Bocchi The Normie
Chapter 1: Bocchi The Poser!
A/N: Contains manga spoilers
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After uploading the new guitarhero video, I, Gotoh Hitori, a.k.a. Bocchi, proceeded with my usual ritual.
I stared at the Oh!Tube comment section while spamming the refresh button.
Ever since I hit 100k subs, there were a lot more comments than usual. I grinned to myself as I saw a wave of positive feedback fill the comment section.
"So good! Your technique is amazing as always! Not only is guitarhero-san's playing eerily accurate to the original song, but your embellishments are creative and unexpected! Keep up the good work!"
I was blessed to have such a nice community, nice enough that even an anxious wreck like me could keep uploading videos to Oh!Tube.
"Nice cover as always! I love how guitarhero-san always does covers of popular songs! Also, I saw your new gear reveal on TwiXer! Personally, I'd never spend that much money on a new pedal, but I guess you're getting a lot of ad revenue, huh?"
While it was true my ad revenue increased along with my growing viewership, that pedal purchase was a result of me going crazy during my 'showing off new gear on social media' phase. I never wanted to go through that addicting, yet strangely liberating, experience again.
"You know, the descriptions are always an interesting read, but isn't it all made up? I mean, guitarhero-san claims that she's the most popular girl in her school, and that she's dating an ace athlete and all that, but would a popular girl wear such a plain looking tracksuit all the time? Seems a bit suspicious, if you ask me."
Even though everyone else was praising me, this one negative comment managed to plummet my mood all the way down to rock bottom.
My fans were starting to catch on to my lies. It was only a matter of time. After all, I couldn't deny that my lies were getting way more ridiculous with every video I uploaded.
At first, it started out with me claiming that I had a bunch of friends IRL, who gave me suggestions for covers to play. I even claimed that I sang these songs in the karaoke with them beforehand.
Somehow, those lies evolved to the point where guitarhero was supposedly the most popular girl in school. A few videos later, guitarhero was going out with the best athlete in her school.
"I dedicate this video to my boyfriend~! Good luck with nationals, babe! Fight on! Luv ya!"
Guitarhero had somehow become an extrovert that surpassed the extrovert power level of Kita-chan herself. After all, despite how popular Kita-chan was, she didn't have a boyfriend. At least none that I knew of.
When I refreshed the page again, I saw that the comment had already accumulated 30 likes. There were even three new comments under it.
"Now that you mention it, guitarhero-san always wears that same old tracksuit."
"You'd think she could afford to buy a better outfit. I mean, that Gibson of hers must be worth at least 500k yen. Plus, she must be getting a lot of Oh!Tube money."
"Yeah, I bet she's just a poser. I'm kinda losing respect for her."
I closed the tab and turned off my PC.
…
…
"Hm? Is it just me or does Bocchi-chan look even gloomier than usual?"
During my work shift at Starry, Nijika-chan noticed my depressed state.
"Bocchi looks the same as always," Ryo-san said, as she walked over to take a closer look at me.
"Let's just ask Hitori-chan what's wrong this time," Kita-chan said, as she walked over to me and placed a hand on my shoulder. "Hitori-chan, did something happen?"
"Well, the truth is…"
Since they already knew about my guitarhero identity thanks to Poison Yami-san exposing me, I decided to tell them everything.
"I guess all your lies are coming back to haunt you, huh?" Nijika-chan said, sighing as she leaned against the counter. "I mean, it was kind of obvious to me you were lying, even before I found out that Bocchi-chan is guitarhero. You only ever wear tracksuits and old sweaters in your videos. I never believed that guitarhero was a popular girl since the start."
"Gack!"
Nijika-chan was blunt as always. She didn't even try to soften the blow.
"I've only seen a few of guitarhero's videos back then, when I saw them on my feed," Ryo-san said. "When I heard you play, I thought to myself, 'Ah, there's no way a girl this young is this good while being popular at school. She must spend all of her time practicing the guitar at home'."
