My Life Gone Viral

by Rae Earl

  She fell asleep telling me a joke, then woke herself up again laughing.

  Lauren sings in her sleep and buzzes like a bee. It’s a bit freaky.

  When Lauren wakes up in the morning, she does an overdramatic yawn that sounds like an earthquake.

  I am officially VERY tired. Lauren dashes downstairs for breakfast very early.

  I check my phone. Lydia Portancia has TEXTED me.

  Millie. WONDERFUL VIRAL WORK! Please make sure that you have a valid passport. If you don’t, please get one. Ask your mum if she has one, too. Will have news soon!

  I know I have one. I shout down to Mum and ask her if she has one, too. Mum responds with “Yes! Why?”

  When I shout back, “I don’t know!” Mum just laughs. Rod giggles, too. This house has become very silly very fast. Going to Granddad’s house is going to be a sensible relief.

  I can’t believe I’m even saying that when Aunty Teresa lives there.

  #FirstAid

  When Granddad answers his front door, he is bleeding heavily from his head. Only he’s not. It’s ketchup.

  Granddad groans, “Don’t ask! Your aunty is practicing bandages. The sauce is there for authenticity, apparently.”

  Teresa jumps up and down when she sees me. “Millie! How fantastic are me and you as a TEAM! We are VIRAL! I was so pleased to see it go big. Can I bandage you, by the way?”

  Everyone is very excited about me going viral, but now it just seems like something I have to do. It doesn’t feel like something to celebrate—just my job. I think I have lost the “fun” of it. The real fun. Not the fun that people force on you.

  I sit on the couch and let Teresa practice putting my arm in a sling. She’s not very good at it. She nearly dislocates my shoulder. It’s at this point that my phone decides to ring. I can see it’s Lydia Portancia, but I can only use my left arm to pick up my phone. I drop it at first and Teresa has to hold it up to my ear. This sight makes Granddad cry with laughter.

  “Millie!” Lydia yells. “I have some incredible news! Tourism Toronto is very interested in giving you and your mum a trip to Canada to see Danny! It’ll be a weekend package. In a few weeks. You go there, you see Danny, you see some sights. Young love! Fantastic places! You take some footage. Send it back. We will edit it and put it together for you for vlog! How does that sound?!”

  It sounds so incredible I can’t believe it’s my life. I am being flown to see my boyfriend in a foreign city!

  “Are you there?!” Lydia shouts.

  “Sorry!” I reply. “Yes! I’ll obviously have to ask my mum, but I think it will be a yes. YES!”

  Lydia whoops with excitement. “Also, we’re going to start putting ads in your vlogs. That means money. Things have gotten BIG, Millie, and it’s down to you. You have made this happen. Well, you and Dave! I’ll give your mum a call just to check everything is okay with her!”

  When I hang up from Lydia, Teresa starts jumping up and down and hollering. Granddad hugs me and tells me how proud he is of me. “You’ll be wanting to get home, Millie, to tell your mum. She’ll be thrilled! You know, when you started all this nonsense, I thought, ‘that’ll go nowhere,’ but you’ve proved me wrong!”

  Teresa suddenly pulls a face of horror.

  “Who will look after Dave? I volunteer! I can practice some basic tourniquets on her!”

  “She’s a cat, Teresa!” Granddad yells.

  “There are many similarities between us and felines, Dad!” Teresa says with a sniff.

  “Like what?” I giggle.

  Teresa thinks for a time.

  “Legs!”

  The evil part of my brain says if I leave Dave with Rod, she’ll forget me by the time I get back and may not ever love me again. I tell Teresa she can look after her, and I fully express this insecurity by eating a very large sandwich that Granddad made me.

  Just as I’m about to polish it off, Mum calls me.

  “Milllliiiiiieee!!” she screams. “We are going to Canada! You clever, clever girl! I am SO proud of you, we are going to have such a good time! I can’t wait! I bet you can’t, either!”

  “No, I can’t,” I tell her.

  Everyone is so excited. Why do I feel so sick?

  And how can I tell Danny that we are coming to visit him when he’s living in a tree?

