Chapter 26 Had Enough?
twenty-six
had enough?
Somehow—I don’t know how how—people caught a glimpse of my t-shirt when I showed up in Damien’s stream.
I was barely in frame for a second before he covered the webcam, but someone managed to screenshot the exact moment once it was archived and did some absolutely bananas zoom-in-and-enhance/CSI crap on the image to make out my HAD ENOUGH? t-shirt.
So now the Whole Freaking Internet knows that I am Scones’s girlfriend.
(By that, I mean the sub-niche: Internet Users > Play’N Users > SOA Fans > SconesOfAyor Subscribers > Who Are Also OddlyAdored Subscribers > And Who Are Inordinately Interested in Strangers’ Personal Lives) (Which is still a heck of a lot.)
My Wednesday night stream is a clustercluck of people wanting to know everything. Ranging from almost sweet to completely debauched. While I’m trying to play a cute little game where I’m a purple puppy opening and managing a cupcake bakery.
“What are we thinking for this new recipe?” I say, ignoring the barrage of questions from my viewers. “Sprinkles or no sprinkles?”
SammyIsMyBaby: Please please please tell me it’s true! You and Scones are dating! OMFG!
AkilaCowgirl: I freaking knew it!! <3
HadTrash93: Yes to sprinkles, and yes to Scoddly being a thing.
ToastOnBeans: Noooo don’t say Scoddly, that’s horrifying
ToastOnBeans: I mean, I think this is fucking amazing, but don’t do a couple name like that for the love of god
“The Swiss Meringue Buttercream is more expensive to make,” I continue after a glimpse of the chat, choosing to keep ignoring it, “but the customers also like it more… Maybe offer one kind with that and one with the American Buttercream?”
WonkyWillow: What are we even talking about here @SammyIsMyBaby? Who is Scones?
SammyIsMyBaby: @WonkyWillow Only the best SOA3 streamer of all time
ToastOnBeans: @WonkyWillow You should watch their Stones of Ayor speedruns together. It’s just sexual tension all over the place.
WonkyWillow: I don’t like those games. I thought this was supposed to be a cozy gaming channel.
HadTrash93: SMBC all the way, Oddly. I can’t stand the powdered sugar crap.
“What I can’t believe is how many customers want chocolate cupcakes.” I don’t know how much longer I can do this. “Vanilla is so much better, hands down.”
BallsOfAyor: I knew you were shit at SOA. You just got your boyfriend to play it for you and then pretended you knew shit.
It’s like my first speedrun all over again. The dickish gamer bros coming into my streams to harass me, while I’m just trying to sell cupcakes.
HadTrash93: Balls, why don’t you go fondle yourself somewhere else.
BallsOfAyor: I wasn’t planning to stick around for this gay shit anyway
BallsOfAyor: Also chocolate cupcakes are way better
“Well, that answers that,” I find myself saying aloud. “Vanilla it is.”
You would think that, after a week, the internet would have lost interest in our relationship status, given how many stupid things people have said on Twitter since then—and yes, I refuse to call it anything other than Twitter—but apparently not.
It’s not just the trolls bothering me, either. They are bad enough, but the people who seem invested in all of this are just as annoying. It feels like no matter what I do, I’ll be disappointing someone.
Some think that we should do joint streams every week.
Some think that I should stop doing joint streams with him at all.
Some think I should play more Stones of Ayor on my channel, while others think I should never play it on stream again.
Some want me to convince Damien to show his face on camera.
Some can’t understand why we’re together because I’m “not even that hot.”
Some want me to divulge personal information about him, like his real name or birthday or shoe size—but I don’t think they were talking about shoes.
Some want me to “just shut up about him already, for fuck’s sake.
” Some want to know when we’re getting married.
Some want to know if I’m pregnant because I have That Glow about me.
And, as it turns out, Damien wasn’t the only one who remembered me mentioning my asexuality on stream a few years ago.
“I knew you were lying about being ace to get attention. You’re not queer.”
Well, that one hit somewhere too personal for me to stand. I almost started crying on my Monday night stream, and I didn’t even have the excuse of Cloud Quest this time.
