Hunter lay in bed and wished Mel was present. She was just, like, extremely cute. Very good to cuddle with. Frankly, it was very homophobic of the universe and geography and time that she wasn’t currently present in their bed.

They pulled up a picture of her and looked at it. Yes, confirmed. She was in fact very cute. Too cute, maybe? Cute to the extent that Hunter had an urge to attack her. But just, like, a light attack. Maybe a small amount of crushing via hugs. Just a little bit of earlobe nibbling.

Unfortunately, she was busy today. Hunter still wasn’t really clear on what she did to make money, except that she seemed to work from home and it involved the internet somehow. They had a sneaking suspicion that she had an OnlyFans or something, but that was kind of none of their business and they didn’t want to be nosey.

Unexpectedly, their phone buzzed. It was a Discord message, from the very girl they were pining for! 

 

melsalvia: hey qt i made u a youtube channel and uploaded to it

melsalvia: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQw4w9WgXcQ

BigGoron5: Oh! Thank you!

BigGoron5: V productive manager

melsalvia: <3

melsalvia: can u plug it on your twitter

BigGoron5: Sure! What’s it about

melsalvia: i edited down ur omegle vod

melsalvia: spiderman: into the omegleverse

melsalvia: wait for the joke to work do u know what omegaverse is lol

BigGoron5: Cursed

BigGoron5: yeah i watched a video essay about it

melsalvia: lmao

melsalvia: NERD

melsalvia: <3

melsalvia: imagine having an attention span longer than 5 minutes

melsalvia: couldnt be me

BigGoron5: Lol

BigGoron5: Oh sorry let me post on Twitter before I get distracted again

melsalvia: love 2 distract u

melsalvia: gotta be one of my top ten hobbies

 

Before getting dragged back into a conversation with a cutie, Hunter switched over to Twitter and posted a link to the video.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQw4w9WgXcQ I have a YouTube channel now! Thanks to my (very cute) manager Mel (@schrodingers_chastity_cage) for putting this together!

Glancing at their Twitter page, Hunter cringed a bit. The profile pic was still a photo of them making a dumb face, with short hair and no makeup.

Seeing the old photo made them feel a bit uncomfortable and unhappy, but did they want to change it? Maybe they could just, like, tune it out. But this brought them to a larger issue, which they decided to discuss with Mel.

 

BigGoron5: hey so seeing my Twitter kind of reminded me

BigGoron5: I’m not that happy with my current online presence. Feels like it doesn’t fit me any more

BigGoron5: But I’m conflicted about changing it. Might confuse people or lose brand recognition

BigGoron5: …No, that’s not the real thing I’m worried about

BigGoron5: I don’t want to have to explain myself to people. I don’t want weirdos coming out of the woodwork to get mad at me for existing and being probably not a cis man

BigGoron5: I don’t want a repeat of that donation message about my channel becoming too “political”

BigGoron5: I’m trying to gain viewers, not lose them

BigGoron5: Should I just not talk about gender or my personal life? It’s arguably none of my audience’s business

BigGoron5: But on the other hand maybe that’s the coward’s way out? And there’s so many people who seem to believe horrifying things about trans people and the media they consume only feeds into that

BigGoron5: Maybe as a very minor celebrity/public figure, I have a moral obligation to be openly trans

BigGoron5: If I even am trans

BigGoron5: All I really know is that I don’t want to be a guy any more

BigGoron5: God, this is all just so tiring

 

They didn’t get an immediate response, so they returned to limply lying face down on their bed, feeling vaguely self-pitying. Hugging a pillow was almost an acceptable substitute for cuddling with Mel. Almost.

After what felt like hours, they heard their phone vibrate. Slowly, they shifted from their comfortable grave and glanced at the messages.

 

melsalvia: o no! cutie!

melsalvia: im sorry i was busy with work/errand stuff

melsalvia: do u want to talk about it?

melsalvia: obviously in the end the decision is up to u! but maybe i can help give suggestions

melsalvia: personally i would be happier to see you feel comfortable fully being yourself online and on twitch

melsalvia: i can’t deny it, some people will probably be real shitty about that

melsalvia: but also those people suck and fuck them and if anything that’s more of a reason to do it

melsalvia: if you’re upsetting transphobes ur probably doing something right lol

melsalvia: do u want to talk or anything? Im free now, could hop on a voice call

melsalvia: or if u want to just not think about it for now i understand

melsalvia: and if that’s the case maybe i could help distract u

BigGoron5: Well u are a very good distraction <3

BigGoron5: sure we can call

BigGoron5 started a video chat

***