If I can’t pour my heart out to my best friend, then I need to pour my heart out to future me. I want to remember everything about today. What I was wearing, what he was wearing, what he said, what I said, how good and how bad it all felt at the same time. Mr. Dennery was right when he said that in ten years, we’d consider this email account the most important assignment in our high school career.

Of course, Raj’s laptop is extra finicky this morning and freezes in the middle of my email. I refresh the page and check my drafts folder, but I don’t see the email saved. Instead, the only unsent email in the folder is the scorched-earth letter I was going to send to Parisa after our fight about Gideon, which I didn’t even realize I still had saved. I click on it, read the first few lines, and shake my head at my insane tirade. But as I try to delete the draft, the computer freezes again. After a few agonizing minutes, I opt for the force quit function, but the computer starts back up again on its own and the email is no longer in the drafts folder. Where the hell did it go? I feel my heart race as I check my sent folder.

No. No. No. NOOOOOOOOOOO.

From: Gabriela Gonzales ([email protected])

To: Parisa Naficy ([email protected])

Date: May 5, 2023

Subject: Beauty privilege?

Sorry if I’ve been unresponsive after our last text exchange, but I’m so mad at you that I don’t trust myself not to say a bunch of things that I’m going to regret. Actually, you know what? Screw it. I’m going to tell you exactly how I feel about our conversation and everything you accused me of.