Chapter Text
Ryland Grace was used to routine.
Every morning he woke up, chugged a bitter coffee, shoved his work haphazardly into his messenger bag, and left for school. He rode his bike down the same route, locking it to the same bike rack, and then prepped his classroom. Even handling his students was consistent—consistently chaotic, which made sense to Grace somehow. He liked to think the variety they brought to his life was the perfect amount: entertaining, endearing, just challenging enough, and confined within the hours of 8am to 3pm. With conversation between other school teachers in the lounge during lunch and after school, Grace convinced himself he had a fulfilling social life. He went home, answered emails, graded papers, called Rocky, took a shower, then went to bed. Weekends were spent going over lesson plans and doing some personal reading or having dinner with Rocky and Adrian if they were in town. That was the routine. Routine was normal. Routine was safe, and Grace liked safe.
…Of course, the universe had different plans for him.
He should have guessed the trouble would start with his students.
“Come on guys, we need to get started,” Grace said, clapping his hands, but the group huddled around a laptop hadn’t taken their seats.
“The video’s almost over, Mr. Grace!” Liam called out.
“Yeah, there’s three more minutes!” Amber said.
Grace sighed. “Why would you start a video if you knew it wouldn’t end before class?”
Various students responded. “The video just dropped, come on, like we’re supposed to wait?” “Yeah, he’s reviewing GTA VII, he got early access!” “If we don’t watch it now, everyone will spoil it!”
Grace walked over to the group, eyeing the laptop. They had YouTube open and were watching a man play a video game. He watched for a few moments, looking at the man in the corner of the video. “Why do you watch someone else play the game?” he asked. “Wouldn’t you rather play it yourselves?”
“Like my parents are going to buy me a console and the game.” “SuperLume doesn’t just play the game; he makes it fun! He makes jokes and tells stories and stuff.” “You’re so old, Mr. Grace.”
Grace smiled. Despite their precociousness, he really loved his students, and he probably indulged them too often. “That laptop better be closed the second the video ends,” he said, walking back to the front of the room.
“Thanks Mr. Grace!” “It’s almost over!”
The trouble really started later that day, when Grace came home from school. Stepping into the hallway that led to his apartment, he noticed movers coming up and down the stairs, taking boxes through the door just down the hall from his. Grace maneuvered himself past the movers, trying to get to his door without being too obvious about the glances he was throwing into the open apartment. (He’s a scientist. Observing things is his job, right?) He had nearly made it, he had his key in the door, he was almost to safety—when a man walked out into the hallway, directing a few movers to handle the box they were carrying carefully. Grace saw him, did a double take, then proceeded to say the worst possible thing he could have come up with in that moment.
“It’s you!”
The man turned, and Grace froze. Why did he say that?? He wasn’t even sure it was the same person. But it really seemed like it. The man standing in front of him sure looked like the man from the video his students were watching that morning. Same well-built stature, same long dark hair, same trimmed beard. And… they were both missing an arm. It had to be the same person. Still, why did he say It’s you! like they were long-lost lovers?
“Sorry?” The man said, looking at Grace with a confused smile.
Fudge. Before he could stop himself, Grace went full speed into over-correction mode.
“I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to say that! I just recognized you from a video my students were watching today, and I said that for some reason. At least I assume you’re the same guy, I don’t really know since I don’t watch your videos. Not that I wouldn’t, I’m sure they’re great! I just, don’t watch a lot of YouTube unless it’s for lesson planning. I’m sorry, I’m totally rambling—"
“What grade?”
Grace blinked. “Huh?”
The man smiled at him. “What grade do you teach?”
Grace’s face felt so hot, he thought he might evaporate. “Oh, um, eighth. Usually.”
The man chuckled. “That sounds about right. I have a lot of viewers around that age. I hope they weren’t watching when they were supposed to be paying attention.”
“No! No, well, only right at the beginning. I said it was fine. They’re good kids,” Grace said, feeling much more at ease now that he felt like he could actually control what he was saying.
The man stepped forward and reached out his hand. “Simon.”
Grace returned the handshake. “Grace. Dr. Ryland Grace, but you don’t have to say the ‘Dr.’ part, you can just call me Grace. Or Ryland, I guess, but most people call me Grace.”
Simon smiled. “Nice to meet you, Grace. I guess we’re neighbors now.”
“I guess so,” Grace said, laughing nervously. They stood facing each other for a moment and Grace decided this was a good time to make an escape. Simon had somehow salvaged their introduction, and Grace didn’t want to risk ruining it again. “Well, I better get going,” he said, heading back to his door and turning the key. “Let me know if you need any help settling in.” When had he ever offered that before?
