She answered a phone call from her own number.

“Hello?” Nora’s voice shook. Jem raised his eyebrow. Their legs were intertwined on the couch.

“Are you with him?” a familiar voice asked.

“Yes… who is this?” 

“You need to break up with him.”

Suspicion flooded her heart. She resisted looking at him.

“Who is this?”

“It’s me. I don’t know how much time I have. But this is a once-in-a-lifetime chance. Believe me,” she breathed. Nora felt tension rising in her stomach, chest and shoulders. She practiced relaxing, like she had learned to do in yoga, but it wasn’t working.

“Who is this?” she repeated.

“It’s me,” the voice repeated, and to Nora, it sounded like it was coming from inside her. “You already probably feel like you give more. To your boyfriend, Jem. But it’s not love.”

“I’m in love,” Nora insisted. Jem put his phone down.

“Who is it?” 

She shook her head like she couldn’t know.

“You think you are. Maybe you are. Maybe I was, I don’t know.”

Nora pushed herself up, removing her legs from Jem’s. He shifted in his place.

“It feels good now. It’s better than what you had with your ex. But look at the facts, he’s cheap. He makes you split things. He doesn’t give you any gifts.”

“It’s been two months…” Nora scanned Jem’s frowning expression, “it’s just the beginning.”

“Who is that?” he insisted, his voice sounding hard.

“I don’t know,” Nora mouthed.

“Are you with him?” the voice asked quickly, then, before Nora answered, continued: “listen, it doesn’t end well for you. He’s love bombing you. He’s emotionally avoidant. You will give more. First he will support you. You will do great things - but on your own. He does believe in you, more than you believe in yourself. But then he will be resentful.”

“What are you talking about?”

A sigh on the other end.

“You will start doing stand up. But you don’t owe him anything. And he will resent you. He will fight with you when you succeed. He will drain you of your resources. You will do more for him. And then…”

There was some kind of rupture on the line.

“Hello?” Nora asked, pulling the phone away from her ear.

“Who is that?” Jem repeated, reaching out for her leg. Nora wanted to pull it away. The phone was still connected.

“Hello?” she put the phone back to her ear.

“Trust me… it may not be the same way there, but he will hit you. Sooner or later.” A chill ran down Nora’s spine. “Don’t stay with him. He’s not the one.”

“But I’m happy. I’m in love.”

“Love doesn’t get the police called to your house. It will cost you more in the end. Trust me.”

There was again a rupture. Nora looked at the phone. The call was dead. She thought about calling the number back. Waited.

“Who was that?” asked Jem, curious and suspicious.

“I have no idea,” Nora lied. There was no logical explanation for what happened. Jem sat up.

“Tell me,” he said, insistent.

“I don’t know, it’s the weirdest thing,” she brought her hand to her forehead, “there was a voice telling me to break up with you.”

“A guy?”

“No, not a guy,” Nora answered, exasperated.

“Then who?”

“A woman.”

“What woman?”

“I don’t know. It sounded like she knew you.”

He balked. “What woman would be calling you about me? I’ve been single for three months. You don’t know my ex.”

“I don’t know any of your friends, either.”

He tilted his head. “We talked about that. You will. Are you going to make a problem about it now?”

Nora wasn’t so sure. 

“No. No problem,” she spoke carefully, but she was looking at him differently. Last night they had had a fight which she didn’t really understand. He called her out for not standing up for him when Lucy commented that he looked like Luke from Gilmore Girls. Nora, in defiance of her whole generation, had never even watched the show and didn’t know what it meant one way or another. But the comment drove him to question her loyalty to him and whether she even cared about him or about what a stupid friend thought. They drank throughout the conversation and Nora increased her speed to keep up with what he was saying, ending up in tears and then her head against his chest, then his body against her in the dark while she wept and exhaled heavily.

He was still looking at her expectantly.

“I don’t know what you want me to say.”

“Who called you?”

“I don’t know.”

“Let me see your phone.”

She handed it to him. He opened the call log.

“Whose number is that?”

“Mine.”

He looked up at her from below a raised eyebrow.

“Are you playing games with me?”

She shook her head slowly. It was something he said a lot and she was starting to understand what the voice on the phone was saying, even though she was having trouble believing that the man who had started to heal her from a relationship of neglect was capable of abuse that the voice had promised.

“It’s not possible. Call it back.”

“I don’t think it will do anything.”

“Do it. Or is it a Google number or something? What are you playing at?”

Reluctantly, she took the phone back and dialled the number. Predictably, it didn’t go through.

“I don’t know, Nora, something’s very strange. I don’t know if it’s going to work out between us if you’re gonna be like this.”

Nora swallowed. It wasn’t worth it to beg. He leaned closer to her, putting his hand on her cheek.

“It’s okay, we will get through it.”

She exhaled, not sure whether she should doubt him or herself.