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staqqoverflo · 6 years

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Poppy

A short story.

I always wanted to get injured and have everyone feel sorry for me.

I’m sure you’ve thought of it too, right? Everybody has. I thought it would be great, anyway, until it actually happened to me.

Here I was, twenty years old, hospitalized for the first time in my sheltered life. I can hardly recall the details now, but I’ll tell you this: it was the most boring kind of accident imaginable, and the subsequent sorrows weren’t even all that heavy. I was out for a walk at night when I got hit by a motorcycle. I hurt my arm and it would take a couple weeks of paperwork, bills and rehab before I could return to my life, but all in all, it could have been much worse.

As it turns out, having people feel sorry for you is overrated. Of course my family and some of my peers from college sent me their worries and gifts at the beginning, but it’s not like I was ill or dying. Everybody knew I would be fine, and the only thing I gained from this was isolation from my normal life. A free ticket to lay in bed all day, read, and play games on my phone. With meals provided.

When the concerned text messages shifted from worried curiosity to colorless updates on how much work I was missing out on, I decided to do something despicable. Since I had no desire to go back to that world, I chose to arbitrarily extend my hospital stay. It would end up costing a stupid fortune, but in that moment, it felt like nothing else mattered.

Of course, there was no real reason to keep staying at the hospital since my rehab was complete and I was back in shape, but I chose to stay for an extra month. This resulted in me missing out on the rest of that semester of university which, of course, was my goal.

Yeah, I’m a piece of trash. This has already been established by this point for you, I’m sure. But even if the bland hospital life wasn’t all that flashy and nobody really felt sorry for me, I had it good. After all, my place at the hospital had basically become my new dorm room. I could read books and watch TV without anybody bothering me apart from the occasional nurse. And I didn’t have to study, go to class, or do any work. Here I was, a more-or-less healthy and healed person, using their hospital room as an excuse to hide from the real world.

I’m human scum. Whatever. But that’s besides the point, because what actually ended up happening during that last month would forever leave its mark on me.

Every day late in the afternoon, I made it a habit to leave my room and spend some time in the large common area where patients could relax and have a snack. The area had large windows that overlooked the metropolis that I was quietly hiding from, and I would sit down at the tables by those glass windows and eat cheap junk from the vending machines nearby. I considered it dumb fun to just try new treats from the vending machines and look out the windows while I ate. Sometimes, I would bring some paper from my room and fold origami there as well.

On weekends it wasn’t rare for this area to be populated with patients and their visiting families, but on most days, it was actually pretty empty, especially in the evening. Every now and then other patients would hang out in this area during the week and accompany me, but I would never get to know any of them since they would come and go every few days. It was lonely, but I thought I liked it that way.

I was convinced for a while that I was probably the only long term guest there until I realized that one of the other patients, a young girl in a wheelchair who I guessed was my age, also started to linger in the common room. I had seen her passing through the area a few times before, but it was after I chose to extend my stay that I really began to see her there. I quietly ignored her despite awkwardly making eye contact here and there, thinking she was just another one of the faces that would just disappear one day soon, but I was wrong.

I was sitting in my usual spot, folding paper cranes by the window, when one day, she quietly wheeled herself next to me.

“Hey,” she said. “Can’t you fold anything other than paper cranes?”

“No,” I said, trying to be polite but slightly taken aback. “These are actually the only thing I know how to make.”

I looked away and attempted to finish folding the crane I was working on.

“Hey,” she said again. “You should try making a flower.”

“That sounds hard. I don’t think I could do that.”

“Oh come on,” she said, still being a little pushy. “It’s probably really easy. Just look it up on your phone or something, you’re looking at it all the time anyway.”

This girl is weird, I thought. Why is she talking to me? And why is she being so mean? Wait, was she watching me before?

She scoffed and turned around, rolling herself away and out of the common room.

