December 13, 2010 at 5 PM, Montreal, Quebec: Rob

"Are you sure you feel alright, honey?" Mom asks quietly, her brown eyes wide in concern as she runs her fingers through my hair again, like I am still a little kid. I do my best to smile as I swat her hand away and try to flatten my hair again, and her face breaks into a mischievous grin. Between her trolling and Dad's genes, I always look like I just rolled out of bed, no matter how hard I try to look presentable. Here I am at a five-star restaurant in a three hundred dollar suit, and my mom is making my hair look like a cheap seventies wig.

"I'm fine. You don't have to worry about me so much." Her smile fades a little and she wraps her arms around me, her glasses going askew as she rests her head on my shoulder.

"I'm your mother - it's my job to worry about you, Robbie. Don't you dare try to take that away from me." We stand there for a moment in silence, an ocean of guilt crashing around my heart as I remember all of the times I hurt her and Dad with my selfishness and stupidity. She jumps when someone's baby wails from a few meters away and she immediately starts laughing. Mom is the only person I know who can argue that taking twelve hyperactive children into a ritzy restaurant for two hours is a reasonable idea. I glance ahead of us in line and see Dad looking back at us pointedly, rolling his eyes in good humor at the fiasco that is about to ensue. "You had better hope your face doesn't stay like that, dear. You know I don't like horror movies."

"It took you almost thirty years to come up with that? Jesus!" he snorts as he tries to hold back a smile. "If anything is going to be compared to a horror movie, it's this brilliant idea of yours. This is just the commercial break before the feature." One of the younger kids belts out another ear-piercing scream and Dad and I both crack up as a young couple glares at each of us in turn from their fancy oak bench. Mom is not amused, and she pulls away from me, crossing her arms and pursing her lips as she prepares to go on the defensive.

"Are you saying something?"

"Oh, no. I'm not saying anything. I was just telling Rob how I could go for some popcorn about now."

"That's what I thought you said." She uncrosses her arms and stands next to me again, leaning into my shoulder and intertwining her fingers with mine. Spending time with my parents always makes me feel so loved, yet so unlovable; I don't deserve any of this.

"Just need some snacks for the show," he adds under his breath, knowing that she can still hear him.

"It could have been worse, don't you know. Garrett wanted everyone to go to Dairy Queen for dinner." Dad tries not to laugh but he loses the battle and covers his eyes with his hand as he chuckles.

"Garrett is a six-year-old who thinks ice cream is a type of fruit, Dale. What else did you expect him to pick?" She purses her lips again and he backs down from the challenge, raising his eyebrows and pretending to hide his grin.

"You're a smart one tonight, aren't you?"

"Better than dumb," I add, and she moves away from me in mock disgust.

"Oh, I see how it is. I see exactly how it is."

"What exactly do you see, dear?" Dad asks as his face breaks into his usual wisecrack grin.

"I see two boys who are about to spend the next two hours sitting in the cold car while everyone else eats dinner."

"I saw a McDonald's right around the corner when we pulled into the parking lot. We wouldn't starve and it would be a hell of a lot quieter." She gives him a lofty glare and looks at him from under the bottom rim of her dark purple glasses.

"Now you've taken it too far."

"I think most of these people were taken too far," he replies, crinkling his nose at the smell of one of my great-uncle's cigars farther ahead in line. "Remind me again why we invited half of these people tonight?"

"You already know why." She sends a revolted glare in the old man's direction and she moves next to Dad so she can put her back to the wafting smoke. Although the smell is vile, the burning smoke in my lungs makes the craving to inhale overpowering. This is why I left my dwindling pack of cigarettes at home: to force me to fight the temptation. Between the threats of having to buy the rented suit and of having my ears torn off by outraged parents claiming that I would be murdering their children with a few tendrils of smoke, the risks of smoking tonight are just too high.

"I forgot why. It looks like you might have forgotten why, too."

