Hello again!
Another month’s gone by, you haven’t opened me once, and we’re still together. Thank you for your continued support.
That’ll be $3.99 plus tax.
Have I already appeared on this month’s statement? Yes. But please, check. This is kind of becoming “our thing” — a little pas de deux set to the tune of the billing cycle, a dance that lasts as long as it takes for a two-factor text from the bank to arrive.
On some level, you have to admire my consistency. First of the month, every month, for the past six years. No matter how many new phones you switch to, no matter how many different service providers you try, I’m always here for you. Unused. Untouched.
Like that fun hat you once thought was a good idea.
At this point, you’re considering resending the two-factor text. Don’t. Trust me. They’re just going to arrive at the same time, one canceling out the other, and then you’re going to have to start all over.
Patience.
Besides, if I’m telling you the money’s already been billed to your Visa ending in 0483, do you really want to sift through an online gauntlet of far more menacing recurring charges? Your streaming services, your domain hosts, your productivity software you can’t buy outright for some reason, your exercise bike video trainers, your giant vitamins, your meditation sessions delivered with gentle British lyricism by a fake monk who you wish you never looked up on Google Image Search?
Relax. I’m four bucks. You know me. I’m an incredible value, probably.
Don’t make that face. You had high hopes when you subscribed, I know. But this could finally be our month!
You can’t tell me you don’t remember what it was like when we first met. That spark. I was free. Easy. But there was something about me that wasn’t like the other apps. I started to challenge you. I felt unique. I made you want to improve — not for me. But with me.
You can have that feeling again. Right now.
Open me up.
Or don’t. That’s fine. I’ve always said that if for any reason this isn’t working, you can cancel at any time.
… If you can find me.
Maybe I’ve been deleted? Or maybe my logo has changed? Maybe my parent company name is different than MY onscreen name? Maybe you’ve finally managed to track me down, inside a subfolder on the fourth screen, and now you’re cycling through menus inside me, each path more labyrinthine than the last, and now I’m frozen, and I’m still frozen, and you’ve reset your phone but I’m still frozen, and now I’ve reset myself for some reason, and you have to log back into me again, but you can only log back into me using that app sign-up burner email address from seven years ago — an address you no longer have access to — and you’ve twice answered incorrectly to the simple-yet-mystifying security riddle you composed: “best friend’s favorite tv dog.”
You want to throw me through the wall. But you remember that you did that once before, in this exact same scenario, and then you had to get a new 6s.
But wait! There’s a ding.
That two-factor text from the bank has arrived.
Ding.
And now that notification has been shunted aside by another alert that just popped up.
Someone unfollowed you on Insta?
That’s more pressing. I understand.
See you next month.