If you're interested in bonus content that doesn't fit in well with the main story line, the chapter of "Bonus Hearts" titled "Words" fits into the timeline here. You don't have to read the extra details to follow the main plot line of this story.

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December 19, 2012 at 3 AM, Fort Worth, TX: Preston

"I sees you later, bby. Enjoy your fake meatballs." Vik snorts and Rob gives me his 'you hafta be kidding me' face before he blinks dramatically with a pout and starts to close Minecraft and the recording programs on his computer. He's getting ready to log off and do his editing before he goes to sleep, and he won't need any of that stuff open to nuke noobs with me and Choco this afternoon. Tonight is guys' night online and no one's gonna do any work for the whole night, except Choco and his weird snooping around he does for the Bacca. That doesn't really count. He's getting ready to start his own channel next month and we're helping him get used to commentating over his gameplay instead of just playing support and calling out locations. Or randomly screaming out directions in the middle of a sentence. He's pretty funny when he gets frustrated, too. Such a salt mine.

"I love you, Preston," Rob whispers in his derp voice as he leans towards the mic so I can hear his creepiness in perfect surround sound. His pupils are really huge because he's sitting in the dark like a total weirdo with that dumb crooked smile of his. He looks like he's insane, like 'I'm gonna sneak in your apartment when you're asleep and cut you into a billion tiny pieces and cook you so I can make cactus tacos' insane. His crazy eyes are actually freaking me out and my skin breaks out in goose pimples.

"Shut the fudge up." I click on the remove button and Mitch him from the Skype call and I see him laughing at me before his video feed disappears. Now it's just me and Vik in the call. He looks like he got run over by a train and you'd never guess he was the same guy we were recording with five minutes ago. It's kinda disturbing how fast he can go from being super happy and hyper to just being completely wiped out and zombified. Sneakstar123 is too good of an actor for his own good. If you watched the video we just did, you wouldn't even be able to tell that he hasn't slept in 36 hours. "You gonna jump off here, too? Or is it editing time again?"

"Naw, I'm done. Even in school I was never one to pull all-nighters, let alone two-nighters. I need to throw it in before I break another keyboard."

"From what? Goin' Hulk on it?" Now that's something I wanna see: skinny little nerdy Vik screaming with his British accent and beating the crap out of a computer in a fit of blind rage in the middle of the night. I could get so many views if I recorded that. Talk about a Christmas bonus.

"Bruh, we aren't talking about you doing parkour maps. I just... fall asleep on them and when I wake up, the middle keys are skewed or broken off." He yawns halfway through and automatically flattens the top of his hair down in front of his headset as he glances down at the clock on his monitor for the thousandth time. It looks like it's already pretty late in the morning where he lives. I know I've made a lot of jokes about how uptight and high-stress Rob is, but he doesn't even start to compare with Choco and Vik. Maybe it's an Asian thing. Or maybe getting perfect grades in school just screws people up for life. I'm so glad I suck at math and American lit and got that barely-a-B game going.

"Aww. Stop cuddlin' with your keyboards, Vikky. It's too fudging kawaii."

"It's 'kuh-wai-ee,' not 'koo-way.' 'Koo-way' means frightening."

"And now he speaks Japanese. Stop being smart."

"Am I smart, or is everyone else just dumb?" he giggles with his usual cocky grin and I just wanna reach through the screen and give him a noogie. I feel like I'm in a deleted episode of the Big Bang Theory – I'm always surrounded by geeks who think they know everything. Even Mitch is a know-it-all and he barely knows his own name most of the time.

"I think everyone's just different levels of stupid. You shoulda asked Rob the senpai if you wanted a real answer. At least then he'd have a jorb."

"Shots fired. He might be waiting for you to fly up to Montreal so he can give you a job, if you know what I mean." He smirks as he swings his boom arm out of the frame and leans back in his too-big chair. He did not just say that. And I did not just imagine that. He's totally joking and he just wants to get a reaction outta me. Please God. Please tell me there aren't more people who seriously ship Poofless. He knows it's just for the camera, right? Right?

