by Kelly Harms
The phones would stay faceup on the table from then on. And if you can see yourself get a notification, it’s not like you’re not going to look to see what it is. That was date night with Tucker.
That’s incredibly sad, I now realize.
“Anyway,” says the server, breaking me out of my thoughts, “the official answer is we love it when our patrons post about us. So take as many pictures as you want. If you do ever get a new phone, I mean.”
“Thanks,” I say. “But I might not want to go back.”
“I sure wish I could quit mine,” she says. “Want another beer?”
I do want one. I’ve forgotten how flavorful and thirst quenching a good American amber can be. Who cares how it photographs? Who cares what the followers think?
For once, not me. I go ahead and say yes, I would. Better still, when it comes, I have no trouble at all enjoying it.
PAIGE
Not three blocks from expensive downtown Copperidge, on the drive between the hospital and the inn, is a whimsical, folksy coffee shop called the Sleepy Bear, in an old brick building with a bank and a restaurant on either side. The sign hanging above the entrance shows a napping bear getting a whiff of coffee aroma from a perfectly poured latte. I wonder if Jessica likes bears, or lattes. It could be a neutral subject of conversation for my next visit. I take a picture with my phone.
Inside the Sleepy Bear, there are tin ceilings and exposed brick walls, with ornately framed oil paintings hung helter-skelter. There’s an old carved-wood fireplace on one side of the room and lots of small mismatched tables and chairs that are surrounded by a short little whitewashed wood fence, like the diners are lambs at pasture. On the other side of the fence are the service counter, a pastry case, and a chalkboard with a list of sandwiches with people names. I order a Rick and a decaf chai tea latte and sit down at a round table for two near a plug-in for my laptop.
Then, as has become my new habit, I open Pictey and take a look at Mia’s feed. No change. She must have really meant it when she said she was going offline. But the comments are going strong with or without her. I expand them and see the natives are getting really restless. The longer she is quiet, the more people seem to behave as if her life belongs to them. And maybe the trolls smell weakness, because they seem to be growing bolder, like cockroaches in a condemned apartment. I can’t zap their remarks from here—my work laptop is still at the inn—so I just have to look at them in all their miserable ickiness.
I am beginning to wish I could contact this woman and let her know her feed is going down the toilet. Pictey encrypts emails and real names, and for good reason, but I think she’d want to know. That she doesn’t is very perplexing to me. After years and years of carefully cultivating her online status, this is how she lets it all fall apart? What if something really is wrong with her? What if no one has noticed?
I shake my head. That’s a silly thought. She’s an extremely popular woman. She has many friends, I’m sure. Friends who would notice if she’d, for example, had a traumatic brain injury and needed intervention.
But then, she was just jilted, and that’s probably quite upsetting to her. Perhaps she’s retreating from her social support systems. Perhaps no one but me has even noticed that something is awry.
My thoughts are interrupted by the arrival of my latte in a pretty china teacup with a matching saucer. A quick look around tells me they’ve got a large collection of such sets, all in different patterns. I think about the work of someone behind that counter, taking various cups and saucers out of the dishwasher and matching them back together. And then the further trouble the barista went to with the latte art. It’s not a heart or a clover or anything else I’ve seen on a thousand Picteys. It’s two wings, with space between them, like an angel’s. Not a children’s angel but a more sophisticated antiestablishment angel, if such a thing is possible.
I look around. Taking a picture of one’s latte art is a socially acceptable behavior. That said, I’ve always had strong feelings about people taking pictures of their food. It’s so . . . pedestrian. Yes, yes, everyone, you’re eating again. Well done.
But just look at those wings. They seem like they’re made of foamy delicious feathers. I’m just going to do it. Never mind my personal thoughts about phone etiquette. At least I’m not posting it online, right?
Or . . .
I look at my phone screen. The latte picture has turned out surprisingly well. You can see the pretty blue china cup and the rich depth of color under the froth. I can fuss with the editing tools a little and make it all a bit nicer still. Maybe I can put a filter on it. I think if I do that, it could pass itself off as something Mia Bell would post.
