“Are you stalking me?”

After answering the call from the number that at this moment I am absolutely positive belongs to Koi, these are the first words I hear.

To be honest with you, I’m not quite sure this is what I expected all this suspense to come to. I hope you didn’t either, I want you guys to be rooting for me here.

“I’m not stalking you!”

“That’s something a stalker would say.”

This kind of circular reasoning won’t get us anywhere, Koi!

“I called Sakura and she gave me your phone number; I promise I didn’t do anything nefarious or shady!”

This number was acquired through completely legitimate means, a fact of which I am very proud. This boy has had so much character development recently, I’ll have you know!

“You’re… you’re really not helping your case here; you know that Akira?”

I guess character development is out the window, it seems Koi may not see me asking her sister for her number as a completely legitimate form of acquisition.

My eyes dart around the room, first to the computer screen showing a very Mayu-less stream background, then to my prized figure of the Queen herself.

What a life hack! If there is no Mayu on-stream, I can look at Mayu off-stream. Never question the will of a down bad hikikomori.

“Your silence is incriminating.”

Oh, that’s right. Sorry, Mayu – I’m just getting berated by a crazy girl I spent like three chapters trying to get the number for.

At this point, I’m probably more of a masochist than any of those warriors “looking after” the stream while Mayu is away right now.

“I’m completely innocent here. If you want to be mad at anyone, be mad at Sakura – she gave it to me!”

That’s right, Akira, be the bigger person. Throw her younger sister under the bus.

“I know that girl well, like she is my own flesh and blood; I can’t imagine she would have given you my number willingly.”

Like she is your own flesh and blood? She is your own flesh and blood! Why are you always trying to spout cool anime lines when they don’t even fit into context?

I laugh under my breath.

“I’ll have you know; I beat her fair and square! No trickery needed.”

Okay, I’m going to admit. That may not have come out the way I intended.

“You really are trash, you know that?”

I deserve that one.

“While that may be true and there are probably many people in my discord that can attest to that fact, I believe that’s neither here nor there in this case.”

“If you keep spouting bullshit then I’m going to be neither here nor there nor freaking anywhere around you at this point. Why did you call me?”

Halfway through the chapter and we are finally getting to the point of this conversation.

Despite her words, her voice is relatively calm – as if she’s either so used to giving out lashings like this that it doesn't even raise her heart rate even a little, or maybe she’s not as annoyed as wants to be. In the end, it works for me because as a Mayu superfan, I’m used to these too!

What a pair we make.

Shut up, just shut up Akira.

I take a deep breath in; I know what to say, I called because I wanted to talk to you… Wait, no. I called because I wanted to hang out with you… No, that’s not right. I called because I think we should hang out?

“I called because.”

Shit.

Silence – The phone hangs up.

Those were not my finest minutes, that I will admit.

My eyes fixate on a singular pixel on my computer screen, I’m not sure if that’s even possible but they’re doing it. I am a pixel, I am that pixel, nothing can hurt me now that I’m a pixel.

As Mayu returns to the screen, the pixel changes, it fades, it disappears, I disappear. Or maybe I have just assimilated into the great Demon Queen of Moe.

“Sorry about the delay, everyone. I spotted some vermin that needed to be squished on my way back to you guys – it took a little longer than anticipated.”

Her joke cheers me up a little and lets me get out of my funk. I resume watching her stream as I get a notification on my phone, another message from Koi.

“I hate you.”

So harsh, so painful.

My hurt feelings merge with my fingertips just like how that pixel version of me assimilated with Mayu.

“If you knew that conversation was going to be so pointless then why did you even answer the phone?”

Now that I’ve written it, that kind of sounds a bit whiny.

I stretch back in my chair with my arms held high above my head until I hear the audible crack of my twenty-three-year-old (but nearly geriatric) lower back.

“I know you may already realize that everything you do, say or even think is completely useless, but that doesn’t mean the rest of us do.”

I stare at my phone screen as it lies way above my head, firmly grasped in my hand. Slowly I lower it – pulling the phone closer and closer to my face as I do so.

It’s practically touching my nose as I analyze the text.

I think that in a way, in some really weird and strange way, this is a compliment.

If I rephrase this and take away the insults, she’s basically saying she doesn’t think everything I do is useless.

Although, that is a low bar, even for me.

Pulling my phone down from my face, I quickly type my response.

“What kind of not useless thing did you expect me to need to talk to you about?”

Maybe Koi is on the same page as me, it would make sense that the reason she picked up the phone knowing it was me meant that she intended to talk to me. Koi didn’t have my number, after all, so even if she wanted to hang out again, she wouldn’t have been able to call me – I just solved a riddle that neither of us could have until now.

I can only see this as an absolute win.

“Idk. I thought maybe my mum had died or something.”

My agitated brain doesn’t even have enough time to both think something snarky and write something different but also snarky in tandem.

“I really don’t think that I’d be the one relaying that information to you, don’t ya think?”

Just when I think that we’re on the same page... This girl will be the death of me.

My phone vibrates but I’m almost too afraid to look at what other ridiculous crap she will spew off at me next.

“LOL. True, idk maybe your mum died or something then.”

I see this as only marginally better than the previous text message and I find the sudden switch to text speech while discussing such a macabre topic to be quite distasteful. I’m sure our readers do too.

At this point, I can’t tell if Koi is the one with the humour of a twelve-year-old or the author is.

I spin around in my chair as I respond to her message – maybe getting dizzy will make this situation somehow more bearable. There is no logic behind it, but I have nothing to lose at this point.

“I really don’t think you’re the first person I would message about that if it happened!”

“I’m a little hurt, but okay.”

Really? After all of this and you’re the one who is hurt?

I mutter angry rumblings under my breath, something about the number of intolerable conversations I’ve had to have recently, maybe also something about being called a salesperson. Who can know at this point?

“DO YOU WANT TO HANG OUT?”

I hope she doesn’t take it like I’m yelling at her, but somehow, I just need to break through this crap and just say what I came here to say. At this point, I’m not sure even if I care whether she says yes or no.

Just end my suffering, please.

“YES BUT WHY ARE WE TALKING IN CAPS LOCK”

Okay… turns out I do care whether she says yes or no.