What do you do when pain hits like a 10
S mel had one of those weeks where life felt like a sitcom written by someone who had too much coffee.
It started with a two-hour drive.
Not a casual drive either. The kind where the GPS keeps changing the arrival time like it’s messing with you personally.
12:31.
Then suddenly 12:48.
Then 1:00.
Smel stared at the screen.
“Should I speed a little bit?” he asked the universe.
Then he remembered speeding tickets exist. And cops. And jail probably isn’t a good first-date vibe.
So he kept driving like a responsible citizen… while internally panicking like a raccoon that just drank an espresso.
Eventually he arrived at the girl’s place.
Way up in the hills. The kind of place where your phone says “No Service” and your brain says “Well… I live here now.”
But she was really nice.
Like suspiciously nice.
She made him breakfast.
Actual breakfast. Eggs. Real food. Not just “here’s a granola bar and emotional support.”
Smel immediately felt guilty.
Not because anything was wrong. Just because his brain runs on gratitude anxiety.
So naturally he did the only logical thing.
He cleaned her entire house.
Not a little cleaning either.
Full vacuum mode.
Living room.
Kitchen.
Corners.
He even charged her vacuum like it was a Tesla.
At one point he stepped back and thought:
“Am I on a date or did I accidentally start a housekeeping business?”
Later they ended up on the bed just talking.
She hugged him and said she wasn’t mad about anything.
Which was nice.
But unfortunately Smel’s brain runs on OverthinkOS 4.0.
So he immediately thought:
Why did she say she’s not mad?
Was she mad earlier?
Did I vacuum too aggressively?
Was the vacuum flirting with her?
Classic spiral.
So instead of relaxing like a normal human being, Smel quietly escaped to the living room to “give space.”
Which probably confused her because from her perspective he just vanished like a polite ghost.
Meanwhile the rest of Smel’s life was also ridiculous.
Because earlier that week someone casually asked him what he’d been working on.
“Oh nothing,” he said.
“Just built my own web browser.”
Like that’s a normal sentence.
No big deal. Just coding like he’s casually inventing Chrome’s cousin.
During the demo the browser crashed.
Hard.
Again.
And again.
Each time Smel just shrugged.
“Oh, fucking crashes.”
Then kept coding like nothing happened.
That’s coder confidence.
The “it’s broken but I refuse to panic” energy.
The internet also decided to be weird that week.
TikTok banned him from going live.
Reason?
“Dangerous activity.”
Smel stared at the notification.
“Dangerous activity?”
“What did I do… code too hard?”
He still has no idea what the algorithm thought he did.
Maybe it saw the vacuum incident.
Algorithms hate clean floors.
So instead of worrying about it, Smel went back to drawing.
Weird beautiful art.
Cosmic tattoo goddess type stuff.
Then he looked at his drawing and said:
“This kinda sucks.”
Meanwhile everyone else looked at it like it belonged in a gallery.
Because artists are legally required to hate their own work.
At some point during the week Smel had a realization.
You can feel nervous and excited at the same time.
Usually that happens when something actually matters.
Like a girl you like.
Or a risky project.
Or accidentally starting a cleaning service during a date.
And honestly?
The funniest part is this:
While Smel was sitting in the living room wondering if he ruined everything…
She was probably in the bedroom wondering:
“Why did the nice vacuum guy disappear?”
Dating is weird like that.
Two people caring.
Both pretending they’re totally chill.
While secretly running 12,000 thoughts per minute