TweenzTalk.net

When I was around 13, nearing my 14th birthday, I came across a website called “TweenzTalk.net”. I was one of those weird kids who didn’t have a ton of friends, so I had decided to scour the internet for a place to meet some people my age who maybe had some similar interests, and that was how I found the site. But now, looking back on it all, I wish I never went looking. 
This was close to a decade ago now, in the mid 2010s. The internet was a lot different back then, but still recognizable from what we have today. Even then, the UI of the site seemed a little dated. It was a simplistic chatroom with a primarily white color scheme, the name of the forum displayed at the top in a basic font with a little tagline under it– “TweenzTalk.net: Chat for kids and teens!”
You didn’t need to sign up to use the site, all you had to do was pick a name and select your age from a dropdown menu– the options ranged from 9 to 19. I typed in the username I used for almost everything at the time, which was “GiveMePizza03”. A bit cringe, I know. I then chose the correct age, and pressed the enter button. To this day, that remains my biggest regret.
There were around 70 people in the chatroom, most without profile pictures and with generic usernames, or even just random combinations of letters and numbers for names. Although there were a fair amount of people with real fleshed-out profiles. After staring at the slowly moving chatroom for a full minute, I decided to type my first message: a simple “hi”. Nobody in the chat itself responded to me– they continued with their own conversations. However, I did immediately get several private messages in the site’s direct messaging feature. Most of the messages I received were from the generic profiles. 
As you might expect, a poorly-moderated chat site aimed at kids and teenagers was chock full of creeps. I truly, sincerely wish I could say that lowlife perverts were the worst thing featured on TweenzTalk. I ignored most of the suspicious messages from blank profiles, and chatted back to a few people who seemed actually interested in being friends with me. I started up a kind of friendship with a girl around my age. Her name was Harper. 
Harper and I bonded over our mutual interests– We were both into cartoons and other things that most kids our age thought were too childish. We were also both interested in the online horror stories that permeated much of internet culture at the time. She was a little more into it than me, and at times she could even be a little obsessive. We would talk back and forth for hours each day about mundane things: the stories we’d read, YouTube videos we’d watched, even boring stuff like what we did at school or what we had for lunch. She just seemed like a kindred spirit, and someone I could genuinely talk to. 
We’d been talking regularly for nearly a month before anything started to get weird. Harper started to talk to me about some “struggles” she’d been going through at home and school, which I was okay with, as I wanted to be there for my new friend. I still have screenshots of some of the messages, so I’ll transcribe them here for convenient reading. 
MoonWolfHarper: I feel like my parents totally hate me
GiveMePizza03: i’m sure they love u deep down, sometimes parents r just jerks :/
MoonWolfHarper: They just don’t understand anything about me
GiveMePizza03: i’m sry to hear that
MoonWolfHarper: Not to mention everyone at school hates my guts
GiveMePizza03: that cant b true :( im sure there r ppl who care about u, just not every1’s good at showing it
MoonWolfHarper: I think you’re the only person who gets me tbh
Over and over again, she’d bring up how I’m the only person in her life who cares about her. I felt bad, but I often didn’t know what to say. I mean, I did care about her. But it was so much pressure to be told that you’re the only positive thing that someone has. One day, for some reason, I brought up the amount of creeps on the site. I guess I wanted to vent to her for a change. Although I tried to ignore them, sometimes they really got under my skin, and it made me shudder to think that other kids were probably interacting with them without knowing how horrible they really are. 
GiveMePizza03: i hate the amount of creeps on this site :( feel like i cant go 5 mins without some creepy message 
MoonWolfHarper: They don’t even bother me. I’m ugly, even pedophiles and creeps avoid me 
I had no idea how to reply to that message. It’s not like I could say “Don’t worry, I’m sure there’s some pervert old guy who’s into you!” But at the same time, why on earth would I affirm her self depreciation? I didn’t respond to the message at all. She didn’t message back either for several days. 
MoonWolfHarper: your my bset frind 
That was odd. Harper almost never made spelling errors in her messages.
GiveMePizza03: ur a good friend 2 me 2
Again, it was days until I got a response. This time, without the odd spelling mistakes. But in her subsequent messages, the erratic typing style was back. 
MoonWolfHarper: You don’t get it, you’re my BEST friend and my ONLY friend. 
MoonWolfHarper: i wnat to shiw you somethg
You couldn’t send pictures via TweenzTalk, only text. But there was a seldom-used video chat function. It wasn’t really a video chat between the two people messaging– it was more of a livestream that people in the chatroom had to request access to. She begged me to look at hers. I was hesitant, as the only things that seemed to be on the streaming side of the platform were old men jerking off. But what I saw might have been worse. 
I requested access to Harper’s video feed. Instantly, I was met with the sight of her scarred arms, with fresh cuts spelling out my name. 
Not my silly username, not my internet pseudonym. 
My real, legal name. 
“Harper” turned the camera to her face. I had still been expecting a 14-year-old girl. Instead, I was met with the visage of a woman who was at least 25. Her hair was stringy with matted areas. Her eyes were red and puffy. The background of her room was disheveled and cluttered. She was sobbing. 
“I’m sorry I lied, but you really are my only friend.” She said in a hushed voice through a sob, as if she was trying to avoid being heard by someone else. Regardless of her efforts, another voice, one that seemed to belong to an older woman, yelled from another room. 
“Lyra? Who are you talking to? You know your daddy and I don’t want you to have friends over. It’s not safe.”
The woman who I’d known as Harper looked straight at the camera with glassy eyes, empty yet pleading. Then, she shut it off. 
Since then, I’d blocked out all memories of the site. Looking back, I should’ve called the police or something. But my teenage mind buried the traumatic things I’d seen deep down until quite recently.
Now I'm left with a myriad of questions. Most notably, has anyone else ever used this site? And has anyone else ever encountered "Harper"? Does anyone know what happened to her?
Category:Internet
Category:Websites
Category:Computers and Internet