If I Love You Was A Promise

First Contact (Syrah's POV)

It was all happening a little too quickly. One second, I'm nervously checking my email, then I'm trying desperately to avoid seeing the first message. A few days pass by, but my pen pal never wrote. All that passed through my mind that night was "What if they don't respond in the next two days? What happens to them, or better yet, what happens to me?" All I knew was that it wouldn't be my fault if he didn't. But then again, who would believe me if I said that.

The day finally came. I got an email saying, "Immediately enter your pen pals' number in your phone, today you need to get to know each other tomorrow the real game begins." shortly after, before I could even type the number into my phone, I got an email. Not just any email, The email. For a minute I sit there, just staring at the screen, dumbfounded. Then I snap back to reality and open the email. It read "Hi... are you 8963...?" I replied, "Yeah I guess so, if that's the number that they gave me." As I sent the message, I felt my face light up, and I thought to myself, "That's weird..." But I had no time to dwell on that. I had to send more messages so we would be done for the day, so the next thing I sent them was, "I'm going to assume you're number 8327?" They replied sort of vaguely, but I guess that makes sense, as the whole premise of this game is to not say or do anything personal. The only responses I received after that were just yes or no, so there was nothing to worry about anymore.

I will admit that it is kind of surprising that I'm the one doing most of the talking, because I am not very good when it comes to being social. I'm what you call anti-social, and I really wish I wasn't, that's just how I was born.

After a few hours pass, I realize we've sent five messages for the day. "My pen pal doesn't seem to be very social either huh." I said in my head as I went to take a nap. I wake up a few hours later, in a panic. I realize I'm late for school. I make my way downstairs, and almost get through the door when my mom looks at me with a worried look in her eyes and says, "Honey, you won't be going to school for the next twelve months you have to do it online. They want to make sure you email your pen pal on a regular basis, which means they won't be going either."

A look of shock fills my face. "So just because we were chosen for something that we didn't even want to do, our lives are changing completely." I said to myself. "This isn't fair, we didn't sign up for this, it was forced upon us." I thought. But no matter how angry it made me or how much I wanted to rebel, it wasn't worth it. That could mean death, and we both have families. Tears fill the bottom lip of my eyes started flooding with water. But I didn't cry. I didn't even make a sound. I just go up to my room and put my headphones on.

Just as I was about to close my eyes, my phone lit up. It was... 8963? Their message simply read "Sorry about earlier, my phone was going to die, and with there being no school they expect me to be at practice more often. I hope you didn't take my subtle messages seriously, and base me off of that." The tears in my eyes vanished, and all I could think about for the rest of that night was how to respond to that. "They're polite, they have manners, and they knew to explain themselves after they dismissed me. They don't seem too bad... but I'll still need to keep an eye out for them in the future. This seems promising, for now at least.