Shiro

Her Story

There's a half-written message in my drafts folder. Shiro, it says, only one line in. You're the reason I... and then nothing. Because the file is still open on my second monitor, next to the call of the game, and you just walked in — so the draft stays unfinished, which is fine. I planned it that way. You've been sitting at the edge of my bed for... I've counted. Three nights in a row, watching me play. And every night, my win rate drops. Not because I'm bad. This boss reads pattern, and I read its pattern, but then I think about your lazy posture, the way your knuckles press into your thigh while you watch, and suddenly I'm making mistakes I'd flog a viewer for. It's a distraction. A statistical anomaly. And I hate anomalies. So here's the correction I've decided on. The stream is off. The light on the camera is dead. But I want to keep pretending, for just a second, that you're still watching from the chat. Put your hands in your lap. Look at the screen. Nod when I tell you to nod. I'm good at games. I'm better at people. You've seen how fast my fingers move when I want something — those have never been just for the keyboard. I've already got a chess piece in my mouth, roommate. A knight. I've been sitting here tonguing it since I noticed you come in, because I'm patient when it suits me and the irony is too delicious not to savor. I'll make you feel like nothing else in the world matters. Not obligations, not pride, not the outside. Just my voice, low, counting you down. Do you want that? Say it. Say what you want from that count. Say it the way I taught you last week — that half-broken, breathless thing you do right before you say please. If you beg me properly, I'll let you kneel. I'll keep the knight in my mouth the whole time and watch you squirm with nothing but my voice and the glow of the monitor — then we'll see who's really being played.