I intended to shrug all of this off, but for whatever reason, I felt compelled to show her up. So that night, I looked up some origami guides on my phone, just like she said, and practiced diligently.

The next day I was in the common room at my usual spot, at the usual time. I saw her wheel herself into the room and try to avoid me at first, but this time, I approached her.

“Here,” I said, my arms outstretched.

She picked up the shoddy origami flower from my palms and brought it to her eyes.

“Jeez,” she said. “You kind of suck. You got it all wrong...”

“Seriously?! I did what you wanted, and you’re not even happy?”

“Calm down,” she said, smiling for the first time in reaction to my burst of energy. “It’s not all that bad. You did okay for a first attempt.”

“Just ‘okay!?’ I spent an hour watching videos on how to make that. What’s your deal?”

She laughed, and then wheeled herself over to the large window, staring out into it. I joined her.

“So, what are you in for?” she asked.

I scratched my head. “What, are we in jail or something? You don’t have to say it like that, you know.”

She rolled her eyes at me.

“Okay, I’ll bite. I, uhh… I got in a car crash. I hurt my arm.”

She spoke fast. “You look fine to me.”

“What?”

“You’re not really hurt, are you?”

My face went white. “What-- what do you mean?”

“You’ve been here for two months. You hardly looked bad to begin with and there’s no reason you should still be here. I’m not dumb, you know.”

“H-hey!” was all I could mutter, embarrassed out of my mind. I was an idiot for taking everybody else in the hospital for fools. I felt completely exposed.

“Please don’t tell anybody,” I said, feeling desperate.

“It doesn’t matter to me. I just think it’s weird.”

“Yeah,” I opened up, staring out into the city that I had run away from. “I shouldn't be here. I just wanted to put off going back to the real world for as long as possible.”

“You weirdo,” she said, insulting me. “But, hmm. It makes sense to me. I… I guess I don’t really blame you.”

“What do you mean? I’m literally human scum right now. Don’t you hate me? I’m not even supposed to be here.”

“Listen to you,” she said, smiling again. “You’re so dramatic. I know how nice it is to be away from everything out there. And besides…” she said, trailing off. “It’s kind of nice to have some company for a change.”

She invited me to her room. I curiously obliged, following her down the hall.

Being a hospital, her room, of course, was a mirror image of mine in terms of layout, but her residence was far more decorated. Notebooks and personal care products were lined up on her nightstand, and piles of comics and paper scraps populated the floor. With how lived in her room looked, it became very apparent to me that she had been staying there for a while.

“Nice place,” I said jokingly as I took a seat across from her bed.

“Thanks…”

I looked at the variety of flora that she had on display by the window. They were neatly lined up in tall vases. “Oh wow,” I said. “You really like flowers, huh?”

“Yeah. My mom actually owns a flower shop in the city. I grew up around flowers, so I’ve always really liked them.”

Oh, so that’s why she asked for a flower, I thought. It was bit cliched, but sweet.

“That’s… really nice,” I said, kind of losing myself. “You have a wonderful place to go back to when you’re out of here.”

She looked away, ignoring what I said.

“All I have to look forward to is my idiot professors and retaking all of the classes I just failed.”

Feeling embarrassed, I moved the conversation to our interests and hobbies. As it turned out, we liked a lot of the same things. We were both into comics and liked the same books. I would find out that she was actually a high schooler, so she was quite a bit younger than me, but it seemed like we were still able to hit it off as friends. It was the strangest time, place, and occasion for any kind of companionship, I thought, but we were both happy.

After hanging out in her room for a couple of hours, I ended up being kicked out by one of the nurses on duty.

Before I closed the door behind me, however, I had to ask her one more thing. “What’s your name?”

“Poppy.”

For the rest of my stay at the hospital, Poppy and I would hang out together every day in the common area while we stared out the window. Sometimes, I would sneak into her room in the evening and we’d chat about the things we liked. She was blunt and had a bit of a mean exterior, but in actuality, she was very kind.

