Rhia, please message me back.

  When Rhia woke up the next morning, it was to thirteen more texts from Milly, and two more calls with voicemails for each. There was no way in hell she was answering those, so she continued to ignore the messages, delete the voicemails, and go about her usual morning rituals.

  Moving about her apartment, Rhia cursed as she stumbled into stacks of boxes, banging her toes over and over again. The blackout curtains on all her windows were doing their job and keeping out any pesky sunlight that might stream in. The problem was that she hadn’t been living in the apartment for long and hadn’t gotten used to where everything was. Well…she also hadn’t bothered to unpack just yet. When Milly and Rhia had broken up, she had moved out of their shared home- a house Rhia had rented in her name and paid all the bills for- and into the new place. The only people that knew her new address was Avery, and her cleaning lady Jen.

  Her kitchen, at least, was set up. In a matter of minutes, she had coffee brewing and bread in the toaster. While she was waiting, Rhia shuffled to the bathroom, dragged her body into the shower, and scrubbed like she could wash the last few weeks away. It was still early and she was still tired. Dressed in clean clothes with a plate of buttered toast in one hand and a cup of coffee in the other, Rhia planted herself back in front of her computer and started her work for the day. She worked for a large tech company as a network administrator and it usually took her around three hours to get her work done, and she was well paid for it.

  When work was done, Rhia shoved a bowl of ramen in the microwave, then mindlessly ate lunch while setting up for her stream. After finishing her food, she set aside her empty bowl and started the stream, adopting the funny, playful persona she used with her avatar. Streaming was always fun, and gaming was Rhia’s favorite past time. All the stuff with Milly had put a dampener on it, but she was determined to get over it. Her fans and followers deserved better than that. She was two hours into the stream when the chat box to the side caught her attention.

  NINJAMONKEY92: Omg, I JUST saw Millymoo’s video!

  LowkeyLoki: Is she serious?! I don’t believe any of that.

  PeachyKeenQueen: Who is Rhiannon Peterson? Is that Rhia’s real name?

  Sn00pDoggieDawg: Rhia, u missd tht gun.

  23i7384729: Rhia, you should prob go watch Milly’s vid.

  Animuuu: skibidi toilet, so sigma

  BangchanIsMyHusband: Rhiaaaaa, play Animal Crossing!

  Rhia’s stomach sank to see her name in the chat and sank even farther when user after user told her to go watch Milly’s video. Her hand shook as she opened another tab and clicked into Milly’s channel. She hadn’t unsubscribed for the same depressing reason she hadn’t blocked her. Rhia missed her and some part of her that she loathed hoped that maybe she could forgive Milly in time and they could be together again, even if she knew logically she would never let Milly that close to her again.

  The latest video on Milly’s page, posted twelve minutes ago, already had thirty thousand views and they were climbing. Rhia heaved a breath as she read the title. “GRWM: LET’S CHAT ABOUT MY EX, RHIAPLAYSGAMES! FREE GIVEAWAY AT THE END!! <3”

  The thumbnail was Milly, her pink hair up in spiraling pigtails, wearing matching pink contacts. Her makeup, though, was unusual for Milly. Instead of her usual glittery pastel looks, her makeup was dark and dramatic. Her slender hand held up a picture of the two of them kissing at a New Year’s Eve party from two years ago she had dragged Rhia to.

  Rhia didn’t want to click on the video but she could see the chat box to the side egging her on. Her avatar was staring to the side, silent. Her heart was thudding in her chest and she felt like she was about to puke up cheap ramen all over her desktop. Like it had a mind of its own, her finger clicked on the mouse and the sound of Milly’s voice started playing.

  “Hi, babes! It’s Millymoo! Get ready with me while I tell you all about my ex-girlfriend, Rhia.” Milly was sitting in front of her setup back in their old house, a space Rhia recognized. The wall behind her was covered in pink roses and vines, with a large neon sign that said Millymoo in bright purple. She was wearing a fuzzy white sweater and little pearl earrings, both of which Rhia had bought her for her last birthday.

  Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  “Most of you would probably know Rhia as RhiaPlaysGames, but her name is actually Rhiannon Peterson. She’s a twenty-seven year old chronic shut-in and is nothing like the peppy little avatar she uses.”

  Milly smeared concealer over her face as she continued, painting her already fair skin even paler. “I suppose some of that could be a product of her upbringing, since Rhia was raised in the foster system and didn’t have a proper home life. She grew up to be a pretty sad, gloomy person.” She waved a makeup brush around like she was casually discussing the weather and not bashing Rhia’s character for her fans.

  “We met a few years back at a streamer conference and she begged me for my number. I tried telling her I wasn’t into girls like that, but Rhia just would not take no for an answer. It was pretty clear she was inexperienced with people, and I felt bad for her, so I gave her my number and decided I would at least try.”

