Behind The Screens

1 | Lighten Up, Grim Reaper.

Alex

It had been two months since school let out for summer and nothing exciting had happened in my life... besides the pool party at the beginning of the summer- that I wasn't invited to. I was, however, invited to John B's birthday party the day before. Woke up the morning of and was too sick to stand. I guess I couldn't have gone to that pool party anyway. Even if I could, I was never usually invited to anything, so there wouldn't be much of a change.

I closed my laptop and leaned my head back against the wall with a heavy sigh. Of course, within seconds my mother was yelling my name from downstairs, jolting me out of any relaxation I had within that moment. I stumbled out of the bed quickly, and a little annoyed. "WHAT!?" I yelled back. "Don't 'what' me, I'm your mother." She came from around the corner in her favorite black dress, dangling her keys from her fingers. Because it was her favorite, it could mean anything. Date, birthday clubbing, regular clubbing, grocery store- she wears it a lot.

"Where are you going?" I asked. She paused for a moment as we walked down the stairs together, then replied "I'll be back" and opened the front door. "Please watch your brother, he's sleeping on the couch." I looked over at my mini-me, back at my mom, then nodded and said whatever. Her mind was made up, and I'm not going to leave him. "Good, see you in the morning." She said and walked out, the door slamming behind her. I stared at the empty space where my mother had just been standing and blinked. Morning?

I pulled my phone out of my pocket and started punching in Tyler's phone number. We had been friends for as long as I can remember, and I know that even if I have nowhere to go and my mom has left (again), he will show up. I tapped the call button and pressed the phone to my ear.

When Tyler finally picked up, his voice was groggy and low. "Hello?" He croaked. "Ew, man, toad much?" There was a pause in which I could hear him moving around in his bed, then he said, "nope."
He checked. What an idiot.

"What did you call me for?" Tyler asked, his voice starting to clear. I ran back up the stairs as I responded. "Mom just left."

"To where?" Tyler questioned. "Well, she was wearing her favorite tiny dress, and told me she'd see me in the morning." I explained. "Ohh... I bet it's a bar night." Tyler guessed. I shrugged as if he could see me. Like I said, it could be anything. "Probably." I said. "So are you coming or not?" Usually if mom leaves, Tyler comes over to make sure I don't absolutely lose it trying to raise a child and be a child. It's kind of unspoken at this point, and most of the time he's just here, but it was a rough school year for him.

While I waited for him to show up, I decided to reopen my laptop. Memes were scattered across the website as well as a few articles about politics, celebrities and blogs about people's day. One of those blogs was mine. Nothing exciting ever happened with me so I could hardly maintain it, but I refused to leave it. I enjoyed reading other people's blogs more than I liked reading an actual book, mainly because I knew it was a reality, and although I ended up envious, it was a nice break.

I scrolled down my feed and came across a post from someone I hadn't seen before. Her url was girlwithablog and was plastered on the popular page.

No matter how many times I try to speak, she wrote, it's like they can't hear me. You know? I don't know a real conversation when I hear one anymore. I don't know. There were about two hundred comments and thirty thousand likes.

I clicked on her profile and the first thing I saw was that she had over a hundred thousand followers. She's one of those. I scrolled through more of her posts and it seemed as though she never knew what to feel.
On one post, she'd explain how human society is irrelevant and that she's not ready to face a world without Netflix and a bowl of chocolate covered popcorn beside her. On the very next post, she displayed an organized picture of her party outfit. For Friday night, it's going to be liiive She captioned. I commented under it.

I thought human society was irrelevant?

I clicked send and continued browsing for a few minutes through more of her posts. She seemed pretty down to earth. I don't see that a lot from bloggers with a good amount of followers. Just as I was about to click the follow button, I received a notification. Girl With a Blog responded to my comment. Within minutes? Maybe she wasn't "one of those".

I was PMS'ing, my bad.

I couldn't help but laugh at her ridiculous, yet bold reply. I shook my head and scrolled back to the top of her account and clicked follow. Maybe her life would be more interesting than mine.
I was about to go to my profile to (pitifully) read my own blogs, when I heard a loud knock on the front door. "ALEX OPEN UP!!!" I heard Tyler's voice yell. At the same time, I heard the soft whimper of my baby brother, Jack. I let out a sigh. 

As I walked out the door, the crying got louder and the knocking got more aggressive, and I wondered why Tyler wasn't catching a hint. I rushed downstairs and scooped up Jack who had already slipped off of the couch and was sitting at the bottom of the steps. "Come on, little man." I said to him, easing his confused cry and earning his smile. He immediately wrapped his arms around my neck and held on tightly. I started walking toward the front door to let Tyler in, but noticed that it was wide open. Suddenly, my brother began uncontrollably giggling. "What-"

"HEY, YOU!" A voice boomed from behind me sending Jack into a fit of laughter and almost sending me into cardiac arrest. Completely ignoring me, Jack climbed off of me and ran into Tyler's arms. I rolled my eyes. "Snapchat is going to love this, man." He said as I was closing the door. "Don't do that." I said. "Whatever." Tyler dismissed. Tyler began limping over to the couch with Jack attached to his leg. "Okay little big man." He said while plopping onto the couch. "Ride is over." Jack giggled and visibly tightened his grip. I laughed, but Tyler was not amused.

"Anything new?" Tyler asked. I shrugged, and remembered page I had looked at earlier. "Found some new blog today." I said. "Oh yea?" Tyler responded. I nodded. "Yea. Girl With a Blog. She's got a ton of followers and still replies pretty fast."

"Nice, I'll check her out." Tyler said. One of the things Tyler and I had in common was that we were both bloggers. Lifeisrad was his url. He hardly posted anything, but when he did, it mainly consisted of pictures of him surfing or skating or the beach and things like that.

Jack finally decided to crawl off of Tyler's leg and into his lap. I heard Tyler let out a little sigh of relief, and then he turned back to me. "So, I think you've got something to add to your blog." I sat in the chair across from him and prepared myself for one of his little pranks. "It better not be another joke." He often does this thing where he tells me that he's got blog material for me and instead, for example, blindfolds me, pushes me into my backyard and kicks me into the pool. That specific scenario doesn't happen often, but it has happened twice. It resulted in my blog post about a month back: It should go without being said, but don't let your best friends blindfold you and lead you to a "surprise". And that was my last post from this summer, which is why I actually gave him a chance this time.

"Seriously!" Tyler promised. "Proceed." I demanded. "So you know that fall festival they have at the beach every year on the Autumn Solstice?" Tyler asked. "What about it?" I questioned.
"Well, we haven't gone since we were like ten and I was hoping we could go, maybe find some dates or-"
"How much does it cost?" I interrupted. "Nothing, you've just got to show up." He explained.

"Well, I guess I'll mark my calendar." I agreed.

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After Tyler had left, I decided to go back on Tumblr and look through more of the new blog. I typed in her name, pressed enter, and a new picture showed up. It was a picture of Times Square.

I love waking up to this every morning, read the caption. So she's a New York Girl... "Al?" I heard Jack's tiny voice whisper. I looked up to see him standing at my door. Almost every night he'd come to sit with me and watch me search through blogs. I patted my lap, encouraging Jack to sit. He ran over to my bed and I scooped him up and sat him in my lap.

I inspected the picture a bit longer, wondering what it's like to be from a big city. Does she know everyone? Does she have money? Is her school five stories high because it can't fit with all the extra buildings? But more than that, what's it like being with her? Because for some reason, as I scrolled through her blog in a very non-stalkerish manner, and through one text exchange with her, I felt like she was someone I should know.