Chapter 2
2
T he bottle spun. Barely paying it any attention, I sipped from my beer bottle as I tapped out a message on my phone to Viking, confirming the start time of tonight’s online campaign.
“Finn. Finn.” An elbow jabbed into my side, and I raised my head to find my football teammate Pete eyeing me expectantly from my left. To my right, there was now an empty space where Ellie had been. She’d crawled across the circle and was kissing Nicola, straddling her lap. Right. It was my turn to spin.
My phone vibrated softly, and I glanced down at the screen, my lips curving upwards as I took in the words.
VIKING:
Any chance we could start earlier tonight? Today has been stressful. I could do with a distraction
I clapped Pete on the shoulder. “All yours, bro. I’m heading out.”
He shook his head at me, muttering something about boring bastards, but I was already on my feet and making my way out of his student house.
I probably should’ve made more of an effort, but I’d thought we were going to just hang out and watch the football. Somehow, Pete’s housemate had turned it into an impromptu games night, inviting several girls from his course, and then alcohol had become involved, and yeah, somehow, we’d ended up playing spin the bottle with an empty vodka bottle.
Fuck, I really was boring, wasn’t I? Who would complain about any of that? I never would have before, but over the last four or five months, I’d become obsessed with a certain game, probably to an unhealthy level.
Ah, well. Too late to change things now. I had a date with Lesath Legends , and a certain Viking was waiting for me.
Settled in my gaming chair in my bedroom, I adjusted my mic as I waited for the portal to load up. Living at home with my parents and younger brother rather than paying for student accommodation meant I got to access all my home comforts, which included my PlayStation. With Lesath Legends introducing cross-platform support a few months earlier, it meant I got to play with and against thousands of players on different consoles and PCs all over the world. I’d stumbled across Viking the day the cross-platform play had come out of beta, and we’d hit it off straight away. Both of us seemed to end up online around the same time in the evening, and I’d eventually messaged him to ask if he wanted to partner up for a campaign.
Now, here we were, playing online together almost every night.
“Ready for this?”
Viking’s voice came through the mic, confirming he was ready to go. As usual, I couldn’t help wondering what his real voice sounded like. Both of us had the in-game privacy mode enabled that distorted our voices. Maybe I’d dare him to share his real voice with me one day, but we’d only just swapped phone numbers, and that was only so we could arrange our gaming times more easily.
Back to the reason I was here and not spinning a bottle, hoping it wouldn’t land on someone I didn’t want to kiss. “What happened today? Why were you stressed?”
I heard Viking’s breath hitch, and then there was silence. Just when I’d given up the question as a lost cause, he replied. “I was doing a project for one of my modules, and I had to do a ten-minute presentation for it today. I…I tried to prepare myself for it, but when the time came, I froze.” His voice lowered. “Fucking stupid, right? I’m an adult, more than halfway through my degree course. I shouldn’t be having these issues still.”
The game buzzer sounded. “Ready up,” I said, tapping my controller as our on-screen characters dropped into the area of the map we’d been exploring last night. Directing my character towards a dilapidated wooden building, I returned the conversation to Viking. “It’s not stupid. Why did you freeze?”
“I-I-I— fuck ,” he whimpered, and I dropped my controller, swiping my phone from the bed. Fuck it. If he really didn’t want to talk to me, he didn’t have to answer. I hit his number and dialled, switching to speakerphone, before I picked up my controller again.
“H-hello?”
The voice was softly spoken, warm, and a little hesitant. My lips curved upwards. So this was how Viking sounded in reality. We’d never crossed this line before, but there was clearly something going on with him, and I needed to hear his voice. Properly.
“Hi. It’s nice to hear your proper voice.”
A shaky sigh came through the speaker. “Okay, I can do this,” he mumbled before clearing his throat. “You sound different to how I imagined.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah. I dunno why. I imagined you with a Scouse accent for some reason. Your game voice sounds a bit Scouse, sometimes.”
I chuckled, but it died away quickly when I remembered why I’d called him, and it wasn’t to discuss accents. “Hey…” I began. “Want to tell me why you froze?”
“I guess so. It—it’s hard to talk about. I… Ever since I was a kid, I’ve been…shy. And, uh, anxious, I guess. To the point where I can’t speak to people without stuttering or losing my breath or going red and—and—and?—”
“It’s okay. You’re talking to me, and it’s all good. Even if any of those things happen when you’re talking to me, you know I won’t ever judge you, right?”
He sighed again. “Yeah, but it’s easier with you. I don’t have to speak to you in person. Face to face. And you, I don’t know, you’re easy to talk to. Maybe because there’s no pressure because we’re both doing an activity that relaxes me.”
“I get that.” Steering my character towards his, I pulled up my inventory to transfer a medipack to his character. “It’s natural to be more relaxed around people who share our interests when we know they’re not gonna judge us. I can’t say I’ve ever experienced the level of discomfort it sounds like you have—I like to think I’m pretty confident on the whole—but I’ve been in situations well out of my comfort zone. I understand where you’re coming from.”
“I wish I had your confidence,” he said miserably. “Here I am in my second year of uni, and the most social interaction I’m getting is gaming with you. I don’t even go to student parties or anything. My housemate dragged me to the student union a couple of times, but I spent the entirety of both times feeling so uncomfortable, like I was on display and everyone was looking at me. Even though they probably weren’t. I’m never gonna be able to flirt, let alone have a relationship or whatever, if I can’t talk to anyone. Even if I could talk, the rest of it is beyond me. Kissing someone? I have no fucking clue where to begin. I’m a lost cause.”
The words came out all in a rush, like he’d been bottling them up deep inside and needed to get them off his chest, and after a deep breath, he continued. “Connor and Niall—my two course friends—were doing the presentation with me today, and they helped me through it, but I feel fucking awful. I let them down. They did their parts just fine, and I couldn’t even get through my bit without them coaching me through it.”
Fuck. The despair in his voice was killing me.
“You didn’t let them down. I know you, and I know that you’re a good—great person, okay? There’s no way they’d hold it against you.”
“Oh,” he whispered.
“Yeah. You froze up. So what? It’s not the end of the world. I bet your lecturers are gonna be impressed with your project.”
He sighed. “I hope you’re right.” But his voice sounded a little brighter, and I could breathe more easily.
“Hey. How about a dare? I dare you to tell me your name. We’re talking on the phone with our real voices; I can’t call you Viking.”
“I-I guess not. Uh. I’m…um…Erik.”
“With a K ? Like Erik the Red? I guess calling you Viking wasn’t too far from the truth.”
“No,” he said quietly.
“I’m Finn. You can blame my brother for my Hammerhead name. He used to call me ‘Sharkfin’ because that was a hilarious nickname to his eight-year-old brain, and not long after that, I was chasing him around the house with an inflatable hammer—don’t ask—so, yeah. Hammerhead shark. I dunno. I’m no good at coming up with names.”
“Finn.”
I smiled. “Hi, Erik.”
“Fuck,” he whispered. “I’m—I need to go. Today’s been— I need to sleep.”
“Okay. Speak to you—” I began, but he was already gone.