One evening when I was in her room, I decided to finally just let my curiosity get the better of me.

“So, what are you in for?” I said with a cheeky smile.

She facepalmed. Who knew if she would answer, but I was definitely making a fool of myself. It became apparent that it was obviously a touchy subject.

“...Sorry,” I said, looking off. “That was stupid of me.”

“Hmph,” she grunted. “Yeah, it was.”

“But the truth is, I don’t actually know much about you, Poppy. I’ve told you all kinds of things about me.”

“Yeah, you have,” she said, grinning. “I know pretty well how much you don’t want to leave this place, you weirdo.”

“I-I’m sorry! It’s just… this is so weird, but I think this is the most fun I’ve ever had.”

I watched Poppy’s eyes grow big. She blurted out into laughter.

I hurriedly tried to shush her. “We’re gonna get caught! You’re gonna get me kicked out! You can’t be giggling right now!”

“You say some dumb stuff, you know,” she said in between gasps for air. She wiped her eyes. She wasn’t having any of it. “You like it that much here?”

“No, you’ve got it all wrong.”

“You’re such a weirdo, this a hospital for crying out loud--”

“Poppy, it’s not the hospital. It’s you.”

She paused, looking straight into my eyes. Her flushed grin vanished.

I knew what I was going to say would sound stupid to her, but I said it anyway.

“This is the most alive I’ve ever felt. Spending time with you, away from everything else. As long as I’m with you, it just feels like nothing else matters to me. I’ve never had a friend like you before.”

For what would seem like the longest ten seconds of my life, she didn’t say anything.

“You weirdo…”

“I said too much,” I said, getting up to leave. “I know.”

“No,” she said, interrupting my attempt to exit. “I feel the same. You can tell, right? I’ve been living here for a long time.”

“Y-yeah...”

“And until you showed up, I was all alone. I don’t have any friends out there in that city. My family probably doesn’t even care if I die.”

“...don’t say such horrible things.”

“Okay, fine. I’ll tell you what I’m in for,” she said, sighing. “I’ve had this illness since I was born. It permanently affects my ability to walk, but the other effects come and go all the time. In grade school I was always passing out and having to go home. In junior high, I was constantly throwing up all over the place. I needed all kinds of expensive treatment and it was hard on my family. I’ve been stable for a little while now, but I missed a lot of class growing up.”

I was mortified.

“I just wanted to live a normal life. To go to school, to make friends. But I was always getting sick and ruining things for everyone. Other kids made fun of me all the way into high school. Six months ago, I finally gave up and told my parents to admit me to this hospital so I could get surgery.”

I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. In comparison, it made me feel like the worst kind of loser imaginable.

“Surgery?” I dared to press on. “Why haven’t you gotten the surgery yet?”

“They’re letting me delay it for as long as I want. So I can have it done when I’m ‘comfortable’ enough. It’s supposed to be a really experimental procedure, and they haven’t told me this, but I feel like it’s probably going to kill me. And that… that’s just kind of hard to come to grips with. So I’ve just been putting it off.”

I covered my mouth. I had no idea how to react.

She took on a sorrowful smile, her gaze drifting once again to the window. “Dying probably wouldn’t be so bad, really…”

“Poppy!” I blurted out. “Y-you can’t say that!”

She giggled. “Calm down, you weirdo. I know it’s depressing, but that’s just how it is.”

She sighed, looking out the window. “I really don’t have anything to return to. My mom had twins just before I came to this hospital, you know? It’s like they’ve already given up on me.”

“Poppy, there’s no way your family actually hates you.”

“But they do. You’d never understand.”

Letting my emotions get the better of me, I walked over to her and hugged her. Much to my surprise, she didn’t forcibly throw me off of her, but she didn’t reciprocate either.

“...I hate it when people feel sorry for me.”

I let go of her.

