The Grey Sunrise || Leafnision

5//

*Time travels back to May*

It was May, still exam period for most middle and high schoolers. The whole atmosphere of the month was overflowing anxiety and stress for every single person out there. It was then that Leafy decided to finally stop ignoring his fans' pleads for a change and figured spicing up his content right before summer started was a dope idea. Lately his uploading schedule was inconsistent and so some weeks he would upload almost daily, while others he would barely make one to two videos. Since he was missing his fan base (and was running sorta low on money *coughs*) he figured it was time to focus more on YouTube and his fans. (It didn't last too long tho let's be real)

He sat himself down for at least a couple of hours thinking of something new and innovative, until it dawned on him. What's the easiest way to grab your subscribers' attention and attract more views? Drama of course. And who was the perfect person to start drama with? Someone equally hated by most people on YouTube, Onision. A few months ago, Calvin had promised his fans a new video on Onion-chan making the situation even more suiting.

The only obstacle, well besides the fact that Mr Cuckboy was almost as irrelevant as he was at this point, was trying to camouflage it as a comedy skit. After a lot of hours of thought and effort from Calvin (10 minutes tops), he finally finished his video and uploaded it to YouTube, titled: 'How to be Onision', the first episode of his new 'How to be' series. This new type of video was pretty special, it didn't quite fit the rant nor the commentary field, but rather something in between.

To Onision's eyes however, it didn't seem so much of an innocent video. After watching it he was aggravated, he felt betrayed once again. He suddenly burst off his chair in search of his phone and without thinking things through he opened twitter. His response was a tweet not directed to Leafy but to their mutual friend Billy the Fridge instead. He was the mediator, the middle ground, the only link between two oposites.

Him being emotional he got Billy involved in his and Leafy's drama and even started blaming him for this. It wasn't until Billy made a twitter video genuinely explaining his humble intentions and how he tried to get them to be friends, and bury the hatchet (despite the opposite outcome), that he realized it wasn't Billy's fault. Leafyisqueer, on the other hand, was sticking to his act and kept on mocking Onionboy, in hopes it would entertain the not so many fans he was left with. In all honesty, Leafy didn't really hate or have any personal grudges with Onision, the video was more of a business move after all. He figured by making it he would gain some views or even subscribes as well. Little did he know this had no effect on his channel whatsoever. If anything he gained more dislikes from Onision fans, not to mention he was starting to almost regret making the video and these tweets.

"Damn was I too harsh on cuckboy? Maybe I should dm him apologizing..." Leafy thought out loud. "Nah, fuck Onision, he can take some criticism. Everyone has the right to express their opinion anyway." He muttered while checking out Onion's angry tweets and continued teasing him. Deep down though, he still felt sorry for him to some extent.

--- (phone call between Onision and Lainey)

...
"What the hell is wrong with this guy?! Like there are only 7 youtubers in all of Washington state and leafy has to burn bridges that aren't even built yet"

"Maybe you should message and ask him yourself if you're so butt hurt."

"Are you insane? The guy clearly loves starting drama and bullying disabled people to get that YouTube revenue. Whenever he picks a victim he releases multiple videos recycling the same irrelevant points over and over again. Why should I waste my time on him?"

"Like you're one to talk. You've made a dozen videos on people before, plus being way more hurtful than he is..."

"Yeah but like... I mean...this is different."

"How exactly is it different Greg?"

"I uh...I make videos on people who deserve getting shit on and criticized, unlike that little snake, leafy who just makes fun of smaller channels than him. He thinks he's so great because he has 4 million subs and so it automatically makes it acceptable to shit on anyone. If anything it makes him look more of a douchebag and now that his views are down he's become a fucking joke."

"Well that was quite the rant, kinda ironic though cause he's way more relevant than you are. But what I've been wondering is why are you so obsessed with him?"

" Obsessed?! What? No! I'm not obsessed with him."

"From where I'm sitting looks like you've been talking about him constantly since he made the first video on you. And here you are now getting so worked up over this stupid new video he made on you. Like can't you just chill, making a video on someone doesn't mean you hate them in real life. Most of the time it's the opposite actually, I'm sure you'd agree."

"Look Lainey..." He sighed. "I can't have this conversation right now, ok? Let's talk some other time."

"Ok whatever you say."

"Thanks for trying to help."

"Anytime, Greg."

"Bye."

"See ya." And with that Onision hung up, carefully placing his cellphone on the glass coffee table in front of him and sighed, lying down on the black leather couch, lost in his thoughts. He sat there for a while until he realized he couldn't stay indoors for much longer if he didn't wanna completely lose his sanity and decided to go for a drive,since it was almost noon.

---

Calvin was about to make himself a drink when he realized he was short on coffee. He wasn't really in the mood to be outdoors but the sudden and striking need of caffeine in his system was enough to push him to grab his keys and exit the house. Besides, he could use some fresh air, well... as fresh as it can be, here in Seattle. After leaving his apartment building he started walking, heading for his favorite coffee shop only 3 blocks away from where he lived.

Once he reached the building, he went inside, sat alone in his usual table in the back of the shop, where there weren't as many customers and ordered his regular like each time. One thing however was out of the ordinary. Moments after his order arrived, he was greeted by the last person he could ever think of meeting, just entering the building. After processing things he realized this person was someone he knew all too well. It was the notorious Onision himself making eye contact with another YouTube sensation known as, leafyishere .

"Hey, I didn't expect to find you here." Onision said quite surprised as he walked closer to Leafy's table and proceeded to sit on the empty chair opposite to him, while placing his own order on their now shared table.

"Well fuck me, I sure didn't expect to ever see you here either." Leafy replied filled with numerous emotions.

And just like that they started talking to each other and having a conversation. Oddly, the only thing the two youtubers had in common (or at least the only thing they knew they had in common at the time) was only briefly discussed at that table. YouTube was a cause of stress for both of them, plus their YouTube personalities were in drama with each other, so they didn't wanna focus on that. They talked about all sorts of things, some of them being about gaming, movies, music, their exes and even opened up about their fucked up family lives. Greg about his relationship with his abusive father that got him into jail for a couple of days and in return Calvin shared, to a certain extent, about his drug addict parents and how he misses his two brothers that couldn't come with him here.

When a few hours had gone by they both had things to go to, so they split the check and before proceeding to head in their own directions, they exchanged numbers so they could continue their conversation. They started texting to each other the same afternoon and they kept talked regularly to each other. I'm August, though, due to both dealing with personal issues, they had kind of distanced from each other for a while but without losing the thought of one another in the back of their minds.

Little did they know they'd be meeting each other very soon, getting involved in a twisted situation that none of they could ever possibly imagine would happen...

_____________________________

Back with another chapter. I was originally intending to make this one the 4th chapter  but later changed it. This is sorta a flashback chapter that would normally go before the previous one but I went for the alternative option cause i posted //4 first but still wanted to include this one. Time will start moving forward soon so stay tuned!!