My short stories

Cyberbullying

Note: This story is inspired by several sources. It takes place three years before Not What She Seems, so Cassie is still living with her biological parents.

Susan James was excited about receiving her new laptop for her birthday. She could finally go on social media, watch YouTube videos and surf the net like others her age. Susan quickly went on Google Chrome.

She was fascinated about all the features her laptop had. Susan decided to check the videos on YouTube.

Susan watched a video about buying slimes to see if they were any good. She found it fascinating as she really liked slimes. Her classmate Cassandra Trillin, or Cassie as she preferred to be called, had given her a complete set of rainbow coloured slimes for her birthday. Susan would be lying if she said that she didn't enjoy playing with the slimes.

However, there was one thing Susan found more interesting than the video. It was the comments! They were along the lines of 'I like how honest she is' or 'I really like your content.'

Susan thought that the commenters were really nice. She decided to watch a different video.

The next video she watched seemed to be very popular. It had over 300K views. It was an animated story about a girl in a big family.

Susan liked the story. The protagonist talked in an entertaining way and all the main characters had their own distinct personalities. Susan decided to subscribe to the creator of the video, whose name was Amayalisa. Susan was careful not to use her real name, so she subscribed under the username RainbowSunlight.

Susan watched another of Amayalisa's videos. This one showed instant snow activating. Susan thought that it was amazing. But as she read some comments, it appeared that not everyone thought so.

Wellycake: Boring! I have seen videos like this millions of times.

Dancing Queen: Come on, show something new!

Lime Soda: Your videos are so lifeless.

Susan gasped in shock. How could those people be so mean? She went to another video on Amayalisa's channel about rating Disney Princess dolls. Most of the comments were nice, but there were still a few nasty comments.

Bella Notta: Grow up! You're not a small child.

Zankar Case: Who plays with dolls nowadays? You're so babyish.

Everest Well: What kind of rating is this? It's so inaccurate!

This was too much for Susan. She turned off her laptop at once. She didn't want to see any more horrid comments.

The next day, Susan couldn't stop thinking about the mean commenters. They didn't seem like the type of people Susan would like to meet. She sat down next to Cassie.

'Hi Susan,' Cassie said in a lifeless tone. Susan noticed that Cassie looked exhausted. Had she been scrolling through social media late at night?

The teacher came into the classroom and started teaching. However, Susan couldn't concentrate. All she could think of was that there were people in this world who had no problem writing mean comments on social media. She decided to check Amayalisa's channel again after school.

Cassie didn't seem to be paying attention either. She just absentmindedly played with her pencil and was trying not to let her eyes close.

Susan glanced at Cassie. Although the two of them weren't that close, it never seemed to stop Cassie from spending as much time as possible with Susan. Susan had a slight suspicion that Cassie was hiding something. She decided to tackle her about it during lunchtime.

Sure enough, that's what Susan did. She went up to Cassie and asked her about what was going on.

Susan looked down, looking embarrassed. 'I... I don't want to tell you. You will just laugh at me.'

'Of course I won't laugh!' said Susan. 'Come on, what's the problem?'

'Fine,' said Cassie. 'The truth is... I'm a YouTuber.'

Susan gasped. 'No way,' she said. 'Are you serious?'

'Yes,' said Cassie. 'I have been creating random videos for six months. I just needed a distraction from reality.'

'Why?' asked Susan. 'You have everything. You're pretty, you're popular, you're rich, you have famous parents.'

Cassie sighed. 'It's just... you won't understand.'

Susan wanted to question Cassie more, but she didn't want to risk upsetting her. 'Well, can I see your videos?'

'Sure,' said Cassie. 'I'll show you after school.'

Susan rarely went over to Cassie's house. It was usually the other way round. She couldn't stop herself from gasping at the house's enormous lawn.

It seemed strange that Cassie didn't like her wealth. She always tried to hide her privileged roots.

Cassie's laptop was a lot bigger than Susan's and was probably three times as expensive. It looked as big as a PS4.

As Cassie went to her YouTube channel, Susan noticed that it looked oddly familiar. Suddenly, the connection clicked in her brain.

'OMG! You're Amayalisa?'

Cassie looked surprised. 'Yeah. Have you watched my videos?'

Susan nodded. 'As a matter of fact, I'm RainbowSunlight.'

Cassie gasped. 'You're my newest subscriber? I would have never guessed. Well, the reason I'm upset is this.'

Cassie showed Susan some of her haters' comments. Some of them were the ones Susan had read the previous day, but there were many that were even more scandalous. One of them even was telling Cassie to delete her channel.

Susan gasped. 'This is awful. It's cyberbullying! You shouldn't have to put up with this.'

'But what can I do?' asked Cassie. 'If anyone ever connects my username to me, I will never live it down. And my parents would be furious.'

'What if we countered this?' suggested Susan. 'Maybe you could post a video about cyberbullying and why it is bad. Maybe that will get your haters to shut up.'

'Alright,' said Cassie. 'But I need your help. I can't do this alone.'

Susan nodded. 'Okay. Let's do this.'