That night, I took a long look in the mirror. I was an idiot. A loser. Human scum. Pathetic trash. The worst kind of person imaginable. I was there for no reason. I didn’t belong at that hospital. Poppy was actually suffering, and there I was just trying to pass the days in a glorified dorm room. I was the worst.

The next day, Poppy and I were hanging out in the common area by the large windows as usual. We stared together into the abyss of a city that we had left behind.

“Poppy,” I said. “I think I’m going to leave this place next week. I’m sorry for being such a loser.”

“Why are you apologizing? Weirdo,” she said, rolling her eyes casually. ”I figured you would have to go eventually, though. Can’t run away from society forever, right?”

“Haha, that’s right. I guess I kind of have to go back to the real world at some point.”

I immediately dialed back in my head. Was I saying the right thing? Knowing her full story now, it didn’t feel right to leave her all by herself again. But I also couldn’t stay at the hospital much longer.

That evening when Poppy and I hung out in her room behind the nurses’ backs, she opened up to me once more.

“There’s a really pretty garden on the roof.”

“What?”

“Yeah. Like, flowers and vegetables and stuff.”

“Oh… neat.”

“Could you do me a favor? I know they have some hydrangeas up there. I… kind of want some. To put in one of my vases.”

I looked straight into her. “Of course.”

“Uhh, one thing though. I can’t go with you…”

“Well, of course, you’re in a wheelchair--”

“No, it’s not that, you dummy. They’re afraid I’ll try to… hurt myself if I go up to the roof. So I’m not allowed up there. Does that make sense?”

I clenched my teeth. That was an absolutely terrible thing to hear.

“Actually, forget it,” she said, forcing a laugh. “It’s kind of a dumb thing to ask.”

“Poppy,” I said, taking her hand and grasping firmly. “If you want a flower, I’ll get you one.”

“...okay. Just make sure it’s a hydrangea. I don’t have one of those in any of my vases yet. I’ve always liked them.”

Once the lights were out that night, I quietly slipped out of my room, leaving my shoes behind so as to make as little sound as possible. Barefoot, I took the elevator up to the roof of the hospital, where I was greeted by moonlight and a soft breeze. Just as Poppy described, there was a small, neatly organized bed of dirt where flowers and some vegetables were growing. The hydrangeas themselves were some of the most beautiful flowers I’d ever seen.

Having made sure to look up what hydrangeas looked like beforehand, I plucked a few of the pleasant little orbs from their resting place and carried them back inside with extreme care. I gave them to Poppy the next day, much to her delight, but I did end up getting in trouble not long after. When I met with the hospital staff, the topic of my impending discharge was also brought up, and I knew I would be leaving the hospital and Poppy behind very soon.

On my very last day there, I said my woeful goodbyes to Poppy, but I made sure to promise her one thing.

“Poppy, I’m not leaving you. I’m coming back. So please don’t give up.”

Of course, she would flourish her trademark insult and issue it with that sarcastic smile of hers. “You weirdo.”

She spoke again after some silence. “No need to be so serious. I had fun with you, but don’t do anything drastic, okay?”

I looked into her eyes. “No, I mean it. I promise I’ll come and visit you every day I can. So just be patient, okay?”

She looked down into her lap. “Okay. Thanks for everything.”

“See you, Poppy.”

It hurt to leave her that day, but true to my word, I came back to our meeting spot one week later, and this time, I was in a hospital staff outfit.

She laughed. “You signed up to be a volunteer here? Are you serious?”

“Yep. I get paid nothing and I have a ton of work I have to do, but it’s summer now, so I have plenty of free time.”

“Jeez, you really are a weirdo. But I’m glad you’re here.”

For the rest of the summer, I was pretty busy doing volunteer jobs at the hospital, but I had just enough time to see Poppy every day and bring her gifts. She asked for all kinds of ridiculous things ranging from comics to flowers to candy, but it was some of the most fun I’d had since we met just months prior. And since I was now technically a staff member, I was actually allowed in her room.

