by Geoff Rodkey
You are a tax lawyer, Eric
Still. I could’ve gotten us out of
this one
CLAUDIA
First of all, let me just say that when I am a parent someday, I will not be a total pushover who lets my kid hang out with a complete psychopath just because he wants to.
Second, I am going to be completely honest here: everyone on earth picks their nose. That’s just a fact.
But people with good manners never, ever do it in public, or when company is over. Especially when that company is an evil little worm.
So Reese and Xander’s plan was doomed to failure.
Unfortunately for me, they wound up getting video of something just as bad.
Actually, it was worse.
REESE
All I can say is, if I knew how bad things were gonna get, I NEVER would’ve posted that video on ClickChat.
CLAUDIA
Whatever.
Here’s what happened: after dinner on Saturday night, I started watching an episode of Super Future Star! in the living room. But Reese and Xander kept poking their heads in from the hallway, giggling like idiots and holding up an iPad like they were recording me.
Even though I wasn’t sure why they were doing it, it was annoying enough that I bailed on the TV and went to my bedroom.
Then I hung out with Sophie and Carmen and Parvati on ClickChat for a while until they started talking about Coven of Angels, which is this incredibly stupid book series about teenagers who live in San Francisco in some future world where witches control the government, and all the cute boys are dead and come back as ghosts or something.
There are, like, ten of these books, and they’re not only ridiculous but very badly written, and I can’t understand why anybody on earth likes them, let alone my friends. But instead of arguing with them for the hundredth time about how stupid Coven of Angels is, I signed off and decided to play some guitar.
I got out my Stratocaster Ed. Note: world’s greatest guitar and started messing around. Pretty soon, I came up with a really cool riff, and a song started to form in my head.
This happens a lot, which is a big reason why one of my two goals in life is to become a famous singer-songwriter like Miranda Fleet. I know people think that’s a long shot career-wise. But when you think about how many shows like Super Future Star! are out there, and how many totally lame singer-songwriters have had hits lately, it seems doable to me. So whenever I come up with even a rough idea for a song, I record it in GarageBand so I don’t lose it in case it turns out to be a hit.
Of course, not all of my rough ideas turn out to be great. Or even good.
And even great songs can start out pretty rough.
Which is why when I record something, it’s meant to be FOR ME AND ONLY ME until I have time to rework it and really make it awesome.
The problem is that when I put my headphones on to record, I get totally wrapped up in what I’m doing. And I forget all about things like the fact that my brother is having a sleepover with an evil little worm and they are both desperate to take me down hard.
Which is how “The Vest Song” wound up on ClickChat and basically Ed. Note: totally ruined my life.
REESE
After Claudia went in her room, Xander and I figured the nose-picking video wasn’t going to happen. So we decided to wait until she fell asleep, then sneak into her room and put one of her hands in warm water and one of them in cold water. Xander said this was guaranteed to make her wet the bed, and if we got it on video, it’d be even more embarrassing than picking her nose.
We started playing MetaWorld in my bedroom to kill time. After a while, Xander went to the bathroom, and when he came back, he said, “Yo, does your sister have a cat?”
I said, “No. Why?”
He said, “ ’Cause some animal be gettin’ strangled in her bedroom.”
XANDER
Straight up, yo: That girl CAN. NOT. SING.
CLAUDIA
That is ridiculous. Like Xander knows the first thing about singing.
REESE
We went out into the hallway and stood next to Claudia’s door. And sure enough, she was singing in this weird squeaky voice—
CLAUDIA
It’s called a falsetto. I’d been trying out a bunch of different vocal styles, and this just happened to be a falsetto.
Because, like I said, the song was just a ROUGH IDEA that I was playing around with and HAD NO INTENTION OF ANYONE EVER HEARING EXCEPT ME. I was EXPERIMENTING.
Which, BTW, is something ALL artists do.
REESE
Well, I don’t think the experiment worked.
CLAUDIA
Duh! THAT’S WHY THEY’RE CALLED “EXPERIMENTS.”
REESE
And it wasn’t just the squeaky voice. The guitar was all weird and, like, thrummy—
CLAUDIA
Because it wasn’t amplified! ALL electric guitars sound weird and thrummy if they’re not amplified!
REESE
Whatever. So we decided to get it on video. And the locks on the bedroom doors in our house are totally easy to pick—you just stick a scissor blade in them and turn it sideways.
CLAUDIA
I am totally making Mom and Dad buy me a dead bolt for Christmas.
REESE
So we got a pair of scissors, opened the door, and ba-ZING! Two minutes later, we’re uploading this video to ClickChat of Claudia singing a love song to Jens—
CLAUDIA
IT WASN’T ABOUT JENS!
