"I'm so glad you guys have your priorities in order," Princeton deadpanned to himself. It was about time for one of their Zoom classes, but he was still getting Discord notifications. Quincy, Emma and Maggie were also all either in (or about to be in) Zoom classes, but not a single one of them was actually paying attention. Quincy was in history, but he'd spent most of his time Discord DMing. Maggie was in sociology and she had, shamelessly, admitted to having her mic and cam and sound off.
"You might as well not even be there!" Princeton typed back in surprise the first time she sent a screenshot in their server.
"Attendance is mandatory," Maggie typed back ruefully.
"But how are you going to get away with being muted and deafened with your face cam off?" Princeton asked.
"Well, the professor kind of wants us muted unless we have a question to ask or answer," Maggie typed. "And the deafened thing he doesn't have to know about. All I did was turn off the master volume, but he can't see that. And as for face cam, I do what any student in my place would do and say that I look like absolute crap. It's only like 10:00 AM and I'm still in bed in a nightgown. Fat chance I'm putting my face cam on!"
"MOOD!" Quincy typed back in all caps. He, at least, left the audio on, so even though he was still barely paying attention to the lecture, at least he was sort of listening. That made him only marginally better than Maggie, who was making no effort to at all. Not that she cared. And Quincy didn't either. He might as well have turned his volume off too for all the attention he was giving the class.
Emma, however, was being slightly better. Although she was still sporadically texting in the server and admitting how boring class was, because it was a science course, she felt obligated to be more attentive than either of her two companions.
"It's too confusing. I'd like to not pay attention, but that's literally impossible. If I zone out even for a second, I'll be lost forever!" she typed.
"How much longer do you have?" Quincy typed back, sending crying emojis.
"You got this!" Princeton typed at the same time, sending a thumbs up and a muscle emoji.
"Science sucks," Maggie typed last, sending a vomit emoji.
"It's almost over, thankfully," Emma admitted, sending a happy face. "Thanks for the support by the way," she added, sending a heart. Quincy spammed some hug emojis, Maggie sent more thumbs up and Princeton sent a smile back at her.
"Problem is, next Zoom is in an hour and a half and it's math!" Emma sent a ton of crying emojis which the others were quick to send back.
Even though Maggie's class had only just started, at least it was only sociology. It was boring, yes, because it was so painfully easy, but at least it wasn't something crazy hard and confusing like science or math. And Quincy was about halfway through his own lecture, between Maggie and Emma, but like Maggie's, his class was incredibly easy.
"It's just history," he typed. "No brain cells required. Just listen to the teacher drone and look everything up on Quizlet later."
"Mood," Maggie agreed, reacting to Quincy's message with a laugh emoji.
Princeton still had about five-ish minutes before his class would start, and it was a class about robotics, but it wasn't very intensive since it was just an intro class. Sometimes, it didn't even feel like a robotics class.
"Change your background if you can!" Quincy typed excitedly. "Get like a screenshot of some really cartoony robot and when you enter the Zoom, choose that as your background!"
"You can do that?" Princeton and Maggie both asked.
"Yes!" It was Emma who answered. "Sometimes, when you're in Zoom, you can click on the settings button and it will give you options about visuals and backgrounds and that's where you can either pick from their selection, or upload your own stuff!"
"Why am I always the last to know things?!" Maggie lamented.
"Only problem is, you need face cam on to do it!" Emma cautioned.
"Ooof," Maggie cringed. Would it be worth it? Because on the one hand, she had an array of funny memes she'd love to use as backgrounds, but on the other, she really, really, really hated the idea of face cam. Not only did she hate seeing herself in face cam, especially so early in the morning when she was still in bed, but the way her eyes and hands were moving would be a dead giveaway that she wasn't paying attention to the lecture. Unless... Suddenly, she got an idea.
Quickly setting the classic, iconic "Troll Face" as her background, she turned on her cam, but pushed the screen of her laptop back such that she was no longer in the shot. As such, all anyone saw was the background.
