No response

Caroline joins me before I can understand why I feel this unusual sensation, as if I had committed a reprehensible action which, however, I have no idea what it is. I know I was wrong somewhere, but understanding where and how it almost becomes a titanic undertaking. It is certainly not about the fact that I am going to read the conversations between Seth and Sharon: having had permission from him there is no consequence that I can fear, or at least this is what I repeat to myself. In addition to this, however, if Morgenstern has land his phone with so much security, there are only two reasons: he has told the truth from the beginning, or he believes that I will blindly trust him - and if he truly knows me, he knows that I am not able to curb curiosity.

So I question myself about why I feel so uncomfortable, the reason why I feel this way. Maybe it's because I doubted his promises? For having think I could really be one of many for him? No, maybe what worries me the most is the fact that I'm going to look for what, of course, my brother and his friends are keeping me secret. Without them knowing, I will betray all three of them - because although they have repeatedly urged me to let go of the matter, serving me half truths, I cannot pretend everything is alright.

«So?» Caro's voice brings me back to reality and blinking over and over again I find myself staring at her. Her eyes have the feverish spark of anxiety, big breaths come out of her nose and she squeezes the fingers around my arm to be sure that I won't fall to the ground at any moment. She fears that things have gone wrong, but I'm not sure I can define the issue in these terms.

I hesitantly point to the phone: «He left me this» I whisper, stunned because of the multitude of emotions and guilt that I feel burdened on me, «He said I can check myself if there is something between them». I bite my lip, undecided on how to act. Should I add more? Do something? I'm not sure, but she is certainly much more responsive than me, so she grabs his smartphone, frowning: «Did he give you his phone?»

I nod.

«So you have access to every single thing in here?» with the nail she collides against the screen, while the sensors reveal her index, illuminating the screen. There is a picture of Morgenstern, Benton and Jace placed vertically, in the opposite direction to how it should be. They are side by side, their hair styled in the most disparate ways: my brother has a crest that leaves strands scattered around his face, Seth has ruffled them, long in front and shorter behind, while Charlie has a multitude of spikes that looks kinda bad on him. Someone is drinking a beer, others have a cigarette dangling between their lips and then there are those who make a tongue, but all three seem incredibly peaceful. It must be a shot of a few years ago, I think. It is probably a pre-concert with punk implications and the more I watch it, the more I wonder why we can't go back to moments like that. I miss seeing them together, knowing them quiet. I miss envying their complicity - but above all I miss being part of it.

Again I assert.

«At the very least, he has erased everything!» Caroline mutters, skeptical of what awaits us. If it hadn't all happened so quickly and unexpectedly, I would have been too, but the sequence of events is on Morgenstern's side right now.

«I doubt... he didn't have time to clear the evidence» once again I sink teeth into the flesh of my lower lip, trying somehow to release the tension.

«Does that mean you believe him?»

«It means that now we find out the truth and ...» swallowing I find myself evaluating for the umpteenth time whether it is correct for me to stick my nose in the conversations he has with his best friends. I strongly doubt that this falls within the permits granted to me.

«And...?» Again the girl next to me brings me back to reality.

«And I could find out more about the quarrel with Jace» I say quickly, so that the words eat each other and it is impossible to clearly understand the plan I would like to follow - it's a pity that she speaks so much, and so quickly at times, that she manages to understand everything without great difficulty; it amazed me.

«Oh! Look» with her elbow she taps me on the side, winking: «we have a little nosey here!»

I look up at her, clearly less inclined to a good mood. I stare at her for a few moments, feeling the pressure on my chest increase. «Am I going to screw up?» In my tone there is a veiled plea, the almost asphyxiating need to know that I am doing the right thing - because if I felt betrayed by Seth's attitude, I would never want that, discovering that I was wrong to judge him so hastily, he could prove equally as a consequence of these actions.

Caroline takes my hand, interlacing her fingers with mine: «Probable».

