The Yellow Heart
The yellow heart disappeared, and- along with it- did my hope.
It's such a minute and seemingly trivial thing. One yellow emoticon shape like a heart. And yet, it means so much.
Of course, it meant as much to me. Or, perhaps, even more.
The ways in which Snapchat as a social media platform works are wondrous. They tell of secrets you never consciously realised, and expose them to your eyes for the very first time, shocking you.
In my case- pleasantly surprising me.
That I had, in all manners told and untold, been talking to, conversing with, and thinking of a certain person the most.
The manner in which the yellow heart had appeared was very much quaint, quiet, and subtle.
No one was expecting its quick knock on the door, its soft footsteps across the room, into the space beside his name on my phone. Least of all was I, who never once thought twice of the incessant number of snaps I sent to every contact (or, whom I had a present, ongoing streak with). Or perhaps…the incessant number of snaps I sent to everyone, but for only him to see.
Yet, upon consultation with the ever-omniscient entity known as Google, I was quick to catch the quintessential meaning of the mysterious yellow heart, and eager to keep its connotations close to mine own, for as long as I could.
At first, it was the innocent act of sending slightly more snaps than usual to the poor receiver, whose phone must have been positively vibrating on end. Later, however, things took a darker turn, as I realised that if his most-messaged-contact was me, and mine him, I merely had to ensure no other contact could break my record with him, and thus proceeded to being highly conscious of the volume of snaps I sent to each other person, making sure I never sent one specific contact one too many snaps- even if it was not quite the most polite course of action.
Unfortunately, this did not come with no worries. It dampened my spirit to find out that firstly, he had changed the emoticons on his phone- so even if he had a yellow heart beside his name on mine, I didn't, on his. Which possibly meant he never even noticed it in the first place. Secondly, I slowly grew more and more obsessed with the yellow heart, and with upgrading it to a red one, and- in the far future- a pink one (although I didn't dare hope). Checking every single website I knew, I confirmed, double-confirmed and triple-confirmed its existence and purpose before softly smiling at my phone as I held it close to my heart.
However, no matter how foolish it all sounded, that heart gave me hope. Home that one day, the impossible could actually possibly happen, and that perhaps, bit-by-bit, that person would think so too.
Yet as I tapped on the squarish yellow icon with a white ghost- similar to that in Pac Man- in the centre, expecting to see the warm, familiar sight of the yellow heart, it all chilled the moment the coloured bar on top turned blue, loading my messages, and showing me that the heart…was gone.
And I fell into melancholic despair.