The Escape Key
His smartphone howled promises of entertainment, but Will would not yield. He was an addict, plain and simple, and he was detoxifying and relaxing with a book. Will suffered last night through the repeating and familiar sounds of the Lizard app. In his allowed morning ritual, he saw that the notifications were for messages of support for his detachment from the network, in a twist the owners of Lizard would prevent if they could.
Since the little lizard logo became a synonym for social interaction, Will's happiness went up. Then down. Quite down. He forgot his friends, hobbies, and job, finally seeking mental health support.
Will realized that his was an unhealthy lifestyle but felt that more than that was out of order. His beliefs now were that Lizard had to abdicate and allow for more beneficial successors. He also realized that newer was not always totally better, that while remarks on the network jogged his imagination, a book or a movie could take it on a marathon, most things considered.
That night he dreamt of lizards skittering across his body, biting him all over, and he woke up at dawn in a cold sweat. He went back to sleep and deleted the app that morning. Through an unprecedented chain of events, the other apps detected the lack of the program, disclosed its absence through their advertising networks, and Will got beset by Lizard adverts whenever he opened his phone. Will shuddered when realizing the same and decided to do a factory reset and lock the phone in a box.