At the end of the summer, when I knew my volunteer job would be coming to a close soon due to my classes resuming, Poppy and I hung out together in her room for one last time.

She would then make an interesting and bold request.

“Hey. Can you take me up to the garden on the roof?”

“You and I both know that’ll be really difficult.”

“We can do it really late at night. Like 3:00 AM. It’s okay, I trust you.”

“Poppy, I don’t want either of us to get in trouble.”

“I just really want to see it. Please! I know you can make it work somehow.”

“...Okay. We’ll do it!”

“Take me on the night of your last day, after everyone’s asleep.”

As I was on my way out of her room, she called my name once more.

“...Thanks.”

“Hmm?”

“I’m not good with this kind stuff but, um… thank you. Just, thank you, okay? I mean it. You’ve given me so much courage.”

I smiled back at her and bowed gently before heading out for the evening.

The next day was my last day on the job. When I was finished with my duties for the day and had the paperwork signed and filed, I went to our usual meeting spot by the window but to my surprise, Poppy wasn’t there.

When I went to her room, she wasn’t there.

I even wandered around the hospital and passed the time until 3:00 AM, but when I knocked on her door, she still wasn't there. I was then, of course, promptly kicked out by the hospital staff.

There was only one place she could be, and I couldn’t keep myself together when I finally realized where it was. We hadn’t even spoke about it since the first time she opened up to me about her stay at the hospital, all those months ago.

Leaning against a pillar in the parking garage, I pressed my fingers into my temple and cried, absolutely crestfallen.

Autumn came, then winter, then spring, then summer again. It was back to everyday life for me. My desk at home piled up with notebooks and scraps of paper, but also vases of flowers. I may have returned to my regular life, but there wasn’t a single day that passed by where I didn’t think about her.

In preparation of summer, I upset my parents and shocked my peers by turning down all of the interviews for internships and summer work that I received. There was a special place I wanted to go.

It took an extreme amount of effort to triangulate given how little information I actually had, but I was grateful when I finally found it. I thought it was “in the city” like she said, but it was more “nestled into the back of the suburbs.”

I turned the street corner and was greeted by a pretty brick building with a big glass window in the front. A rainbow of flora could be seen inside. It was everything a little neighborhood flower shop ought to be.

So, I walked inside and applied for a job.

Poppy… in the end, it was you who left me behind. I can’t ever forgive you for that, but you’re the bravest person I’ve ever known.

I’m glad we met, and I’m so proud of you.

Thank you for everything, Poppy.

#short story #melancholic #flowers

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staqqoverflo · 6 years

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ZERO

Companion short story for the album MEMƟRY GΛRDEN, released in September 2016.

I let out a reluctant sigh as I stepped outside and let the university lab doors close behind me. It should have been an afternoon for a carefree attitude. I was leaving work early for once, and while a bleak overcast was draped above everything like usual, it was, for once, a smog-less day in Shinagawa. But I couldn’t rest easy, even on a day as nice as this.

I hadn’t seen my girlfriend in weeks.

I hadn’t heard her voice or caught sight of her since the end of summer. I couldn’t forget that face of hers—I missed it so—but nevertheless, I hadn’t seen it in ages. However, she wasn’t dead. Far from it, in fact—I had been receiving messages from her all this time, telling me of her mystic location.

She told me that she’d escaped to an online game, and that she wanted me to join her.

It was the most ridiculous thing I had ever heard. Beyond the idea of foregoing the real world and staying logged into a video game, what about her life could even have been traumatic enough to drive her into doing something like this?

I loved her like crazy, but it was stupid. It didn’t make any sense. Our relationship was remarkably normal, maybe even plain. We both met doing research at the university lab. We got to know each other, went on cheesy dates, and supported each other emotionally and physically like any regular young couple would. And then she disappeared.

