Zoey cleared her throat and returned her attention to the monitor, moving the mouse as she gathered what remained of her presenter cadence. The question Layla had left unanswered was still sitting somewhere in the back of her mind, but the stream had to end eventually, preferably before chat found another reason to interrogate either of them.
"Anyway. Thank you to everyone who watched, donated, and behaved with the minimum level of human decency required to keep the stream online."
CHAT:
WE DID GREAT
we discussed toilet ghosts for twenty minutes
actually loved this stream
NOT BANNED YET
"And thank you to the sponsor for sending the products and apparently an ongoing legal narrative I’ll be reading immediately after this."
She turned slightly toward Layla. Her composure held, although her fingertips tapped against the desk before she continued.
"And thank you, Layla, for coming. For your first stream, you handled chat better than most people who’ve been doing this for years."
CHAT:
LAYLA YOU HAVE A FAN CLUB NOW
SHE TAMED US
INVITE HER BACK
she was so sweet omg
Zoey gave the camera a tight smile and gestured politely toward her guest.
"Do you want to say anything before we end?"
Layla answered in the same serious, calm tone she had carried throughout the collaboration.
"...it was an honor participating in this collaboration."
The formality of the response brought a genuine warmth to Zoey's expression.
"And it was an honor having you."
CHAT:
LMAO THEY'RE SO FORMAL 😭
wait is layla streaming somewhere too??
LAYLA FIRST STREAM SUCCESS
10/10 guest would watch again
Zoey raised a hand toward the camera, determined to finish the broadcast before the demands for a second collaboration developed into a petition.
"Thank you for watching. Take care of your skin, wear SPF, and read legally binding documents before agreeing to things."
CHAT:
see you next stream <3
SHE LEARNED NOTHING
BYE LAYLA BYE ZOEY
PART TWO PART TWO PART TWO
She clicked the end-stream control.
The preview remained on the monitor while the connection closed, with the last few messages continuing to race down the chat window. Then the broadcast interface disappeared, replaced by the post-stream dashboard and its final viewer count.
The room fell quiet.
Without donation alerts, chat messages, or Zoey's running commentary filling the air, the steady hum of the computer fans became noticeable again. She lowered the hand she had been holding toward the camera and released a long breath.
"Okay. We’re off."
She checked the dashboard twice to make certain the broadcast had ended before removing her headset. The band had flattened part of her orange-red hair, leaving a shallow indentation across the top of her head. She placed it beside the keyboard, then looked over the product table.
The closed product tray occupied one corner of the desk, surrounded by stained cotton pads, discarded packaging, and the folded sponsor sheet. An entire hour of skincare education had left behind something resembling the aftermath of a very specialized laboratory accident.
Zoey began gathering the used cotton pads into a pile.
"It's strange when it stops."
Her voice had lost the projection she used for the microphone. She glanced at the monitor, where the viewer count remained visible despite the absence of anyone watching.
"One second there are thousands of people commenting on everything you do, and then it’s just... the computer fan."
She dropped the cotton pads into the wastebasket beneath the desk and straightened, turning toward Layla.
"Are you alright? I know that was your first time, and the chat was...chat."
"I am fine. It was very enlightening."
Zoey nodded, although the answer did little to help her decide how the rest of this interaction was supposed to proceed.
There was no audience to address now, no sponsor segment to follow, and no rapidly scrolling wall of messages demanding her attention. The two of them were sitting together in her home, surrounded by equipment that suddenly had no immediate purpose.
The familiar room felt considerably more intimate without the stream running.
Blue and violet light from the neon strips washed across the shelves behind the monitors. Game and anime figures stood in uneven rows beside boxed collectibles, while posters occupied most of the wall above the setup. Zoey spent hours in this room every day, yet having someone sitting beside her without a camera to perform for made her conscious of details she normally ignored.
Including the distance between their chairs.
And how close Layla was when she spoke.
And the fact that every questionable decorative decision Zoey had made over the past several years was currently on display.
She reached toward the nearest shelf and adjusted a figure by a few degrees. It had already been facing forward.
"Enlightening is probably the nicest possible word for what happened."
She returned to the desk and gathered the discarded packaging, flattening an empty box before placing it beside the closed product tray.
"I normally don’t notice any of this."
She gestured toward the lights, shelves, and posters.
"When I’m live, it’s just the background. Now it suddenly looks like I invited someone into a museum dedicated to every purchase I made after midnight."
A quiet laugh escaped her. She picked up her water bottle, finding it considerably easier to hold something than to leave both hands idle.
Layla checked the time.
"I need to go now."
Zoey's smile faltered. Already? She glanced instinctively at the clock, then back at Layla. Had she said something wrong? Was the room uncomfortable? Maybe Layla had only been waiting for a polite opportunity to leave, and Zoey had been keeping her here with her rambling about figurines and midnight purchases.
Her thoughts were already racing through the last few minutes, searching for some obvious social mistake she might have missed. Meanwhile, Layla had given her absolutely no indication that anything was wrong.
Zoey straightened in her chair, suddenly desperate to find a reason for her to stay a little longer without making it sound like she was asking her to stay.
