All Along

Newly Discovered

He was crushed. Stomped into the floor until there was only a sad smudge left stained into the carpet. Viciously, his mind raced as he stared at the picture. His eyes darted between the two faces, their smiles seemingly mocking him from behind the screen. Bad could feel his vision starting to blur as tears lined his eyes. Skeppy had gotten a boyfriend.

Bad had always wanted what was best for Skeppy and part of him still supported him. But there was another part somewhere deep within him that scraped and scratched in the corner of his darkest thoughts, a part of him that was filled with jealousy. It cooed at him in his mind, telling all the things he never wanted to hear. He's leaving your friendship for something better. You never had anything special. You're being forgotten. His emotions were vultures on his vulnerabilities. Enmity swooped in with a violent attack and soon followed by guilt, resentment, and loneliness. They left nothing but shreds in their path.

Bad started to think about the past few months. When was the last time he and Skeppy talked? It felt too long ago. Maybe that's why Bad had been so surprised because wouldn't have Skeppy told him? Mention anything about seeing someone? Bad almost felt betrayed because as his so-called 'best friend,' he should've known right? But a gross, sinking feeling started to settle within him because what if he had and Bad hadn't heard?

Bad let out an exhausted — and slightly irritated — sigh. Skeppy really chose a bad time to announce this because soon he was about to be put on stream live in front of thousands and here he was, rattled. Broken down into the lowest of lows. Hours before, Quackity had messaged Bad, asking him to join and play a game on stream with him. Bad had agreed without knowing what the game it was, so when Bad got the notification on Steam that Quackity gifted him GTA V, he knew the stream was going to be draining in more ways than one.

Bad glanced down at the clock at the bottom right corner on his monitor, the stream would start in about 30 minutes and, not including the time for the starting screen, that was 30 minutes of anxiety-inducing anticipation.

-

Bad was spread out across his bed, blankets of mismatched colors and sizes were strewn around him, wrinkling in on themselves, his laptop humming next to him. Call him pathetic, but he was watching old videos of him and Skeppy. Although, they were recent ones because there really hadn't been any recent ones. Bad couldn't recall the last time they had sat down to record something when he looked back, maybe they had grown more distant than he had thought.

Suddenly, his phone's display lit up with a familiar chime following. Bad scrambled over hastily and read the screen. A small piece of him had hoped it was Skeppy but was immediately shot down by a reminder screaming at him. It was the reminder he had been dreading for the past half hour: stream in 8 minutes. He groaned. He had spent the last 20 minutes or so calming down, but Quackity knew how to get him riled up in an instant. It's always been like that with Quackity; he would say something purposefully targeted toward Bad at his expense, trying his best to make Bad snap at him. Most of the time Bad played into the bit, but Bad would be lying if there hadn't been times he had been truly angry.

The blankets clung to him as he dragged himself out of the comfort of his bed before lying on the floor in a pathetic heap. With a huff, he sat down in his black, leather computer chair and pressed the button on his computer tower. The monitor beamed out light with excitement, welcoming Bad as he opened Steam. He scooted in his chair and reached his hand for the grey mini-fridge next to the feet of his desk. He snatched a half-empty bottle of Canadian whiskey from the top shelf and slowly chugged a couple of swigs, feeling the poison sluggishly move down his throat. Bad didn't care if it was stronger than what he normally drank, he didn't care about much of anything anymore. He just knew he would need it to stay relaxed enough during this stream.