REESE
Um, hello? “That cute leather vest, it’s really the best, with an accent so smooth, like a musical groove”?
CLAUDIA
They were TEMPORARY LYRICS! And that could’ve been anybody!
REESE
Oh, sure. ’Cause you know, like, a THOUSAND people with leather vests and foreign accents—
CLAUDIA
GET OUT OF MY ROOM!!!!
REESE
But we’re not done with the oral history—
CLAUDIA
OOOOOOOUUUT! I HATE YOU!!!!
CHAPTER 7
THE CLICKCHAT ATROCITY
CLAUDIA
I apologize for losing my temper at the end of that last chapter. I could have edited it out, but I think it’s important to leave it in as proof that the scars of war run deep, and that people who are involved in such conflicts often have emotional problems that last for years after the fighting has stopped.
I am going to try to get through this next section very quickly, because even now, just thinking about it makes me want to cry.
And also stick hot needles under my brother’s fingernails.
First of all, it is very, very important to understand that the song I was singing was A) definitely NOT about anyone in particular; B) actually about a lot of different things, not just vests and foreign accents; C) not even called “The Vest Song,” which is a name Reese and Xander totally made up; D) a very rough first take that I fully intended to rewrite and rerecord, definitely without a falsetto (because I agree it wasn’t working); and E) absolutely, positively NOT MEANT TO BE HEARD BY ANYBODY BUT ME.
For the rest of my life, when I record anything, I am going to sit facing the door so I know if someone’s poking their head in with an iPad to secretly record me.
I am also never, ever going offline again for more than fifteen minutes. Because if I’d been on ClickChat that night and caught it early, it wouldn’t have been so bad. But I’d turned off my phone and the Wi-Fi on my laptop so I wouldn’t get interrupted while I was recording. And when I finished playing guitar, it was late enough that I went right to bed without bothering to go back online.
So I had no idea what had happened until the next morning, when I turned on my phone and found twenty-seven new text messages.
Sixteen were from Sophie. The rest were from Carmen and Parvati. For the historical record, here are a few of Sophie’s texts:
SOPHIE (text messages)
ANSWER YR PHONE CLAUDIA
SRSLY THIS IS EMERGNCY
OMG YOU NEED TO GO ON
CLICKCHAT NOW AND SEE WHAT
REESE POSTED
V BAD THINGS ARE HAPPNING
WHERE R U???? CALL ME STAT!!!
CLAUDIA
After seeing Sophie’s texts, I was pretty much in full panic mode before I even opened ClickChat. And what I found on Reese’s feed was so horrible that when I first saw it, I got a stabbing pain in my chest like I was dying of a heart attack.
For the record, here is what it looked like (minus the actual video, which eventually got deleted). I only included the first 15 comments—by the time Reese deleted the video, there were 135 of them:
214 likes
goddessgurrl OMG!
mdith_timms ikr?
goddessgurrl guys shes singing about Jens
lingurding EPIC FAIL
lurvlyc hahahahahahaha!!!!!!!!!
i_m_ batman_4realz my dog heard this and now he’s howling
tasha_sez Miranda Fleet call ur agint u r in TROUBLE hahaha
goddessgurrl so sad. there is no way Jens likes her
sophie_k_nyc Reese this is NOT FUNNY Claudia will hate u
mdith_timms what is Jens username? someone should fwd
lurvlyc MY EARS… THEY BLEED…
sophie_k_nyc srsly Reese DELETE THIS NOW
goddessgurrl shut up Sophie. cant you take a joke?
mdith_timms yea we r just appreciating her awesome talent
<3 <3
lingurding omg Claudia shld probly move to Alaska or sumthing
CLAUDIA
Trust me when I say the next 120 comments were even worse. Which is why, as soon as I made sure I wasn’t actually dying of a heart attack, I went to Reese’s room to kill him.
REESE
Xander was right—after we posted the video, the girls in our grade (plus a few boys, but mostly it was the girls) all went totally nuts in the comments section. It was actually kind of scary how nuts they went. Like, even before we went to bed, I’d started thinking it might have been a bad idea to post the video.
CLAUDIA
“MIGHT HAVE BEEN”???
REESE
I’m sorry! Anyway, we were up pretty late, so I was still asleep when Claudia came in and started kicking Xander.
CLAUDIA
I was NOT kicking him. I am a peaceful person.
He just happened to be lying in a sleeping bag on the floor, and it’s a very small room. So on my way over to your bed, I accidentally hit him with my foot about five or six times.
REESE
If you weren’t kicking him, why was he screaming?
CLAUDIA
Because he is weak. I AM A PEACEFUL PERSON.
