Five Letters

I know how she's doing from her Wordle score. That's all I get now.

Our friend group has a chat. Eight of us, five years, a ridiculous name that no one remembers choosing. And every morning at 7:30, one person posts a green-and-yellow grid and we all pretend not to care about each other's streaks.

Her name was Priya. We grew up two streets apart, shared a school bus, a hundred dumb secrets, and then, for six months, a bed. Then I wrecked it by being the kind of person who thinks "space" is a personality.

We don't talk now. I'm still in the chat because leaving would be a scene. She's still in the chat for the same reason.

So I read her Wordle score the way other people read horoscopes.

Three guesses means she slept well. Five means she's stressed. A fail means she's had a rough night. Last Tuesday she got it in two. Showed off. That's the Priya I know when she's happy.

Today, her grid came through. Four rows. And in the second row, a word I couldn't ignore.

Yellow, green, yellow, green, green.

I stared at it. I did the maths. I knew the first letters she'd have used. Her starting word.

It spelled my name.

Not by accident. She'd been using it for weeks.

Wordle gives you six chances.

She'd been wasting one of hers on me every day.