"A-already ? ahem...Do you want something before you go? Water, tea... an actual complete glass this time?"
"No."
Layla rose from her chair and moved away from the desk to collect her belongings. She put her gloves back on, then gathered her umbrella and the rest of her UV protection.
Zoey watched her pull on the black gloves and collect her umbrella. Earlier, she might have mistaken the entire outfit for an elaborate gothic aesthetic. Now, she found herself checking whether Layla had remembered everything before going outside.
Zoey set her bottle down and stood almost immediately, sending her chair rolling a short distance behind her.
"Right. Of course."
She watched Layla finish covering her pale hands before taking hold of the umbrella. Then she stepped around the cable beside the desk, nudging an empty product box out of the way with her foot to clear the path toward the door.
"I’ll walk you out."
At the entryway, Zoey opened the door and moved aside to give Layla enough room to pass with her belongings. The frantic energy of her earlier welcome had faded, leaving her with a rather inconvenient awareness of how little she knew about saying goodbye to someone when she genuinely wanted to leave a good impression.
"Thank you. Really."
Her fingers rested against the edge of the door.
Layla gave her a polite bow before stepping outside.
The afternoon sunlight illuminated the street, making her black outfit stand out sharply against the pale pavement and bright buildings. With her umbrella open above her, she walked away from the house and continued along the residential alley.
Zoey remained in the doorway, watching until Layla disappeared from sight.
Only then did she close the door.
She stood in the entryway for a moment, facing the wooden surface. The silence that had felt awkward in the streaming room now seemed to have followed her all the way downstairs.
There was really only one appropriate response to the situation.
Zoey leaned forward, intending to rest her forehead against the door in the manner of a deeply troubled protagonist from a dramatic film.
Unfortunately, she misjudged the distance.
Her forehead struck the wood with a considerably louder impact than intended.
"Ow... ow, ow, ow..."
She dropped into a crouch, one hand pressed against her forehead while the other braced against the floor. A thin vertical imprint from the doorframe was already reddening beneath her bangs, and her eyes watered as she waited for the sharp pain to subside.
After remaining there for several seconds, she addressed the empty entryway.
"Perfect. Very dignified."
Using the door handle for support, Zoey pushed herself upright and made her way back to the streaming room.
The neon lights were still on, casting their familiar colors across the shelves. Both monitors displayed the post-stream dashboard, and Layla's empty chair remained beside hers.
Zoey lowered herself into her seat and picked up her phone.
Their message history was remarkably short. Most of it consisted of practical exchanges about the collaboration, arranging the time, confirming details, and making sure everything was ready for the stream.
She opened the text field and began typing.
Thank you again for participating in the stream today.
Zoey examined the sentence.
Too formal.
She deleted it.
Thank you again for coming today. I think the stream went really well.
Too short. What if it sounded dismissive?
She added another sentence, reconsidered the wording, removed it, and restored it with different punctuation. Then she added an apology for the chat. And another sentence explaining the apology.
What should have been a simple thank-you had grown into a paragraph.
What should have been a simple thank-you had gradually grown into a paragraph.
Thank you again for coming today. I know I already said it before you left, but I wanted to thank you properly. I think the stream went really well, and chat liked having you there. I hope they weren’t too overwhelming. They can be a lot, especially if you aren’t used to livestreaming, but you handled them better than most people do their first time.
Zoey reread the entire thing.
Her thumb hovered over the delete key.
Nearly an hour had passed since Layla left, and Zoey was still trying to write a thank-you message about a collaboration they had both attended.
Instead, she started a second paragraph.
Also, if you ever need help with anything related to streaming, you can ask me. Cameras, microphones, lighting, software, moderation, or setting everything up. Even if you wanted to start streaming yourself, I could help. Not that I’m assuming you want to start streaming. I just mean that if you did, or if you were curious about it, I have some equipment and experience, so you wouldn’t have to figure everything out alone.
Zoey winced at the screen.
"Why does this look like a service contract?"
She tried shortening the message.
Two more sentences appeared.
There’s no obligation, obviously. It’s only an offer. You don’t need to answer now.
Zoey lowered the phone and looked toward Layla's empty chair.
This was getting ridiculous.
She had spent an entire hour speaking to thousands of people while demonstrating products she barely understood. Sending one private message should not have required this much preparation.
Before she could begin rewriting it for the ninth time, she squeezed her eyes shut and pressed send.
The message appeared in the conversation, occupying most of the phone screen.
Zoey placed the device facedown on the desk.
Almost immediately, she turned it over again.
She kept the conversation open...
Elsewhere, Layla was returning home.
She unlocked the door of a residential apartment and stepped inside, closing it behind her. The curtains were drawn against the afternoon sun.
Her umbrella went into its usual place near the entrance. She removed her gloves and put away the rest of her UV protection, each movement familiar from repetition.
Beyond the entryway, a sofa stood along the right-hand wall.
Someone was sitting there.
A hand rested comfortably on one of the armrests.
Layla turned toward the person as she finished putting away her belongings.
"You ate?"