I flip back through her feed, and sure enough, there are latte-art pictures here, there, and everywhere. As our sales managers would say, my art is “totally on-brand.”
I take a moment to think this impulse through. If I log in as Mia—and that should be easy enough with the state of passwords today—and post this photo on her account, and she takes it down right away and changes her password, then my curiosity will be satisfied.
Further, assuming she’s still alive, my post will be unmissable. Mia will get an email from Pictey saying she’s logged in from a different device, so there’s no chance she’ll miss it. And if she reports a breach, the IP address will be from this coffee shop, ten minutes’ walk from where she was staying a few days ago. They’ll think she used an unsecured hot spot while having lunch here sometime or other. It’ll be of zero concern to anyone. More to the point, Mia Bell will realize her account is slowly melting down and get back to work.
Further, I reason, influencers are a key part of the Pictey business model. Recovering the attention of this major influencer will also benefit my employer.
Carefully, I consider the cons of posting on a stranger’s social media feed. As far as I can see, there are none.
So. It’s decided. I’ll be able to call Mia’s attention to her neglected feed with alacrity, and nothing will be hurt in the process. In fact, she’ll only be helped. It’ll save her from blowing up her entire career as an influencer.
So resolved. But there’s the matter of the caption. Can I write something that sounds like her? Some Mad Libs–style combination of buzzwords and hashtags?
Better still, something coded that lets her know: someone out there notices that something’s amiss.
It takes me four minutes to get into her account. Her password is Mike*0204. His adoption anniversary is February 4, as she’s posted several times. I was only slowed down by the punctuation—most people use a period or a dollar sign or an exclamation point between key word and key date. I can’t help but laugh. Even just by forcing her to change her ridiculously obvious password, I am doing her a massive favor.
From there I load the coffee picture, adjust it until it looks good enough to me, and type out my best attempt at a caption.
Spending some time with my #betterangels today. Saw these wings and thought of the care that goes into the invisible parts of our lives, and what else is latte art if not making something previously unseen into something beautiful. And just like that, a truth lands on angel wings: What if you guys are feeling unseen?
I pause, thinking of what I want to tell Mia, exactly, through this post. I want to tell her she’s blowing it, sure. But there’s more than that. I want to tell her that I know something happened, something sad, and it’s ok, and she doesn’t have to be perfect. I want to tell her that maybe it would be better if she didn’t pretend to be. Better for everyone who sees her and feels like they’re doing something wrong by comparison. Better, especially, for my sister.
So I type:
Here’s what I need you to know today: You are seen. I need you to know that what’s happening on this side of the camera isn’t always perfect, it isn’t always beautiful, it isn’t always an exercise in joy and mindfulness and #gratitude and bliss. It isn’t even always as real as it could be. When you suffer, when you feel pain, w
hen you don’t feel good enough, you’ve got to know you’re not alone. There’s someone out there, maybe someone you don’t even know, who sees what you’re going through. xoxo Mia #SleepyBearCoffee
I look up from my typing. My, but that is a good imitation of this woman, I think. I am freakishly good at impersonating an online celebrity. Is that a skill? It’s certainly eye opening.
I suppose as I’ve been looking into Mia Bell, I’ve taken more notice than I realized. I’ve internalized her voice. That means I’ve probably also internalized her perfect hair and perfect skin and perfect clothes and perfectly positive attitude too. I’ve internalized the idea that every single thing she does is beautiful and polished, that she’s incapable of screwing things up, that there must be some reasonable explanation if she does. As much as I’ve been dubious of her carefully curated identity, I’ve still bought into her bill of goods.
And consider me, with my complete lack of “lifestyle aspiration.” Last haircut two years ago, last diet much longer, clothes assembled from online batch shopping, shoes by New Balance, replaced by the same exact model every four hundred miles. If I’ve bought into what Mia is selling in even the smallest of ways, then it’s official: No one is immune. No one can follow these so-called influencers and come out with their head on straight.
