CHAPTER 11 ATTACK OF THE FOLLOWERS

CLAUDIA

After I got home that afternoon and made sure Ashley’s boyfriend was cool with loaning me his Flubby costume, I texted Jens.

It was our first official communication since the breakup.

CLAUDIA AND JENS (text messages)

^{Ed. Note: ME} Hi! How are u?

Hi! I am good! ^{Ed. Note: JENS}

Great!

If u r texting me than r we friends again?

Possibly. I am wondering if you will do me a big favor

Yes sure anything

Are you busy this weekend?

I have soccer game Sunday. But Saturday free

Would you be ok with me hitting you over the head with a fake baseball bat in Central Park while I wear a Flubby costume and Carmen records it for a Blurt?

I think my English is not good enough to understand this

Your English is fine. It’s just a very strange favor

You want me to play baseball in park with Carmen and Fluuber?

OK maybe it’s your English

FaceTiming you now to explain

CLAUDIA

It took a while to get Jens to understand what I wanted him to do. Then it took even longer to get him to agree to it. By the time he did, the rest of my family was home. And because it was Friday night, we all went out for dinner.

Dad had just gotten a Blurt account that day so he could understand what was going on with me and Reese. Or at least try to. Because Dad was having a very hard time figuring out Blurt.

DAD AND MOM (text messages)

I got a Blurt account!

I’ll follow you. What’s your username?

I don’t have one

That is literally impossible

You definitely have one

I am MomSeesAllSoBehave

Follow me and I will follow back

How do I follow you?

Click search button and type in my username

Can’t find search button

Bottom left on home screen

Can’t find home screen

Seriously, Eric?

What does the cheeseburger do?

???????

There is no cheeseburger

Yes there is. Bottom middle of screen

That’s not a cheeseburger

Pretty sure it is

Hang on I’ll ask 25-year-old in my office what that is

Just clicked on cheeseburger and something happened

Not sure what

25-y-o says it’s a mouth. And if you clicked on it, you just Blurted

I did what????

CLAUDIA

Dinner that night was a real disaster. I’ll let Reese explain why.

REESE

Mom and Dad have this rule that we can’t use our phones at the dinner table. But after we ordered, I was like, “Who wants to see my new Blurt?”

’Cause I was crazy excited about it. I’d been checking the Blip counter, and it hadn’t really taken off yet. But I figured it was going to blow up any minute.

CLAUDIA

Serious question: why did you think a Blurt of your avatar pretending to drink a log was going to be popular? I mean, why would anybody want to watch that?

REESE

Huh… I guess when you put it that way, it DOES seem pretty stupid.

I think I just figured the last one got huge, so this one would, too?

Or something?

Anyway, I asked Mom and Dad if I could take out my phone to show them the Blurt.

And they were like, “No phones at dinner!” But I just kept bugging them. I was like, “It’s only two seconds long! C’mon! I worked really hard on it!”

Finally, Mom was like, “Fine. But we’re watching it on MY phone.” So she got her phone out, and she and Dad watched my Blurt.

CLAUDIA

At first, Mom and Dad just looked confused. Mom said something like, “I’m not sure I get this.…”

And Dad said, “Why is he hitting himself in the face with a block of wood?”

REESE

I started explaining it to them. But then I guess Mom must’ve scrolled down to look at the comments. Because all of a sudden she was like, “REEEESE! THE LANGUAGE!!!”

CLAUDIA

Mom and Dad’s other big rule besides “no cell phones at dinner” is “no swearing on social media.” Not only do they not let me and Reese use bad language online, but if anybody else swears when they comment on one of our posts, Mom and Dad make us delete THAT person’s comment, too.

This is because they believe everything that happens on your online accounts is a reflection of you as a person. So if you let people swear on your ClickChat page, or your Blurt page, or wherever, when you grow up and want to get a job, employers will google you and see the swearing and decide not to hire you.

This actually makes a ton of sense to me.

REESE

Not me. I’m either going to be a professional soccer ^{Ed. Note: Reese’s career goals = not realistic} player or a Blurt star when I grow up. Either way, I don’t think swearing on my Blurt page is going to be a deal breaker.

CLAUDIA

It turned out Reese’s new Blurt was NOT going over well with his 22,000 followers. And they were letting him know it. So when Mom looked at the comment section, it was basically Curse-O-Rama.

BLURT COMMENT SECTION

REESE

Mom lost it. She was like, “Delete these comments or I’m shutting down your account!”

I was like, “What comments?” ’Cause all I’d been looking at was the Blip counter. I’d forgotten Blurts even HAD comments.

So I took out my phone. But then Mom was like, “No phones at the table!”

Which seriously did not make sense. How was I going to delete the comments if I couldn’t use my phone?

CLAUDIA

Mom takes the “no phones at the table” rule very seriously. But she ALSO takes the “no swearing on social media” rule very seriously. So the situation pretty much made her head explode.

She told Reese he had thirty seconds to delete all the comments with swearing in them. But when he saw the comments, Reese suddenly realized his new Blurt was a disaster. And his career as a Blurt star might be over before it started.

So he COMPLETELY freaked out.

REESE

I didn’t know what to do! I was like, “I gotta delete this whole Blurt! But I can’t! ’Cause what if Rush Soda wants to pay me for it? But everybody’s hating on it! And what if I lose all my followers? I should tell them I’m sorry! But they’re saying really mean stuff! So I should defend myself! Or maybe I should just block all of them? I gotta talk to Xander! AND WHY WON’T MOM STOP YELLING AT ME???!!!”

CLAUDIA

Basically, dinner that night was dumplings, kung pao chicken, yelling, and tears.

It was so bad that six weeks later, Mom’s still too embarrassed to go back to Han Dynasty. ^{Ed. Note: Mom read this and said, “Give it another month”}

After we got home that night and he talked to Xander, Reese wound up deleting the whole soda/log Blurt. And if he’d been smart, he would’ve realized he was in way over his head, and he should just be happy with his one insanely successful Blurt and quit trying to make a whole career out of it.

Unfortunately, he wasn’t smart.