REESE
If you’re so peaceful, why’d you start punching me?
CLAUDIA
You’re my brother. It’s different. Besides, you totally deserved it.
REESE
It’s not fair! You know I can’t hit you back.
CLAUDIA
Because you’re weak, too.
REESE
No! ’Cause you’re a girl!
CLAUDIA
That is totally sexist, Reese.
REESE
Fine! Next time, I’ll hit you.
CLAUDIA
Like to see you try.
REESE
Will you just chill? I’ve apologized, like, fifty times for this!
CLAUDIA
It’s never enough.
REESE
Can we get back to the moral history?
CLAUDIA
Oral history.
REESE
Whatever. So, all the yelling woke up Dad. And he came in and separated us, and that’s when you got all hysterical and totally freaked him out.
But he had to deal with it, because Mom was at the gym.
MOM AND DAD (text messages)
(DAD) TOTAL TWIN MELTDOWN PLEASE
COME HOME ASAP
(MOM) Is anyone hurt????
Not physically. But Claudia hit Reese
Can’t you deal? Only good spin class
all day starts in 5 min and I have not
worked out in ages
This is way over my head. Lots of
tears and girl stuff
Eric, YOU MUST DEAL. I will be back
by 11:00
OK but no promises kids will be in
one piece when you return
MAN UP!!! You wanted kids
REESE
I deleted the post even before Dad told me to. Because I seriously did feel bad about it. Like, even when I was lying in bed the night before, I was thinking, “Maybe I should delete it.”
CLAUDIA
BUT YOU DIDN’T.
REESE
Well, Xander was there, and… I’m sorry! Really! I am. It’s, like, the stupidest thing I’ve ever done. Are you ever going to forgive me?
CLAUDIA
Hmm. Let me think.
NO.
CHAPTER 8
ATTILA THE FEMBOT
CLAUDIA
By the time Mom got back from her spin class, Dad had sent Xander home, taken away all of Reese’s electronics, and grounded him indefinitely.
And this is how horrible what Reese and Xander did to me was, and how ugly the comments on ClickChat got: Reese did not even try to argue about his punishment.
Not only that, but after Mom heard the whole story and watched the video on Reese’s laptop—right before she made him delete the file forever—she didn’t try to make me feel better by saying things like, “Oh, honey, it’s not so bad” or, “Sweetheart, I know it’s annoying, but try not to blow it out of proportion.”
Instead, she took me shopping for shoes and let me get a pair of boots that were way too hot and weren’t even on sale.
But before we went shopping, she called Xander’s mom and had a long conversation with her in the bedroom with the door closed.
XANDER
Yo, that was WEAK, getting moms all up in my bizness. But it was a fail, yo. ’Cause I was clean. Ain’t nothin’ on MY ClickChat wall but skate videos. All that “fan page” ish? That was some otha bruthas.
Actually, it was sistas.
CLAUDIA
If the “Vest Song” nightmare had ended when Reese took the video down, it would have been bad enough.
But it was about to get even worse.
Because at some point between Saturday night and Sunday, the Fembots created a “Fans of Claudia Tapper” wall on ClickChat.
As far as The War went, the Fembots getting involved was like… I don’t even know. It was MUCH crazier than anything in normal world history.
It was like if right in the middle of World War II, when America was totally focused on trying to beat the Nazis, Attila the Hun suddenly came out of a time machine and ransacked half the country.
Seriously.
I didn’t find out about “Fans of Claudia Tapper” until that Monday morning. I’d been dreading going to school that day, because basically the whole sixth grade had seen “The Vest Song,” and I knew just walking through the halls was going to be a nightmare.
But even though their ClickChat comments were the absolute worst, the Fembots weren’t even my biggest worry. The person I was REALLY worried about seeing was Jens Kuypers.
Because even though the song was absolutely NOT about him, everybody thought it was. So I figured he must think I was some kind of insane stalker or something.
And of course, practically the first person I saw that morning was Jens. Although it actually wasn’t THAT bad. Because he is such an incredibly kind and thoughtful person, Jens made a point of smiling and saying “Hi, Claudia!” in this really cheerful voice. Which was very cool of him, except that I knew he was only doing it to be nice, so it kind of just made me more embarrassed. I couldn’t even look him in the eye, and afterwards I decided it’d be better to completely avoid him for a while.
Like a y
ear. Or maybe two.
I was still recovering from seeing Jens when I walked past the Fembots. They were all clustered around Athena’s locker, and when Clarissa Parker saw me, she went—in this REALLY snotty voice—“Ohmygosh, Claudia, have you SEEN your fan page?” Then they all laughed like it was the most hilarious thing ever.