SillyNate's Collab Month

16th of July: Only Nate

I'm Sorry But Collab Month is Cancelled

I take a deep breath as I press the record button and go to sit down on the squeaky hotel bed. I feel absolutely terrible. Everybody had so much faith in me and they were so excited over this project and then I went and failed everyone.

Abbs has been a constant beam of support but I just couldn't manage it and now I have to explain it to my viewers. I care about providing them content so deeply and I know how much they looked forward to seeing collaborations between their favourite creators. I have so many valid excuses but it still feels horrible to make this video. Nevertheless, I have to persevere and make it.

I don't know how long I've sat and stared into space while the camera has been on. Thank god for editing.

"Hi," I start a bit shyly, completely forgetting my usual intro. This isn't a normal video and maybe I'll even delete it later... who knows? But I know that I need to be honest with my audience and I can only hope that they'll be as understanding and supportive as ever.

"I guess it's pretty self-explanatory by the title of this video what it's going to be about. I promised that I would upload a collab video with one of my fellow YouTubers ever single week day of July..."

I hesitate, struggling to actually push the words past my lips. Contrary to popular belief I am quite a hard worker and I love getting stuff done. Breaking a promise is tearing at my heart, I absolutely detest it.

I take another deep breath to steady myself. Abbs is somewhere in the hotel, giving me privacy to film this but I kind of wish that she'd stayed.

"I won't be able to stick to my promise as I'm sure you've already guessed. I bit off more than I could chew. I'm here in LA now and there's so many things going on and things I need to do while I'm here and I also need to have the space to do things, I want to do. I'm sorry that the last few videos have gone up so late and that there was no video yesterday. I simply don't have time to edit and now a few of the people I had scheduled to film with have cancelled and this project has just become too much. I wanted to complete it so badly but I just can't."

I ball my hands into fists and squeeze them down on my thigh.

"It's too much for me. I'll still film loads while I'm here and I'll get those videos up eventually but I can't manage to upload five times a week. It's not doable for me at the moment. Making videos this month has been too stressful and I can feel myself not enjoying it anymore. I never want that to happen, so I know I need to take a step back. I've still been vlogging every single day on my other channel but videos on this channel usually take a different skill of editing. I say a lot of things on this channel and I want to stick to what I say."

My voice is trembling a bit because I know where my mind is headed. I need to talk to them about all of this. It's bigger than just failing the collab month promise. I need them to hold me responsible to what I'm saying but I also need them to realise that I will grow and I will change and so will my content.

"I might stop daily vlogging at one point," I say and the words come out in a tumble because I'm nervous admitting that. "I don't see it happening anywhere in the near future because I absolutely love it right now, and that feeling is something I've always strived to keep when it comes to my YouTube videos. I need to be happy while I'm making them or I will become a miserable person and then it won't be any fun to watch me anyway."

I hear the door creep open and spot Abbs taking a hesitant step into our hotel room with a question in her eyes. She's asking if she can come in. I nod. I actually would like her here and I'm about to wrap up before I get all too emotional. This isn't a proper video; it's just something to explain what's going on for the people that haven't seen me talk about it on the vlog.

"That's what's happening with trying to stick to this excessive upload schedule I have right now. However, I do have one piece of good news. I have a video filmed, which was so hilarious to make, sitting on my SD card and that one will be going up on the last weekday of this month, which is Friday the 31st of July. It contains some of your favourite couples, hopefully, and it was a hoot to film because we're all friends in real life and it was just filming our shenanigans. I think you'll like that. I'm sorry I can't promise anymore. I hope you understand."

My breath evens out and I must have looked finished because not a beat later, Abbs is flinging herself into my arms and practically crawling into my lab. My arms close around her instinctively, immediately ready to embrace the support she is offering me.

"They'll understand, Nate. More so than anything they want you to be happy. You've been too wired up lately and I'm sure people have noticed in the vlogs."

"Wired up?" I question. "I haven't seen anyone say that. I haven't even noticed I have been tense?"

"You have," Abbs says and snuggles up to me closer. "I noticed. I'm so happy you're not trying to force this through when it's making you this stressed."

I let out a laugh that sounds a bit desperate but I don't care. Abbs pulls back enough to look at my face and her eyes are so kind and her arms still holds onto me gently. I still feel so sad that I've failed but Abbs is correct, as she so often is. I need to be happy with what I'm making and this was simply not manageable anymore. They'll understand.

**********

I'm sorry that I revived this book and thought that I could actually complete it. Turns out I'm not just feeling it or have the time to actually make it so I'm sad to say that this is the penultimate chapter of SillyNate's Collab Month. Like Nate promised in the video I'm writing a final video featuring Natigail as well as two other prominent YouTube couple that I really like. I'm sorry I couldn't stick to this story back summer 2015 or when I decided to complete it. This is the best I can do because I don't like leaving stories unfinished but my mind is so far from 2015!Natigail that it's too difficult. I'm sorry about that. I post a lot of my stuff on AO3 now, under the name @natigail, which always serves as a reminder of this couple which are by far the fictional characters that I've written the most words about.

The final chapter will be going up in two weeks. Sorry again.