"It's only for five more days, then the reunion on the 26th. We can handle it, Darren." Dad sighs and puts his hands in his pockets, deploying his famous puppy dog eyes to try to get out of attending the massive family dinner even while we wait in line for them to arrange our tables. "Don't you look at me like that. We are staying and everyone is going to have a good time, including you." She pokes me in the chest and I jokingly put my hands up in surrender.

"As long as I don't have to sit next to the kids' table this year, everything will be great."

"The kids adore you!"

"Better with the kids than next to Uncle Benny," Dad grumbles, waving a curl of thick white smoke out of his face.

"Hey, I would take a face-full of smoke over a face-full of potatoes," I retort, reliving the shock of being hit in the face with a handful of garlic mashed potatoes last year at some hole-in-the-wall family restaurant. There are few things in this world worse than getting a chunk of salty potato in your eye, then getting mocked by a crowd of giggling kids who claim you're crying.

"Now that's what I call a face peel!" Dad cackles, so proud of his lame pun that he doesn't hear the waitress finally call our party to the long-awaited table. In their defense, it takes a while to push enough tables together to fit forty bitchy adults and their hoard of bratty kids. Mom pulls Dad's hands out of his pockets and holds hands with both of us, trying to form a chain against the stampede of impatient relatives. She can try to insulate us from the most obnoxious members of the family, but I already know how this is going to turn out - it has been exactly the same every year since I was fifteen. I see my third cousin Angela and her daughter speeding toward us and I walk even faster, doing my best to pretend that I didn't see them, with their matching white silk mini-dresses and platinum blonde hair. With any luck at all, I will get a winning spin on this little roulette wheel and snag a seat next to good old Uncle Benny and his pungent cigars.

"Oh, Dale! It's so nice to see you again!" Angela squeals for the tenth year in a row, her identical daughter staring at me like I am an exotic zoo animal. Even the war cries of zombie pigmen are more pleasant than Angela's silicone screeches. Mom tries to force a smile but it looks more like a pained grimace, and Dad is trying to stifle his laughter.

'I think this lady might be even more of a try-hard than Preston, and that is really impressive.'

"You too, dear. How is the home business going?" Mom frantically searches the table for three available seats in the most socially acceptable way possible, but I can tell that all hope has been lost. It took a significant amount of bargaining and bribing to persuade me to come home in time to attend this dinner, and she promised I wouldn't have to play eHarmony with her cousin Angela or Dad's aunt Debra again this year. Next year, even homemade tiramisu won't be payment enough.

"Oh, it's just fabulous! You wouldn't believe how many boxes we sold this year! We might be in the running for the regional award and a big bonus check, too!"

'Since when is selling mail order scented candles and make-up a home business?' Dad's face breaks into the most devious smile I have ever seen, and he strolls to the farthest seat and sits next to his brother to continue their debate about which hockey team is more likely to win the upcoming game. If we had been playing chess, he would have taken all of my pieces except the king. Now I have nowhere to go except the empty seat between Mom and Angela, and sitting in the cold car is beginning to sound like an amazing idea.

"And Robert, it's great to see you again, sweetie! You look so handsome!" I fake a smile, but it probably looks more like the face I make when an angry Creeper is about to blow up a newly-finished base. Angela reaches up and tries to make my hair lay flat, and Mom turns away in chagrin and sits down. It feels like she is petting me like a dog, which just makes me want to mess it up even more. Every family gathering is awkward and embarrassing, and this lady and her kind are the reason why. "What are you doing with yourself these days? You're putting that business degree to good use, aren't you?"

"Yes, it's actually very helpful. Going to UdeM was one of the best decisions I've ever made." I resign myself to the seat and move the chair as far away from Angela and her fake, shell pink fingernails as I possibly can. If I had a choice between eating an overpriced steak here or a stale Pop Tart back at the hotel, I would be preparing my wire hanger right now.

"Where are you working now?"

"I'm still doing YouTube."

"Oh, Robbie! You could do so much better than that and you know it! You could work at a bank or a big company, or you could own your own business! You could make so much money if you would just put yourself out there a little." Her perfectly painted façade is already beginning to crack around the edges and there is a note of desperation in her voice as she realizes that her well-laid plans still won't work, that I still haven't changed.

