"Conspiracy; in other words, a made up story by some nut who wears tinfoil on their head and has an extreme case of paranoia is basically what you sound like right now," Austin said in a cocky way. He always thought he was so much smarter than everybody, when in reality, he knew just as much as the next guy. His grades in school were average, but he claimed it was because he was too advanced for them so he never tried. I personally thought it was because he overestimated his ability to handle the honors classes, but that's just me.
"Listen, I am telling you the government does listen to your conversations through your cell phone. You don't have to be in a call, the microphone itself is controlled by them, I am telling you it's true!" I exclaimed. I knew I sounded like a mad woman, but I knew what I was talking about; it was his own problem if he didn't want to believe me, but I just wished he would've.
"You're crazy," he replied emotionlessly. He replied just to say something, he probably didn't even hear what I was saying, almost like he tuned me out.
"I'm telling you, I know!"
"I honestly don't care what you think you know, what I do know is what I will go by, your theories are nothing but that; theories. I'll stick to the facts," and he closed his laptop and walked away. It was his own fault.
The next day, Austin didn't come into school. I wasn't all that worried about it, but it was a bit odd nonetheless. To be a good friend, I called him once I got home, but it went straight to voicemail. I assumed he was asleep, but just to be sure, I rode my bike to his house anyway. He came to the door as soon as I pulled up.
"You've got me creeped out now," he stammered. I dropped my bike and walked toward him.
"About what?" I asked.
"What a coincidence is it that after our conversation about bicycles yesterday did I scroll down to see a page full of ads for ten-speeds all throughout my internet," he explained. I laughed.
"Dude, you need to calm down. So what? That's all it is right? A coincidence," I replied back sarcastically. He groaned.
"No, listen. Then after that, I went to my grandmothers house. My uncle was there and he's been having car troubles. He specifically said he wanted to get a 2006 Subaru. Sure enough, later on that night when I opened my internet, ads for that specific car came up. Not just regular country-wide ads, these were specific dealerships around our area and people on Craigslist selling that one specific car!" He sounded petrified.
"It's just a conspiracy though, no?" I asked, again, sarcastically. He threw himself to the ground so over dramatically and kicked his feet like a child throwing a tantrum at the supermarket.
"Fine, don't take me seriously," he shouted and slammed the door shut. He probably regretted it, but that was his own problem.
The next day, Austin came to school. He sat down next to me and didn't say anything, so I started up a conversation.
"Sooo... what's up?" I asked awkwardly.
"Nothing," he replied and left it at that. I didn't bother trying to get him to talk. He stared blankly at his notebook and began drawing. I looked over after a few minutes to see he had drawn an impeccable drawing of a dog chasing its tail and a cat doing the same. Strange, but I didn't question it, he didn't seem in the mood to talk much, so I got up and went to lunch.
The end of the school day came and Austin ran over to me as soon as he saw me in the hallways, shoving himself by a few crowds of younger students.
"Okay, listen to me. I turned my phone on finally to make sure I didn't miss any important calls. After that, Kyle came up to me and was talking about the football game from a good three seasons ago that was record breaking. A few hours after that? I got a telemarketing call asking me if I wanted to win tickets to see a football game coming up. This is happening too much to just be a coincidence," he stammered nervously. I rolled my eyes and patted his shoulder.
"You need to relax buddy," I laughed a bit.
"That's not all! I had left my phone on and went to my next class. I placed my phone on my desk for the entire class. What we learned about was how to use a microscope. Strangely enough, I got a spam text with a link to buy cheap microscopes online. It can't be my phones cookies because I never once in my entire life have ever had the need to look up microscopes! What do I do?"
"Nothing man. You're going to have to relax and go with the flow. You'll be fine. Don't do illegal stuff and the government will have no reason to come after you," I explained. He wasn't satisfied.
"I don't want them listening to me at all!" But I couldn't help him there. I shrugged my shoulders and waved goodbye to him as I got onto my bus to head home.
Later that night, I got a call. Sure enough, it was Austin.
"Listen to me, please," he whispered into the phone sounding scared, "this has turned into something more than just my phone, even my laptop is acting up. Ads for kitchen appliances bombarding my social media just after my mom was complaining about the refrigerator being weird. So I shut off my laptop. Then my mom happily called me downstairs for me to see my uncle Joe was there with his dog, Pepper. He stayed for a little while and then left. Sure enough, my phone rang for a telemarketer to ask if Pepper was available to speak with her. It made no sense, this is driving me crazy and scaring me. People are watching me and I have no way of stopping them," he explained.
"You're overthinking this way too hard. Just calm down," I tried to say, but he didn't want to hear it.
"No! I will not calm down! This is insane! You need to help me!" But there wasn't much I could do about it. It wasn't my job. He hung up suddenly and didn't answer when I called him back.
The next day, my mother woke me up screaming. Austin was dead and they didn't know how or why. I didn't know how to react to any of it and my mother was in hysterics. I went up to my room and closed the door. My phone rang and I answered it.
"He believes you now, but he can't know everything," and they quickly hung up. I chuckled a bit, opened my laptop, and typed my password into my computer: "tail_chaser" and disabled the microphones.