"Ugh!"
Ryo-san was also pretty blunt herself. These girls really didn't have any tact.
I turned to Kita-chan, the only one who I could rely on to comfort me.
She gave me an uneasy smile and looked away. "I think I did see guitarhero recommended to me once, but I only watch make-up tutorials and fashion videos on Oh!Tube. When I saw that ratty outfit in the thumbnail, I wasn't interested in watching the video. Sorry!"
"Gahhh!"
Kita-chan's comment hurt me even more than the other two.
"Ahh! Bocchi-chan is melting again!"
As the girls tried to get me to stop disintegrating, Manager came out and frowned at all of us. "Oi, are you girls gonna keep fooling around, or are you gonna get back to work?"
"S-Sorry, Manager!"
While I was sweeping the floor with a broom, Kita-chan tapped me on the shoulder, giving me a cheerful smile. "You know, Hitori-chan, the simple solution to your problem is to switch up your outfit in the next video."
"There's no way I can do that."
"Even though it'll solve all your problems?"
"Yeah, there's no way."
For a normie like Kita-chan, I could understand why she'd think it was easy to change my image. However, for a gloomy girl like me, wearing anything other than a tracksuit was too much of a challenge.
"I don't see why it's a problem, Hitori-chan. I mean, you don't even show your face in those videos. You can just hide behind your guitarhero persona and wear whatever you want without any consequences, right?"
This girl who shamelessly plastered selfies of herself all over Isstagram, was advocating the benefits of complete internet anonymity?
Maybe it was my fault for corrupting her.
Kita-chan's Crime Coefficient was going up because of me.
"Well, I guess that works in theory," I said, not outright denying the solution she presented.
What Kita-chan said made sense. Gotoh Hitori and guitarhero were two completely different people. Guitarhero could perform in front of thousands, even millions of people online, while Gotoh Hitori still suffered from stage anxiety.
Maybe I could actually wear something other than a tracksuit, as long as it was for a guitarhero video?
"If you need help, Bocchi-chan, I can always help choose your outfit~!"
"I-It's fine! I can handle it on my own!"
Her Kit-aura was going into overdrive.
…
…
After my shift at Starry, I headed home, had some dinner with my family, before going up to my room.
I proceeded to spend thirty minutes staring at my closet, which was full of all the girly, frilly clothes that my mom bought for me.
There was no way I could wear this stuff.
I swiped through all of the dresses in my closet, trying to find something I could wear without inflicting a fresh batch of trauma on myself.
Eventually, I managed to come across one of the band shirts I bought. I got this shirt to make myself look like a rocker girl at school, an ill-advised attempt to start up a conversation with classmates who also liked music. I let out a groan, thinking about those painful memories.
I took the shirt out and laid it on the bed. Despite the embarrassment I felt from looking at it, a shirt of a popular band was something I could actually wear in front of an audience, without feeling too much shame.
With the top dealt with, I had to deal with the rest of the outfit.
I looked through my closet again and saw the Kucci track-jacket I bought on an impulse, during that time when I thought that signing with a music label would make me filthy rich.
Even though I kept the receipt, I couldn't bring myself to return the Kucci jacket to the store. I didn't want to have the people there think I only bought the expensive jacket to show it off on social media, only to return the item the next day. Only shameless people did that.
Like Ryo-san.
The Kucci jacket was still a tracksuit-type of clothing, but at least it was different from my pink tracksuit, not to mention the difference in quality. I put it beside the shirt on the bed, adding it to the outfit I was constructing.
The only thing left was choosing the bottom. Aside from my school uniform skirt, I only had those girly skirts my mom bought for me. I picked out a pink, pleated skirt. It was a bit too much for me, but at least the skirt matched the color of my beloved tracksuit. The familiarity was comforting, in a way. Or maybe that was just my overactive coping mechanism at work. My mind's ability to twist tragedies into acceptable outcomes cannot be underestimated.