'So would you and your daughter, if you would stop being leeches.'

"It might not pay as well as I thought it would, but it's what I love to do. I make people happy, I make ends meet, and I have a good time. What else really matters?"

"Financial security matters, don't you think? Knowing you'll have enough money to pay your rent and your phone bill next month?"

'Like you would know anything about that, right? I pity your ex-husband.' I want to keep this as pleasant as possible to try to preserve the remnants of my damaged reputation with the family, but she just makes everything so god damned difficult and painful.

"Personally, I would rather be happy than rich. If worst comes to worst and YouTube doesn't work out, I will try something else. For now, I plan on sticking around."

"But that isn't a job, Rob." She pauses for a second as a lightbulb goes on in her head. "Poor Robbie needs to get a jobbie!" Her childish giggle makes the whole thing even worse and Mom looks like she might spit her mouthful of ice water all over the table.

'Please don't ruin that for me. You took away everything else tonight; please don't take my jokes, too.'

"I have the best coworkers in literally the entire world, and I get to do anything I want whenever I want to. There is no way I would trade all of that freedom for a little extra money." The gears are rotating in her head and I can see her tweaking her plan of action while we place our orders. This was just the standard preamble to a two-hour-long sales pitch that never varies and never improves. As soon as the waiter walks away, she launches into it with fervor.

"You might love it and you might be content with Kraft dinner every night, but will your future wife love it?" I can feel my eyes widen and my face flush bright red, and I know I probably look like a character from The Binding of Isaac right now. "Didn't think about that, huh?"

'No, I've thought about it plenty. Last time I checked, though, my love life was none of your business.'

"Most professional gamers end up with other professional gamers, especially on YouTube. My partner and I would make enough to buy twice as much Kraft dinner," I reply, and her plastic smile stays firmly in place. Angela is going to fight me over this until the end of the world, but as soon as she walks out the door of the restaurant tonight, her opinions mean nothing to me.

"Maybe you could afford to sprinkle a little pepper on top every once in a while to switch it up," Mom snickers next to me as she shakes a glass pepper grinder over an imaginary plate in front of me. Angela looks offended that Mom would take my side over hers and she huffs under her breath. "They make all of those fancy shaped ones now, too. They had cute little Spongebob noodles with flowers last time I went shopping." If there was ever a time to keep a straight face in order to save face, it was now.

"You can't expect to live on poor people's food forever, Rob. You definitely won't be able to get away with it once you get married."

"I get more opportunities and earn more money over time as my channel grows. Logically, it would make more sense to wait longer to get married so we could eat something besides Kraft dinner and corn every night."

"It might seem that way right now but you're in your prime! No one is going to want to marry you in ten, twenty years when you finally make enough money to own a car." I can feel a little spark of indignation beginning to grow in my chest, and I wish I could speak my mind in front of her, just once.

"I own a car right now. I bought it two months ago." A note of sarcasm is seeping into my voice as my mind-to-mouth filter breaks down; I need to keep it under control.

"With cash," Mom adds with the trolly little smile she always gets when she knows she just won an argument. At this point, she seems to be having more fun than Angela is.

"Well, that's very impressive. But don't you want your future wife to be proud of your job and be able to brag about it a little?" A greasy little smirk stretches across her face as she reaches the pinnacle of her perpetual argument. "Who says you have to marry someone who plays video games? I've looked on OurTube a few times and there are hardly any girls who do games for a living. How is that going to work out? The odds don't seem to be in your favor, Rob." The vibrant blush returns and I am speechless. I just want to crawl under the table and hide my face in my hands. This is not a talk I want to be having right now, especially with Angela and her nameless daughter in front of dozens of other relatives, especially the kids.

