I’ve had many names online.
Usernames. Handles. Nicknames made on the spot.
Some were versions of me.
Some were who I wanted to be.
Most were just placeholders — borrowed masks in borrowed spaces.
Every platform asked me:
“What do you want to be called?”
But never:
“Do you want to stay?”
I never really owned any of them.
Accounts disappeared. Passwords lost.
The names stayed behind, tied to data I no longer had access to.
And the versions of me that lived there?
They faded too.
Now, I’m trying something different.
A name I chose.
A name I own.
Not to build a brand.
Not to be loud.
But maybe — to be whole.
So who am I, when no one’s watching?
Right now, just someone quietly writing,
under a name that might finally be mine.