"Haven't you learned nothin'? Rob can't get any jobs. Not even if he does it for free."

"Oh! So he does it for free! You asked him about it?" I can feel my face heating up and I wanna beat my forehead on the desk until I knock some of the stupid out. Why do all of Mitch's recording buddies hafta be complete trolls? Choco's like the only good one and that's because I'm the one who found him. "So does he use a barter system, or is it actually free?"

"Dad gommit, Vik! Rob-a-Dob-Flob-a-Knob can't get a job because he whines too much and he ain't got no skills. If you want him to get a job, maybe you should fly up there and teach him a couple things."

"Pew-pew! You're firing your lasers today. You sound pretty harsh for someone who's wearing a MrWoofless t-shirt." I reflexively look down and my blood starts to boil when I see he's right. Why does crap like this always hafta happen to me? Why does everyone think I'm in love with Rob the freakin' pleb? I'm not allowed to have best friends now? Why doesn't anyone ship me with Kenny or Choco to even everything out? Why does it always hafta be Rob? The only worse thing I can think of is Nooch. Or Jerome. Or Mitch. Or Vik. Crap. They ship me with all those guys, don't they? Why me?

"What? It's comfy! You wear Sidemen t-shirts all the time and you don't see me goin' around accusing you of having orgies with them." He makes that dumb giggle noise again and I hope he wakes up one of his housemates so they walk in his room and beat him down for me. This guy's just a tiny, nerdified version of Bodil except he's not even funny.

"Who knows what happens when the cameras are turned off? Why do you think they call us the 'Sidemen?' We spend all our time on our sides."

"TM-freakin'-I. Why'd you hafta give me that visual?!" I don't know what's worse – seeing them all laying in a conga line or in a big circle doing switcharoos. I'll never be able to think about the Sidemen House the same way again.

"I didn't give you anything. It's not my fault your brain is full of filth." I catch myself making a face and take a drink of my Red Bull to wash that picture outta my mind. I can't wait until I'm twenty-one and I can buy alcohol. Daka smuggling beer into the house was seriously the best part of him living at home. "You've got me curious now. How do things work between you and Rob?"

"Whaddaya mean?"

"I don't understand how your relationship works so well. You live so far away from each other and rarely see each other in person, but you're still so in sync. It's sweet, actually." I can feel the mouthful of energy drink expand and it explodes all over my clothes before I even know what's happening. Great, now he's gonna make a joke about how talking about Rob makes me wet. I get it, alright? He thinks he's punny and funny and witty but he's not.

"Holy crap. You did not just go there."

"Why so surprised?" he says in his weird voice, and I wanna strangle him with his mic cord right now and hang him out a window for the pigeons to eat and poop on. Seriously dude? How can he believe this stuff?

"Because I'm not dating Rob and I'm sick of everyone thinking I am! I have a girlfriend!" I don't get it. Hannah's picture is plastered all over my Instagram and Twitter accounts and I talk about her all the time and she posts on my pages. So why doesn't anyone ever know about her? Do they seriously just look at my feeds to find Poofless stuff? Is that all I am – just the loud, fat half of Poofless?

"Oh. Really?" I facepalm so hard Rob probably heard it all the way up in Montreal. I bet he's laughing at me right now while he eats his TV dinner and edits his videos. How can Poofless be such a massive, hairy, smelly, radioactive mutant beast when Rob and I only use it as a joke in a couple videos a month? We aren't even promoting this ish and it's completely outta control. "I honestly didn't know that. When did that happen?"

"In August. She's freakin' awesome and I love her. And she lives in Canada." Vik snickers and now I just wanna smack him like a itch. He's lucky he lives like halfway across the world.

"Yeah, right. That's what they always say."

"What?"

"Either you have an invisible girlfriend who, conveniently, no one else has seen or talked to, or someone is talking out of his arse. Either way, I think you have a Canadian fetish, my friend."

"She's not invisible! I have her picture all over Instagram and I talk to her every day on Skype!"

"Funny how that works out. No one else has seen her in person, and you don't have any pictures of you two together. You could just be posting photos of some random girl you found on Google. You're scaring me a bit here."

