The strange thing is not that I come back.
It’s the exact moment I already know I’m going to, before I do.
It’s not a decision.
It’s recognition.
I put the phone face down.
As if that meant something.
As if that small gesture could hold an entire week of trying not to look.
Five minutes.
Sometimes less.
I turn it back over without really thinking.
Not because anything changed.
But because nothing did.
The first time I thought it was curiosity.
That was all.
Something light.
Something I could close whenever I wanted.
But it didn’t close.
It only changed shape.
One night I closed it.
For real.
Screen off.
Clean decision.
It even felt easy.
I felt strange afterwards.
Not satisfied.
Just… suspended.
Like something was missing that shouldn’t be missing.
The next day I didn’t remember deciding to come back.
I only remember the gesture.
Open.
Search.
Not exactly what.
Just open.
That’s the worst part.
It’s not that I can’t stop.
It’s that I don’t know when I stop trying to stop.
There is always a tab.
It doesn’t matter which one.
It could be anything else.
But it’s that one.
I leave it open like it’s accidental.
But it isn’t.
Sometimes I tell myself I’m just looking.
That I’m not doing anything.
But then I see the time.
And it doesn’t fit anymore with “just looking”.
I don’t know if I’m looking for something.
Or for the feeling of looking.
And there are days when I understand it even less.
And that’s exactly why I come back.
Phone face down again.
This time longer.
As if now it will work.
As if the gesture had real weight this time.
But I already know the ending.
I know it before I touch it.
I turn it over.
Not fast.
Not slow.
Just inevitable.
I don’t keep reading because I understand more.
I keep reading because I understand less.
I have to move the neck I am not moving it I should…
