Virtual Attraction [COMPLETE]

3| Chatroom Troll

I didn't see Mom again until the next day. 11:23 am, there she was sitting on a kitchen chair beside the island, skimming through a newspaper article about whale extinction.

"Hi, mom" I said, hesitantly, not sure how far I should push the button.

"Did you eat the waffles --"

"Blaze," my mom interrupted. "I heard you sneaking around last night."

"This is my house too, am I not supposed to live here just because you're entertaining your never-ending list of boyfriends?"

"I asked you very nicely to stay away."

I could sense an impending fight between us, and I didn't want to ruin my new, blissful mood. Ignoring her question, I hastily served myself some pepperoni pizza from the oven and raced upstairs.

I heard her call after me, "Come back here! Stop running from confrontation." But, I slammed my bedroom door, hard, not willing to listen.

No matter what my mother said, there were no excuses for her behavior.

After showering and dressing in my Hello Kitty pajamas, I read some more of Love on A Secluded Island. I had already read the novel dozens of times but this time, as I was reading, my mind couldn't focus on the words in front of me. It kept shifting towards the Fable website. I wanted to read some of the other submissions and see if anyone left a comment on my story.

I went to the Fable website, there was a comment on my contest submission.

Aw, this was sad. I hate her friends. Nice job. -KittyRocksLuv91

I scrolled through the other contest stories that had hundreds of comments. Most of them even had about a thousand reads or more. There was zero chance of me winning the contest, but at least someone had liked my work.

Thank you, I replied.

For the rest of Saturday, and all of Sunday, I spent my time on Fable since I didn't have to go to work this weekend. At first, I was just reading all the amazing stories, some that had millions of reads, others that had only a few.

Eventually, I got an urge to write some more of the story I'd used to enter the Fable contest, remembering how much I'd enjoyed writing it before. One person had liked it apparently, so it mustn't be that bad.

I pulled out my laptop and began writing. I didn't have a set plot, everything that was coming out was impromptu and unplanned.

Quickly, I remembered what I had enjoyed about writing the contest. It felt like my characters were my friends—like I had a special connection to Wesley and Fern. Wesley appreciated Fern, when it seemed no one else in their school did—especially since Fern had lost all her friends. Fern had a sort of shield around her that was hard to break into, and seemed that only Wesley could.

I related to Fern's fiery personality and witty humor, and fell in love with her cute, younger sisters who admired and respected their older sister. I wished that Fern's parents were mine, that I had a goofy, embarrassing father who shows up to school in long, woolly socks in the middle of summer; or a mother who was there.

"I could start fires for what I feel for you." – Unknown

Monday came with a blaze of shock.

My temples thrummed with an angry pulse, protesting the dim light in the long subway ride I had been on for the past hour. I reached over the Hello Kitty sheets of my bed, and pulled out my old, worn laptop and typed in the familiar url, that never failed to bring comfort. www.Fable.com.