"Fudge off. Go jump off a cliff in the Nether and burn."

"Why would I do that? I don't want to be a lava mob. It looks like Rob has enough problems and admirers as it is."

"I do not admire Rob! I'm not gay!"

"Whatever you say, bruh. I'll say one more thing then I'll let it drop." Vik pauses and looks at me with a devilish look on his face, waiting for me to ask what he knows. Why do I like this guy again? I don't get how he can be so nice and such a jerk at the same freaking time.

"Shoot."

"If you've ever had any intention of getting together with him, you should think about doing it now. I've heard someone else talking about making a move on him." Well that's news. Is it one of Mitch's friends or one of the Sidemen or... who else does Vik know? Or is he just screwing with me to make me do something stupid? Anyways, why does it matter? I don't wanna date Rob. It's not gonna happen. I'm not gay and I'm not in love with my best friend.

"Who was it?"

"Like I would tell you! That's half the fun of it!" Frickin' troll. Why can't I ever get an answer out of anyone? "I'll tell you this much: you won't be happy about it."

"As long as it's not Hannah, I don't give a single fudge. I hope it works out for 'em."

"You say that now. Damn, I'm going to have to buy some snacks for this one. This is going to be good."

"Oh, shuddup. Get your butt off here and get some sleep before you see more stuff that isn't real."

"If you say so. I'll catch you on Thursday at five PM Eastern?" He's all business now and even his greasy little giggle is gone. This guy goes from a hundred to zero real frickin' quick.

"Sounds good. Enjoy your sweet dreams about that Robert booty."

"I'm sure you will."

"Go to sleep, you fudging pleb! Get outta my sight!"

"Buh-bye, Preston." He hangs up with another smirk and I immediately facepalm into my sugary, sticky, Red-Bull-covered hands. This sucks bowling balls.

No matter what I do, Poofless still haunts me. I don't want it to. I don't want anything to do with it. I hate it so freaking much. It sucks in all the wrong kinds of ways and I wish I'd never agreed to use it as a running joke. I should've gone hashtag nope all over that ish when I recorded that Party Games video with Rob right after we met. I should've nuked it before it grew up and evolved into its final form. Now it's this giant, ugly, ninety-five-headed hydra monster that no one can control, and I'm the only one fighting it while Rob and everyone else just sips their tea and laughs at me. If it was with anyone else but Rob, I'd peace the whole scene and never talk to 'em again. There's nothing I can do about it but blow him off completely, and I can't do that to him. I don't trust him by himself for a long time without checking up on him and I just can't up and leave him after everything he's done for me and all the time we've spent together. My only escape plan isn't much of a plan – it's just a surefire way to bring Betty down on my head and make myself feel guilty for the rest of my miserable, plebby life.

And nothing I say helps, either. I can't sit there and tell everyone in the world that Poofless isn't real because no one freakin' believes me. They just pull a Vik and say 'Yeah, right' and they keep on telling me how perfect Rob and I are together and how cute our evil, nerdy Jewish babies are gonna be. And preggo Rob's a whole other can of bullshrimp I don't ever wanna think about again. What part of 'I'm not gay' do they not get? I'm not gay. I have a girlfriend. I don't like Rob like that. Nothing's ever gonna happen between us but bromance and jokes. No matter what Twitter and Instagram and YouTube and the fan fictions say, I'm not gonna marry that big, awkward, whiny, derpy pleb. Not gonna happen. Nope. I'm not gay.

And since when is it okay for people to assume who I like and what I like and what I really mean when I say something? You don't see people goin' around shipping Rob with AshleyMariee or Cupquake or some random girl he met at a convention. Why's it okay for people to step all over me and not listen to anything I say, but no one'll even say anything about how cute Rob would be with a girlfriend? So if you're gay everyone has to tip-toe around you, but if you're straight, people can say whatever the frick they want? No one questioned him when he came out as gay but no one believes me when I say I'm straight. What's the difference? How's that fair? I just want people to take what I say seriously and not sit there and try to tell me who I like and why. I don't. If I liked Rob, don't ya think I'd be dating him right now? Do ya see how I'm not? Guess what that means. I don't like Rob. He's just my friend. That's all he's ever gonna be. So stop trying to force me to be something I'm not and back the holy fiery frick off. I'm not gay.

