Sometimes, the worst kind of betrayal doesn’t come from strangers—it comes from people who once made you feel seen, understood… even special. And the moment they turn on you, everything you thought was real starts to fall apart.
My roommate, Stacy, had a bad habit of eating other people’s takeout. One day, she went too far. She scarfed down the food my online gaming buddy, Shadow Strike, had ordered for me.
Later that night, Shadow Strike sent me a screenshot from the delivery driver’s camera and texted, You look like that? How dare you even talk to me? Gross.
Then he dumped me and immediately started flirting with Valkyrie, the top female gamer in our scene.
Soon, everyone was reposting pictures of Valkyrie and mocking me.
Look at the whale who got dumped.
Serves her right.
Chad traded up.
I stared at the picture and froze.
Wasn’t that… me?
I logged into the game, and sure enough, Shadow Strike had already cut ties with me. I tried messaging him, but he only sent one word back.
Disgusting.
Then he blocked me.
Just then, my roommate Stacy noticed I was online and invited me to a lobby.
“Hey, Liv,” she said sweetly. “I’m one game away from Diamond. Can you carry me?”
I tried to shake off the weird feeling. I figured I’d help Stacy first, then sort things out with Shadow Strike afterward.
But the second I joined the lobby, I saw another player already there.
The ID was far too familiar.
Shadow Strike.
Stacy and Shadow Strike were chatting on voice comms. The second he realized I had joined, the friendly tone vanished from his voice.
“Ugh. Why would you invite her, Stacy?”
From the bunk above me, Stacy whined, “What’s wrong, Shadow Strike?”
“Not her,” he snapped. “I don’t want to play with her. Don’t ever put me in a room with her again.”
I frowned. “What is your problem?”
His voice turned cold. “How dare you ask me that? Just thinking about us being a thing makes me sick. Don’t ever say we had something. I’d be embarrassed.”
Then he muted me and said to Stacy, “I’m not playing with her.”
Stacy leaned over the edge of her bunk and smiled smugly. “Sorry, Liv. Shadow Strike likes playing with me more. Maybe next time.”
Then she kicked me out of the room.
Shadow Strike was good, sure, but that wasn’t why we had become gaming buddies. I knew him in real life. His real name was Chad, and he was the star point guard on the basketball team at the university next to ours.
Once, during a campus competition, I twisted my ankle. Chad had carried me all the way to the nurse’s office, joking the whole time to keep me calm. He had been handsome, kind, and unexpectedly gentle.
I had fallen for him a little that day.
Later, when I realized he was also Shadow Strike, I accepted his invite to play together. We spent hours queuing up—him in jungle, me in mid—and we clicked instantly. He used to tell me I was the best female gamer he had ever met. He said he couldn’t stand girls who flirted their way up the ladder.
But now I could hear Stacy above me, her voice overly sweet as she played support.
“Oh, Chad, can you give me blue buff, please?”
He laughed. “Sure.”
The cutesy tone made my stomach turn. I bit my lip and stood up. I needed to get out of the room.
Then Stacy suddenly asked, “Why do you hate Liv so much?”
Chad didn’t hesitate.
“She’s just gross. Looking at her makes my stomach turn.”
I stopped cold.
Gross?
I wasn’t vain, but I knew I wasn’t ugly. I’d actually been runner-up in my school’s hottest student pageant last year. This was the first time in my life anyone had called me disgusting.
Stacy sounded startled for half a second, then quickly slipped back into her fake sweet voice.
“I get it. A guy like you should be with a goddess. I hate ugly people too.”
Chad laughed. “Like you? No. You’re the goddess.”
Stacy giggled like they were sharing some private joke.
I turned to look at her.
She was facing away from me, perched on her stained pillow, headset on, surrounded by dirty sheets that hadn’t been changed in months. Her unwashed hair clung in greasy clumps around her face, and the whole room smelled faintly of fried food and sweat.
Yet she was sitting there acting coy while Chad flirted with her.
I couldn’t take it anymore.
I grabbed my phone and headed for the cafeteria.