Then

“No, you shouldn’t use SIGKILL to stop a given process right away. It prevents the computer from doing any finalization.” He reached past her and made the change with a few keystrokes. “Always use SIGTERM so the process can be finalized.”

Some would claim she learned fast, but he knew better. She learned just enough to apply, and no further than that. Even in the precision of semantics required for computation, an experienced user understood nuance.

“Okay, but if the result is the same, does it matter?”

He blinked. “Sort of? If you care about the process at all.”

“Well maybe it does to the computer, but if all I want is to end it then I’ll just use whatever comes to mind first.”

“I think that’s fair.” He conceded.

She saved the file and leaned closer to him. “Thanks for taking the time to help me review. I know you wanted to do other things but well, we got to spend time together right?”

He laughed at that. “Well, I guess the result was the same. I don’t think it mattered.”

---

Now

He had composed it and recomposed it, deleted it and then dredged it up from memory, and ultimately, he pressed send on the text.

Hey. It’s been a while, and I saw your status update. Congratulations on the wedding! I hope everything is perfect!

Staring at the screen as though willing a response to appear, he was surprised when it did.

Hi. I don’t want to be in touch anymore.

Boundaries. Boundaries. Boundaries. They needed to be respected. His mind said no but a strong feeling willed his thumbs as he typed.

Just wanted to congratulate you, wishing you all the happiness in the world.

Send. Why did his thumb know where it was before he could even think about it?

Then the response came.

SIGKILL