“...and with that I’m signing off guys! Thanks for another good night!” Esme Jeanne waved to the camera and shut down her stream, her eyes briefly glancing over the best wishes of her viewers and fans alike. She unplugged her webcam and microphone before shutting down her computer entirely. Part of her thought she was being paranoid, but far too many of her friends had their computers hacked and personal lives doxxed recently.
Her phone buzzed by her end-table showing a text from Em making her exhaustion slide away. When she pictured them smiling at her and laughing awkwardly, trying to muster up the courage to ask her out. “We only need to keep the act up a little longer.” she reminded herself, thinking of the tournament at the end of Tact-Con where they would finally go public with both Em’s identity and their relationship.
She reached over to see the text when she heard someone knocking at the door.
“Hey can we talk Esme? You're done streaming right?”
Her eyebrows furrowed, frustrated at the voice of Em’s friend and tag-along. She contemplated just not replying but knew he’d just stay out there pounding at the door. Patience and understanding had never been his virtues. She got up and opened the door just slightly to him, his clothes were messy and his hair unwashed. He was every attribute of a traditional shut-in nerd, an out of place stereotype in the professional gaming scene.
“I just got off stream, it’s four in the morning. What do you want?” She’d meant to keep her frustrations out of her voice but she wanted to get some rest. If the match hadn’t gone into overtime she would have finished up her stream hours ago.
He nodded awkwardly, tapping his foot and shifting his posture like a squirming rodent. “It’s about Emily, I think she’s gonna do something really stupid and we’re her friends so I figured we should talk to her about it.”
Holding back an angry retort at Em’s misnaming and misgendering, Esme opened up to the door to her hotel seeing his obvious concern. The situation wasn’t super difficult to understand after-all, though Em denied it on multiple occasions. This boy had been crushing on Em for almost ten years, working closely together as a team on the esports stage and as friends in life the entire time. They evolved together going from small local events to the national stage always as a pair even while others rotated out.
Esme thought to herself with a sigh, “Well I guess I can try and break it to him gently. He’ll be pissed for a bit but he is still Em’s friend. He’ll just have to get over it.”
She gestured for him to sit down and grab a cup of coffee before going back to quickly typing out a message to Em. She started to say she was talking to James but thought better of it, no need to create needless confusion before the finals match. “Some idiot snuck past security and I gotta kick him out, I’ll call you in a min hun :) <3 “
“Who are you texting?” James asked suspiciously.
She rolled her eyes, facing away from him before setting her phone back on her night stand. “So what are you freaking out about?”
He shot a glare at her before taking a sip of his coffee and setting it down. “I think Emily is trying to run away with someone before the finals.” He stared at her, acting like he dropped a bomb that was supposed to blow her away.
She looked back in confusion, surprise for a few minutes before it clicked that he was speaking seriously, and she suddenly burst out laughing. He began to interject before she raised her hand up in mercy and took a drink of her water. They sat in silence for a few minutes as her giggling came to a stop. “Oh my god James, I really need that laugh, honest. It was a long stream and I can always appreciate some good humor.”
She looked back at him and realized that his face was contorted in a barely controlled bout of frustration , suddenly the atmosphere grew serious again and any hint of humor evaporated. “Fuck man, are you serious? Think about what you’re saying. That game addict who won’t even take a stupid baghead disguise off quitting for someone? Can’t we talk about why that actually annoys you.”
He started to reply before shaking his head. “I know what you're trying to say and you can stop right there. I only care about the match. You're her friend. I thought you would try and help her, not make jokes!” He slammed his fist down on the table making her flinch back just a little.
She took a deep breath while the air grew cold and she exchanged a tense look with him before deciding to cautiously trust him while slowly moving back towards her phone. “Look I just think… I just want you to take a breath OK? I know you're concerned about them I understand…”
“Her. I’m concerned about her.” He shook his head while taking a deep breath, his voice dropped to something methodical and emotionless. In his hand he was flipping some kind of box in his hand before slipping on black latex gloves. Esme could feel her heart begin to race as she eyed her phone and the door which suddenly looked miles away as she realized he had at some point put himself before it.
She reached out to her phone slowly as she quickly typed out the code to security while facing him. “Hey what’s that…” She pointed at the little plastic box with an antenna sticking out of it, her voice shaky fearing any answer he could possibly give her, as he took slow and heavy steps forwards, the small distance between them growing ever tighter and claustrophobic.
“I know you’ve been trying to get her to spend more time offline. You’ve been distracting her. It took me a while to figure it out, I mean were both her friends right? You probably had good intentions, I’m sure they’re a nice person but we’re a team. Just Emily and I. I didn’t want things to come to this. I hope you know that. You are just a problem. One that needs rectifying.”
He was up close to her, and panic was starting to roar loudly in Esme’s head. Security should have been here by now. Fans really were unable to break in and confront the famous actors and gamers alike who gathered here and security was always fast to respond if an emergency call was dialed out.
“I really…” She swallowed her nerves and glared back down at him making him take a momentary step back. “I have no idea what you're talking about. They really are my friend, which is more than can be said for a creepy asshole like you!” The repressed anger was quickly burning out her caution and he flinched like her words had physically slapped him.
“You’re just some whiny prick who they picked up at some local tournament years back and has tagged along ever since. Your crush is so pathetic you don’t even see it yourself, even if everyone else does. You want to know who she’s dating? It’s me-” Before she could say anything else, a heavy metal object swung against the side of her head. It sent her plummeting to the ground like a sack of potatoes, spraying blood and brain matter across the walls.
“I know. I just didn’t want to believe it.” He mutters quietly as he knelt down and gingerly closed her eyes. “Were friends after all Esme.”
He closed his eyes softly and said a prayer for her before switching off the signal jammer he’d activated earlier. He sat in silence, contemplating for a few minutes until his phone vibrated, showing a call from his closest friend, teammate, and his partner.
“Hey you! How’s practice going? That’s great to hear, yea I’ve been doing some practice matches with the adaptive AI and as far as I can tell the Kingmaker strategy should be full proof. Raging-Cactus? Oh, sorry I've been online too late lately, you mean Esme? She just got off stream, didn’t she? I think I had it running in the background, I haven't heard from her like I said, I’ve been uploading for the last couple of hours. Some crazy fan? Ehh, sounds sketchy, well don’t worry about it and keep practicing, you’re our star we can’t let you be distracted. Give me a few minutes and I’ll go and check on her. Hey, don’t worry about it Emily, were partners right?"