First of all, I don’t think I’ve ever claimed to be queer—even though Victory assured me, back in university, that there is an A behind that + in LGBTQ+—but the idea that I would somehow lie about being ace for attention?
Given that I only mentioned it once or twice in my streams, ages ago, and haven’t brought it up since.
Given that it has been a source of anxiety for me since I learned the word in high school.
Given that I’m still not a hundred percent sure what it even means.
Given that I’m still not a hundred percent sure who I even am.
Even if—and that’s a big if—I’m completely, a hundred percent allosexual after all, I still never lied about it. I said the thing that was my truth at the time.
And what would I have to gain from doing so? It’s not exactly something to brag about. I don’t experience sexual attraction the way that almost every other human does, aren’t I cool? I don’t get it. If anything, it only ever made me feel like there was something wrong with me.
I’ve googled things. Words like demisexual and graysexual and asexual grayromantic and everything in between. The more I try to narrow it down to a word that fits perfectly, the more my head starts to explode.
And the last thing I want is to draw attention to any of this, let alone lie about it to get attention.
The comments on Damien’s streams have been even worse, though. Yesterday, someone told him they hope this doesn’t mean he’s going to start playing the fruity games that I play on his streams now.
He didn’t let that one slide.
“You know what, I think tomorrow I might do something a little different,” he said at the time. “Just for kicks.”
Packing up orders in the shop today takes longer than I expected, but I manage to make it back to my apartment in time to catch the second half of his stream this afternoon. He told me that he was going to play Cloud Quest on his channel for the first time ever, and I didn’t entirely believe him.
But he’s doing it.
He’s playing freaking Cloud Quest in front of a hundred thousand bros who just wanted to watch him chop down doomstalkers with a giant axe—given that he finally retired Charles and started a new SOA4 game for his streams a couple weeks ago.
The comments are surprisingly tame.
SammyIsMyBaby: This is so cute I can’t even
KarlachsBitch: You missed one of the red flowers down by the river
ToastOnBeans: Yeah, you’re gonna have to do another pass of that whole area
“I’m in no rush, guys,” he replies, as calm as he always is, whether he’s steering a gentle cloud or decapitating doomers. “We’re just here to chill today.”
At least, most of the comments are tame.
BallsOfAyor: Dude this is so gay
Damien’s head turns slightly, like he’s reading the chat, while his thumbs keep steering with the controller as the cloud continues on its leisurely way through the sky. “Hmm. Is it?”
BallsOfAyor: This is the gayest shit you’ve ever done
He snorts derisively. “I’ve literally sucked a guy’s dick, so no, I don’t think this is the gayest thing I’ve ever done,” he says offhand, but then his grip tightens on the controller, like he just realized that he said that out loud.
He’s never mentioned on his streams that he’s bi—I’ve seen almost every single one, and it was still news to me when he told me.
He’s usually very careful about not sharing anything personal.
No one knows his name or what he looks like or where he lives, and until last week, no one knew anything about his love life.
And, oh.
The shitstorm that descends at that moment.
Not all of it is negative, exactly—ToastOnBeans is thrilled, saying they could tell he played for both teams—but most of it is awful. Or at the very least, not very respectful. Prying. Judging. Teasing.
And he ignores it. All of it.
He continues the rest of the stream like nothing even happened. He still checks the chat and responds to things that are relevant to the game—or at the very least, that are not about him—and it finally clicks for me what he’s doing now:
Of course he’s not ignoring the trolls because he condones their behaviour. But he’s not taking the high road, either, like he’d told me he was.
He’s hiding.
Because anything he could say now would be too personal. Taking a stand on anything would be giving too much away. People would see him. The real him.
The thing is, he can hide his face and his name and his personal life as much as he wants, but the real him has always been there. In his jokes, in his laugh, in his play style, in his details. I’ve always been able to see the real him, even when my pride had me trying to deny it.
I don’t think I fell in love with him when we were in his bed. I don’t think I fell in love with him when we first kissed, or when I first wanted to kiss him. It wasn’t even when we first met; it wasn’t love at first sight.
It was love before first sight.
I think I’ve been in love with him for a long time.