I’ve been watching the last few weeks, the way the light catches the foam on their lattes, the careful tilt of their heads just so. It’s always golden hour somewhere, even when it’s just overcast and grey outside. We meet up, always at one of those places with the exposed brick and the little succulent arrangements, the kind that scream "aesthetic" before you even taste the coffee. And for the first ten minutes, maybe fifteen, it’s a flurry of clicks and flashes. Hands reaching for phones, angles adjusted, smiles plastered on. Then the cameras go down, and the air just… cools. Like someone opened a freezer door. And then we sit there. The clatter of ceramic, the low hum of other conversations. Sometimes someone will ask, “Did you get the shot?” or “Oh, that’s going to look amazing on the feed!” And then silence again. It used to be, when we first started hanging out, that the chatter would just pick up right where it left off, easy and warm. Now it feels like everyone’s waiting for a cue, or maybe just waiting for the food to arrive so they can do it all again. I’ll try to say something, a story from work, or a memory, and it’s like my words just bounce off a wall of glass. They nod, sure, or give a little hum, but their eyes are already drifting. To the window, to their phones, to the next picture. It costs me, you know? To go to these places. A ten-dollar coffee and a fifteen-dollar pastry, sometimes more, because that’s the going rate for a picture-perfect brunch. And it adds up. I’m still scraping by, really. Every paycheck feels like a tightrope walk over a chasm of bills. My fridge isn’t full of organic produce, it’s full of whatever was on sale, whatever would last. So I look at them, with their effortless clothes and their perfectly manicured nails, holding up their phones, and I feel this hot, sour twist in my stomach. Like I’m paying a premium just to be a prop in their staged lives. The other day, I finally just… stopped. They were all showing off their latest finds – a new vintage shop, a rare book, something else that cost too much and meant too little. I looked at the table, piled with empty plates and half-finished drinks, and realized we hadn’t actually talked about anything real in months. Not about fears, or dreams, or even just the petty annoyances of the day. It was all surfaces. And I just thought, *what are we doing here?* What am I doing here? Pretending to enjoy this charade while my bank account weeps. I went home and just stared at the ceiling for hours. My phone felt heavy in my hand, a useless brick. I thought about all the times I’d scrolled through my own feed, seeing other people’s perfect lives, and how I’d always tried to make mine look just as good. But it’s not. My life is messy and sometimes hard and mostly just… ordinary. And I miss the ordinary. I miss a friend who asks how your day *really* was, not just if you got a good shot of your latte. I don’t know what to do with this feeling, this cold emptiness that’s settled in my chest. It feels like a betrayal, but I can’t figure out who betrayed whom. And the worst part is, I’ll probably go again next weekend. Because what else would I do?