The queue dropped me straight into Arathi Basin and I actually grinned. It’s one of my favorites.
We were all milling around the Horde side before the gates opened, grabbing whatever the mages and warlocks had dropped on the refreshment tables. I snagged a couple of mana buns and was trying to tuck them into my sash without looking like a total gremlin who’d skipped breakfast for three queues straight when I noticed her… another Discipline Priest.
She was standing at the same counter in full conquest gear. The highest tier stuff, everything perfectly matched and glowing like she’d just stepped out of a rated arena. Meanwhile I’m still rocking a few blue pieces that I keep telling myself are “good enough for now.” Same dark robes as me, same glowing runes, same stupid staff. Except hers looked… sharper. Cleaner. Like she actually cared about transmog this season. I caught her glancing sideways at me in that way women do when they’re sizing each other up but pretending they’re not.
I gave her a forced smile and nod. The one that says “oh hey, fellow healer, we’re totally on the same team” while my brain was already running the numbers.
She smiled back, all sweet and professional. “Nice buns,” she said, nodding at the ones I was still trying to cram into my sash. “You going BS or are you heading to LH with the other freaks?”
I laughed. The kind of laugh that’s mostly teeth. “Figured I’d hang back and go wherever the people were, and you weren’t. You?”
“Oh, I might head to the Lumber Mill if things get boring,” she said, adjusting her hood with this little flick of the wrist that made it sit perfectly. “Someone has to keep the left side from collapsing while the rest of the team tunnels the Blacksmith again.”
We both knew exactly what this was. Two Disc priests in the same unrated pug. One of us was going to top the charts.
The gates opened and off we went.
Halfway through the match I heard her voice carry across the field when I bubbled a rogue who immediately died anyway. “Nice bubble, Sahsha! Real clutch!”
I shouted back, “Thanks! Try not to get caught alone on the road again!”
We kept it up the whole game. Little jabs, little compliments. All of it dripping with that fake but friendly venom only healers can manage.
In the end we won, but it was super close. They were sitting right behind us. But the healing charts?
Aeloria topped me by almost eight percent.
Eight. Percent.
I stood there after the gates closed, still clutching the last half-eaten mana bun, watching her get mobbed by a couple of grateful DPS who were actually saying her name out loud. I just nodded when she looked my way and muttered, “TY for heals.”
She grinned. “You too. See you in the next one?”
“Yeah,” I lied. “Can’t wait.”
I didn’t die once the entire match. Not once. That’s… something, I guess. Small wins and all that.
But Light above, getting out-healed by another Disc priest in Arathi Basin still stings deeper than I want to admit. Why do I do this to myself? Turning every match into a silent competition and then beating myself bloody when I don’t come out on top? I know I’m not bad. I held my own, kept people breathing who had no business surviving. But these ridiculous expectations I pile on myself… maybe it’s the overthinking. Maybe it’s the fear that I could be better. Either way, it’s exhausting in that bone-deep way only another healer would understand.
I really need to stop staring at other priests at the refreshment counter.
~Sahsha
(Weary Discipline Priest Still Chasing That Perfect Set, Professional Overthinker of Refreshment Counter Rivalries, and Someone Who Should Probably Eat More Than Half a Mana Bun Next Time)