One Shot Stories - Ling & Orm

Textmate (LingOrm)

Disclaimer: G!P

It was well past midnight, and Ling was in full cozy mode, lazily clicking through TV channels before heading to the kitchen on an urgent mission: midnight snacks.

She returned triumphantly, hands loaded with a steaming bowl of instant noodles, a mound of rice, three hard-boiled eggs, a cold Coke, and a bag of potato chips. Settling happily onto her sofa, she dug in.

The room filled with a delightful symphony of loud noodle slurps, soft chomp-chomps of egg and rice, the sharp crunch of chips, and noisy straw sips, all timed to the upbeat music on TV.

Mid-slurp, her eyes drifted back to the screen, where a late-night chat ticker was cycling through profile posts from across the country. One caught her eye: Orm.

21 • 173cm • Bubbly & loves food!

Right next to it was a phone number. Ling's eyes widened. A fellow foodie! She scrambled for her phone, thumb flying across the keyboard to save the contact before the ticker refreshed and swept Orm away forever.

Ling kept munching away, her mind racing just as fast as her jaw. Staring at the blank text box, she tried to draft the perfect opener.

"Hi."

"Ugh, too boring, way too cliché," she mumbled to herself, instantly hitting backspace.

She tapped out another idea: "Hey gorgeous ;)"

She winced. "Nope, way too flirtatious!" Delete, delete, delete.

Cheeks completely stuffed with noodles and egg, she looked like a little chipmunk hoarding winter snacks as she chewed thoughtfully. Finally, a stroke of midnight genius struck. She typed with renewed confidence:

"I heard you love food... I love it too! Want to be textmates?"

With a light shrug, Ling hit send before she could overthink it again, not really expecting a reply from a random TV ticker anyway. She picked up another chip, perfectly content, and waited to see what would happen.

An hour passed with complete silence from her phone.

"Oh well, at least I tried!" Ling whispered with a quiet shrug, tossing her phone onto the nightstand and drifting off to sleep with zero expectations.

When Saturday morning rolled around—her glorious day off—she jumped right into her routine. She threw on her favorite athletic wear, grabbed her water bottle, and dusted off her iPod. Plugging in her earphones, she scrolled straight to "I Gotta Feeling" by the Black Eyed Peas, letting the upbeat tempo power her through a solid gym session.

Back home, freshly showered and fed, Ling happily flopped starfish-style onto her bed. She reached for her trusty Nokia 6600 on the side table, expecting nothing more than the time, but the screen flashed with an unread message from Orm:

"yes i love food, sure why not, lets be a textmate :')"

Ling's eyes went wide. "No way... she actually replied!" she gasped out loud, excitement instantly bubbling up inside her.

Abandoning all cool, she typed back at lightning speed before her brain could even catch up:

"hi! my name is ling, i live in manila. how about you? where do you live, orm?"

SEND.

Just a few seconds later, her phone buzzed in her hand. Ling instantly clicked open the notification, a bright grin spreading across her face.

"i live in batanes," Orm replied.

Whoa, quite a distance! Ling thought. Before she could even process the geography, another buzz shook the Nokia: