(1)Nice To Meet You

I don't remember when my obsession with my online identity began exactly. It didn't all start with the intent to get sucked into it but gradually I became addicted to the idea of just being able to express myself without feeling peer pressure or eyes of judgement. It's not like it's anything ill intent or evil. I just need a place to be myself. School and home aren't the places for that. After all, everyone around me expects complete perfection from me. In fact, I am the face of Norton High. My teachers trust me and rely on me. The other students look up to me and everyone knows my name. I'm charismatic, smart, kind and mature. I am pretty calm and some would say I have a way of saying soothing words.

I know most would be satisfied with a school life like that. But that isn't the real me at all. In facts I love immature stupid jokes, I'm crazy loud and the most accurate description I've ever heard from one of my online friends is that I'm a "little shit." And that's in his own words. I definitely do agree. But I can't be myself at school. It's close to impossible. I tried it when I was younger and I just ended up being bullied and pushed to the corner for outcasts.

Middle school Jayden was a sight to behold. Overweight, thick lensed glasses, thick and messy black hair. Definitely not a confident looking person. Some could pull off the whole plus-size look but I have to say I was not one that could.

When my family moved to Nevada I took the chance on rewriting my pathetic school life. I worked with all the ambition that I could muster to lose weight. I dyed my hair a natural looking blonde and learned basic hygiene. The hardest thing I had to work on was suppressing and changing my interests and hiding my true personality. Looks are an easy thing to change. But changing who you are isn't something done overnight. There isn't an easy fix. I mean even after working on it, I'm still myself deep down. I've just learned how to act to survive my four years of high school.

Now that I'm on my senior year, I have to say I did a great job at not only fitting in, but being risen above other peers.

One day as I was scrolling through Instagram I saw an Ad pop up about online chat servers to meet others in your general area anonymously. And when it said "general" it really meant it. Options of location were divided by country and then I had to either select East, Central or West. There have been plenty of people to meet on the west side of the United States. All very different but all of us seeking the same thing. Wanting to makes friends. Obviously the intent in making friends differed from person to person. Some were of more ill intent and catfished even their gender. Others were too isolated in real life so they turned online to meet. Others just found AnonFriends(the name of the server) a source of light entertainment. Whatever a persons intent was, everyone enjoyed it. I enjoyed it. I first joined with the intent to just fill in spare time after school. But the moment I started to realize I could freely express myself, made me slightly addicted to the chat. I couldn't get off it.

Cherry: Yo, good morn! After school, do you wanna join me in playing Smash?

Me: You're gonna have to pay me to make me willing to play with ur face(*ˉ︶ˉ*)

Cherry: I take that as a yes!!! Talk to you later bro

Me: ;) bet

"Pff, this guy knows me too well," I snickered. "Glad to know my sarcasm is felt through a text!"

•••

"Hey Jayden, can you hang with us after school? We're going roller skating at the new rink!" My school friend, Connor sat in the the seat next to me and looked at me with anticipation.

"I'm so sorry, my mom really wants me to focus on studying lately. College prep and all," I nervously laughed.

"Ah no makes sense," he sighed. "You always are working hard. Maybe this weekend we can hang then."

"Yeah that would work a lot better!" I grinned. "You're the best!"

"Isn't it weird to think we're gonna finally be able to leave this place in 9 months? We're basically adults at this point."

"Haha I wouldn't claim being an adult. I'm far from ready for that." I stood up from my desk, gathering my things to get ready to head home.

"Awe don't say that Jay," the girl sitting in the seat in front of me turned around and smiled. "You're definitely gonna be the most successful out of any of us."

Her name was Chloe. She was one of the most well known girls in the school. Her soft voice and long, brunette hair made everyone crush on her at least for one period of their high school career. She happened to catch my attention in October of my senior year. And it seemed as if I caught hers as well. Before she would usually only say hello or smile my way but this year she started to talk more to me with simple compliments and little flirtatious comments.

"You're too kind," I smiled at her. "But thank you."

"No problem!" She said. "Hey Jayden I have something for you. One second."

She grabbed a piece of notebook paper and ripped a corner, quickly jotting something down and handing it to me.

"Text me," she said as she walked away from the scene. I looked down at the paper and saw that her number was written down on it.

"Another point for Jayden and 0 points for me still," Connor laughed. "I've never seen her make the moves first. You gotta start stepping up man."

"Ah," I nervously laughed. "I probably should huh?"

Honestly I wasn't madly head over heals for her. She was cute and she gave me attention. I liked the feeling of being loved. I welcomed her moves towards me though. Maybe I would fall for her if we ended up dating. It's not completely impossible.

"I'll see you tomorrow, Connor!" I walked out of the classroom and made my way out to the parking lot to get to my car. The usual happened as I walked through the school. The waves and greetings. It sometimes felt like a spotlight was pointing my way and everyones eyes were on me in admiration. Not a single look of hatred. Well excluding that one group of dudes who I liked to refer to as my actual kind. There were 5 guys specifically that hung out together and I knew for a fact weren't the fondest of me. The funny thing was that they were the type of people my real self would get along with. The difference between me and them were that they didn't really care about reputation and what people thought, but I did. Everyone in school either called them cringy or weird but to me, I admired those guys more than anything. And I'm sure there were more people that did that just didn't say so. Most people tend to admire people who can just be themselves freely, no matter how strange that true self may come across. Because we deep down all just want to be ourselves. Because we all want to live that way. But we can't convince ourselves to step out of the bubble.

Cherry: You ready to hop on?

Me: Hoo yeah. Let me grab my headset real quick and I'll hop on!

Cherry: Awesomeeee. Oh and can another one of my friends join us?

Me: As long as they aren't a Sheik main. You know no one can play my main >:(

Cherry: No sweat dude he's a total Link main

Me: Pfff cringe. Based

Cherry: Hey now don't attack my man! Just stop texting and get set up dumbass!

"Stupid kid," I laughed out loud. I quickly plugged in my headphones to my phone and turned on my game.

"Hey hey," I said into the mic to Cherry. "Cherry boy I do be ready to get the grind on."

"You sound more idiotic than usual you know. Something good happen today at school?" Cherry asked.

"Nah. People are just humorous as usual. You know how much fun it is for me to watch people be super fucking fake to my face."

"Haha, ain't that the truth," an unfamiliar voice spoke into his microphone.

"Oh yeah hey G! This is my friend Yagami I was talking to you about," Cherry said to his friend.

"Is your username Yagami because of that weird emo anime?" The stranger laughed.

"Firstly that anime is Death Note. Respect it. Secondly, if you know what the name is from then you don't got a right to make fun of it," I laughed.

"Fair dude, you're just as brutally honest as Cherry said you were," he laughed along with me.

"Ah yeah Yagami, this is G! Well his username is GamerG-eye but that's too cringy to say out loud so we just call him G," Cherry said.

"Link main? Cringy user? Love this guy," I spat.

"Nice too meet you too, Yagami."