“Will do,” Simon said. “See you around!”
“See you around.” The door closed.
Safe in his apartment, Grace buried his face in his hands and slid down the door until he was sitting on the ground. That had to be one of the most embarrassing moments of his life… and yet, the way Simon had deftly maneuvered the conversation into comfortable territory was something Grace had never experienced before. He knew he had a tendency to ramble. He rambled while teaching carefully planned-out lessons, so when confronted with an unexpected exchange, with a stranger no less, he simply lost control. This made social situations difficult, and Grace had had his fair share of awkward moments in professional settings and on terrible blind dates, where the other person tried to forcefully change the subject, or let Grace rabbit hole into his own embarrassment, or simply told him he was talking too much. Somehow, Simon had responded in a way that spared Grace from spiraling while still engaging with him. Like he actually cared about what Grace said.
It was refreshing. It was different… but Grace supposed that was a good different. If he ever ran into Simon in the hallway again, he wouldn’t have to worry as much about embarrassing himself. That was a relief. He doubted they would have many interactions anyway, but it was comforting to know.
Grace pushed himself off the floor, deciding to get back into his evening routine to try and rid his body of the leftover anxiety. But as he moved through the kitchen, grabbing a sleeve of crackers that he pretended counted as dinner, his thoughts kept drifting back to the man across the hall. Simon. His students had seemed so engaged with his video. Grace couldn’t imagine making that kind of content for a living. Sure, he taught in front of large groups of kids and had presented before large assemblies during his time in academia, but the online thing seemed like a completely different ballgame.
Grace spread out the quizzes he needed to grade and tried to focus on the answer key.
…Was it really that interesting watching someone play a video game? Grace had never really got into gaming. The idea of it fascinated him—interactive storytelling with some kind of learning curve, but he had simply never gotten into it himself. He knew Adrian liked video games; he wondered if they knew about Simon. What had his students said his online name was? It wasn’t important. He had work to do.
A few moments later, he had opened his laptop and was navigating to YouTube. Blame his scientific curiosity. This was something he didn’t understand: it only made sense for him to do research, right? He typed SuperLume into the search bar and multiple videos populated, each with a couple million views. Grace hadn’t realized there were that many people on the internet. He saw a thumbnail for a game he had heard Adrian mention before, and his mouse hovered over it. He hesitated. This was unknown territory. Close the tab, one side of him whispered. The other side of him was shouting, Play the video! For science!
And suddenly, Simon’s face was filling the screen, talking to the camera animatedly about how excited he was to play the newest installment of his favorite franchise. He was energetic, immediately engaging, and talking comfortably as if his audience was an old friend, sitting in the room with him. Grace was fascinated. As Simon started to play, Grace began to understand what his students meant when they said it wasn’t just watching someone else play a video game. Simon enhanced the story, creating stories and jokes that Grace would never have come up with playing on his own. As the video went on, he found himself laughing multiple times, both at Simon’s exclamations and at the comments others had left underneath the video. Viewers had timestamped moments in the video that they found the funniest or related to in their own playthroughs. It was a whole community and form of social interaction that Grace had never experienced before. He was enthralled.
His phone rang. It was Rocky.
Fudge. Had he really been watching this video for two hours? He paused it and answered the video call.
Rocky was glaring into the camera, his phone propped up so he could use his hands to sign. “You don’t love me anymore,” he signed.
“Sorry Rocky!” Grace apologized, signing and speaking at the same time. “I lost track of time!”
“No, you hate Rocky.”
“If I hated you, I wouldn’t have answered. Also, I’ve called you consistently every night for the past three months. I feel like that’s enough evidence to prove my devotion.”
“You didn’t call me last Saturday.”
“That’s because you were here in my apartment, talking to me face-to-face!”
Rocky grinned. “I guess you’re right. What made you lose track of time anyway?”
Grace glanced at his laptop where the video was paused in the middle of Simon creatively cussing out a monster that had killed him in one hit. “Just… some videos for a lesson next week.”
“Grace lies.”
“Grace does not lie!”
“I can hear your heartbeat.”
“Through the phone? Yeah, right.”
“Rocky put a microchip in Grace. I have access to all your vitals. I can play music in your brain at any time.”
Grace laughed. “Now that I believe.”
Luckily, Rocky dropped his accusations and the conversation continued as it normally did (if thinly veiled threats as a form of showing affection could be considered normal).
The call ended, and Grace turned back to the quizzes that still demanded grading. He would finish these, take a shower, and then go to bed.
He glanced back at his laptop. Then back at the quizzes. Then back to the laptop.
No harm in having the video continue on in the background, right?