'The odds are never in my favor, especially tonight. How am I going to get out of this?' Most of my extended family conveniently forgets about my ex-boyfriends whenever the subject of marriage comes up, but Angela is one of the loud mouths I strategically avoided telling altogether. Her judgment isn't even what matters here: right now, I am just not mentally capable of handling the shitstorm that would hit YouTube if the news of me being bisexual travelled online, and she would never stop gossiping about it until it got around. Now that most of my cousins are old enough to be interested in YouTube, they stalk me online and have become some of my most avid fans. Given their insider perspective on my personal life and their omnipresence on my channel, these kids would have a significant amount of power over my career if they learned that information and tried to use it against me. Even though everyone who watches my content seems to suspect it already and I play along most of the time, the official confirmation that I am attracted to guys would still take an enormous chunk out of my subscriber count and my pitiful income, and I simply cannot afford it right now. Before you can be brave, you have to be sensible.

Regardless, nothing on YouTube can be kept a secret forever, especially when others are in on the loop and the rest of the world is interested. At a time when coming out as queer spells the end for many YouTubers' channels, I am in no hurry to test my luck or the Bacca's PR skills. However, I know for a fact that I have at least a few people on my side, no matter what happens when D-Day finally comes. My parents have been there since the beginning, and they were the ones who explained to me what the word 'gay' meant. I will never forget the looks on their faces when I introduced them to my 'husband' in kindergarten, a boy named Andrew who had persuaded me to wear a blue Life Saver gummy on my finger as a wedding ring. Mom insisted that we have a long talk at the kitchen table while Dad leaned in the doorway, crying with laughter as she tried to pry the dried candy off of my stained, swollen finger. In all honesty, I think it came as more of a shock to them when I started dating girls on and off in high school. Although Mom firmly believes that it would be healthier if I was 'out and proud,' she respects my decision to keep it quiet until the time is right. With that in mind, I pray that she won't let it slip tonight in front of Megaphone Mouth.

I also have a couple of major allies online in the Bacca and the Nooch Bot. Jerome had figured it out before we actually met, and when the subject finally came up in conversation, all he had to say was "No shit, Sherlock." Without his support, my Minecraft channel never would have made it past fifty thousand subscribers, when a group of homophobic assholes had tried to force my account out of existence with flame comments, DDOSing, and false inappropriate content reports. He is one of my best friends and my biggest ally, and I secretly ship Merome as much as I ship Royza from Fullmetal Alchemist (and I think he might, too). All in all, I trust the Bacca not to let it slip, but if he does, I know he can find a way to make it right again.

Getting Nooch's support was even more unexpected and my trust in him is less certain. I still have no idea how Mat figured it out, but he asked me bluntly one night while we were tearing our way through Halo 3 at his house, back when I was still working full-time for Machinima. When I confessed, he just nodded and threw a grenade at an enemy scout, like nothing was ever said. It was never mentioned again but he didn't have the reaction I had expected, either. Nooch is an unpredictable guy.

No one else has been interested enough to ask, or they may have already come to their own conclusions. In any case, I probably wouldn't lie if someone I knew personally asked me directly, but I intentionally avoid any questions relating to my sexuality online where the masses can see it. In the end, I feel like it's really no one else's business and evading the subject entirely prevents any negative backlash while promoting entertaining speculation. Most days, it seems like the comment section on one of my videos has more betting going on than a Las Vegas casino.

'I should cash in on that if I can get out of this.' Angela is a spotless personification of a YouTube comment section - confusing, offensive, relentless, and opinionated. I need to somehow win this argument and keep her out of my hair, both literally and figuratively. My head is swirling with conflicting emotions right now: embarrassment and panic, laughter and affection, the usual sadness. I am paralyzed here and this pause is already several seconds too long. 'What do I do about Angela without outing myself or making a scene? How do I win this argument and get out of dating her soulless little clone?' I scramble desperately for an answer and my mind lands on Mitch, the rising king of the Hunger Games and the pivot point of the new Benja-centric Minecraft craze.

"I like taking my chances," I answer, a statement that would seem out of character to anyone who actually knew me. "One of my friends is dating a gamer girl he met at a PAX convention two years ago, and they ended up being really good friends before they started going out. I want that kind of closeness and understanding with someone before I think about marrying them."