  #Lumberjack

  When I get home, Mum is singing Celine Dion songs with Rod. They don’t notice me at first because they are too busy belting out the theme from Titanic. I walk into the lounge just as they are wailing that their hearts will go on. When Mum sees me, she tries to pick me up and spin me around. Lauren runs in and there’s a semi–group hug thing going on within seconds.

  It’s great, but inside of me I am feeling very quivery. I ask to talk to Mum on my own.

  “Mum.” I sigh. “I’m just going to say this. Part of me doesn’t want to go. Every time I think about flying, vlogging abroad, and even seeing Danny, I feel like I’m going to puke. My head goes dizzy. I feel like I can’t breathe. I feel…”

  “You’re having a little panic attack,” Mum says very matter-of-factly, “and that’s completely normal. This is a huge thing for someone with a brain like yours. And like mine. I’m nervous, too. But I know if we don’t go, we’ll regret it forever! It’s a free weekend trip abroad. You’ll be with me! And Danny!”

  “I can’t even tell him,” I say. “He’s with some uncle who is off the grid. Do I vlog it now, or wait, or—”

  “Take a deep breath, close your eyes for five seconds, and vlog it now!” Mum yells. “It’s YOUR trip. YOU have earned it. Let’s enjoy it. Commit to it now! Do it, Mills! Danny will be thrilled when he finds out!”

  Mum always makes me feel better. She drives me mad but, essentially, she is magnificent. I punch the air and run upstairs. I can do this. I can TOTALLY do this. I think.

  I collect Dave from underneath the radiator and go to my desk.

  #Trip

  I am nervous about doing this vlog. It is HUGE news. Before I press RECORD, I take Mum’s advice and take a deep breath in and out. While I’m doing this, Dave tries to put her paw over my nostril. Perhaps she is training to be a killer cat. Finally, once I’ve got her paw off my face, I’m ready to start.

  Hi! Millie here! A quick one, but an amazing one! Tourism Toronto has seen me moaning about missing my boyfriend and they’ve seen Dave pretend to be a beaver AND … Hashtag Help! They have invited us to CANADA!!

  When I say “us,” I mean me and my mum. Sadly, Dave can’t come because if we take her there we can’t take her back for months. She’d have to go into quarantine, which is this place where they check animals don’t have something horrid called rabies. Don’t google it. It’s awful.

  Dave absolutely seems to understand this. She buries her head into my chest. This makes me feel completely emotional, but I carry on.

  ANYWAY, we’re only going for a few days. We’ll be seeing …

  And I realize I don’t know exactly what we will be seeing.

  … all Toronto stuff like the big waterfall, AND I will get to see Danny. Here’s the weird thing: You’ll be finding out I’m going before he does because he’s currently with his uncle who thinks humanity is doomed. To cut a long story short, he doesn’t have a phone on him and this will be a TOTAL surprise. Anyway, if you’ve got any thoughts on what I should see or shouldn’t see, leave it in the comments. And I’ll see you from Canada soon!

  As I press STOP, I realize that Mum has been listening at the door. She rushes in and says, “Millie. We need to talk.”

  “Okay,” I say. This is a bit of a mood change.

  “I don’t mind you mentioning me and Rod. I don’t mind you saying I used to have anxiety, and that I still have to manage it—I’m not ashamed of that—but under no circumstances may you EVER show anyone my passport photo.”

  Though this makes me laugh, I can see Mum is deadly serious, so I promise her that I won’t—though, obviously, I really want to see it. Perhaps she had
really bad hair.

  * * *

  When Mum leaves, I upload the video. It’s official: We are going to Canada. I hope Danny is out of the forest by the time we go. I’m not really a camping kind of person. I get scared when I can’t use a hair dryer.

  #NoDave?

  The next morning, I wake up and look at my phone. I have seventeen missed calls and it’s only 6:23 a.m.

  Lauren is very grumpy. “Your phone keeps giving out bad blue light. It’s kept me awake.”

  “I’m sorry, Loz,” I reply. “It was on silent. It just wasn’t on dark. Danny has tried to call me loads of times. He told me he was in the middle of nowhere without reception!”

  Lauren is still half awake. “Try calling him back when it’s morning!”