I looked at the clothes laid out on the bed. The Kucci sweater, the red shirt with a popular band's logo and the pink, pleated skirt. It was basically an upgraded version of the rocker-girl outfit I wore to school. I thought about adding more accessories, but I realized that my tendency to go over the top with props, and unnecessary add-ons, was the main reason why my plans failed most of the time.
After a few more minutes of debating with myself whether this was a good idea or not, I decided to just go ahead and wear the clothes. Once I had them on, I looked at myself with my phone camera. I thought I looked decent, at least, I didn't think I looked like some kind of circus freak. The outfit didn't radiate Kit-aura, but at least it was a step above the NEET-like clothes I always wore for my videos.
With the clothes on, I started filming my next video. It hadn't been long since the last upload, but I wanted to dispel the narrative that guitarhero was lying about her popularity at school. I checked back at that comment thread and saw that there were now 100 likes and fourteen comments agreeing with the OP that guitarhero was just a poser.
I needed to prove them wrong. Well, I needed them to think they were wrong.
After recording the cover, I spent the rest of the night editing the video, before uploading it to Oh!Tube. It was already late, and I still needed to do my schoolwork. I didn't really feel like doing any of it, but I didn't want to suffer through the hell of retaking exams again.
As tired as I was after finishing up my schoolwork, I didn't have enough energy to check the video. Using up the last of my energy, I washed my face at the sink, brushed and flossed, and dove onto my bed and crashed for the night.
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…
The next morning, with bleary eyes, I got up from bed and picked up my phone. I usually checked the new comments on my videos as soon as I uploaded it, refreshing the page over-and-over to read the new influx of comments, but since I didn't do that last night, there were hundreds of unread notifications on my phone, all from comments on my new video.
Biting my lip, I went to my Oh!Tube page and checked the comments.
"This is unusual! I'm used to seeing guitarhero-san with that old tracksuit. I didn't expect the outfit change!"
"That Kucci jacket must have been expensive. I'm so jealous of famous Oh!Tubers…"
"That outfit is really well put together! I'm sure your boyfriend must have liked it!"
The audience reception was better than I expected.
I kept scrolling down, looking for any negative comments, but I didn't find any. That person who doubted guitarhero's backstory didn't even comment anymore.
As I kept scrolling down, I did manage to find one comment that wasn't as positive as the others.
"Ugh. I figured that guitarhero-san was exaggerating about her life. I thought I had a shot, but there's no way a normie like her would pay attention to someone like me."
There were a few replies to that comment.
"Yeah, there's no way a girl like her would pay attention to otaku like us."
"This guy actually thought he had a shot with guitarhero-san www."
"She's way above our league, dude. Just admire her from afar and don't get your hopes up."
Way above their league? Was that what they thought of me?
Well, it wasn't me, per say, they were talking about guitarhero.
"Uehehe. Hehehe."
I couldn't help but let out a creepy chuckle as I kept reading the comments.
"Mama, nee-chan is doing something weird again."
I heard Futari's voice from the door.
Since she always came to my room to wake me up along with our mom, they saw me cackling to myself while I was bent over and looking at my phone.
"Now, now, this isn't the weirdest thing your nee-chan did! There's no need to call the exorcist this time!"
Just when I was starting to feel good about myself, I crashed down again.
…
…
During lunch break, Kita-chan said that she wanted to practice with me, since we had a concert at Starry coming up the next week. We met up under the stairs again, on the misconceived pretense that I didn't want to bother the other students by practicing in class.
While Kita-chan was following my strumming, she looked up from her guitar and sighed. "Sorry, let's take a break! I'm not making any progress with these barre chords."
I tried to give her a reassuring smile, but I knew that it ended up as another one of my creepy smiles again. "D-Don't worry, Kita-chan! You're making a lot of progress! Those chords are really tricky for beginners. I struggled with them, too."