I guess they’re called influencers for a reason. Staying sane in a Pictey world is a lost cause.
MIA
The next day, having bored myself to tears on a few of Mom’s books and wandered the house aimlessly driving her nuts, I hike up to the chicken house as soon as the hour is decent. As I walk, I wonder if I’m puffy from the pizza and beer, but there’s no way to check in my phone camera, and so I decide my only choice is not to care. Besides, Dewey is the size of man that could make most any woman feel dainty, and a few carbohydrates can’t change that.
I knock on the door. I hear a girl shouting through the door, “If you want eggs, they’re on the screen porch,” so I shout back, “I’m looking for your dad.”
The door opens. It’s that girl, the chubby young tween I saw in the window last weekend. Azalea. Oh, how I wish I could take her shopping. “Hi,” I say, trying not to be intimidated by her appraising look. “Is your dad home?”
“Yes,” she says. “Do I know you?”
I look at her for a moment. Is she old enough to be on Pictey? I suppose she is. “I don’t think so,” I say hopefully.
“He has a gun,” she says, and I realize she wasn’t asking if she knew me because I’m internet famous. She was asking because she has taken me for an assailant of some kind.
“Maybe I should come back later,” I say, backing away quickly. “When would be a better time?”
The girl’s eyes shift, slowly, and then start to sparkle. She cracks herself up. “Dad’s in the backyard adding a wire coil to the fence. We have coyotes.”
I exhale in relief. “Oh, thank goodness. You had me going with that gun talk.”
She giggles, pleased with herself. “We do have a gun. But not, like, for killing people who come to the front door.”
“That’s reassuring,” I tell her. “So coyotes, then? Maybe I can help him out.”
She looks at me with a raised eyebrow. “Are you a coyote expert?”
“I have watched a lot of Road Runner cartoons,” I admit.
“Did you bring any Acme TNT?” she asks, and I laugh, pleased to find that Dewey is raising this goofy daughter of his with the classics.
“Meep meep,” I reply. Andy and I used to watch hours of Looney Tunes on Saturdays when Mom worked a swing. He made us “cereal salad,” a mix of frozen fruit, Mom’s homemade muesli, and Lucky Charms. Something about this girl reminds me of my own childhood. I had a goofy sense of humor, I was just this side of roly poly, and I probably would have enjoyed a junk art metal chicken in my front yard. And I loved people but never knew what to say to them. Without Andy, I would have been desperately lonely.
Azalea smiles, but it fades. “I do wish we could just blow those coyotes up. They ate Magdelina and her sister Dolores.”
“Oh dear. Were you close?”
She shrugs and tries to look casual, but I see sorrow in her eyes. “I mean, we’re going to eat everyone eventually. I just hate that it was a violent end. And I guess I was kind of close to Maggie. She was a good friend.”
“Well then, I’m very sorry for your loss.”
“Thanks. Do you have any pets?”
“I had a dog,” I tell her. “He was my best friend.”
Azalea’s wide eyes get somehow even sadder. “He died?”
I nod. “Cancer, not coyotes.”
“My mom died of cancer too,” she tells me. “It was when I was young. My dad says, ‘Eff cancer.’”
“Your dad is exactly right.”
“You can come through here,” she says, walking me back through the house. “I’m Azalea, but you probably know that. Dad talks about me constantly. Are you Mia?”
“I am.” I wonder how she knows this. Does her dad also talk about me constantly?
“You moved in with Nurse Marla?”
“I wouldn’t say moved in. I’m just here for a week or two.”
“Your mom is nice. She came over when I fell off the roof.” I am about to ask her about that tidbit, but she isn’t done talking. “Dad said you threw your phone over the edge of Mount Wyler.”
“That’s true. I did. Do you want me to take my shoes off?” I ask as I follow her through the tiled entry to a small living room that leads to the kitchen.
“Why’d you do that?”
“I think I was overusing it,” I say honestly. “And also I was in a bit of a mood. Shoes?”