  I don’t even try to explain to her that it IS morning. I go to the bathroom and I try to call Danny back, but there’s no reply. I try again just for luck, and he answers.

  He seems a bit stressed.

  “Hello, Millie! Hang on … Hang on. Just let me go to this washing line. Hang on. It’s night here. Hang on. There’s no point in doing video. It won’t work. Is it true you’re coming here? Mum rang the store in the next village to us!”

  “Yes!” I yelp. “In a couple of weeks! Tourism Toronto is paying for it. We can see each other! You will be back in Toronto, won’t you?”

  Danny goes quiet and then replies, “Yeah! I should be. That’s great! Anyway, I’ve got to go. It’s not really safe out here. Bears! I’ll send you my home address, though, when I’m back in civilization. Bye, Mills.”

  And he hangs up.

  I stand by the sink for a few minutes and think about what just happened.

  Why did he tell me he wouldn’t have phone reception when he does? Why wasn’t he as excited as everyone else when I told him we were going to Canada? Why have I got this terrible feeling in my stomach that things are not quite right?

  Mum knocks on the door. “Hurry up, will you, Millie?!”

  I unlock it and step outside. Mum can see I’m wearing a frowny face and asks me if I’m okay. I tell her I’m just tired. That’s partly true, but I’m mainly wondering if my boyfriend is already seeing someone else and if she also lives in the Canadian wilderness. Perhaps she’s been there all this time—waiting for him and carving animals from wood. Or something.

  When I go back in the bedroom, Lauren murmurs, “Did you speak to Bradley? Sorry, I mean Danny. I get mixed up in the morning.”

  “Yeah,” I reply. “He could speak to me. I don’t think he was that excited, though.”

  Lauren wakes up incredibly quickly. “Why?” she yells.

  “Just a feeling I get. I think there might be someone else, Loz!”

  “No, Mills!” Lauren shouts. “He loves you. You can tell. I think he was just distracted by the—”

  “Bears.” I finish her sentence.

  Lauren brightens up. “Exactly! Bears! And they are scary. That’s why the Polish army had one in World War Two!”

  As Lauren is back on her favorite bit of trivia ever, I check the reaction to the Canada vlog. Some of it is annoying.

  I only watch this for Dave! I don’t think I’ll watch Canada if she’s not there.

  (I can’t smuggle her in my hand luggage!)

  That’s a long way to go for such a short time.

  (As Mum says, we don’t turn down a free holiday! We will deal with the jet lag.)

  Toronto has the world’s longest road. Can you check it out for me, please, and get some footage?

  (This is from Bradley. Yes, of course I will.)

  Whatever anyone says, Canada is happening. I’m just worried that Danny and I might not be.

  #PlaneAnxiety

  For the next few weeks, Mum and I prepare for our trip. I don’t have much time to worry about anything, as it’s all visas, phone calls, itineraries, Lydia Portancia panicking, and Mum packing and repacking about fifty times. Danny sends me lots of messages, and we speak a few times. He acts fine. Mum thinks I was expecting a bit too much. She says when I see him, we will just jigsaw together and it will all fit. I think she’s wrong. I think there’s something just not right. I think Zan might not be …

  I don’t know. Yin and Yang. Zan and … Millie. It’s just not the same.

  I get myself so wound up about this that I don’t vlog, and I barely sleep. It’s tragic. I also decide that seeing Bradley is a bad idea because I worry it might confuse me before I go.

  Lydia Portancia tries to be understanding by suggesting I save all my energy for Canada. Besides, she’s “very busy with her other clients” like Erin. Who is now the spokeswoman for a spray-on hair dye. Lydia uses “I’m busy with other clients” like a punishment, but I can’t quite explain why.

  Eventually, it’s time for me and Mum to leave for the airport. Rod and Mum kiss in the street, Loz makes a sick noise, Granddad sends me a kiss by text, Aunty Teresa reminds me to stay away from stagnant water, and Bradley sends me a message.

  Don’t forget my road

  With a heart.

  I was right not to date him. He is confusing.

