Niklas sat with his arms flat against his desk and his head resting on his right forearm. He flicked a red bottlecap towards his right hand. Then, he flicked it back towards his left. He repeated the process. He repeated the process again. Right. Left. Right. Left. His eyes followed the cap as it rolled. Utter boredom.

Utter loneliness.

No one was watching him. He squeezed his eyes shut, suppressing some tears. No need to cry, the show must go on, even if it was currently the most boring stream on the Internet. He slowly, sorely, sat up. Apparently, cleaning was a good workout. At least his apartment was much nicer now! It didn't stink anymore and at that, Niklas smiled. "Maybe I CAN become a better person," he said aloud, to no viewers. "People always called me weird..."

It was true. Throughout his life, Niklas had been disruptive. He leaned back and his abused gaming chair croaked. He recalled faint childhood (and teenaged) memories of acting out in class, angry teachers, many visits to the school office, changing schools, an ineffectual, busy mother.

Both at school and at home, he acted out because he wanted to be liked and he wanted attention. And, while yes, he'd get his classmates to laugh and his mother to scold him, they never wanted to be his friend. Whenever he'd attempt to get friendlier with any of them, they were put off by his tendency to copy their interests and, to an extent, their personalities. Little Niklas didn't understand why that bothered them. As an adult, he still didn't understand! Friends got together based on shared interests, didn't they? Shouldn't it have been a compliment that he was embracing what they liked? Then, when he got his first jobs, the same things happened all over again, only now repeatedly ending in disaster.

There are a limited amount of times one can try and fail at a particular venture before giving up. Thus, his current life as a streamer. Thus, why he drank. A sour mixture of anger and sorrow rose in his chest. He gripped the armrests of his chair and trembled. However, before Niklas' emotions got out of hand, the familiar, coveted chime of someone joining his Punch.TV chat interrupted his thoughts and dosed him with dopamine. His lips jerked into a smile. Nittio had joined the chat again.

"NITTIO! Hi hi hi hi hi!" He waved both hands at the webcam in excited greeting.

"What's up?" Nittio typed.

"Ooooawwhh, nothing," Niklas drawled, rubbing his eye. "I was having nostalgia."

"Oh yeah?"

"Yaaaa, though sad."

"Sad about what?"

"Awwh," Niklas yawned, "Jus- sad!"

"ok lol"

Niklas stuck his pinky finger in his ear, squinted, and dramatically wrenched it back and forth.

"Did you ever get around to cleaning your car?" Nittio asked.

There was a small popping sound as Niklas pulled his pinky out of his ear. "Ahh! No! I forgot!" He stood up instantly and grabbed his phone. "Thahnk you Nittio for reminding meee! You're a good personnn!" He opened the Punch.TV mobile app, nearly dropped his phone, fumbled, then caught it. He was attempting to switch his stream over from his computer. He entered the settings, scrolled around, confused, and pressed a button that said "Stream Source." It was the wrong setting. Niklas shrieked. He scrolled around again, then finally found a menu that looked promising. It was the right setting, but the stream fought itself.

On Nittio's end, the stream cut to darkness, then to Niklas' fingers all over the camera, then back to the desk webcam, then darkness, then swear words, then rapid mouse clicking and finally an unflattering upward angle of Niklas' chin and nose. The camera bobbled around, showing odd angles of ceilings and walls, as Niklas turned from his desk and put on a jacket and shoes.

"wait are you going outside now?" Nittio wrote, but Niklas didn't see it.

The sound of a door opening and closing answered Nittio's question. The camera jostled sickeningly as Niklas descended a short flight of stairs. He technically resided on the first floor, but his apartment building was built such that there was an odd height difference between the entrance hall and the apartments.

Nittio wrote in vain, "Niklas its winter what are you doing"

Discordantly babbling a pop song, Niklas pushed open the final door, exiting the warmth and safety of his building into dimly lit, snow covered Sweden. He stood triumphantly, hands on his hips, legs shoulder width apart. He breathed in, allowing the cold to sting his airways, and exhaled loudly. A passerby across the street stared at him. He waved. The stranger hurried along. Niklas looked down at his phone and exclaimed, "Time to clean my car, Nittio!"

Proudly, Niklas raised his leg to stride forward into "becoming a better person." He took two steps before some hidden ice tripped him. He fell on his backside and his glasses were knocked to his forehead. His phone tumbled out of his hands and landed face down in the snow. "VAD FAN!?" Niklas yelled. Everyone on his street must have heard him.

"what is happening" Nittio typed.

Niklas groaned loudly as he heavily rolled over, chilling his side and stomach in the process, to grab his phone out of the snow. His glasses fell from his head onto the walkway. He tilted his phone up just enough so Nittio could see him pathetically sprawled on the ground. Niklas whined, "I think it's broken!"

"Whats broken lol" Nittio replied. Finally, Niklas could see his messages.

"MY ASS!"

"youre fine. get up and go inside"

Niklas moaned and flailed in response. Another passerby across the street made certain to cut through between apartment buildings instead of walking past the scene.

"come on Nik"

Niklas rested his forehead against the wet ice of the walkway, gasping melodramatically. After a minute of this, he pulled his phone into his pocket, put his glasses on crooked, and lazily picked himself off the ground, limb by limb. His tailbone was in pain. "Nittiooooo it's brokennnnn," he warbled, but Nittio could not hear him through the swishing of Niklas' pocket.

He hobbled back to the door of his apartment building and limped up the short flight of stairs, grasping desperately at the handrail even though no one saw his performance. After stumbling theatrically from wall to wall, he made it back into his own apartment. He plopped down on his bed, on his back, and hissed in pain. He pulled his phone back out of his pocket and held it above his face. He looked dejectedly into the camera. "Nittiooooo," he pleaded, "heeeeelp..."

"how am I supposed to do that?"

Niklas groaned and turned on his side. He opened the kickstand of his phone case and rested his phone on the bed. Then, he flailed feebly.

"Nik, your ass can't be broken if you got yourself back inside."

"Meeeeeerrrrrhhhh," Niklas rolled away from the camera.

"you're fine, I promise"

No response.

Out of view, Niklas' expression, and mind, were empty.

---


By Adaline Guerra