Show up Strong

Show up Strong

He sat looking down at the phone in his hand, he could not understand why she had even agreed to this, sure it was a dating site, all that swipe left or swipe right, but he had suspected and had mostly come true, that he would get more left swipes than right swipes.

But no, not this one, he had seen her image on the screen of his phone and had instantly been drawn to her, nothing crude like breasts or some such male go to, no he just saw something in her eyes and had gone the route of chance favouring the bold and swiped right on the image.

The chance favouring bold theory had not worked that well for him, more like chance favouring the bold every three times out of Ten, was enough to break your spirit, well if he took it that seriously.

So one swipe later, he had placed the phone down by his bedside table and called out to that magical creature Alexa to switch out the lights and he had let the little sleeping fairies come along and sprinkle him with the magical sleeping dust.

The next morning starting with the usual routine of reaching for his phone before his eyes had even fully opened and he could barely focus on the small rays of light that had managed to break through any openings in his bedroom curtains.

The notifications on his screen showed the usual messages for his various mobile games and some new email messages which were most likely spam mail or such, it did not matter how quickly you marked it down as spam, it always found a new way to invade your inbox.

After a few moments of rubbing his hand over his face and the horror of how bad he felt his breath must smell after eating that burger before bed and not having brushed his teeth, he noticed the symbol that showed he had a notification from the dating app.

Guiding his thumb across the screen, it changed from the image that showed rolling clouds and he once again told himself, he needed to update his screen image to something other than the ones that came with the phone.

His eyes opened wide in response as he saw the image of the woman he had swiped right on the night before. the vain hope she would read his profile and open up a dialogue, give him the chance to impress beyond a profile of words he could barely remember and a photo that even though was his best, was not exactly eye-catching,

But now, she had replied to him and he reached with his finger to open the reply, his finger resting on it as he took a deep breath but did not exert enough pressure to send a signal for the phone to open her message.

"Show up strong"

He said simply to himself, the words something his mother had told him constantly when he was a kid.

"Show up strong and the rest will fall into place"