Mark

2.0

"Mark, look man, I love you, but you've got to stop talking about this guy!" Nate was spinning back and fourth in my leather-clad rolling 'boss chair', which was really hurting his Halo gameplay. Now, I may not have been a huge fan of video games, but when Nate offered, I wasn't going to turn down a good Halo blood bath.

"I'm not always talking about Matt," I replied, even though I knew that was a lie. He was constantly on my mind, and I couldn't help it if he came out in conversations frequently.

"Uh, yeah, you are."

"Well, I'm sorry then. But can't you be happy for me, getting a crush and all?" I looked over at Nate, who had taken a moment to adjust his glasses, allowing me to slaughter him in the video game.

"Sure, if it wasn't so hopeless," he replied, looking over in the brief moment he respawned.

"What do you mean?" I had a sneaking suspicion than Matt was straight, but I didn't want to think about it.

"Dude, he has a girlfriend."

"Oh."

"Her name's Stephanie," Nate added, gunning down my character in call of duty.

"M-hm."

"Focus on some other guy. I heard a rumor that Tyler is single."

"Why would I care?" Nate always seemed to be the gossip of the town, knowing the dirt on everyone and everything. I wasn't much into romance or relationships, but he was always trying to set me up anyway.

"Whatever Mark, you are impossible to satisfy."

"I didn't ask to be set up, Nate."

"Cause you've got your eye on Matthew Patrick," he mocked.

"He's got a YouTube channel too," I said, remembering what I had found the other day.

"For what?"

"Video game theories or something."

"Sounds stupid." I had to agree with Nate there, it was pretty stupid. He put all this effort and research into these complex theories on video games. As if anyone would watch that.

"Not as stupid as your band," I shot back, risking a glance over to him, and looking away from the screen.

Nate's band seemed to change every fortnight. Last month it was called Diet Everything has consisted of him, Rory, Jack, and some kid named Phillip. Now it was just him and Jack the drummer, called Time Party. The names never got any less stupid. And neither did the music.

"Hey! My band is awesome." I scoffed.

"Hate to break it to you, Nate, but no, it's not. The names are ridiculous."

"It's not easy to find a good band name."

"It's even harder to find one as stupid as yours."

"Whatever, Mark, you don't know anything about music. You listen to Fallout Boy."

"Do not diss Fallout Boy. I can like what I like."

"That stuff's for emo and scene kids. You are not emo."

"God, Nate, I can still like their music, can't I?"

"You know," Bage continued, now paying any attention to my last comment. "You really aren't anything."

"What?"

"Going off the 'not emo' thing. You're not a jock or a nerd or a popular kid... You really don't have a friend group. I mean, you hang out with Rory and me so I guess you're part of our friend group, but, like, we have other friend groups and you're really just our friend."

"Nate-"

"You're not in our group, you know? I mean, you used to hang out with the popular girls, so-"

"Nate, seriously-" I hated when people mentioned who I used to hang out with.

"You're really just a floater. Like, an outsider who really is an outsider, not just part of the outsider group."

"Not helping, Nate."

"Sorry man. But it's the truth."

"Just shut up, Nate."

"Sorry." There was a pause, the sound being the yelling and gunshots of call of duty.

"Do you think that's why Matt doesn't like me? Cause I'm an outsider?"

"Okay, now you need to shut up."

"But he's cool, right? He hangs out with Daniel."

"He makes YouTube videos on game theories. He's not cool."

"But he hangs out with the popular kids. So he's cool. So he won't hang out with some weird outsider."

"Mark, you've got to be kidding me."

"Nate, you have to make me cool." I looked away from the game, ignoring my dying avatar.

"No way man. That's, like, the worst idea I've ever heard."

"But-"

"You're getting way to caught up in this. Just forget about it, okay?" I sighed. There was another pause. Then I looked back at the screen and picked up my controller again.

"Okay."

+++++

a bit of a introduction to the character's personalities...