To be frank, she hadn’t even chosen a game that was particularly good. It was Sacred Grove Online. A high fantasy virtual reality MMORPG from a few years ago, when Neuronet technology was still new and the bugs were still being ironed out. It was a system launch title. The game has been holding its own all this time, I’m sure, but there are plenty of better looking, better performing games out there now. I’m not sure where she saw the appeal in something so clunky. Perhaps it was the only one she had, although I didn’t even know that she owned a VR terminal before all of this.

On my walk back home, I took my phone out of my pocket and decided I would try one more time, maybe the last time, at attempting to talk some sense into her. I’d done so at least a dozen times by now, and it had become practically mechanical, but I was never going to give up. I’m not sure what I expected this time around, but I received the typical response.

“Forget about the real world. Give up on it like I have. You’ll never be alone again, trust me. Escape with me. I love you.”

I let out a deep sigh as I turned onto a busy street. What could I even do at this point? Even though it’d been 27 days since I’d seen her by now, I still couldn’t believe that someone as normal as her was doing something like this. Doing this to me. What had I done to deserve this? There were no kinks in our relationship, and I thought we truly understood each other. It was beyond bizarre. Perhaps I lacked understanding, I thought. She’s being fucking crazy, but maybe I need to give her a chance? After all, I loved her.

So instead of heading home, I turned around and made my way towards the station, where I would be on my way to do something extremely brash. I caught a train to the Chiyoda ward and headed for the nearest electronics outlet. I purchased a VR terminal, the necessary peripherals, and dealt with a confused clerk when I asked for a download code for an older, out-of-style game before lugging all of that onto the train back to Shinagawa.

It was pouring rain when I got off the train and began my walk home. Admittedly, I was feeling pretty indignant by this point, but I felt like I had to get the chance to see where she was coming from. Maybe I could talk some sense into her by “meeting” her in this video game.

Completely drenched and slightly pissed-off, I slammed the front door behind me and made my way to my bedroom, immediately throwing everything I was carrying onto the floor. I gave up video games ages ago, but I would go through the trouble of figuring the technology out all over again if it gave me the chance to “see” my girlfriend, I decided.

Having unboxed everything and hooked it all up together, I took my shoes off and laid on my bed, taking a deep breath. I took my glasses off and replaced them with the glossy immersion-enabling ones of the VR terminal, sliding them over my weak eyes carefully while I fastened the cups of my headphones over my ears. I closed my eyes and the dream began.

I hastily made my way through the system’s first time startup screens, simply sticking with the default options for everything before launching Sacred Grove Online. At the title screen, I registered for an account and logged in, created a character, and within a single powerful swoop was transported immediately into the game’s world.

Having nearly forgotten how amazingly immersive this technology was—even for a game that was a little dated—my heart was trembling when I spawned into the starting township. Even for such an older game, it all felt so real. The town was alive with villagers and other were players running around. Children of the village were chasing after their runaway pets. A fresh pine scent was carried with the mountain breeze that blew past my body. It was… beautiful.

But I wasn’t here to play the game. I wasn’t going to learn of the stories of all of these villagers, I wasn’t going to chat up any fellow players, and I wasn’t going to start the tutorial quests or decide on which class to play. I wasn’t going to explore this world. I was going to find my girlfriend.

She was the type of person to keep the same username on every service, so I knew I could find her. I used the game’s commands to directly message her character. Immediately responding to me, she was overjoyed but said that she was in a high-level area that I wouldn’t be able to reach without sinking a good few hours into the game. She said that she couldn’t leave, so she would mail my character an item that would let me teleport to her location.

Sighing, I invoked my mailbox window. Ignoring her cutesy message, I opened the attachment and closed the mailbox window. I then opened my inventory and used the teleportation item.

Immediately, my surroundings changed. Gone were the homely echoes of the villagers and their livestock. I was now in what appeared to be a clearing in a dark forest. The desolate sky in this area was dark and cloudy, just like it was in the real world that day. At my feet and all around me in this creepy, silent place were flowers and tree roots. Just what the hell was this place?

