Page 52 of Puck Your Feelings
"You heard me." I stand up, stretching my back. We've been sitting here for forty-five minutes, and my spine is protesting. "No editing. We post it as is."
"Kane." He swivels in the chair to face me. "You sneezed. Loudly. It sounded like a baby elephant dying."
"Then people will know I'm human." I cross my arms. "Isn't that the whole point? Being authentic?"
"Authentic doesn't mean we can't make you sound like youdon'thave tuberculosis." But he's fighting a smile.
"Post it. Now. Before I change my mind."
"You're not even going to listen to it first?" He looks scandalized. "Kane.Jayden.Youalwayslisten back. You made me repeat that seventeen times yesterday."
"That was different." I lean against the desk, looking down at him. "This was just us talking. Either it works or it doesn't."
He studies my face like he's trying to figure out if I've been possessed. "Who are you and what have you done with the Hockey Robot?"
"I'm trying to be less robotic. Isn't that what you wanted?"
"I—yeah, but—" He shakes his head, laughing. "Fine. Fuck it. The worst has already happened, right? What's one more disaster?"
"That's the spirit."
He pulls up the upload screen, his cursor hovering over the publish button. "Last chance to back out."
"Do it."
"Your funeral." He clicks.
The progress bar fills agonizingly slowly—the wifi out here is shit, which is probably intentional on Cap's part—and we both just stand there, watching it like it's a bomb countdown.
76%... 82%... 91%...
"What if everyone hates it?" I ask, and I'm not sure why I'm asking him, of all people.
"Then we'll hate it together." He glances up at me. "But they won't. We were good."
98%...
"We were, weren't we?"
100%. Upload complete.
"Fuck," we say in unison.
Becker refreshes the page. Zero views. He refreshes again. Twelve views.
"Your mom's on it," I observe, spotting the first comment.
"Both my parents, probably. And my sister. She made, like, four accounts to boost my numbers when I first started." He keeps refreshing compulsively. Forty-three views. Eighty-nine. Two hundred and six.
My phone buzzes. Then his. Then mine again.
"It's happening," Becker says, and he sounds somewhere between terrified and exhilarated. "Oh god, it's happening."
I pull up my phone. The team group chat is already exploding.
Cody:Not great. Not terrible.
Petrov:Is very good! You sound like real people!
