Sometimes, I catch myself wondering what Carter actually looks like, not in the vague way you wonder about a stranger online, but in the intimate, dangerous way your brain starts building someone into something they never promised to be. He’s been in my chat almost a year now. A constant that’s never once overstepped.

No late-night selfie fishing. No “accidental” thirst traps. Just hype messages, quiet check-ins, and that calm energy that makes you feel like you’re standing in the sun without realizing you were cold. He’s not like Ghost.

Ghost is sharp edges and antagonism, the kind of gamer who lives to poke at my soft spots and smirk when I snap. He’s friction, a dumb challenge. A chaos I’ve never been able to ignore.

But Carter? Carter is ease. He’s soft-spoken in messages and over-the-top in his support, but never in a way that feels performative. He notices things like when I’m off my game, when I laugh differently, when my hands shake just a little too much on stream. Sometimes that feels more intimate than any flirtation.

In my head, he’s got that unassuming kind of hot, the kind that doesn’t hit you until he smiles, and then it’s all over. Easy eyes. Soft grin. It’s ridiculous. We live fifty miles apart and have never shared a room, let alone a moment.

Sometimes, when the stream ends and the world is quiet, I find myself wondering what it would feel like to have that warmth in person. And if I’m being honest… maybe I don’t just want to meet him. Maybe I want to matter to him.

I shut my PC down, rub my eyes, and finally take a good look around my apartment. Yeah. It’s bad.

There’s an empty energy drink can teetering dangerously close to the edge of my desk, three plates stacked on my nightstand, and I’m pretty sure that’s a sock on my lamp shade for some reason.

How did I let it get this bad? Oh, right. Because I spent the whole weekend glued to my screen, screaming at strangers, and getting absolutely obliterated by a man in a neon mask.

I groan and shove away from my desk, rolling my shoulders as I stand. The second I do, my back cracks like I just aged twenty years, and I wince. “Okay, no more ten-hour gaming binges without breaks,” I mutter to myself, stepping over a pile of unfolded laundry on my way to the kitchen.

As soon as I grab a trash bag, my phone buzzes on the counter. Cassie.

I swipe to answer and put her on speaker. “Hey, I was just about to call you.”

“Bullshit, you were gonna sit in your own filth for at least another day before I bullied you into doing something about it.”