"It's really amazing how you were able to play 6 hours a day for three years. I can't even play for fifteen minutes without needing a break!"
I wondered if her attention span got fried from all the aimless social media scrolling she did. Not like I'd ever say that to her face.
As if to prove my point, she took out her phone and started scrolling away. I let her have her break as I kept strumming some chords, when her eyes widened as she gasped. She brought her phone screen right to my face. "Hitori-chan! Isn't this you?!"
Since I was startled by the action, it took me a few moments to see what she was talking about. On her screen, there was a fashion influencer on Isstagram, talking about some cool outfits other internet personalities wore during the past week.
For some reason, guitarhero was included in her list.
"Alright, this one is a new face in my series! I'm sure you guys have seen her videos floating around, since they've been trending recently! It's guitarhero-san! Usually, we've only seen guitarhero-san wearing an old, beat-up tracksuit in her videos, but in her newest video, she's wearing a Kucci sweater, a Hako-Boon t-shirt and a cute pleated skirt from Rizz Rizza! The red and pink from the shirt and the skirt make for a powerful combination, and the luxurious Kucci sweater ties it all up beautifully! I'm looking forward to more amazing outfits from guitarhero-san~!"
I thought that the outfit was decent, but this fashion influencer was talking about me like I was some kind of Isstagram model.
"Ah, I get it," I said. "This is what they call rage-baiting, huh? She's trying to get people to disagree with her in the comment section to pump up her engagement numbers."
"That's a miserable way of looking at someone who was just trying to compliment you, Hitori-chan."
Did that mean this influencer-san was sincere when she praised my outfit?
Even though it was just something I randomly threw together?
Then again, the Kucci sweater actually cost me a small fortune, and the skirt was something my mom bought from a trendy store.
The Hako-Boon shirt also gave the whole outfit a 'rocker' vibe.
"I'm so jealous, Hitori-chan! I really admire this fashion influencer, you know? And you just got a feature from her. You're really amazing!"
"W-What do I do, Kita-chan?!"
"Why are you panicking so much, Hitori-chan? Isn't this a good thing?"
She didn't understand the way the internet worked at all.
I grabbed Kita-chan's phone and looked through the comments.
"Wow, this guitarhero-san is really cute! I'll check her videos out for sure~!"
"I wonder what her face looks like? Is she planning to do a face reveal soon?"
"I just subscribed to her to see what her next outfit will look like www."
Just like I feared. The legion of normie fashionistas were gunning for me.
Guitarhero, the channel that was my online safe haven, the normies were taking it over.
"No, no, no! This is an emergency! What should I do?!"
I rolled around on the floor while clutching my head.
Kita-chan tried to get me to stop thrashing about. "Isn't this a good thing?! You wanted to make others think that guitarhero is a popular girl, right?! You succeeded, Hitori-chan! And you're even getting a lot of new viewers from the fashion community!"
I stopped rolling about and stood up, grabbing Kita-chan by the shoulders and staring her right in the eyes. "You just said it yourself, Kita-chan. The fashion community now has their eyes on me! What do you think will happen in the next video?!"
Kita-chan narrowed her eyes, the gears turning in her head. Eventually, she started to turn pale. "W-Wait! This is bad! Hitori-chan will have to step it up a notch in the next video!"
"Y-You finally get it! I'm doomed!"
Soon, both Kita-chan and I were rolling around on the floor together.
"Hitori-chan is done for!"
"My internet career is finished!"
Just when I thought that things were looking up for poor, old Bocchi here.
Somehow, I managed to dig an even deeper hole for myself.
…
...
She tried her best, but it wasn't enough
She sold her soul for a taste of clout
And now her lies will be exposed
This is her fate, this is the road she chose
"Bocchi R.I.P." - Song and lyrics by Gotoh Hitori, a.k.a. Bocchi
A/N: New uploads every Friday