'The premise would be mostly true if Mitch actually knew how to flirt and wasn't so blind. You can't find real love with looks, money, and popularity alone, assuming that love really exists.' Angela seems dissatisfied and takes a sip of her ice water before she replies, the wheels in her head grasping for traction.

"Not everyone can marry their best friend or find their carbon copy, Rob. Someday you're going to see that you're being completely unrealistic."

'Like you?'

"Doing YouTube is hard for both people and it requires a lot of patience. In order for the relationship to work, they would have to understand why I have to spend three days straight in my office talking to myself and playing through a new game without sleeping. They would have to be okay with me spending ten or twelve hours per day recording and editing videos, and the rest of the day handling my social media accounts. More than anything, they would have to understand that I will probably spend more time at conventions or on Skype with my friends than I will with them, and know that it's nothing personal." I cringe at this last clause, knowing that it was the spark that ignited the fuse on three of my last four relationships.

"But why would you do any of that?" I have never wanted to facepalm so badly in my life, but I stop my hand halfway there and pretend to straighten my dark blue tie. "It sounds really selfish to me." Now I am beginning to lose my patience.

"Is it selfish if a businessman has to spend more time working at the office than he does at home to pay the bills?"

"That's a completely different thing. OurTube isn't a real job, Robbie." She smiles again and I can feel the cycle repeating itself. At times like this, I wish I was more like Jerome: he would excuse himself to go to the restroom and just never come back.

'He's braver than you are. He's a Bacca and you're just a derp.' I glance over at Mom and see that she is cruising around on Facebook, liking her sister's selfie with her husband that was taken three minutes ago from the other end of the table. I smile and follow suit, unlocking my phone just as Angela opens her mouth again. 'I hate to be rude, but I hate listening to you even more.' She opens her mouth and closes it a couple of times, looking like a Magikarp who forgot how to use Splash.

"Did you order the choice ribeye or the filet mignon?" she asks, and I ignore her, assuming she must be talking to her stoic, silent daughter. I check my e-mail and see that I have dozens of unread messages from this afternoon, including a new PM from PrestonPlayz.

'Should I open this here? Is this really something I want to deal with right now?' I consider putting my phone away, but it seems to be warding Angela off and the anticipation will ruin the remainder of the evening. 'I guess it would be better to get it out of the way.' I stare at his username in the title of the e-mail for a few more seconds before I decide to click on it, but before I open it, the cream of potato soup arrives and Mom nudges me to put my phone away.

"You wouldn't want a repeat of last year, eh?" she snickers, snatching the pepper grinder out of Dad's hand while he argues with his brother. He glances back at his hand a few seconds later and looks around stupidly until he sees Mom holding it over her bowl. "I swear, the two of you are worse than the kids."

"Isn't this nice, Robert?" Angela asks, leaning over and patting my arm as awkwardly as possible. "It's nice to get out of the house and try different foods every once in a while, right?" If I had any pride left before tonight, it is quickly vanishing before my eyes. I just want to slam my hands on the table and rage quit life right now.

'I miss Procyon and my Pop Tarts.'

----------------

December 13, 2010 at 9 PM, Fort Worth, TX: Preston

"Okay, this is just embarrassing." I chuck the Xbox controller on my bed and bury my face in my hands as the final score of the round pops up on the screen. I'm just making myself look like an idiot in every freaking way imaginable today and I need to stop trying to interact with people. I hit the console's power button with my toe and slump back in my chair and stare at the black screen. "How much worse can this get?" I just got owned by fans in four consecutive rounds on Black Ops and by Mitch in a recorded Minecraft PVP battle that everyone's gonna see. I'm dragging my own reputation right through the mud. It's filthy and I should feel bad.

I do feel bad.

I feel horrible.