Emma, meanwhile, chose something more aesthetic. She changed her background every lecture, but she always chose pretty things like flowers, or cute things like baby animals. Or she would do scenery, like a city skyline or a rolling field of wheat.
"But wait, why aren't you doing one today?" Princeton typed, recalling that Emma's face cam was also off.
"Because I'm attending this Zoom session completely naked," she replied with a shrug emoji.
"Ooooooh!" Quincy and Maggie both spammed the chat with eye and drool emojis. Princeton, meanwhile, nearly choked on the air.
"What?! Why?!"
"It's hot, I'm alone, it's my house, it's my rules, and my cam is off," she typed back. Maggie continued to spam the chat with eye and drool emojis.
"You shameless little…" Quincy teased Maggie.
"I won't say no to hot naked girls. I don't care how much of a simp that makes me!" Maggie bragged. Emma sent a wink to her, which Maggie quickly returned. "Besides, I've seen Emma naked before and it is quite the sight to behold. H A W T!"
"LOL, awww," Emma sent a blushing face. At the same time, Quincy chuckled to himself and Princeton felt himself blushing, but not in the flattered way like Emma…
ooo
"Oh, yes! Class is out!" About 15 minutes later, Quincy typed excitedly in their server. "We got out early!"
"Lucky," Maggie sent a pout. Quincy sent her a tongue stuck out. Emma had been done for almost half an hour at that point. Princeton had joined his own lesson just a few minutes ago.
"You gonna use a cool background?" Emma asked.
"Ehhhh, maybe in a bit," Princeton typed. Even though he was neither the smartest nor most studious of their quartet, he was the good-two-shoes and felt compelled to focus on the Zoom lecture as best he could. And even though he was sure putting a funny or cute background would only be met with positive reception (because it was something the others could all attest to, Maggie had gotten quite a few "LOLs" in the text chat in response to her new background) Princeton still felt a bit too shy and nervous to try anything yet.
"Baby," Maggie teased, sending a baby emoji.
"You're right," Princeton didn't even bother trying to deny it. He was the youngest, shyest, sweetest and smallest of the group. He really was the Team Baby. But he wasn't totally perfect, as proven by the fact that despite the lecture going on in front of him, he was still on Discord.
"For shame, Princeton," Quincy remarked. "You claim to be the best of us all, yet you're still texting us."
"I'm still better than you all," Princeton teased. "That's how low you guys set the bar." This earned him a round of laughter and teasing from the others, but they couldn't really deny it either.
Princeton was the role model, and the face of the group if they ever needed to curry favor with someone else. Quincy was too much of a joker, Maggie was too sarcastic, dry and mean (in a playful, deadpanning way) and Emma, although another good choice for the behaved one of the group, just didn't care enough to fill that role. She agreed Princeton would be better than her because he had a natural inclination towards behaving while, for Emma, it was more of a "whatever happens, happens" thing. If she was good, then good. If she was bad, then oh well.
"Well, maybe next time he can choose a funny background," Maggie interjected. "We have a lot of memes at our disposal."
"Don't we ever?" Princeton agreed with a laugh. That was perhaps their fullest chat of the server, the memes chat. Even general texting had nothing on the amount of memes per day that everyone in the server loved to post.
And especially in June 2020, most of the memes were either related to the Rona, or to just being queer AF. Already, every user and pfp had been changed to something Pride related. Princeton was "Pan-ceton" (though he'd sometimes switch it to "Trans-ton"). Quincy was "The Arrow Ace", Maggie was "I'm a Super Queer-O" and Emma was "That Artsy Gay".
"Anyway, shouldn't our good little Teacher's Pet get back to class?" Quincy sent a wink at Princeton.
"Shut up," Princeton typed back.
"We're corrupting him!" Maggie cheered.
"I'm still better than all of you," Princeton shot back. And then he proceed to stay on Discord and play-argue with his other three besties while the Zoom lecture continued on without him. So this was what passed for education these days? Well, at least it was fun.
AN: Based off true events. My fav part about Zoom was setting cute or silly backgrounds, and then I'd never really attend a single lecture (I'd do the "cam off, audio off"). I'd spend all my time on Discord, LOL