My Virtual Lover

Live 18: Jury's Inner Conflicts

Days passed by so quickly, Rhapsody has finished her client’s assignment on Friday night. It was supposed to be a weekend for her to chill and relax. However, her time is wasted on doing her Livestream and freelance job as a graphic designer. She barely leaves her room, which makes her father quite worried.

She slumps her face onto the pillow, her eyebags are apparent for his father to see whenever she leaves the room. Her exhausted face tells how much she tried hard in gaining her money while having fun in Holorealm. Although lately, she feels too tired to even care about the drama that surrounds her name.

After what she did in front of the Holorealm celebrity Davis and her younger brother Sunsun, her name is notorious for her coldness and aloofness. A straightforward and rude broadcaster who likes to have fun with her friends and is a passionate gamer. Due to Jury’s straightforwardness, not lots of people can stand her blunt attitude

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One thing that she’s good at is being realistic and independent with her choice. Decisive in nature, the only that causes her indecisiveness usually starts with the letter ‘G’, which is game. Jury opens her cell phone, checking the email whether the client responds to her email. 

She had an idea to make an autumn-themed cafe since the owner loves the color of autumn and brown. The rustic and old cafe theme is suitable for the slogan ‘Good Cup, Good Coffee’. She remembers that the responder said that their most sold food is maple syrup french toast, the cook is a talented one.

The sender attached a photo of his fresh maple syrup french toast, making her hungry for the cook’s food. Jury has never been a great cook, rather she is too impatient to even care about her result. She’s baffled with the amount of stress she puts on every day, holing inside her bedroom doing Livestream and designing at the same time.

Jury is bored with the layout of her bedroom, seeing the same thing after her Livestream, even after designing. It’s still the same grey walls, cold ceramic floor, and most importantly the same laptop screen. It was incomprehensible how stressful she is to work indoors, even though she dislikes outdoors often.

But she can’t take it anymore, she needs to refresh her mind from the online chats, friends, and works. She goes out of her apartment, wearing boots and a black string dress to the mall next door. Walking through the bustling twin streets of the mall with her boots tapping on the rocky cemented surface, crossing over from her apartment to the other side.

She looks at the glassy mall before her, she doesn’t waste any time getting inside. She doesn’t have any place in mind for refreshing other than the mall next door, it would be nice if she could enjoy the refreshing public park or other things than another building. Julius once mentioned how boring Surabaya is, after all, it’s a metropolitan city.

If she expects to find a good park around then she’s mistaken, now she can see why her father said such things. There are lots of branded shops inside the mall, but again it’s just a shop. She admits that the price is cheaper than the one in London, but she herself doesn’t fancy shopping for clothes.

The glass shines, reflecting the lights inside the mall, but even so, her heart remains husky as ever. She thought she could see something inside the mall, something that refill the void in her chest. However, she’s not interested in the brilliance of a shining diamond or branded products. She wants something more real, not superficial products that make her happy.

It’s the human touch she craves for, she can feel it from her body. Shivering and anticipating someone will grab her hand and call her darling, her important person. As soon as her mind flies to that, she shakes off her mind unwillingly to be taken by her wild fantasy. She promises herself that she won’t return to her old ways.

“Relationship is nothing but a hassle” she clenches her fist, as she looks down on the shiny marble floor. “It’s what I promised to myself, I won’t back down from that!”.

She stomps her way to the game stores on the basement floor, expecting to see a gaming headset on sale since it’s going to be a Black Friday sale soon. It’s a headphone with Nexus brand, her orange eyes sparkle when she sees the headset on display as soon as she goes down through the elevator.

Her old gaming earphones are quite rusty due to the six years of usage, it’s still usable but her collector mind tells her to buy the headphones on the Black Friday sale. The gamer girl latches her palm on the glassy wall, looking at the grand display of the Nexus Headphone along with the other merchandise such as mouse pad and gaming mouse.

Next to the gaming store is a Vtuber store where the clerk seems to sell Vtuber’s merchandise cheaper than the original. She looks at her Rhapsody’s keychain as she stares at the gamer maid, her persona looks innocent and girly. Her mouth forms a frown when she gazes at the reflection of her clothes on the glass.

“I’m nowhere near Rhapsody” she mulls to herself. “But it’s better this way, no one knows who I am”.

Rhapsody is the ideal persona she wants, a cute clumsy girl that everyone likes. It must be nice being Rhapsody, being clumsy but no one hollers at her even when she’s being clumsy. Since she is an anime girl, perfect, and cute. Deep down, she envies her persona for her popularity of being a clumsy gamer girl.

“If I am Rhapsody, then I wouldn’t suffer this badly with low self-esteem issues” she mumbles to herself in front of the store clerk, seemingly confusing him. “If only I am reborn as a 2D character”.