☆ ☆ ☆
"Can I get you anything else, @Yuu? An extra pillow? Blanket? Something to drink?"
A tall, dark-haired man was standing at the door.
There was a concerned tone in the man's voice as he called Xiao Jinyu (萧晶玉) by his online alias, but everything about those words felt alien and unfamiliar. Nobody called him that in real life. Some people at his university referred to him as "Jin", "Jinyu", or even "Jim", but Yuu didn't like any of those names. "Yuu" (愈) — which meant "to heal" — was a nickname that he had chosen as a teenager, mainly because he only ever played clerics in MMORPGs. Over the years, it had stuck as a central piece of his digital identity.
But this wasn't the Internet or the virtual world.
All of this was real life.
Less than an hour ago, Yuu had helplessly followed this man into an unfamiliar apartment in a low-income neighborhood in New York City. Public subsidized housing surrounded all sides of this run-down apartment complex, and the streets bubbled with the language of diverse ethnic minorities that Yuu didn't understand.
The man was very large — easily over six feet tall — with tanned skin the color of burnt ivory. The height difference was enormous, and Yuu cowered underneath his shadow like a tiny rabbit. As a 22-year-old Chinese national, Yuu wasn't very tall by American standards. He had recently graduated from college, but he was often mistaken for a high school student. In this particular neighborhood, Yuu's oriental heritage stood out like a sore thumb.
"Yuu? Are you alright?" The towering giant repeated, a worried expression on his face.
His presence felt incredibly familiar yet contradictorily alien. It felt like Yuu had known him for years, but his friend was wearing a different skin and a different face. It was disorienting to suddenly reconcile the difference in mental imagery.
They were supposed to be close friends.
They had never met offline before, and they hadn't even spoken on the phone.
Today was the first time they met in person.
Yuu nodded quietly, withdrawn and hopelessly awkward.
@Vesper — his real name was Rohan Nahdi — was nearly a decade older than Yuu. The age gap had never felt so apparent when they chatted behind the anonymity of their computer screens, and it was much easier to melt into the fantasy of their digital personas on the Internet. They had basically known each other for nearly four years. In fact, @Vesper was one of Yuu's closest online friends.
They messaged each other nearly constantly on Discord and Final Fantasy Online.
They were even married in some of the MMORPGs that they played together.
It was a little jarring to finally meet him in real life.
Yuu was just slightly shell-shocked.
...Only slightly.
Somehow, he ended up in his virtual boyfriend's apartment.
...Except neither of them were exactly the same as their online personas.
☆ ☆ ☆
Rohan was leaning against the doorway to the living room with his arms crossed.
He looked concerned.
"Yuu?" He said with a frown. "The past few days must have been a whirlwind... just let me know if I can do anything, okay?"
The 22-year-old international student was sitting stiffly on the couch clutching his backpack in his chest.
There was a complicated expression on Yuu's face.
"Sorry... for dumping all of this on you." Yuu whispered with a hoarse voice.
"Don't apologize. You're my friend. I don't give a damn about ICE1U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). Deportation officers arrest immigrants for violations of U.S. immigration law, monitor cases during deportation proceedings, supervise released immigrants, and remove immigrants from the United States. and federal agents. Donald Trump can go to hell."
"I don't want to get you in trouble."
Technically, they were breaking the law, and Yuu didn't mean to drag Rohan into this.
He was supposed to have gotten on a plane back to China forty-eight hours ago. Yuu's student visa from college had expired, and he hadn't been able to get it extended. United States immigration law had gotten increasingly strict in recent years, especially for individuals of Chinese and Indian origin, and there was a hard cap on the number of H1B visas approved every year. Due to restrictive quotas, it could take up to a decade for applicants from certain asian countries to obtain a green card. A vast majority of applications were denied.
For that matter, Yuu was a liberal arts student.
It was extremely hard for an arts student to pass the screening process. The H1B visa program favored foreign workers with technical, engineering, or scientific expertise, which definitely did not apply to fine arts major like Yuu. Ordinarily, international students like Yuu simply had to give up and return to their home countries after graduating from school.
However, going back to China was absolutely out of the question for Yuu.
It was a... complicated... situation.
He couldn't go back.
☆ ☆ ☆
Yuu felt self-conscious.
Rohan was staring at him, but the towering man didn't remark at all about his appearance.
It was an obvious elephant in the room, yet Yuu wasn't sure if if his best friend was simply being polite by not mentioning it. In the digital world, Yuu mainly used female avatars and female pronouns, and he was Rohan's 'wife' in a number of games that they used to play. Of course, Rohan had known about Yuu's gender issues nearly since the beginning, and he never seemed bothered by it.
'You are you.' @Vesper had told him years ago. 'This is just a game, anyways.'
Rohan saw their digital relationship as roleplay, in other words.
This was something that Yuu had accepted a long time ago.
It was actually incredibly relieving to know it wasn't serious, and it allowed Yuu to indulge himself without fear of hurting Vesper's feelings. The virtual world was a place where Yuu could enjoy a self-contained fantasy. When he opened his Internet browser, he didn't have to worry about mixing his real life issues with his online persona.
For the past four years, this digital space had been incredibly precious to him.
Now, that fragile virtual illusion was in danger of crumbling apart.
☆ ☆ ☆
Rohan sighed and walked over to the kitchen table.
"I have to go to work," he said emotionlessly.
"Mh." Yuu nodded and squeezed his legs into his chest tighter.
It was nine o'clock in the evening. Rohan worked multiple part time jobs, many of which were night shifts.
"Just get some rest, okay? We can talk later."
"Stay safe..."
"Thanks. Goodnight."