“I’d leave ’em on if I were you,” she says and gestures to the kitchen. When we arrive, I see that a chicken is sitting on the kitchen table.
“Oh,” I say. “There’s a chicken inside your house.”
“At least one,” she says.
“My in-house chickens are usually of the frozen, skinless variety,” I tell her. “Sorry,” I say to the chicken on the table.
“It’s ok. Dad has drilled into me that the girls are food. But I still always think of them as pets. This is Veronica.” She gestures to the feathery dame on the table. “Maggie used to come in here, too, but . . . you know.” She sighs, and my heart goes out to her. “Veronica isn’t as friendly as Maggie was, but the other chickens were all jealous of her looks, so we moved her inside.”
“I can see how they’d be jealous,” I say. “She’s very attractive. Nice . . . feathers.”
“Yeah, we’re not sure what it is, exactly. She looks like a regular chicken to me. Here,” she says. “My dad is through that door.” She points to the kitchen door, where I see a little flap at the bottom, a doggy door, only it is shaped like a small round arch. “Is that a chicken door?” I ask.
“We don’t want her pooping in the house,” says Azalea, matter of fact. I love this girl. I am about to ask her to introduce me to the rest of the birds when she reaches for the person doorknob. “DAD!” she shouts, before the door is even fully open. “DAD, THE PHONE LADY IS HERE!”
The phone lady. What a dubious honor. But Dewey doesn’t respond. “He might have his headphones on,” she says. “You can just go out there.”
“Ok,” I say, but I’m a bit hesitant. Am I walking directly into a chicken yard? Will there be poop everywhere and jealous chickens with inferior feathers pecking at my ankles? I take a fortifying breath of indoor air and step out into the yard, trying not to look like a city-girl cliché. “Dewey?” I say in a low voice, afraid of what, I’m not sure. Alerting the chickens?
There are a lot of chickens. The yard is huge, four times the size of my mom’s, and instead of a mess of raised garden beds and small trees, it’s just a mix of clover, gravel, and grass. Toward the back fence there’s a row of tidy chicken coops surrounded by a chain-link run, several beehives, and a swing set—the kind that’s just two plastic swings hanging on a woo
den A-frame. My eyes follow the fence line, and I see Dewey, facing away, stapling loops of what I think of as prison wire on the top of the five-foot wooden fence. He’s in his element, worn jeans kind of just hanging onto him somehow, dusty white T-shirt, work gloves, muscles, butt. If I had a phone, I would probably take a pic for posterity. Maybe show it to my mom. But I don’t, and maybe I look a bit harder as a result. In fact, it’s a full minute before I call out “Dewey!” again. This time I’m louder. The chickens don’t seem overtly dangerous.
His head turns sideways, and he notices me, or notices something. He pulls off his headphones and lets them hang from his neck. Turns around. His hair is thick and messy, and his face is tan. I smile at him. “Hi there,” I say.
He takes a few long strides to me. “Hey, hey!” he says, and there is excitement in his voice that seems like a promising sign. “What are you doing here? Are you low on eggs?”
“We’re fine on eggs, thanks. I just came to see you,” I tell him. “I’m phoneless, you know, so if I want society, I have to go a-visiting.”
He smiles indulgently. “I’m happy you’re here, but if you ever actually need to make a call, don’t forget about landlines. I know your mom has one. She posted the number on my refrigerator.”
I laugh—that does sound like my mom. “Assuming you haven’t done the same back to her, how would I find your number without the internet?”
He laughs too. “The numbers to most landlines are in that large yellow book your mom is using to even out the legs of the wicker table on her front porch.”
I blink for a second. A phone book. Of course. I get one and throw it away every year as a matter of course. The thought that they have a use simply never occurred to me.
“Still,” says Dewey, “I am all in favor of this technology ban, if it means surprise visits. I just didn’t realize you’d be sticking with it.”
“What do you mean? I threw my phone over an actual cliff yesterday. What else would I do?”
