I only got Instagram because my best friend kept nagging me. “Get one; you’ll LOVE IT,” and “It’s fun, you get to pretend you’re a photographer,” had been hurled at my inattentive ears for months, so I surrendered my opposition and signed up for an account. My first picture was raindrops on a window with an “inkwell” filter and lyrics from a Ray LaMontagne song as the caption... Yup, I had become just like the hipsters that I hated within 3 minutes of joining Instagram. But, just like everyone said, I was hooked from the first post. I followed all of my family and a few friends and liked their pictures as notifications popped up with comments like, “you FINALLY joined the crowd,” and “you’re already a pro Instagramer,” as if it were an actual accomplishment. Despite my aversion to this “photography” app, I enjoyed it and scrolled through my feed, double tapping almost every photo there. It only took me three weeks to find Michael’s account. I don’t even remember how I got there, but he had a few pictures with my cousin so they had to be friends. I followed Michael, and he followed me back within 5 minutes; in the digital world, that’s basically the equivalent of winking at me as we passed each other on the street. A few months passed and I posted a selfie, with lyrics to my favorite Mumford & Sons song and a #nofilter even though I used the “Walden” filter but you couldn’t really tell anyway. He was the first one to like it. I got a notification, telling me the that “@onthemapp” commented on my very first picture. I got this stupid smile on my face, and mustered up the courage to click on the activity tab at the bottom of the screen. I looked up at the real world to catch a breath before I read the comment that would change my outlook on love. I was sucked back into the virtual world within seconds, and read “hey, this is very hipster of you *winking emoji* *crying laughing emoji*. But you should text me *smirking emoji* 250-867-5309.” I texted him, and got an immediate response. That totally meant that he was into me, right? It had to be. Nobody replies that quickly without waiting for the text. Turns out, he was friends with my cousin, but he lived all the way in Alabama; usually that would make me stop the conversation right there, but there was something about him. He really payed attention, and he had a passion about life that made me want to fly over the field of poppies, AWAY from Emerald City because I didn’t anything to complete me anymore. Within a few months, we talked on the phone every night, and texted every second that we weren’t on the phone with each other. Sometimes, these memories send shocks of misery throughout my entire body, consuming me. With endless conversations about life, dreams, goals, music, animals, death, life, society, and everything in between, he became the light my life thrived on. My grades shot up, I slept less, I was generally more motivated, and happier than I ever had been. Now, it seems kind of stupid that I connected with someone on that deep of a level without even meeting him. But I just couldn’t resist the attention he gave me, and the intellectual conversations we had just reassured my need to attach to someone that could test my views of life. I had never talked to someone that could change my entire outlook on any given situation with a single text message, but he managed to do it. With every day, I grew more attached to him: the one thing that I was afraid of. So I stopped texting him first, I stopped complimenting him, I forced myself to stop thinking about him every second of every day, and when I saw something I wanted to tell him about, I locked myself out of my phone so that I wouldn’t text him. I ran away from my feelings because I knew that he didn’t want what I wanted. I wanted commitment, and truly loving relationship; which I now realize is stupid to ask for when you haven’t even met the person. Because I was apparently feeling completely psychotic, I decided to call him and tell him that I couldn’t talk to him anymore because I cared for him and wanted more, which I knew he didn’t want. Now, I don’t know if he was feeling as unhinged as I was, but he said that he wanted exactly what I wanted: a relationship. I can remember thinking, “well, that didn’t go how I expected.” Despite my shock, I was the happiest I had ever been, and I fell even more in love with the boy I met on Instagram. Fast-forward about 1 year and 5 months, and here we are. Last week, he stopped texting me, calling me, tweeting me, commenting on my pictures. Obviously, after the second day I started calling like a madwoman trying to get her medication before she had a psychological breakdown. He finally picked up, but neither one of us said anything for a full minute. I broke the vexatious silence with, “hey, I just wanted to say hi, I think.”

“Look, I don’t know who this is, but I’m Michael’s girlfriend and you need to get the hell away from him. We’ve been together for 8 months now, and I’m not about to let some irrelevant side-chick get in the way.”

In the background I heard, “Baby, what are you doing with my phone?” *click*
The dumbest part about that phone call was that I was genuinely mad that he called her baby, with the same voice inflection he used with me. That term of endearment that I treasured like gold, he threw around like pennies. It wasn’t sincere, it was something he did to keep me around, for whatever reason. I wasn’t even mad about the girl, which made me mad. It should have infuriated me that he cheated, and lied, and manipulated me. I was mad that she got to be with him and I didn’t. I was livid because she got to hold his hand, and stroke his hair while she looked into his eyes. I was enraged because I didn’t get to love him anymore. So here I am, broken and distraught over some random person I knew from Instagram, but never even met. I hate him, but I hate myself more for letting him in because I knew better. I hate myself for loving him.