Whatever. This isn't gonna do any good because if I try to say it out loud in a video or on Twitter, everyone's just gonna tag Rob and write #RIPPoofless and ask why we aren't friends anymore. They're gonna TL;DR the whole thing and ask when the next episode of Preston to Commander is gonna be posted or if I'm ever gonna play Hunger Games again. They just see what they wanna see and my thoughts and opinions and feelings don't freaking matter. And it wouldn't do any good to tell this to Rob because it'd just hurt his feelings. Besides, we can't do anything about it because it's gone way beyond the two of us now. We don't own Poofless anymore – the internet does. And that's scary as crap.

I sigh and peel my sticky fingers off my forehead and get up to go wash my face and arms and change my cold, wet clothes. I need to think of something I can do to at least lessen the Poofless and get it outta my face. Every time I open Chrome or check my e-mail, the first thing I see is Poofless. Poofless comments. Poofless photo edits. Poofless GIFs. Poofless tribute videos. Poofless usernames. Poofless fan art. Poofless stories. Poofless make-a-baby pictures. Poofless Halloween costumes. Poofless clay sculptures. Poofless poetry. Poofless t-shirts. Poofless fan clubs. There was even one person who had a Poofless birthday cake with an edible photo of us together on it, which goes way beyond freakin' creepy. And it seems like it gets worse every month. It was annoying in August, bad in September, worse in October... Then the roof blew off. It exploded into a million little flowery pieces in November and every one of those pieces has sprouted and grown to the point that our Minecraft channels have just turned into one big, giant, rose-covered Poofless weed full of busy buzzing fans who sting you into submission whenever you say something bad about a relationship that never existed. I hate it. I love my fans but I despise this ship. The only OTP I want is the one that goes in the toilet. I hope whoever's crushing all over Rob is his type because Poofless needs to go die in a lava pit. As stalker-y as it is, I'd rather have photo edits of me with Hannah than ones of me and Rob.

Wait. That's it. That's what Vik was talking about. I dry my face off on the hand towel and pull a clean t-shirt on before I hurry back over to my computer set-up. People don't think Hannah's real and that we're not really dating because we have no photos together. You know how to fix that? Take some photos together. I bring up Chrome and start Googling everything I can think of so I can put this plan into action. I finally know how to kill Poofless without losing Rob.

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December 24, 2012 at 7 PM, Fort Worth, TX: Preston

"When's this happening?" Dad asks as he picks at a piece of roast turkey with his fingers. His eyebrows are scrunched together in confusion, like he can't believe I'd ever live anywhere but downtown. Sam and Daka couldn't make it home this year (thank the Lord) and Mom's just sitting back in her chair and listening to our conversation while Caleb, Keeley, and Josh talk about what they hope they get for Christmas. I already know what I want – and I'm gonna give it to myself.

"Prob'ly in March when the snow starts to melt. Maybe a couple weeks earlier or later. I was gonna fly up and find an apartment and come back and drive the moving truck up. I'll hafta buy a new car when I get there." As sad as it is to sell my baby, there's just no way the carefully restored black 1995 Ford Mustang I bought in high school is gonna make it in the snow and freezing cold. I'll have to buy something that sits a little higher and won't get stuck in three inches of slush.

"What brought this on? You don't wanna be makin' spur-of-the-moment decisions about something big like this, son," Dad replies as he finishes his turkey and wipes his hands off on his napkin. He really doesn't want me to leave but I have to. Things'll be so much better in Washington.

