Met Online

Chapter 2

My phone buzzes on the coffee table next to me and I tear my gaze from my worn-out copy of Pride and Prejudice, which I've been finding comfort in for the last couple of hours. With one hand on the book, holding it open on page 137, I reach for the phone on the coffee table. The screen comes to life underneath my touch.

Kickster: New Messages (1)

With a slide of my thumb across the screen I unlock the phone and wait for the Kickster app to load.

Hero56 is requesting your friendship - do you wish to accept or deny?

My finger hovers over the screen as I hesitate to deny the pending friendship. My parents have warned me about pedophiles and strangers online enough times for me to know that sharing personal information with strangers online can have major consequences. But accepting a friend request on an app where the only name I go by is a, less creative, fictive username isn't exactly sharing personal information.

My logic sense has her lips pursed and arms crossed and she is shaking her head at me, while my curiosity is lurking in the shadows of my mind, intriguing me as she waves me over with a single finger and a sly smirk spread across her lips.

My curiosity ends up getting the best of me and before I have time to change my mind I press the green button on the screen.

Kickster: your friendship has been accepted.

My phones buzzes with a Kickster chat message before I have the chance to close the app and return to my book.

Hero56:hey, it read.

My insides are in the midst of a heavy debate, trying to decide whether or not to ignore the message or respond to it. But there is no point in ignoring his, seemingly innocent, message when I have already accepted his friend request.

Princess123: hi, I reply before I fold the corner of page 137 in the Jane Austen classic, creating a temporary bookmark. I place the book on the coffee table, next to my abandoned teacup.

Hero56:how are you? I cringe at the message. I hate that question, mainly because those who asks always does it out of politeness instead of genuine interest.

Princess123:I'm good, you? I tell him the same lie I always do when someone asks me how I am.

Hero56:I'm all right, he replies and then the conversation dies out.

My eyes flicker from my phone to my abandoned book and back to the screen again. As relieved as I am that the stranger hasn't taken the conversation any further, there is an undeniable itch of curiosity tearing at my insides and it prevents me from stopping my fingers as they run across the touch screen, forming a new chat message to the stranger.

Princess123:do I know you? I ask.

Hero56:no. I stare at the message in silence, touching the screen now and then to keep it from going black, as I rake my mind for a suitable reply.

Princess123:then why did you add me?

Hero56:why not? He replies.

The guy is starting to freak me out. The way he is avoiding my questions makes me nauseous and the fact that I don't know him makes me feel like I'm being set up for a joke. But the ache in my heart, created by Samantha and Hannah, needs nursing and I'm desperate need for some kind of attention to keep my mind off of all of the evil thoughts strolling around in my mind.

Princess123:that's not an answer. I pull my bottom lip between my teeth as I wait for his reply, but when he doesn't reply I realize that I have to be the one to push the conversation further - again.

Princess123:where did you find me?

Hero56:luck, he finally replies. I pull the blanket further around me, so that it covers my entire body from my chin and all the way down to my toes, as if it's a shield that's going to protect me from the discomfort I feel whenever the stranger avoids my questions.

Princess123:I don't believe in luck, I type and hit send. I keep close watch of the screen as the message spirals out into the never-ending world of the Internet.

Hero56:then lets call it faith.

Princess123:I don't believe in that either and even if I did it wouldn't be a proper answer, I tell him.

Hero56: demanding, are we? His messages is starting to remind me of a crime show, where they were once trying to catch a serial killer who found his victims in online chat rooms. Maybe accepting a stranger wasn't such a good idea after all.

Princess123:don't change the subject, I reply before I reach for the television remote on the coffee table. I long for the comfort that I know the background noises of the TV will provide. But as I stretch across the couch, reaching for the remote, my phone buzzes in my lap and I end up knocking over my half full cup of tea. The ceramic cup survives but the tea creates a pool of brown liquid on the living room floor.

I throw my phone at the foot of the couch and jump to my feet. I run for the kitchen to retrieve anything that can clean up the mess I've made. I settle on a roll of paper towels. When the tea pool is cleaned up I have used up almost the entire roll and I end up having to walk two times to the garbage can in the kitchen in order to discard of the stack of wet paper towels, because I can't carry all of them at the same time.

In the midst of my tea pool cleaning madness I have forgotten everything about Hero, the stranger, and our Kickster chat. But as soon as I take a seat on the couch again, out of breath and sweaty from my desperate attempts to clean up all of the tea before it could damage the floor, my phone buzzes again, making the whole couch vibrate like a mini earthquake is taking place on one of the cushions.

Hero56:your name was on the suggested list.

Princess123:so you decided to chat with a stranger? The idea seems so absurd.

Hero56:why not? I needed a distraction. Funny - that was the exact same reason that I had originally created my Kickster account: because I needed a distraction from my life and every shitty thing going on in it. Well that and because Taylen had basically forced me to join the online social site.

Princess123: a distraction from what? I'm afraid that I will have to wait for his response, but it doesn't take much more than thirty seconds before my phone buzzes with another chat message.

Hero56: a distraction from life, he reply and with those four words all of my discomfort toward him seems to vanish like the sun on a cloudy day.