Ah, great... that's exactly what I wanted to hear.

«But if you think that's the only way to get an answer... well, I'll be your accomplice. Certain secrets weigh less when shared» she adds after a few moments, reinvigorating the hold. Her smile is sweet, relaxed and, somehow, makes me feel less criminal, so I remain motionless for a moment staring at her, lost like a castaway in her understanding.

In part I am grateful to have her here, to know she's by my side as I advance in the unknown of a cell phone that does not belong to me and could reveal terrible things, but in the same way I am afraid to find out that I could be on the point of making an irreparable mistake - and I'm not sure if her support is enough to keep me afloat. However, evaluating every aspect of this unusual situation, I realize that doubts are equally heavy boulders for my afflicted soul and, sooner or later, if not the uncomfortable truth, they will take me to the bottom and drown me.

So then I in turn tighten my grip on the fingers of the girl next to me, aware that the longer I wait the less things get simple. I am convinced that there is no action without consequences, but that if I want to silence at least one of the voices that buzz in my head I must be ready to face them and, with the heart stuck in my throat, I end up entering a code that I have seen repeating dozens of times.

The display is unlocked with a slight click, catapulting me in front of dozens of apps that sometimes I recognize and others seem unknown to me, but only when I see the one of the messages I find myself wondering "who do I start from?". Yes, because in my plan I have not taken into account that time is essential, that by using too much of it, I could suspect the one who, I'm sure, while serving a coffee or a hot herbal tea, looks furtively beyond the shop windows, studying me. I have to decide what, but above all to whom, to give priority: whether to my "relationship" with Seth or to our clique of friends - and it's not an easy choice, because both issues seem to weigh equally on the scales.

I swallow.

Tic, Tac.

Tic, Tac.

Tic.

Tac.

Let's start with the most recent problem. As soon as I have silenced my doubts about Seth's loyalty I will be able to understand if there may have been some lies among his half-truths on the "Jace" issue, or if I can get any more information out of his mouth.

So I start rummaging through the chats. I start from social media, where I find myself sliding the finger over a conversation in which dozens of tags appear, then a few comments from her: "can we meet?" or "fuck, would u answer me?" followed by concise, cold sentences.

"No", "It's not difficult, Sharon: we broke up" and "Please stop it. You're getting stressful" are the most frequent answers, too bad they go back at least four months ago - then Seth seems to have just stopped giving her rope. I move on to the messages, praying that I have time to find out more about my brother, but here the hit and answer sequence between Morgenstern and his ex becomes more intense, at times it even seems to take on the tone of a fight.

I go back to the date of our first kiss and that involuntary punch, perhaps a few days before. Sharon asks him to speak, to explain the situation better, but he refuses, says that he is tired of continuing like this and that at the moment he has other issues on his mind, but she does not understand, stubborn as she has always been, she continues to insist. The discussion continues, there is some attempt to call and video call, but he rejects them all and she gets angry, some threat escapes her fingers.

I advance between the conversations, finding an increasingly insistent Sharon and a shy, bored, sometimes even angry Seth - until, in yet another attempt by her, he bursts with a "Is it clear or not, that there is a other person now? " and at that point, his ex's attempts to attract his attention again almost verge on squalor.

I exit the chat.

I have a big breath and a heart that beats wildly, agitated. The gaze runs from the display to one of the smoked shop windows of the pastry shop - and there I see his shape, bent over a table that gives onto the sidewalk. He smiles at two old women, let himself be stolen by a few small talk of circumstance, but I see his eyes trying to get to me.

There's another person now - and apparently it's me.

Caroline mutters, making me move away from Seth: «He didn't tell lies».

«No, apparently he hasn't done it» but I would have expected it from him - we always expect it from someone like that. Isn't that so? It is the bad boy on duty who takes the false step, trampling with his weight the fragile heart of the protagonist who, suddenly, seems to be a ripe orange. So, as soon as his foot presses on that juicy fruit, unaware of what disaster is about to take place, it explodes in a horrible way, pulping everywhere.

