She was the other reason he didn't quit this job. She had joined the IT department about the same time as he did and, in his opinion, was the complete opposite of the stereotypical person who worked in that field. With her Middle Eastern heritage, her skin was a beautiful natural tan and she had amazing black wavy hair that usually framed her perfectly shaped face. She had taken to wearing short sleeve blouses and polo shirts that hugged her in a way that highlighted her figure. Not that Fred minded, as he had a soft spot for well-endowed women. Maybe it was a good thing they weren't currently in the office, as he would probably have been caught staring at her.
Fred happily pulled off the shirt he had thrown on and tossed it onto a pile of clothes that sat to the side of his work desk. Since his roommate had moved out of the studio-style dorm room when quarantine had started, Fred had slowly taken over the whole space. He glanced over at a heap of laundry, that he wasn't even sure if they were dirty or clean. Fred decided it was probably "clean enough", a statement that could also be applied to his dorm space. It would be obvious to anyone seeing it that a single guy had been living in the room for eight months. The only reasons he had left the room were to take out garbage and to do laundry, which as time went on he was doing less and less often.
Standing up, he proceeded to stretch, which felt good after a 6 hour work day. His mind returned to the thought of going back to the office. Honestly, the 7 to 10 minute walk to the library where the student IT department was housed, wasn't the worst. However, the thought of dealing with technologically illiterate professors and faculty members in person where he would have to attempt to hide his facial expressions and eye rolls, was not something he really wanted to deal with. But on the bright side, he might be able to see Amanda, the cute student library receptionist, if she was still attending school.
The thought of her reminded him of the one time, before in-person classes were canceled, that he'd managed to work up enough confidence to ask her out for coffee. He could still remember the sting of the beautiful redhead's response. "I'd love to go get coffee with my work bestie."
While bestie wasn't the most common thing girls had called him, it was up there. His friends and others including bosses and coworkers would often call Fred a good worker, a solid friend, a guy you can always count on to get the job or task done. Girls, on the other hand, would often refer to him as their buddy, or say that they loved him like a brother, or he was always welcome to girls' night as an honorary girlfriend. He was the guy that they would call when they needed a ride because they had gotten too drunk at a party, to vent about the latest boy problems, or even to play the fake boyfriend at bars or events when a guy started to hit on them too much.
At this point in his life, he was pretty sure that he'd spent more time at bars and parties pretending to be someone's boyfriend, than in his only previous relationship in high school. He hadn't even asked out his ex Stacy. It was now obvious, with the gift of hindsight, that she'd only asked him out to get back at her ex.
Deep down, Fred knew that Stacy had been way out of his league, as he was about as average a person as you would ever meet. He could easily blend into the background in most circumstances as he was only 5'10, and just in general unremarkable. The last time he went to the doctor's office, the only thing they had commented on was that he needed to slow down on his drinking, but he was a student and considered that to be an intrinsic part of college life. His drinking had probably picked up some during the lockdown, as evidenced by his collection of different partially filled liquor bottles that were set up on the spare bed. His extra drinking, combined with his very sedentary lifestyle, had added a few extra pounds around his middle, but it wasn't like he could go walk to campus or around town with quarantine.
Walking over to the kitchen section of the studio dorm room, Fred grabbed a can of some generic macro beer from the fridge. He was originally supposed to move home, however, a few months before lockdown happened his dad had chosen to retire from Chico State University, which was the other reason Fred could afford to go to school. With this decision, his dad and mom had sold their home and most of their furniture before packing themselves into an RV to go explore the country. This resulted in most of his stuff either being in storage or in the dorm room, which he was glad he didn't share with anyone else at the moment. Currently, his parents were in Nebraska staying with one of his mom's old high school friends who had undergone a major surgery before everyone was required to quarantine.
