A Fictitious Pondering On The Perils Of Punctuation and Online Communication Late At Night

Bye.

He winced at the finality of it, even as his finger lifted from the key struck. The small pixel hanging on the edge of his last instant messge stuck out like a blow to the head. He didn't mean to type it. It just sort of flowed out. He felt guilty, wondering what the person on the other end of line thought when they recieved the bludgeoning period. The other party signed off.
He leaned back in his chair, wrapping one arm across his chest while his other hand rubbed his chin in thought. The sudden abscense of Instant messaging conversations mde the room around him feel more empty. There was a faint hum from the speakers that rested the edge of the wooden shelf above his computer. He ignored it. The chair squeaked as he leaned farther back, sinking deeper into thoughts and silence, which welcomed him as an old friend. The bright computer screen blurred momentarily as he focused on what had just transpired.
Had some of his words come across wrong? For a moment this occupied his thoughts.
The Chair Squeaked again as he leaned forward, protesting against so much movement so late at night. The cursor blinked against the melancholy blue that made up his background in the Instant Messaging Window as if waiting for him to make a response to the sign off of the other conversant. He typed in the window.

Bye!

Cheerful, Expectant almost. Waiting for a confirmation of knowledge of ones departure. Or acknowledgement that one had enjoyed the conversation, and looked forward to another.
Continuing below what he had just typed he accidently struck the enter key.

Whynot84: Bye!
____________________________________________________________________
User Musicaddict2984 is not available

____________________________________________________________________

The automatic response startled him. It was like a sharp noise crashing out of the computer screen into his eyes. Refocusing, he pushed it out of his mind. He typed again.

Bye!

Being careful to hit the shift key with his left pinky finger first, he tapped the enter key with his right.

Bye
Bye!
Bye!!

He continued with several other ways to puncnuate the hackneyed farewell before stopping. Expanding the screen to be able to see them all stacked.
Reaching up, he turned off the speakers, cutting off the hum and increasing the silence.
Exasperated, the chair complained again, settling into a recline. His hand returned to his chin. He risked a glance at the clock in the bottom of the screen. It was late. But no matter.
He thought over the conversation in his mind. She had IM'd him first. Was he avoiding her? Unsure why, he told himself it was because he didn't want to talk to anyone. It had been a long day he was tired he wanted to be alone his fingers hurt.

MusicAddict2984: Hey

Seeing her window flash on top, he didn't acknowledge it right away. Its not the he was doing anything else important. The webpage infront of him shone with a greasy herald of an imminent blockbuster and all of its revolutionary breakthroughs. He scrolled to the end of the review. Not really reading it, just entertaining his eyes. He didn't want to seem like he was really excited to talk to her. He hit the refresh button a few times. Just to see what other stupid ads would pop up on the obnoxious border at the top of the page.

Whynot84: Hey!

Subconciously, or maybe less than he thought, he wanted her to think that he had been involved deeply in something else, just noticing her greeting when he found a break in the deep discussion that he wasn't having. In fact, she was the only person online.

Whynot84: How are you doing?
MusicAddict2984: Good. You?

Im great he thought, the taste of his own sarcasm left his mouth dry. He didn't respond right away. Why had her response been so short?

Good. You?

No smiley face or anything. Was she okay? He tried to imagine her sitting at her computer. Her expression in his mind changed as he clicked through different possiblities.

Sad. Morose. Angry. Bitter.

He had never seen her morose. Or bitter for that matter, but could imagine it.

Whynot84: Im good. What are you up to?











There was no response for few moments. Staring stupidly at the little window, he waited for it to blink while subsequently not blinking. She was probably talking to someone else. He felt a little unimportant for a moment. Finally he went back to refreshing the movie review page. This time a monkey came up on a white background with flashing letters above it. HIT THE MONKEY WITH A FIVE IRON TO WIN A FREE IPOD. As the monkey jumped around making stupid stereotyped monkey noises, a bag of golfclubs popped up as the mouse scrolled over it. He was about to throw a club out of frustration at the obnoxiousness of the ad when she responded.

MusicAddict2984: Im Good, Im going to bed. later

His heart dropped a little. She was going to bed? It was late, but he wanted the company. Had she been waiting for him to say something? Maybe to strike up a conversation of interest? Had she, like him, been waiting for response that would bring her some deep topic of thought to fill the time? Had he somehow let her down as her friend by not responding?

Whynot84: Okay! But how'd it go last night?

Trying to see if she did want to talk, he brought up a previous topic that went extremely well. In fact it was almost an inside joke. He made sure to add an exclamation mark to appear nonthreatening and friendly, trying to leave her no reason to think that he didn't mind chatting if she felt like it.

MusicAddict2984: Good. Have a good night!

Her response felt kind of empty. A response meant to pacify his attempts at communication. This bugged him. She might as well of not put an exclamation, he saw right through it.

Whynot84: Alright sleep good

He was a little bugged, so he didn't bother with a smiley or a exclamation. He didn't want to sound really peppy. Because he wasn't. Maybe she would notice and feel guilty. That wouldn't be so bad.

Whynot84: Bye.
User MusicAddict2984 signed off at 2:50 AM

He ran his fingers through his black hair, settling lower into his chair, his eyes closed as he finished running through the Conversation in his mind.. The dialogue meant nothing he told himself, he had no idea what she was really thinking.

User Whynot84 signed off at 3:20 AM

Quickly closing the computer to avoid temptation of checking his mail again, he got up, the chair complained one more time. He fell asleep quickly.