  “Oh, my god.” The whispered words were backed up with another surge of nausea. Rhia’s mouth watered and she swallowed compulsively. On screen Avatar Rhia was looking just as smiley as ever.

  Milly moved on to dusting her eyes with gray and black eyeshadow, her mouth open in concentration as she peered into a mirror. “Over the course of our relationship, Rhia was mentally and verbally abusive to me, always putting down any ideas I had and generally just trying to infect me with her gloominess.” She paused and looked serenely towards the camera, her cheeks turning pink. “Thankfully, I had all my fans to keep me from falling into that. I wanted to leave the relationship but I was honestly a little worried about my channel and how Rhia would react. She’s got a lot more followers and subscribers than I do and all I could think was that she would tank my career for revenge.”

  Rhia almost wanted to applaud Milly's acting skills as she looked heartbroken and frustrated while lining her eyes.

  “It was so hard, but I finally was able to get away from her. I kicked her out of my house and I guess she has a new apartment somewhere in the city.” Milly went on to tell more lies about Rhia while transforming her face into the dramatic look she wore on her thumbnail, all while Rhia listened in muted horror. The people in her chat were going wild at her response, or lack thereof. Some of them seemed to actually believe Milly and took vicious glee in cutting Rhia’s character while others staunchly defended her, saying Rhia would never do the things Milly claimed and that Milly was known to lie about things. Which was news to Rhia, who would never have guessed Milly had a mean bone in her body up until three weeks ago.

  They had been at home and it had been storming outside, a late summer storm that had rattled the windows of their house and had made the idea of working seem like a daunting task. Instead, they had decided to put on pajamas and do some gaming with a few of Milly’s friends. They had been gaming for a bit when Milly had announced she was hungry and had asked Rhia to make her ramen, the only thing Rhia knew how to cook. She had tried cooking countless times before with recipe books in hand, only to end up with something horrible at the end. Rhia had gotten up and it had taken her only a moment to slip a packet of ramen in a bowl with some water into the microwave. Milly usually liked it better on the stove, but Rhia didn’t think there was any actual difference and secretly just microwaved it. She had returned to her headset just in time to hear Milly talking with her friends about her.

  “-I don’t know how much longer I can do this shit.” Milly was talking, groaning woefully. Rhia was going to announce herself but something made her keep quiet and listen.

  Trisha, one of Milly’s best friends since high school, laughed. “She’s such a wet blanket. I don’t know how you can stand it.”

  “Because she bought me a Gucci bag when I reached 50k last month,” Milly chirped. “I can pretend to like pussy as long as I’m getting spoiled. Besides, I’ve gotten a ton of new subscribers since we announced we’re dating.”

  “You slept with her?!” Steven, Milly’s other friend, asked in an accusatory growl. “Isn’t that prostitution or something?”

  Milly scoffed and gave a little ringing laugh that echoed back across the house where Rhia was standing frozen, unable to believe what she was hearing. “The only one I’ve slept with this whole time is Terrance. And Jackson. And Milo. And Milo’s dad.”

  All three of them laughed at that.

  “So, what have you done?” Trisha asked curiously. “You can’t tell me you haven’t fooled around for almost three years! There’s no way she would stick around that long.”

  “We make out sometimes. She’s actually pretty decent at kissing. I let her go down on me a few times but I’ve never done anything to her.” There was a rustle like Milly was shrugging. “It’s not really any difference than if I made out with a random girl at a club, though.”

  “Yeah, I dunno,” Steven drawled sarcastically. “I don’t suck off random dudes at clubs.”

  Milly laughed again and the sound set Rhia’s teeth on edge. “Well, maybe you should.”

  Rhia wasn’t prone to anger but rage and grief had swept through her in equal measures and it had taken all of her control to not scream at Milly and rip apart everything she had bought her. Instead, she had calmly turned off her console, grabbed her phone and keys, called an Uber, and had taken herself to a hotel. While she was there, she emptied out their shared bank account that only she deposited money into, canceled all the cards she had given to Milly, and had started looking for apartments across town until she could gather enough wits to look for something in a city somewhere across the world so she would never have to see a single glimpse of Milly ever again. Just to be petty, she had gone through and had canceled all the subscriptions she paid for, then had called the utility companies attached to the house to let them know to cut everything off at the start of the next month.

  Avery hadn’t taken the news well, but he was at least relieved she was away from Milly. He had arranged movers to go to the house and pack up all her things while he supervised. Afterward, he had called to say that Milly had been furious but had tried to play the victim the whole time to appeal to Avery and the movers. He had helped Rhia find a new place and, two days later, she was in her new apartment, completely alone.