He poses in crimson flannel, the buttons opened slightly to show off his pronounced, tanned collarbones, arms at his sides. The filter is set to Amaro, whatever that means, the yellows and reds accentuated with the rest muted, irrelevant. A headphone in one ear, the other dangling off to the side, he half smolders and half smirks at the camera, the effect something devilish and alluring—they are just going to eat this up, he tells himself as he taps the submit button on his phone. His dark hair and bright blue eyes pop up from the screen. He watches with bated breath as the blue bar works its way to 100%.

When it’s all done and over with he’s brought back to the main page, where he’s greeted by a million of the same photos of himself, all of them lofty, sultry, gorgeous. He’s worked for years to build up this kind of a reputation, following so strong that when you typed his name into the search bar, the first results were pages and pages of his face. An audience so large that it transcends blogging programs, spills out into reality.
Once he’d been approached as he was walking down the street, asked, “Are you Alec Devons?” by some young girl. He’d looked at her and tried to answer, but words failed him. He hadn’t thought it would carry over into the real world—that it would be more than something he went to when his friends weren’t around, when he was alone in his apartment with nothing better to do. He’d hastened and walked away, startled and confused, without saying anything in response.
This, of all things, occurs to him as he stares at the thousand-odd photos of himself he’d accumulated over the years, their eyes seeming to stare back at him from the screen of his laptop. He sees himself with short hair, long hair, black hair, blue hair; in the bathroom posed shirtless for those at home to appreciate; all done up before his senior prom, dapper and refined in his tux—god, didn’t that feel like ages ago?; smiling, smirking, fake crying; flipping the camera off for lack of anything better to do with his hands. There are a thousand different moments right then and there, most of them staged, and they’re all rushing at him, overloading him: he’s recording his life on here.
Meanwhile the likes and comments come flooding in on his newest photographic masterpiece. He breaks from his reverie to scroll through the usual pages upon pages of vapid, objectifying remarks—“You’re so hot!”; “What’s your number, bby?”; ect.—and wonders why people aren’t tired of him yet. When this stopped being about making new friends online and became nothing more than a place for him to hold himself on a pedestal and watch as the peons got on their knees and cried praise.
“I wish u lived near me… I’d love to show u a good time.”
“Wow!!”
“ILYSM!”
His friends, they’d asked him earlier if he wanted to go out, they knew this great pub, why didn’t he join them? He’d turned 21 almost two months ago and he hadn’t bothered to go out drinking yet—too busy studying, a key word for cloistering himself in his shared apartment, only surfacing to go to class. The outside world just feels so choking to him, so vast.
He has no tragic backstory to explain this neurosis, no history of neglect or abuse to frame his distorted state of mind. He’s seen doctors and psychiatrists and herbalists to no avail; all he knows is that he gets anxious, unbearably anxious, whenever he leaves his home.
He had declined their offer in favor of a night alone with some instant ramen and a DVR replete with unwatched shows—what else did a man need? They’d asked twice more, insistence growing with each repetition; his answer did not change. They left him, reluctant.
His phone beeps at him, and he opens his new message: it’s from Matt, his best friend since they met in freshman Physics, way back when they were still growing: “Hey. Is something wrong? You never want to hang out with us anymore.”
He stares at the text, gnawing on his lower lip. The notifications keep flashing at the top of his screen, reminding him that he’s adored across the continent, maybe even the world. “Yeah, I’m fine, man. Don’t worry about it.”
“You don’t seem it. And to be honest, it kind of pisses us off when you bail and do nothing but sit and take pictures of yourself.”
He types, “I have nothing better to do,” and recoils at the message he almost sent. Nothing better? Maybe I do have a problem, he tells himself, deleting that line of text. He knows his priorities are screwed, that he needs to do some reevaluation. He’s known this for a while. “I just… wasn’t feeling the crowds tonight. Sorry, man.”
“Well, you’re gonna have to come out sometime! We don’t have to go to bars, but… You’re melding to the couch, man. It’s not healthy.”
He can read Matt’s texts in his own voice without even trying, the sound forever imprinted in his memory after years of doing plays with him, of long drives in which they inevitably got lost, of karaoke night at the local tavern. He’d been able to handle it all, once, had possessed the strength to fight his demon and win; but as the years went by his constitution eroded to the point where it was naught but a whisper against the wind, a stone against the tide. He wonders when and where he began to relapse.
“Next time, I’ll come out. Scout’s honor.” Next time, next time, next time—it is a promise that forever repeats itself, his go-to phrase when nothing else would suffice. To Matt, though, he is sure that these promises aren’t worth s*** anymore.
“Nope. Tonight. I’m coming back to get you, so you’d better get dressed. You’re getting in the car the second I get there, decent or not.”
He glares at the screen. “Matt, I told you no already.”
“You’ve been telling me for two months. It’s too late, I’m in the car and I’m not gonna text and drive.”
“F***… fine. Whatever.” He stuffs his phone back into his pants pocket, walks out into the living room, and moves back into his rut in the couch—he’s surprised that it hasn’t molded to the contours of his ass yet. It’d be less than five minutes before Matt got there. He’s getting a headache just thinking about it.
He’s already surpassed 500 likes and comments in the span of those long five minutes, his profile drowning in a sea of admiration. What’s the point of this again? he wonders. What am I getting out of this? He doesn’t need to hear Matt’s voice to know that his friend is really worried.
The more he reads the comments, actually goes over them, the more he feels like he’s wasted his time on here—that none of these people are his friends, merely participants in a massive, You’re Hot And I Want You Palooza. He probably isn’t the only one they comment on, likely isn’t even their favourite on the site. Is he even special beyond his staggering number of followers?
Matt doesn’t knock on the door, just unlocks it and pushes it open like he owns the place. “You look terrible, man. Buck up.”
Alec looks up at him from his phone. “I look fine, thanks. The internet said so.” He thinks he’s being sarcastic, witty.
Matt rolls his eyes. “The internet’s a liar, you know. Just full of people throwing out compliments and hoping they’ll get some back.”
“It’s kinda fun, in some ways…”
“Like how? When’s the last time you talked to someone?”
“Uh… Last week.”
“And how long did it last?”
“About an hour…”
“Yeah. That’s what I thought.”
“It’s got other stuff, too!”
“What, like that stupid farm game where you have to babysit it twenty four seven? Or the one with the vampires? Please tell me you’re not bailing on us for those.”
“No, I’m not… Bailing on you guys.”
“Then what are you doing?”
“I’m just… I don’t like being out there. I don’t fit in. I’ll go to those parties and see all these great people having a great time, and I’ll just be there watching and trying to get in on it. And failing.”
“This isn’t some Elliot Cameron’s house party from tenth grade, Alec. We’re just hanging out and having some drinks—no one’s gonna alienate you.”
“I still… Just get anxious. You know how it is.”
“Yeah, I do. And I know that you used to be able to handle this, but ever since you started getting obsessed with that blog thing of yours, you’ve gotten worse.” I know I have. “It’s like… a crutch or something. I don’t know. But you’ve gotta come out, live your life. You’ve only got one year left and then you’re gonna be a f*ing adult, so try to act like one.”
Alec’s eyes sting and he looks down to avoid his friend’s gaze. “Ouch.”
Matt hesitates for a second, composing himself a second later. “It’s the truth. I’m sorry.”
Alec knows that he’s reaching a crossroads here: if he turns Matt down, he’ll alienate himself even further, maybe harm their relationship permanently. If he goes with him, though, he’ll end up getting sweaty and vomiting during one of his frequent panic attacks. “I’ll… think about it.”
Matt cracked a tiny smile. “That’s… a little better.”
He glances at his phone to escape the moment and is greeted by another inane, sexual remark. Usually the attention helps calm him, helping increase his self worth; but today it’s vexing and unwanted. Didn’t these people have anything better to do? Did anyone on there know anything about him other than his face? He sighs. He’s sickened at the thought of spending four years uploading pieces of himself to this place, for all to gawk at and trivialize. I turned them down for this?
“Yeah, actually… Let’s go.” He stands up from the couch, stretches his arms high over his head, his phone still in his hand.
Matt lights up immediately, the joy and relief in his expression more than palpable. They’re leaving before Alec can even fully process it, on their way to join the friends that he hadn’t seen in days. Alec doesn’t touch his phone on the ride there, just makes small talk, catches up. It’s amazing how much you miss if you disappear, even if it’s only for a couple of days.
Matt pulls up to the front, parks, and unlocks the doors. “Go in ahead without me,” Alec tells him, leaving his seatbelt on. Matt nods, head out, glancing back warily at him before he disappears into the bar. He hears upbeat music for a short time before the door closes, blocking it out.
Alec navigates the menu on his phone and finds the page that he wants—needs—in no time at all. ‘Delete Account,’ in large, red block letters, a warning to those who carelessly clicked buttons. He wavers for a moment, thumb hovering right over it; he takes a deep breath and presses down lightly. It asks for his password, which he quickly fills in; by now, typing that phrase is part of his muscle memory, forever embedded.
It asks if he’s sure—there are people who would miss him, who wouldn’t be able to continue if he left! It regurgitates a list of random followers and he doesn’t recognize any of them.
“Yeah. I’m sure.”
He exits the car, a thumbprint superimposed over his old life.