Chapter Three — Seen. Not Replied. Still Suwanee.
By Monday evening, Suwanee Jameson already knew how the week was going to go.
She had opened Facebook more times than she cared to admit, always pretending it was just to scroll, just to check something. But the truth was sitting right there in her inbox: her last message to Michael Delanie.
A funny meme. Something light. Something about choir rehearsals and tired tenors.
Seen.
That was it. He had seen it, hours ago, maybe even smiled — but didn't reply. Again.
It wasn't the first time. It had been four days since they'd last talked properly. And even then, she had started the conversation. She had kept it alive. She had tried. Michael had responded — short, polite, even sweet — but never curious. Never engaging. Never like someone who wanted more.
And now, she was just... the girl who messaged and got ignored.
She tossed the phone on her bed and sighed, pulling her sketchpad into her lap. The pencil in her hand didn't move, though. Her fingers just hovered over the page, staring at a blank space she had no energy to fill.
This wasn't like her. Suwanee was the loud one. The funny one. The one who had energy even when everyone else was drained. She didn't do "quiet sadness." But somehow, this ache didn't need loud tears. It just sat there — soft, but heavy — like soaked fabric pressing down on her chest.
Still, she got up the next morning, tied her hair in her usual pineapple puff, and faced school like a warrior.
In class, she joked with her seatmate. At lunch, she teased Ada about her obsession with boys who had pink lips. She laughed with her friends like nothing was wrong.
But it was. She could feel it — underneath the noise, in the quiet of her thoughts.
Even during art class — the one place where she could usually escape — she found herself staring too long at her unfinished work. Her teacher passed behind her and said, "You've been distracted this week."
Suwanee just smiled faintly and said, "I'm okay, sir."
And in a way, she was.
Because she had decided something.
She wasn't going to beg for replies. She wasn't going to double-message. She wasn't going to ask, "Did you see it?" or "Are you busy?" or "Is everything alright?"
If Michael didn't want to talk, that was fine. But she wasn't going to sit around hoping to be noticed like a lost earring under a chair.
She was Suwanee Jameson. She had exams to prepare for. She had sketches to finish. She had zobo to drink with her girls on Saturday.
And even though she still liked Michael — deeply, quietly, stupidly — she was learning to like herself more.
By Thursday night, she hadn't messaged him again. The silence between them was starting to feel like closure — the kind that doesn't come with explanations or endings, but with peace.
She lay in bed, her sketchpad beside her, finally letting her pencil move. She didn't draw him. She didn't even draw a person. Just patterns. Lines. A storm of expression that didn't need words.
When she was done, she looked at it and whispered, "If he's not for me, God… let it be okay."
And as the wind whispered through her window, Suwanee smiled — soft, but sure.
Michael Delanie might not have seen her.
But she was learning to see herself.