I found you again last night. Not in a text, not in a dream, but in the kill feed of a game I swore I’d quit three years ago.
Because out here, in the real world, you’re the one who got away. former love interest runs a gang video game
You’ve built an empire out of pixels and latency. A hundred players report to you. They call you “Bishop.” They don’t know you cried during the third act of La La Land . They don’t know the way your hand used to find mine in a dark theater, just to check if I was still there. I found you again last night
I just want to know if you still have that old save file. The one where we built a tiny house on the hill in that farming sim. No guns. No turf. Just two avatars standing in the rain, watching the virtual wheat grow. You’ve built an empire out of pixels and latency
I don’t want to join your gang. I don’t want to raid your compound.
I almost sent a message. Something casual. “Nice take on the Meridian heist.” But I stopped. Because what I really wanted to ask was: Is this where the soft part of you went? Did you bury it in the server room? Or did you just learn to armor it so well that even I can’t see the seam?
Forever this time? Probably not.