Not that it is important, to tell the truth, as long as you don't stain his clothes or ruin his shoes there is nothing to fear - we're just a fruit, the world is full of them. And I would have expected exactly this from Seth, instead he noticed my heart, he moved it so that, advancing, it cannot end up under his soles, even if I feared it all the time. From the day Jace left I have done nothing but imagine and fear that moment, coming to touch it several times with my fingers and thoughts thanks to excessive paranoia.

«Jay?»

I observe Caro, confused.

«Are you okay?»

I nod, forcing myself to smile: «Yes, I just need a few hours to calm down» and I don't lie. Surely after this stressful afternoon I will need to shut myself up in the room and silence everything, maybe even giving me a few tears, who knows. It had never happened that I felt so overwhelmed by emotions, especially negative, seeing Morgenstern next to some girl - and if in the past I had limited myself to pouting, smoking a few extra cigarettes or stealing yet another shot from an unknown joint, this time it will take me more, a real outburst.

«Would you like to go home?» Caroline's fingers let go of my hand to brush the wrist, they try to soothe something that neither of us understands, but that we both know is there.

I stare at her, trying to steal something that maybe escapes me but not her, but not finding any answer I bring my eyes back to the conversations screen.

«I'll finish here, okay?»

She asserts, resting a temple on my hair and using the free arm to gird me, passing it between my jacket and backpack. At this distance it is impossible for me to ignore her perfume, it tastes of cherry and vanilla. It intoxicates me gently while, like me, she too starts looking at the display. So I take to scroll through the names and dates, I go back and forth the list, but something does not return.

The more I advance and go back, until I get to our conversation from last night and that of his boss this morning, the more I wonder if the view is playing me some bad joke: why isn't Jace among the recipients?

«I-I don't... see him» escapes me, while confusion gets the better of any other emotion experienced in the last few hours. Am I going blind? No, surely his name is only escaping me because of anxiety - and then I frown so much that I feel bad, yet, despite the effort, I still don't see it.

«Neither do I ...» I hear echoing next to my ear after a few moments.

But it's not possible, is it? Two best friends should write to each other, especially if divided by tens of hundreds of kilometers. I'm not saying that their correspondence should be daily, but at least there should be. So why is there nothing here? Why if I go back, enough to get three months ago, there is not even a shadow of Jace?

Like a lightning bolt in clear skies, however, as I retrace the list in search of my brother for the umpteenth time, Charlie's name catches my attention.

I stop my fingers.

Maybe if I take a look in here...

I bite my lip, undecided.

I am aware that I have not foreseen the possibility of poking my nose here too, yet at the moment it seems to be the only source of information available. There is no trace of Jace, just as I have not seen many group conversations - and in the few that I have discovered, my brother's name does not appear. So what alternatives do I have? Practically none: so I tap on Benton's nickname, opening the discussion.

If I were honest I would admit that I feel like a traitor in spying on their chatter, but for now I would like to avoid it, so as to hold back my guilt for a while longer. By making this gesture I am not only betraying the trust of Seth and Jace, but also that of Charlie, the one who, since my birthday, has maintained a silence that makes me doubt his existence, and it does nothing but make me even more ridiculous and childish, as well as sinking into a pit where I could be buried; yet I do not retreat. A button would be enough to leave this madness and I could pretend that it never happened, thus avoiding further mess, but I can't press it, finding myself reading instead.

What I find, however, is certainly very different from what I would have expected and at first glance it even seems to make no sense. There are the usual friendly chatter, the most disparate jokes and various links connected to who knows which web pages, then, almost out of nowhere, a message sent by Morgenstern and to which Benton has never responded.

"Can we talk about it?"

And looking up once more at the shop window, more confused than I was at the beginning of this research, I wonder what they should be talking about - what did you do, Seth?