Chapter 2 #2
It’s already dark out by the time I get home home, and I drift through the apartment, turning on lamps.
I never use the overhead lights, if I can help it; I prefer the cozy vibes of accent lighting.
The apartment itself is pretty cozy already, though.
It’s small, but plenty for just me. It has a separate bedroom that only has a twin bed—also plenty for just me—and a combined kitchen-and-living-room area, with my gaming desk shoved into the corner by the window.
I’ve always liked this apartment, but it was mostly rented out to grad students while I was growing up, and I only got to see it when I helped Gram clean up between tenants.
And while I know some people think All Landlords Are Bastards, Gram is actually pretty cool, even when the tenant isn’t her own grandchild.
She’s always charged below market rate for rent, since she only needs enough to maintain it—and I’m pretty sure she’s putting half of what I’m paying her into a retirement fund for me, though she denies it every time I confront her.
I’m grateful for it, of course, but I worry she thinks I can’t take care of myself.
Then again, maybe I can’t.
I’m well aware that working part-time at my mother’s stationery shop and streaming video games three times a week is not a solid career plan for someone in their mid-twenties, but I have no idea what else I’d want to do.
I suppose the streaming would be more viable if I could reach a higher revenue tier on Play’N, but I would need way more subs for that, which probably means streaming every day—or finding a different niche with a wider audience.
But I have an image to maintain, a role to play.
Which, ironically, doesn’t include role-playing games, as much as I might want it to.
I collapse onto my couch, trying to decide what I feel like playing for myself tonight, but after the week I’ve had, I just want to turn my brain off for a bit.
I look down at the giant reusable bag on the floor next to me, containing a million balls of yarn and a half-finished blanket that I’ve been crocheting for the past two years, off and on. Mostly off.
Before I know it, I’m in my comfiest jammies with a cup of tea and my laptop on the table in front of me while I curl up on my couch and work on endless granny squares.
And, for reasons I can’t explain and don’t want to think about, I put on the archive of SconesOfAyor’s stream from earlier today that I missed.
It’s a habit I fall into when I don’t know what I feel like watching, because SOA3 streams are my comfort show, like Gilmore Girls is for Mom.
I don’t bother paying attention to the chat log while I watch, I just listen to his commentary and glance up occasionally from my project to see what part he’s at.
He’s currently on a play-through where he’s doing every side quest in the game, but the character he’s playing is a pacifist and he’s trying not to actually kill anyone. It’s kind of hilarious.
He always does this sort of thing, making a whole character, with morals and a personality that he tries to stick to for the entire game.
My favourite Scones character was an elf who intentionally got himself turned into a vampire and then went around exclusively murdering vampires, like a serial killer that only murders serial killers.
(And yes, he named the character Dexter.)
You’d think that would be the point of a role-playing game, you know, to play a role, but most of the Stones streams I’ve seen from other people, they just play as a generic human male who tries to get the best outcome from every situation.
A bunch of them skip through dialogue, even when they aren’t speedrunning. It’s not nearly as fun.
Not that I should find this fun. Not when I know Scones is just a gatekeeping asshole like the rest of them.
“You know, I’ve wondered that myself,” he says calmly while running through a cavern full of aggressive doomstalkers trying to kill him.
I think he must be responding to something in the chat, but I don’t bother checking.
“I mean, Lord Wunderth is collecting the Stones so he can become the new King of the Gods, right? As if he doesn’t know what happened to the last guy who had that job?
Like, the very fact that these Stones exist would be a red flag to me for sure. ”
I try not to be amused.
“No, I know, you’re right,” he continues.
“They all think they’re special. ‘The last seventy people who tried to do this got brutally murdered, but I’m different.
’” Scones leans forward to look at something on his screen, and I can see his mouth curve into a smile at whatever he’s reading.
So I lean in to my own laptop screen to read the chat log too.
SpacePudding: Watch Scones play this whole game nonlethal and then use the Stones at the end to kill everyone and become a god XD
“You’ve figured out my evil plan,” Scones says jokingly, sitting back in his chair again. “But I could totally get away with it. I’m different.”
I don’t intend to keep reading the chat log, but I catch a glimpse of my name and freeze. Not my name name, but my username. They didn’t tag me, but asked Scones if he’d ever do another speedrun to “put OddlyAdored in her place” and I feel my face heat with rage.
Rage, and maybe shame. Because part of me worries that they’re right—wherever my place is, it isn’t here. And I was foolish to even try, to pretend that I could just go wherever I wanted. That I could step outside the expectations of others without repercussions.
The timestamp on the message indicates that it was posted at about this point in the stream, and I notice Scones lean in to read again, but the smile on his face drops and he says nothing before returning his attention to the game.
Once again, he remains silent on the matter of his viewers trashing me on his platform. It’s as good as condoning them.
“Holy shit,” he says after a minute, still running through a labyrinth of caves. “How many doomers are in here?” He laughs and I finally look at how many red dots are surrounding his compass in the corner. “I’m trying to spare your lives, my dudes. Don’t come at me.”
He’ll go out of his way to avoid hurting cursed rotting-flesh monsters with razor claws, but he can’t say two words to defend my honour?
I run my hands over my face and slouch back in my seat until I’m nearly horizontal.
I shouldn’t care what he thinks. It’s not his job to defend my honour, like I’m some princess that needs to be saved.
I know this. He’s a stranger on the internet, he owes me nothing. But it still feels like rejection.
It feels like Cameron all over again.
Before I can fully wallow in my self-created misery, I hear a scratching at my window and sigh. I get up to open it and a grey cat—this one with a white patch over its left eye—struts in and sits on my desk, patiently awaiting her treats, which I keep on hand for such visits.
“I wondered when you’d show up, Danke,” I tell her as I fetch the packet of chicken snacks from my kitchen cupboard.
Maybe I already am like my grandmother.
In which case, I definitely should not give any fucks what some scrawny-ass nerd on the internet thinks of me. Gram sure wouldn’t.