"I've been thinking about it for a while now. I could save a lotta money on plane tickets and hotel rooms if I lived closer to Seattle where most of the gaming conventions are held. Plus, I'd be much closer to my friends and Hannah. It'd be a lot cheaper and less lonely for me to live up there and fly back home every couple months to visit than live around here and hafta fly all over the country all the time." Now that's just a flat-out lie and I feel bad for telling them that, but they don't look suspicious. I guess it's a good thing my parents don't know a lot about my YouTube career 'cause that just made this a heck of a lot easier. If anything, I'll be ten times lonelier than I am now because I won't have my family dropping in to visit, and travel expenses are gonna be horrible because Seattle's out in the middle of freaking nowhere. But it'll be worth all the money and trouble when I get there. Poofless is gonna die this year, and Hannah's gonna be the one who kills it.

"If you're sure, honey. If something goes wrong, it'll be a lot harder for us to help you out of it. Are you sure you can handle living all the way out there by yourself?" Mom asks and I nod and try not to roll my eyes. She still treats me like I'm sixteen and she isn't sure if I still need a babysitter or not. I only come home on the weekends and holidays as it is, so what's a little more freedom gonna hurt? At least up there I won't hafta worry about coming home from the gym and finding Josh playing on my recording computer with a bag of Cheetos on his lap and Mom using up all my laundry soap re-doing the clothes I just washed but didn't wanna fold. I love my family more than I can even say, but a little distance couldn't hurt too much.

"I hardly ever ask y'all for help now. What's gonna change when I live a couple hundred miles north?"

"You mean a couple thousand miles. That's a long way away, Preston. We'll support you either way, but we want you to be sure before you get all the way up there and get stranded in some rinky-dink snow town with just a gas station and a mini mart. You know for sure this's what you wanna do?"

"Of course. I wouldn't bring it up if I wasn't sure I could handle it. And it's not like I'm leavin' forever. I'll be back for Christmahanukkah and Passover and whenever I have conventions in San Antonio or on the East Coast. I'm not gonna ditch you guys. Plus, Dak lives up there, too."

"And you're sure you can afford this?" Dad seriously doesn't think I can do anything on my own, does he?

"Yes, Daddy. I can afford it. By February, I'll have enough to cover the plane tickets, the move, and a security deposit on a new apartment, and I can get a cheap car up there after I sell the Mustang at the auto mall downtown. It's all taken care of." They sit there and look at me for a few seconds before they trade a glance with each other and look back at me. Uh-oh. "So whaddaya think?"

"Well, I'll be honest, son... This isn't one of your brightest ideas. But if you think you can handle it, who're we to stop you?" Dad says and I nod and try not to look offended. I can't believe they still treat me like a little kid. I look at Mom and she sighs but still gives me a smile.

"If you're absolutely sure it's what's best, then I think you should go for it." At least she's on my side. "But Pressy... I want you to make me two promises that you're gonna keep when you get there." That can't be good.

"Uh, sure. What's up?"

"First of all, as soon as you get settled in, I want you to save up enough money to move back home in case something comes up. Okay?"

"Yeah, definitely. I was gonna do that, anyways."

"Good. And second, I want you to promise you'll keep going to youth group even when I'm not there to pull you out of bed anymore. Pastor Davids told me you skipped last week and he wasn't very happy with you." I feel a nervous smile taking over my face and Dad snorts and takes another drink of his wine. Ten years later and he still doesn't like the main pastor of our church.

"I swear I'll be more responsible, starting now. I won't miss church or youth group anymore, and I won't let my washer overflow again. I promise." She seems satisfied but Dad doesn't look so sure. I don't think he buys anything I said tonight. I didn't really expect him to. Whether they wanted me to or not, I was still gonna leave in two and a half months – I just wanted to give them a heads up so Mom wouldn't hafta try to pick the lock on my old apartment and walk in on something weird. Dad swirls his glass of red wine around a couple times and takes another sip before he sets it down.

"Alright then, Mr. Responsible. Why don't you get to work on that mess in the kitchen? I'm sure the kids'd like the help," he says as he grabs another little chunk of lukewarm turkey off the platter and starts tearing it apart. Mom looks like she likes that idea and I try not to make a face as I stand up, knowing they're gonna be talking about me as soon as the kitchen door swings shut. But it doesn't matter. In just nine or ten more weeks, I'm gonna be outta here and my new life's gonna start, without Poofless. I can't wait.