by Bryan Cohen
Chapter 29
Dhiraj had multiple successful websites before TedFinley.com. TreasureTreats.com, IndianEntrepreneurs.net and his favorite, AmericanSmells.org. But he'd never seen numbers like this. Before the interview, the site received a respectable 50,000 views on the first day. Afterwards, he'd gotten more than a million views and he'd reached nearly 100,000 email subscribers. The phrase #TedFinley remained trending for 48 consecutive hours, along with two related phrases, #SuperTed and #TeddyBear. He decided not to track #GoHomeAlien out of spite. Dhiraj looked at his alarm clock. At 5:45 a.m., he was one of the only people in his school who was awake. That gave him a lot of comfort.
"The hardest workers reap the greatest rewards."
In his hands, he had an index card with TedFinley.com written on it. He passed by his year-at-a-glance wall calendar and his collage of everything he wanted in life to get to his own personal wall of fame. The wall included his top five projects of all time. He examined number one on the list, the field hockey fundraiser from seventh grade. Plenty of groups sold wrapping paper or candy to pay for trips and uniforms. For the most part, students and parents hated selling things. Dhiraj's idea was to handpick students in every school who actually liked sales to do all the selling for these groups. He found dozens of students who loved selling, had them do all the work for these reluctant students and parents, and took a cut from every single one. Before he knew it, Treasure's field hockey team had 50 times the funds it had ever raised on its own.
"Sad to see you drop down, old girl," he said.
Dhiraj shifted three of his projects down, including his teenage entrepreneur video course, his e-commerce health supplement company and his short journey into pen-name erotic fiction. Dropping out of the top five was his local dating website that never quite reached the heights he'd hoped for. TedFinley.com had far exceeded them all in just one day.
"If only you could give a speech, humble website."
Dhiraj took one last glance at the wall before he sat down in front of his laptop. It was time to write the first email to Ted's fans. He titled the email "Ted Talks." He spoke the words aloud as he typed.
"Dear All. No, scratch that. Dear Friends. There we go."
He made the correction and cleared his throat.
"The outpouring of support in the last few days has been truly super. While I don't know where my powers came from, if I had to guess, I'd say they came from the love you've all shown me."
Dhiraj took a sip from his cherry cola. He knew it was Warren Buffett's favorite drink, and he did his best to model whatever the financial icon did, down to the multiple morning paper routes he ran as a child.
"A little housekeeping before we get to the good stuff. Please make sure you're following my verified social media accounts. The following are non-verified: Ted Funley, Ted Finley Flies, Super Ted Flies and Tedly Winks. I've always been TedFinley5 and I'll stay that way. I'm still Teddy from the block!"
Dhiraj pondered that last sentence before backspacing over it. In truth, Ted never had an account to tweet from, but Dhiraj had made an account for all his social media-phobic friends just in case. His backup plan had worked swimmingly so far.
"A lot of you have asked about the crowdfunding campaigns to build me a lair or design me a costume. While I did not start these myself, I have been in touch with the founders and they are legitimate."
Dhiraj's iron-clad contracts with the crowdfunding organizers made sure the money would get to the right place. His lawyer father would be so proud. Dhiraj had tried to bring up the lair with his super-powered friend after the interview, but Ted had kept droning on about Erica, Natalie and the strange email from the unknown address.
"Do you know how many of those I've gotten, Ted? It's probably from someone posing as a Nigerian prince who wants to give you a million dollars to hold for him."
Ted was sprawled out on a chaise lounge at the time. The alertness he'd displayed on national TV had all drained out of him.
"I just have a bad feeling about it. Maybe I have another super power that lets me feel when bad things are coming," Ted said.
Dhiraj shook his head.
"I think you would have felt when Natalie was about to humiliate you on a viral video."
Ted covered up his face with a pillow. If Dhiraj had a nickel for every time he'd seen Ted do that, he could have flown the field hockey team all around the world. Do they have field hockey in Maui? he wondered.
"Do I say something to Natalie about the kiss? Do I tell Erica I want to keep things slow?"
Dhiraj took the pillow off his friend's face.
"Natalie is a strong girl and she's the one who broke things off. Things with Erica so far amount to a kiss in a secret room that only one person saw. Let's see if she wants to take things public before there's a slow-down or speed-up of anything."
Ted nodded.
"You're right, Dhiraj. How are you so on point with this stuff?"
Dhiraj smiled.
"That's what you give me 15% for."
"Since when?"
"You could get 100% if you want to handle all your social media and your phone calls," Dhiraj said.
"No, 15% sounds fair," Ted said, before he dozed off.
Dhiraj covered him up with a blanket and headed home.
Dhiraj continued the email.
"I will try to be in touch every week when I'm not fighting for truth, justice and the way to get to first period on time. Stay tuned for my next up, up and away message.
Sincerely,
Ted
PS: My mother appreciates all the food you're sending, but there's no way she can cook it all. Please donate that food to your local food bank."
Even though it had been less than 48 hours, Ted's house had received dozens of deliveries of meals and gift baskets. Several were from the people he'd saved at the diner. Others had been overnighted from super-fans. After sampling the first couple of meals, they called over a representative from the closest homeless shelter to take as much as he could fit in one van. Upon request from Mrs. Finley, Dhiraj had made sure their address was wiped from anywhere it could be found online.
Dhiraj queued the email to go out to all 100,000 followers the following day after school. He didn't want any teachers on the list to think he was sending it out during school hours. With that out of the way, Dhiraj sifted through the Ted Finley mailbox. He hired a virtual assistant to go through and eliminate all the obvious spam and any illicit requests. As a result, it was mostly harmless fan mail and business requests. A request from a major toy company to make a Ted action figure seemed intriguing. The very next email came from the address Ted had been worried about. Dhiraj clicked through.
There was no subject and the body of the email was as short as could be.
"2pm."
Dhiraj deleted the email. There was no reason for Ted to get worried over nothing. At least, he hoped it was nothing.