With his beverage in hand, he moved past the desk that he'd set up as his workstation to his personal desk, the joys of having two desks as the room was designed for two people. He shrugged as he sat down and woke up his personal computer. Discord had grown quieter over the months. Most of the friends he'd added to different gaming servers had slowly stopped showing up online. He had managed to add one new gaming friend during the eight months; Toni, or as their gamer tag said Italianwolf. They only used Discord and in-game chat to talk as Toni supposedly had a garbage mic so he wouldn't be able to hear them anyways. This was why Toni had given their real name, as typing out the screen name every time would be a pain. Fred did make a joke about Toni being the girl version of Tony, however he was quickly corrected that Toni is actually very common for both guys and gals in Europe. Fred, of course, had been embarrassed that he'd possibly misgendered his friend. Plus, he was sure that with how few of girls that played fighting games that there was no way he had befriended one.
Currently, Toni wasn't online and the only other person showing as active in Discord was his old high school buddy Richard, but Richard almost always showed online. Fred really didn't want to talk to Richard at the moment, remembering the last time he and Richard talked outside of gaming. They'd been drinking and shooting the breeze in voice chat about a month ago, before Richard had gone on a rant about how if Fred had more of a backbone and confidence, then he'd have a hottie to spend quarantine with, as Richard had, rather than spending those months alone. Not that the statement wasn't true, but what had gotten under his skin was how much it had been rubbed into his face that Richard could have sex anytime with his super hot girlfriend, and all Fred had was his hand and the internet.
Subconsciously, Fred had found his way to Richard's girlfriend's Instagram. There were a few photos of her and Richard, however a majority of the posts were just of herself. She seemed to have no issue putting herself out there, showing off her amazing body. He could only wish he was in lockdown with someone like her, as Natalia checked every box for the type of girl Fred was attracted to. She had large breasts on a more athletic frame that she seemed happy to show off via social media. It also helped that, in general, she was way nicer to him than Richard was. Personality was also a major factor influencing which women caught his interest in addition to the large tits on thinner bodies. He just couldn't help himself but to lust after massive busts.
His attention was brought back to reality as Discord let out a ping indicating that a message had come in. He quickly closed the Instagram page of Natalia wearing a black bikini that he'd been staring at as he tabbed over to Discord.
Italianwolf had come online and sent him a message "Are you ready to game or just masturbating? ;p"
Fred quickly responded to Toni's taunt with "You wish! I'm going to crush you." Booting up Street Fighter V, he promptly sent a private invite to Toni. Now Fred wasn't any good, but it was one of the few games that he and Toni could play without needing to actually talk, so they could just message each other between rounds. They ended up playing Lucia and Laura for hours on end, just enjoying each other's company. There was a comfort in their gaming, almost as if they were in the same room. He came to a small realization that he didn't exactly know where Toni was from. It probably was somewhere in the Western Hemisphere with their gaming times lining up. Maybe he should ask someday, once quarantine was done to see if they were in the United States or Canada, as he would love to have a beer with them and have a conversation in person.
Eventually, Toni signed off, claiming they needed to try to get some sleep. Fred glanced at the clock and saw somehow it had gotten to 2 am. He was still awake and buzzing at this point so he opted to mindlessly scroll Facebook and Instagram. He would pause on women that he'd become friends with or followed, including some who he'd asked out only to be friend-zoned. At least it was the term that Richard and their other friend, Thomas, consistently threw around when describing his relationships. Fred didn't put much stock into being friend-zoned as he considered it more important to put his friendship above any potential romantic feelings he may have for someone.
Feeling slightly ashamed that he had started to objectify his female friends, he opted to switch over to scrolling through Reddit. Maybe he could find a new OnlyFans girl to fantasize about instead. For some reason, Fred felt less creepy lusting after a woman on one of those sites rather than someone he personally knew on social media.
He stopped at a post and had to rub his eyes in shock to make sure he wasn't imagining things. Much to his disbelief, he saw his TA from the Accounting class he'd taken the previous year promoting her OnlyFans. There was no way that Diane, who had been a beacon of professionalism in and out of the classroom, was showing off her body on the internet. But there she was and he was positive that it was her. Indeed, he even recognized the tight blouse and skirt combo, as she had worn it to a department event they had both attended.
