Chapter 2: Elo Hell and Broken Hearts

He replied instantly: "Still breaking up?"

He was quick on the draw. He never missed a chance. Always calling me out. My cheeks burned, but I tried to play it cool.

Me: "..."

I hesitated, fingers hovering over the keyboard. Finally, I just sent the three dots, hoping he’d get the hint.

"How about we break up after the season ends?"

I typed it out again, feeling both shameless and a little desperate. I hit send before I could second-guess myself.

The chat went silent.

Ouch. The little "seen" notification stared back at me, mocking. I waited, biting my thumbnail, but nothing. Not even a typing bubble.

I stubbornly stared at the screen for another minute. My phone kept flashing, "The other person is typing."

Every time the bubble appeared, I held my breath. Every time it disappeared, my hope sank a little more.

I tossed my phone aside and got up to grab some water.

The kitchen was quiet. The fridge hummed in the background. I tried to distract myself, but my mind kept racing. I chugged a glass of water. Then another, just to kill time.

When I came back, my phone was blowing up with notifications—over a dozen messages.

The screen lit up like a Christmas tree. My pulse jumped as I swiped to unlock, half-expecting a wall of insults.

"Heh, so in your eyes I’m just a tool for ranking up? 😏"

"You only think of me at times like this."

"Almost a year together, all wasted."

"And your stats—I don’t even wanna talk about ‘em."

"How do you play a champ so easy you could use your feet, and still play like this?"

"You better just quit gaming for good."

I read each message, getting angrier as I went.

By the last one, my hands were shaking. My face felt hot. I wanted to scream. Wasn’t it just an 'a'? If you don’t wanna help, fine, but why trash my stats? Even telling me to quit gaming? Who does he think he is?

I blocked him again. Whatever. I was done.

With a huff, I hit the block button and tossed my phone onto the couch, like that would somehow erase the sting of his words. The room felt colder, emptier.

Sam saw my sulky face and hurried over to comfort me. "Maddie, log in. We don’t need him."

She slid next to me, looping an arm around my shoulders. "Screw him. We got this. Girl power, right?"

"You found someone?"

My voice was small, hopeful. Maybe she’d discovered a miracle player in the last five minutes.

"I paid eighty bucks to hire a booster."

She grinned sheepishly, holding up her phone like a receipt. "Desperate times, desperate measures."

I gave her a thumbs up. "Respect."

I tried to sound impressed, but deep down I was a little worried. Eighty bucks was a lot for a maybe.

A few hours later, just before sunrise...

The sun was starting to come up, painting the sky a pale pink. My eyes burned from staring at the screen too long. The booster was good, but not a miracle worker.

Turns out, even money can’t always buy wins.

We hit losing streaks—the kind that made you question your life choices. My coffee went cold. Sam’s hair was a mess. At one point, we both just sat in silence, staring at the defeat screen like it had personally betrayed us.

Looking at our record—win one, lose one—win two, lose three.

The numbers didn’t lie. We were stuck in Elo hell. No amount of wishful thinking was going to save us.

I let out a long sigh and gave up.

I slumped back, hands in my hair, feeling like the universe was out to get me. My dream of Diamond was slipping away.

Sam and I hugged each other and cried.

We clung to each other, half-laughing, half-sobbing. Sometimes you just needed to ugly cry with your best friend at five in the morning.

After our meltdown, we had a serious review and agreed—only my blacklisted Wild King or a pro-level player could carry me out of Elo hell.

We sat cross-legged on the floor, talking strategy, but deep down we both knew—unless a miracle happened, we were doomed. I wasn’t planning to contact Wild King again. After all, he told me to quit gaming.

I opened Twitch and saw Jax was live—Chicago Comets’ star jungler.