It had been one week since I sold my soul.

  Okay, technically I just sent an email. But the vibes were very faustian.

  Since then, Project Parfait hadn’t followed up, just an automatic “Thank you for your submission!” and the haunting silence of corporate HR energy. I oscillated between overanalyzing my mic quality and mentally drafting a list of reasons I should be rejected for everyone’s sake.

  So when GhostToast invited me to a casual IRL meetup with a few indie VTubers including some I’d trauma-bonded with in group collabs.

  I said yes before my anxiety could slap my keyboard away.

  Which is how I ended up sitting in a café shaped like a bookshelf, clutching a latte I didn’t order because I panicked and just said “Same” when the barista asked.

  This was the first time any of us were meeting face-to-face. No avatars. No overlays. No tactical use of anime filters to hide the fact that I hadn’t brushed my hair since the pandemic started. Just real people. In the real world. With real pants.

  I wasn’t sure I remembered how to do “person.”

  And then Noah walked in.

  I only recognized him because of the sticker on his laptop, a GhostToast’s cursed little mascot with the gremlin smile. Otherwise? He looked like the quiet kid in class who always finished tests early and then silently judged the rest of us for breathing too loudly.

  He had glasses. A cardigan. A whole book in his back pocket, like a man who either read for pleasure or plotted revolutions on the side.

  “Hi,” he said, sliding into the booth next to me with the calm of someone who’d already analyzed every exit route and rated the table’s stability.

  “You’re real,” I blurted out.

  Noah blinked. “So are you.”

  “Oh god,” someone else muttered from across the table, Mallow, I think. “We’re all real. This is weird. I hate this.”

  Everyone laughed, which helped unstick the ball of social anxiety currently trying to climb my spine like a gremlin.

  We’d talked online for months. Shared cursed memes. Played unhinged horror games. Helped each other survive the twisted monetization maze of content creation. But in person?

  You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.

  Different.

  Still good, but different.

  Noah, for one, was nothing like GhostToast. Online, he was chaos incarnate. Unhinged jokes. Screams that could crack drywall. The most energetic “let’s goooo” you’d ever hear from a haunted PNG.

  In real life?

  Soft-spoken. Observant. That kind of smart that doesn’t yell about it, just watches you quietly and then drops one surgical comment that ruins your worldview and your lunch.

  “How’s the existential dread since sending the application?” He said, watching the foam swirl in his cappuccino.

  I stared at him.

  “You didn’t even say hello.”

  “That was my hello.”

  Rude. But valid.

  “Uh. Dread’s good. Very existential. Strong notes of fraud complex and mild impostor syndrome.”

  “Classic vintage,” he nodded.

  Mallow perked up. “Wait, you applied to an agency?”

  I froze. “Wait, that wasn’t public knowledge.”

  “You’re not subtle,” Noah said, sipping like a cryptid. “You panic-Tweeted about ‘becoming content.’ We did the math.”

  God. I needed to delete Twitter. Or myself.

  But they didn’t tease. Not really. Just vibed with me, in that chaotic, content-creator-understands-content-creator way. Like we were all running the same glitchy program and finding comfort in each other’s error messages.

  We hung out for hours. Talked about cursed chat moments. Swapped editing horror stories. Ate waffles and made fun of each other’s usernames. At some point, Mallow asked if Ketsusaki would ever collab with GhostToast again, and I said, “Only if the toaster signs a prenup this time.”

  Noah choked on his drink and wheezed for a solid minute. Worth it.

  It wasn’t until the sun started to set that I realized something strange.

  I’d gone outside. I’d met people. And I hadn’t combusted.

  In fact… I’d had fun.

  Real, stupid, soul-healing fun.

  And for a moment, I didn’t think about metrics or follower counts or whether I was “good enough” to join a corporate label.

  It's just me. Gremlin. Demonic. Human. Still a mess.

  But not alone.

  When we finally stood to leave, I grabbed my bag and looked at Noah, who was shoving his laptop back into his backpack with the tired efficiency of a man who lived in Google Docs.

  “Thanks,” I said. “For inviting me.”

  Noah looked up. “Yeah. Figured you needed to touch grass.”

  I snorted. “I touched laminated wood flooring.”

  “Close enough.”

  We said goodbye. Hugged awkwardly. Promised to schedule something soon that we’d all forget about until two weeks later. The usual.

  ~

  I walked home with a warm drink in one hand and a takeout bag in the other, hoodie half-zipped, heart weirdly full. The city buzzed around me like soft background music, still chaotic but not unbearable.

  When I got back to my apartment, I dropped my bag, kicked off my shoes, and collapsed onto the futon. My cheeks still hurt from smiling. My voice was hoarse from laughing. And somewhere in my pocket was a crumpled café receipt covered in doodles from Mallow and a tiny, smug toaster Noah had drawn next to the words “Sign the prenup, coward.”

  For the first time in a while, I didn’t bother pondering.

  I wasn’t refreshing my inbox nor overthinking if I sent the wrong file.

  I was just… happy.

  My phone buzzed once.

  I didn’t check it.

  Too tired.

  Too content.

  The screen lit up briefly on the table beside me.

  [1 New Email] – Project Parfait Talent Division

  Then it dimmed.

  And I fell asleep.

  Still smiling.