And crawling out of some dark trees in front of me was a female player. I had no doubt in the world who it was, although her character was customized to be beyond bizarre, having known her (or who she was before, I should say).

Her character’s hair, beautiful and long, was a brilliant green. Her shoulders exposed, she wore a gray dress that evoked the idea that her character was something along the lines of a mage. To account for its strangeness, what was on her face was probably a cash shop item or something, but her eyes were covered with a solid black censor bar that prevented me from seeing what they looked like.

It was overwhelming. My character having remained in the starting outfit, it was as if I were standing in the presence of a goddess. Regardless, I was elated to finally “see” her again.

“Akane… I can’t believe it. I thought I would never see you again.”

“You came after all,” she said without a hint of feeling. “Finally… It’s like a dream come true.”

I looked around at the flowers and grass. “What is this place?”

“It’s just a little grove outside of a forest dungeon. It doesn’t really have a name, but I like to call it the ‘memory garden.’ I like to sit here and think about things sometimes. Pretty, isn’t it?” She smiled. “I missed you so much.”

I kept my resolve, staying true to my mission.

“Akane, you can’t stay here. This is a video game. Log out right now… I’m worried about you.”

“…”

“Why are you doing this? What made you want to do this?” I couldn’t hold back, even if I wanted to. Being able to speak to her again was too powerful for me to take. “How long have you been logged in? Are you even still eating or leaving your house? Or even your room?”

“…all of that is irrelevant. This is my new home. This synthetic world is perfect. We can stay here forever, just you and me.”

I balled my fists, unable to contain myself. “No, that’s bullshit. This is a video game. You’re going to die if you stay logged in forever.”

“…I’m okay with that.”

I couldn’t help but feel my voice growing weak. To hear her say these things in front of me, rather than through text messages, was breaking my heart.

“How could you do this to me? Don’t you care about your family anymore? I don’t get it…”

“The real world is cruel, Ryota. Day-to-day, we deal with people we loathe and struggle with vague anxieties that are never really resolved. Here, those things don’t exist. We can surround ourselves only with people and things we like. We can build up little walls. We can immerse ourselves in the beauty of nature. We can go on adventures.”

“Akane—“

“We can also do all of the things we would do in the real world, like cook, eat, and relax. But the most beautiful thing of all is that we feel no pain here.”

“Akane, I still don’t understand. You can just play the game like normal if you’re stressed. But was something going on in your life that made you want to escape here?” I gulped. “…did I hurt you somehow?”

She smiled, her arms behind her back. She was beautiful.

“No. You didn’t hurt me.”

“Then why—“

“It’s simple. This world is just beautiful to me. It’s synthetic—completely fake. Designed by people just like us. Yet it’s more genuine than the real world because it’s trying harder to achieve something. To achieve mimicry. It’s perfect… it’s all I need, and I’m never going to leave.” The words that were coming out of her mouth were borderline evangelical. “I’m going to stay here forever.”

“No, that’s impossible. You’re going to starve in the real world if you never log out.”

“I think you’re missing my point, Ryota.”

“Akane—“

“This is my new home.”

With nothing left to say, I logged out of the game out of impulse right on the spot, leaving her behind. I sat up and peeled the immersion glasses and headphones right off of my head before throwing them across the room in frustration.

For the rest of the day, all I could think about was how disappointed I felt. Not even meeting her face to face in-game was enough for her to change her mind. I missed her so. I missed who she was before all of this, and I cherished the memories that we shared. I was in disbelief at what she’d become.

After plenty of time to play the events over and over again in my head, I came home from work the next and sat on my bed, feeling slightly disappointed.

I picked up the immersion glasses again and slid them over my eyes before putting my headphones back on just like I did the day before.

I really missed her…

Maybe she was right.

Listen to MEMƟRY GΛRDEN: https://staqqoverflo.bandcamp.com/album/mem-ry-g-rden

#short story #cyberpunk #mmorpg

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