I let out a long groan and slowly turn my head to look at the clock. I DMed Rob six hours ago and he never bothered to reply. He probably thinks I'm a complete frickin' nooblet right now. I really screwed everything up. I spent all day at school thinking about what I was gonna do about the whole Woofless situation and I finally decided the only way to make sure Jerome wouldn't rek me when I wasn't looking and make sure Rob and I could keep working together would be to try to apologize to Rob even though he doesn't seem like he's pissed at me. But now he hasn't answered my DM and he's sitting on a couch somewhere roasting chestnuts and laughing at my stupidity. This freaking sucks so bad.

"Come on, dude! Just do something! Cuss me out, turn me down, laugh at me, something. Don't just leave me hangin' here like this like a jag." The clock moves to 9:48 and I just wanna smack my head on my desk. I can't even focus enough to shoot some noobs on Black Ops because apparently I'm the biggest noob ever. "Maybe I shouldn't've asked him to record again so soon. Maybe he thinks I'm a total creep. I shouldn't've put that in the message. Why do I have to suck so hard?" I check my phone for the umpteenth time in the last hour and wheel back over to the computer to remove the posting date on the Party Games video. If he hates me, the least I can do is make sure that no more evidence of our association with each other gets posted online.

I should've asked him when I should post it before I sent that sappy apology. I feel so stupid right now. In less than a week, I've screwed up my reputation with at least three YouTubers, made myself look like a jerkwad in front of tens of thousands of fans, and lost a chance at a recording partnership with someone with tons of experience on the Tubez. The only worse thing I can do is go troll on Rob's channel and piss off the Bacca. I feel like a little kid lost in a mall. I put my head down on the cool desk and just try to exist for a while without anything in my head. I start to fall asleep, then my phone buzzes and I snap back awake like someone shocked me with a taser.

"Please be him, please be him, please be him..." I scramble to unlock my phone and see Rob finally answered my DM! But do I wanna read it and find out how much he hates me? I hesitate for a few seconds but I have to know what it says. I shut my eyes and click on the message header, slowly opening one of my eyes to peek at the screen. It feels like I'm holding my final report card of life and I need to know but I can't stand to know.

To: Preston A ([email protected])

From: Rob Woofless ([email protected])

Do not reply directly to this e-mail. If you wish to reply to the sender or report spam, please go to http://www.youtube.com/ and log in to your account to use the messaging function.

Hey,

I just rescheduled the video to be posted tomorrow so it would go out at the same time as your perspective. Notch knows everyone wants a break from the Ancient Aliens Mod Pack Series, anyway. I should be back home late on December 27th if you want to record something in the evening. Anything without viruses is fine; I'm not that picky.

Don't worry about it, man. Everyone has bad days every once in a while, and I totally get it. It's all gucci.

-Woof

"Thank the Lord that's over with. Now I just have to worry about finding a map or something neither of us's already done." It feels like gravity just got a thousand times weaker and I have so much energy I have to do something with it. I log back onto my computer and sign into YouTube to start searching through our past videos and fans' comments for map recommendations. This has to be good.

----------------

December 13, 2010 at 11 PM, Montreal, Quebec: Rob

'So that was what Jerome was up to when he texted me. I wonder what he said to make Preston freak out like this?' I swipe the screen on my phone to archive the rather lengthy, entirely unnecessary, and seemingly heartfelt apology, but I still have no idea what to think of him as a person. It was obviously his little chat with the Bacca that had prompted him to PM me, yet the content of the message is so at odds with Preston's on-screen personality it seems like it might be genuine.

Although I am always grateful for Jerome's help, going after this newbie YouTuber over such a little thing seems excessive. He might be overconfident and tactless, but he did just start doing collaborations three months ago - there was no real need to scare the kid shitless when he just has no clue what he's doing. Perhaps Preston did something else to earn himself a spot on the infamous Naughty List, and maybe an early Christmas present, too. Regardless, I can sense a modicum of panic in his message and I feel sorry for him, whatever it was that he did. 'Did I actually break TBNRfrags? I guess we'll find out tomorrow when the videos go live.' Now it's time to see if he meant what he said, or if a few salty tears from his fans can turn him into obsidian.