I wish I understood people (Persona, Corruption/Various Kinks)

(Ha, april fools! You thought that I'd make a third story when I'm barely able to keep up with the two I'm already making?! What do you think I am, some sort of crazy person?!)

Connecting with people was hard.

No shit, Vivian thought to herself. She was never the most social person. Ok, that was being generous. She was a nerd, a nerd who despite having B cup breasts, a stomach that was plushy but just barely not fat, and a decent ass, never quite seemed to attract any attention. Maybe it was how she left her red curly hair in a bit of a mess, letting it cover her face. Maybe it was the large glasses she wore if you did manage to find her face under her curls. Maybe it was the loose fitting clothes that made her look like one of the guys on most days. Maybe it was the fact that to connect with people, you actually had to try.

It's sort of amazing how quickly isolation can sneak up on someone. She had friends... in college, about 2 years ago. She'd met 2 of them at anime club, and 3 of them from when she helped them pass their Intro to Ethics course. She was never quite able to make the two friend groups merge, partially due to resistance to go out by her anime friends, and also that little embarrassment that came when you felt you weren't as close as you hoped. Oh, I already had plans to hang out with Marian. Oh, the game is this weekend, didn't you remember?

Now it wasn't helped by the fact that she moved after college, when most stayed in the same area. And the area didn't help either. Her father's friend had offered her a job setting up routers and making websites for his various businesses. It was a on-call type job, one where most of the time, she was working in the background and she would be called if something really messed up. She had to be local to come in, but most days she would only see her own face in the mirror. And it's not like the surroundings helped much.

She lived now in a small town, about 30 minutes from the one she was born in. Mt. Migadoe was a small community, where the biggest meeting place was the bar, the local greasy spoon, and the church. Unfortunately, Vivian was neither religious, especially prone to eating out, nor interested in drinking with a bunch of farmers and other blue collar types.

She'd kept in touch with her friends online until now, but daily messages became weekly, and now, as she looks at the discord message in front of her, part of her wonders if the last one will soon leave her. Avery was one of her anime friends, and she had messaged her, asking her why it had been two weeks and she still hadn't responded to her message.

How to tell her friend that every time they talked, she brought up her fiance, who was just so perfect, who loved her nerdy hobbies and was so handsome and fit and sexy. How to say that she hadn't watched anything recently because part of her was tired in watching so many shows that felt like they used the same cliches, that fell into the same patterns.

She wanted to change her life. She wanted to get to know people. So as she closed her discord window, she was surprised when she saw the black website. It must have been a hidden frame she clicked on before she went back to the discord window. Her cursor goes to close the tab, before she reads it. A wish, huh?

She writes it before she even thinks about it. I wish I had friends. But she stops. No, that was not what she really needed. The problem wasn't external. It was internal.

I wish I understood people.