  When we get to the airport, I remember that they are the worst places on EARTH for anyone with anxiety. There are the endless questions: Am I carrying anything suspicious? Did I pack my bags myself? (No, my mum did. Fifty times.) There’s beeps, random swabs, and X-rays. Mum can see that I’m nervous. She leans over and whispers, “Remember, we all have fear. It’s the management of that fear that counts!” She then organizes the check-in line and lets a woman with small children go in front of us. Everyone else tuts, but Mum doesn’t care. She winks at me and says quietly, “If I keep busy doing the right thing, I forget my worry. Top tip!”

  When we finally board the plane, Mum goes a bit holiday happy. She asks for champagne before she even sits down and then, unbelievably, the flight attendant brings one to her! Once we’ve taken off, I settle down and try to sleep. I can’t quite believe I am 36,000 feet in the air. In fact, I try not to think I’m in the air at all. I focus on landing. And my hotel bed. In Canada.

  #OhCanada

  The next day I wonder, Is this the next day? and Is this Canada? There’s a great word for this feeling—“discombobulated.”

  I wake up at 3:00 a.m. The hotel air conditioning is whirring and Mum is doing her semi-snore. Jet lag is real and I can’t sleep. The hotel wireless is rubbish and Mum refused to make my phone international-roaming friendly. Therefore, I start to overthink everything. Like air conditioning. Teresa told me about something called Legionnaires’ disease. It lives in air conditioning. It gives you pneumonia, but you just think you’ve got a bad cold until it’s too late.

  I fall asleep with this thought till I wake up again two hours later. I feel like a zombie and I may have a deadly illness that will kill me with a hacking cough but IT IS GENUINELY GREAT TO BE HERE!

  Mum springs out of bed. She travels for work and seems to have complete resistance to tiredness, jet lag, and probably Legionnaires’ disease. “Come on, Millie!” she yells. “WE ARE IN CANADA!!”

  In the hotel lobby next/this/WHATEVER morning, we meet our guide. She is a permanently happy woman called Cindy with bright red hair and a clipboard. She greets us like we’ve known her for years.

  “Ms. Porter! Millie! Good to see you here! We’ve got such a packed schedule! The first day you are going to Niagara Falls and up the CN Tower! And then tomorrow, Millie, of course, there’ll be time for you to see your partner!”

  My partner. That sounds very old.

  “Now,” Cindy adds, “is there anything you want to do?”

  I think of Bradley. “I’d like to see the world’s longest street, please!”

  Cindy looks odd for a moment. “Yeah! We can do that! Anything else?”

  Mum shakes her head. “Not for me. I just can’t wait to get going!”

  “Okay, then,” Cindy says excitedly. “Let’s go to the CN Tower!”

  #Tower

  There’s one thing everyo
ne in the world should know about the CN Tower. It’s very, very high. I know towers are normally not short, but this one is HUGE. I stand at the bottom of it and look up.

  “Are we going up there?” I ask.

  “Oh, you’re not just going up!” Cindy shouts. “You’re going to hang off the edge.”

  “Yeah, of course we are!” I laugh. I hope Canadians get sarcasm.

  “I’ve read about this,” Mum blurts excitedly.

  I have not read about it, and I go very pale indeed.

  “Mum, I can’t do heights. You know I can’t. Plus, I’m too young!”

  “Oh no, you’re not, honey,” Cindy squeals excitedly. “You’ve just made the age limit. See how you feel when you get to the top!”

  When we get to the top, I don’t feel any different. We agree that Mum is going to hang off the edge, Cindy is going to film her, and I will concentrate on the words.

  Hello, Millie here in Canada and Hashtag Help! We are up the CN Tower. I am going to level with you. I just can’t do what Mum is about to do, as my anxiety level even being up here is just stupid, BUT the view is incredible! Look!

  Cindy spins the phone around. Toronto is STUNNING VON DER STUNNING!

  I am now going to watch as my mum hangs off the edge of this tower. It’s 553 meters up in the air. She will be attached by some ropes and other hopefully very strong stuff.

  I look out and Mum hangs off the edge and waves. She’s all rigged up and looks incredible. She looks into the camera and says, “I LOVE CANADA!!”

  If you want to come to Canada and you want Hashtag Help to hang off an incredibly high building, you can find it here. I mean, you might die!