YouTube Headquarters
One Year Later
We’re in the conference room for our weekly Monday meeting, and Phoebe is assigning tasks to my fellow interns.
“Run the weekend numbers.”
“Set up the meeting for Thursday.”
“Please handle the SWAG closet. I can’t find a thing in there.”
As she continues, I wait patiently for my assignment. I’m only a month into my summer internship, and so far, I haven’t been assigned anything but mundane tasks. I haven’t even been assigned a coffee run. I’d delight in the chance to leave my desk for the dreaded SWAG closet. Then I hear it.
“Rae. I have a special project I need help with. Can you stay behind a moment?”
I stay put, running through the possible project scenarios as the rest of my colleagues file out of the glass door.
“Okay, so this project is of a sensitive nature,” she says, leaning across the extra-long glass table. “I’m sure you’re aware of the Curt Kempton murder.” It’s not a question. Phoebe has never been one to pose questions.
I nod. “Of course. So sad. That crazy girl murdered him.”
“Yes. Well, we’re coming up on the anniversary, and we’d like to run a special tribute video on the homepage this Friday,” she explains.
“Oh, yes, that would be so nice,” I say, unsure of how much sympathy to show.
“I need you to go through our archives for videos and clips from him. Perhaps things he never used but that we can compile to honor his talent.”
“Sure. Of course.”
“Great. You know how to find his file on the shared drive?” she asks.
“Yes.”
I make my way down the halls of gray cubicles to the IT department. When I see Omar’s at his desk, I breathe a sigh of relief. IT never seems to be around when I need them.
“Hey, Rae. How are you settling in?” he asks with a warm smile.
“Good! I like it here,” I tell him. “So, Phoebe assigned me an interesting project involving Curt Kempton’s archives.”
“Oh?”
“Yes! A tribute video.”
“Cool. We have a decent backend that lets us go back to all of his published videos, as well as ones in the queue that he hadn’t published yet.” He pauses. “Do you need help accessing them?”
“Well, I know how to access the main files on the shared drive, but I haven’t dug around much else on there,” I admit.
“No worries. I’ll show you how to get there. Follow me.”
I follow Omar through the building to the “Cell.” It’s where all of the computer and video equipment lives, and no one is supposed to go in there unless they’re in IT or Engineering. The Cell is filled with rows of black boxes with blinking lights and infinite wires. It’s cold, but the buzz of the machines suggests they’re warm to the touch. We pass through to a back room I never knew existed. Inside, three engineers sit at desks working on various projects that far exceed my pay grade.
“Hi, Mike,” Omar says to one blond engineer. He replies with a wave.
I follow Omar to his desk, where he quickly taps a combination of keys to unlock his computer. “Come around here,” he directs.
He navigates to the shared drive, and so far it’s pretty familiar, but instead of accessing our team folder, he clicks on one titled Talent and then Platform Backup. I watch as he follows these digital breadcrumbs until we finally land on Curt. He clicks on the folder, and a long list of files shows up.
“Wow. I had no idea he had this much content,” I say. “Looks like I’ll have a lot to comb through.”
“Eh, should be pretty easy to snag a few clips. I’ll email you the path to this folder, but save it this time, huh?” he says with a smile.
“I promise. Thank you!”
I return to my desk, where I open my email and click the link Omar sent. Immediately, the folder opens on my computer, and I feel almost dizzy with the file options. I scan the list, looking for a particularly interesting recipe, perhaps, or anything unpublished. There are an overwhelming number of files, so I click on one at random. Almost instantly, Curt’s familiar face pops onto the screen. He’s in a kitchen I don’t recognize. It’s tiny. He’s dressed in sweats. I check the file name and see “rehearsal_NoPub.mov.” I watch the video and mark the time code of a particularly endearing part that may work for the montage.
Hours pass, and the eerie feeling that I had at first fades as I watch video after video. I’m nearing the end of the final folder, and I’ve only selected ten clips. I’m growing nervous that I may not have enough content to present to Phoebe.
I take a sip from my water bottle and roll my head to relieve some tension that seems to have built during the course of this project. My eyes land back on the screen and seem to fall on one particular file. In between a litany of food-pun-titled videos, I see one named “KillerContentRehearsal_PubTBD.mov.” I click on it, thinking some more laid-back, almost candid rehearsal footage may be exactly what I need.
Curt appears on the screen in a white T-shirt and familiar Apple earbuds. He appears to be sitting on a bench in the park. This change of scenery reinvigorates me—everything else has been in some kind of a kitchen or studio.
“So, you guys know I love cooking, but you may not know about some of my other, more personal projects. Since we lost one of my idols, Anthony Bourdain, to suicide, I think it’s important for me to open up and really connect with my followers.”
He stares into the camera as he says this. I smile as I prepare myself for some more personal content. Phoebe is going to be so happy.
“I spent time at the Broughton Rehab Center in Maine a couple of years ago,” he says. “And I have battled my own problems, but as an aspiring influencer, I went primarily to do research.”
I lean into the screen and adjust the volume on my headphones. Then I mark the time code.
“I knew this influencer game was going to be challenging. With the algorithm changes and oversaturated market, I knew I needed to be more creative. More inventive,” he says, leaning back—I can tell he’s recording this on his laptop.
“Legacy has always been important to me. I am here on this planet to create and influence, but I can’t do that if I only have thirty thousand followers,” he argues, and I agree. “So, I met Kyle at this facility, and he told me about how he got himself shot by officers in an attempt to commit suicide. They call it suicide by cop.”
I realize this is not at all what Phoebe will want, and I move my hand to pause the video, but before I can, I hear him say, “So that gave me the idea to commit suicide.”
I freeze, and the video keeps playing.
“It just kind of hit me, the way I think all great ideas hit geniuses,” he boasts. “I need someone to kill me, on camera, to go viral. That would surely solidify my fame and legacy forever.
“I obviously didn’t find the right person at Broughton, because, you know, well, I’m still here,” he says with a chuckle. “So I started working in the kitchen at the Weinstein Center. Truth be told, I needed to hone my culinary skills, and it’s chock full of psychos, so I was killing two birds with one stone.
“When I met Alexa, I knew she’d be perfect. I’d read her file,” he explains. “So I hired her company to help with my engagement and marketing, but mostly, I wanted to get to her.”
I’m aware that my mouth is agape, but I’m still frozen. His green eyes stare at me, as if he’s telling me his dirty little secret. I can’t turn away.
“So, if anyone ever finds this little video, then I will have picked the right girl,” he says.
My mind swirls and races. I reach for my laptop as the video still plays.
“And you now have killer content. So send me viral if I haven’t already.”
I grab my laptop, hard drive still connected, and run down the hall to Phoebe’s office.