Buddies
or an online reinterpretation of Socrates (short story)
Ten minutes. You can do this.
It’s Monday, time for new resolutions.
Mina runs fingers over her long earrings, made of enameled steel with green and turquoise paint. She scrolls the feed, fingertips cold.
Three days after she opened the account. She made a list, organization is key: five likes, three reshares daily, a new post every ten days. Her checklist has twenty-three items.
The sound of a quiet message arrives as Mina takes a bite of her cheese sandwich.
“Hi. How are you?”
His name is Jack I. The photo of his torso wrapped in a white towel. Mina gulps. Her temples throb.
She mutes the messages. She’ll look at them later, when it’s their turn.
Next comes a long article about writing contests. She was disqualified from the Short200Contest two weeks ago. She stretches, the muscles of her back ache.
Disciplined, Mina!
She opens the article and hits like. After all, she knows what it’s about. She’s not a cheater.
Two minutes go by.
The blinking message pulls at her nerves. It’s from someone named Omar. His bio says Made from Sweetness, with a broken heart and a slice of watermelon.
He writes: “Hi.”
She rushes to the bathroom, and sprays Shalimar, hoping the intense notes of resin and powder will steady her breathing. Inhales.
Then boils water for tea.
Three minutes online. One post liked. She has to hurry.
An article about friendship in Socrates. By H, who calls himself a “veteran historian” and wants to “make history and culture more accessible to a general audience.” He explains the difference between “social pleasure” and a “soul-relationship.”
Hmm.
“For Socrates, a friend has to help better one’s inner self. Friendships are vital for both learning and moral growth, and friends won’t always praise you or just agree with you. A friend isn’t someone who flatters.”
Right. Someone who wants to make one better.
Mina looks out the window where two old walnut trees stand. Her eyes seek their green when her mind needs a break.
“Bad people can’t be genuine friends,” H insists. “Friendship isn’t a feeling, but a way of life. Friends need frankness (parrhesia) because misleading would hurt them.”
Mina hits like. Then she changes her mind and shares it. For the first time. The idea that friendship holds more value than companionship should be promoted.
Twelve minutes. She’s done socializing for today.
*
H finishes revising an article a conscientious student sent him. Over an hour of comments. Now and then, a short laugh slips out of his throat.
He leans back, hands folded, and mutters, “What I’ve come to do for young people’s online support.”
Two weeks in, and he’s posted only one article. About Socrates, but now he needs to find something new, something that isn’t a scientific paper, a research excerpt, or a book review. Neither academic nor trivial. Yet successful.
“Find your niche,” his student said.
H lines up the little figurines beside his monitor: Qin, Nike, and Thana. Most of his ideas come just from looking at his muses from antiquity, but now all he can do is rub his bald head. He squints at them, turning possibilities over in his mind.
“And post once a week,” the student had added.
H can’t write about himself. Or passing thoughts. He’s a professor, goddammit.
“Where am I supposed to find the time?” he asks the figurines. All three remain still, waiting for his next move.
Ping.
“Is that a message?” He checks his inbox.
Mina liked and reshared your article.
MinaTranslations. Book reviews. A blurry profile photo. An obelisk at sunset. Winter.
A real reader.
The thought steadies him. Makes the hunt for banalities feel less shameful.
He nods once, and types:
“Thanks for resharing. What caught your attention most?”
H waits.
*
Mina lines up the six books she has to read this week. That’s what she does: compulsive reading. Then she writes reviews she’s paid for at minimum wage.
Who cares? As long as she can still support herself by reading books, everything is under control.
Her only friend, Chris, told her she’s going to lose her job.
“AI will do it much faster. And better. You have to be an online veteran, to have a chance in this field.”
She’s been rejected twice. They said AI reviews meet the new book market standards. She doesn’t.
Chris advised her to “be nice to the right people, “be part of the writing-obsessed community,” and “show love and read their stuff.”
Tomorrow she’ll start the list of people she should get closer to.
Today she reads.
Ping.
A message from H.
Mina looks at his profile again. Historian. Not very young, and the photo doesn’t do him any favours. He’s asking her what she liked in his article.
“The part about how differently we understand friendship today,” she writes. Should she respond like this?
That ping again.
“You mean social relationships. Friendship is a rare finding. Are you from Sy? I see the obelisk in your profile. What a coincidence.”
Mina closes her laptop. Is he a stalker with smart lines?
Ping.
What now? She’s checking the new message.
“Hello. Where are you originally from?” Jeffrey123. No photo.
She grabs two books from the stack and throws herself onto the couch. She tries to read, yet why is she getting these messages? Who are these people? She feels like dying of embarrassment.
Mina scrolls to her profile. In love with words. Always reading, sometimes writing. Brief book reviews.
Tomorrow she has to fix it.
Today she reads.
*
H writes ideas on the page. Curious minds. A journey through history. Understanding philosophy. Decoding life. He crosses out the last one twice with a green pen.
“Monetizing ideas,” the student had said before ending the call. He had explained the weaknesses in her paper, she had told him his online content was all wrong.
“Me, I’m all wrong.” His lip still curls at the thought. He didn’t argue back. It’s true: he has a single like from someone who didn’t even reply to his thanks.
H opens Scrivener and throws himself into Socrates.
A city thrives only if its people cultivate virtue.
He feels like a gadfly, stinging Athens, the great sluggish horse, just to wake it.
Why does the other department head already have 10k followers?
He lifts his chin and checks whether he’s received a message from MinaTranslations.
*
She’ll answer today.
Yesterday she read until midnight, dulling the thought that maybe Socrates’ interpreter deserved a reply.
She spent an hour tweaking a few words. “The photo with the obelisk was a mistake. I forgot the online rules. Maybe because I’m used to subjects at least two hundred pages long. Your text was pretty cool. Unexpected.”
It won’t get more neutral than this. With her chin tucked into the wide collar of her sweater, her legs drawn to her chest, she presses Send.
She rubs her temples. What’s left of her long-thought-out ideas about being a writer?
Ping.
“You gave me a like, and I wanted to thank you. Despite my academic background, I have trouble absorbing the online world. My question about Sy was a mistake. I regret it, #MinaTranslations.”
Mina bites the inside of her cheek.
“This really is an online jungle,” she writes. “Isn’t it our job to preserve our loneliness?”
Send. Her fingers on the keys.
*
“You just quoted Socrates. That makes you a disciple of my work. Or buddies, #MinaTranslations. Online-city buddies.”
H sends her a friend request.
*
A drift expression drifts her face. Mina wants to take her words back.
The end