattractive man in his bed, shirtless, complaining about some video game. He was disgusting, she’d decide with no evidence. And she would move on, hoping it would be a while before she would have to see something like that again.
And that was her life. Work, chores, bills, and the app. Sometimes she’d go out, but not often. Sometimes she’d find a new hobby but they quickly got abandoned for the app. And that’s what had happened on that day. She’d been scrolling casually, a cross stitch abandoned on the sofa near her. She was smiling, just slightly, as new faces that she would rapidly forget flashed past her.
Until one didn’t. It didn’t flash past. The next face was the same as the last, and again, and again. She furrowed her eyebrows and groaned. What is this some new trend? Some political thing? It’s stupid. Her thoughts were clear. She didn’t try to hide her disgust at both the repetition and the face itself. It was vile, ugly, and she didn’t want to see it anymore.
She kept scrolling. But it was there. It was getting bigger. It was smiling. It was terrifying. She bristled at it. And it bristled back.
But… no. She must've been imagining it. It was static, only existing in her phone. It wasn’t real. It couldn’t see her. It couldn’t see her, right?
Her finger moved towards the off button on her phone, but the thought of turning off her screen, of returning to the boring life outside of the app, filled her with a sense of fear much deeper than it possibly could.
The app was addictive. And she was overdosing.
She was lost. It was everywhere and it was all over her. It’s long tongue snaked it’s way into her ear. It’s sagging skin rubbed against her arms. It’s teeth sunk into her thigh. It’s eyes never left her own. She couldn’t blink and it burned, but she couldn’t turn her eyes away from the app for long enough even to do that. It was everywhere and everything. And it was seeping into her skin. She couldn’t remember anything besides it. What was her name? Surely she had one. Where did she live? Did she have a house? What even was the name of this app? Why had she downloaded it?
She could not remember. All she knew was it. It was around her and it was her. She was it. It was it.
Sometimes she thought that maybe she had turned off her phone and that she was just staring at herself reflected back on the black screen. She looked like it now. She was it now. She figured that soon enough she wouldn’t even be she. She would fully become it. But then something would lurch and she would be staring out at a new face. Not the way she had before. Not from the outside, but this time from the inside. She was stuck in the app, stuck as it, and she was screaming for help.
If someone who’s face looked kind appeared she’d beg them for help. They all scoffed or rolled their eyes, some even screamed in disgust. They hated her. They hated it. And she was trapped, calling for the people whom she knew but didn’t to help her. Knowing they never would.
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