Light Up, Losers

“Hey, Uncle Norman,” said Billy as he came in through the door. “Mom made some coffee cakes. Wanted me to deliver one to you.”

Uncle Norman got up from his recliner and took the pan from his nephew. “And just when I was starting my diet! Aw, well, it can wait! Say, Billy, you must be getting excited? Halloween’s right around the corner.”

Billy’s face lit up. He’d always loved the holiday as a boy, and now, at seventeen, his enthusiasm was stronger than ever. “Oh yeah,” said Billy. “I can’t wait.”

“Here, have a slice of this,” Uncle Norman said, bringing the coffee cake into the kitchen, “and tell me about your costume for this year.”

Billy sat at the table. “Well, so I found these cool robes, and I built this rad staff thing. And then, for the mask… Well, it’s sort of hard to explain… But, like, with my phone–”

“Oh, say no more,” said Uncle Norman, setting down a piece of coffee cake in front of Billy and then sitting down with his own. “I understand completely.”

“Really?” Billy said. “You’re familiar?”

“With the masks one wears on the internet?” Uncle Norman chuckled. “Oh, sure. I may be a bit older than you, but I’m plenty familiar with that.”

“Oh, actually,” said Billy, through a mouthful of coffee cake, “I was talking more about–”

Uncle Norman paid him no attention. “It starts off innocent enough. You take a few nice pictures of birds while you’re out in the woods, post them to a few forums. Maybe you exaggerate your knowledge a little bit, act like a real expert when you’re actually just an amateur. But you’re racking up the positive responses, so who cares? You’re a bird guy now. That becomes who you are online, the mask you wear, so to speak. So you start doing your research, reading all the guides and pretending you’ve always known this stuff. You’re ordering book after book after book about birds, barely paying attention to the titles, and then one weird one shows up. The binding is odd, and there’s no title on the front, just a symbol, and you realize it’s some sort of incantation book. You read a few, but toss it aside. It’s new-age-y mumbo jumbo, not the info you’re looking for. Not the kind of stuff you can use to build your persona and get those sweet, sweet likes.”

“That’s interesting and stuff, but–” Billy tried to say, but his uncle was deep in his reverie.

“And the likes? They’re fading. So you get a few books on taxidermy and start putting up fliers around town advertising your services. ‘A bird hits a window, you call me.’ That’s what they say, more or less. The birds, the ones that don’t fly away after a few minutes, they’re gonna die. People just want to feel like they did something. So you take these birds, saying you’re going to do your best. But you’re just waiting until they knock off so you can do a little taxidermy and pose them just right for your photos. The likes are back up on the forums. They’re calling you the bird whisperer. That’s the new mask you wear. But you’re greedy now. You start pulling a Victor Frankenstein, taking a little bit of this bird, a little bit of that bird, putting them together. ‘Interesting find,’ you’re saying on the forums, ‘need help IDing.’ Now you’re doing numbers like never before.”

“Um, Uncle Norman?” Billy said. He’d long since finished his coffee cake.

Uncle Norman hadn’t taken a bite of his. “Then, one night,” he said, his eyes glassy and distant, “it’s hard to say why, but as you’re working on a new specimen, one of those incantations comes to your mind, and you say it. The specimen blinks its eyes, and you stumble back just as it takes flight out the cracked window in the basement. The others lining your shelf also spring to action and depart. Other people on the forums start reporting sightings of these birds. Some of them are three, four states away. And the reports are not good. The flock carried away a stray cat in Jacksonville, one says. In another, they pecked the windshield of a Volkswagen until it cracked and then swarmed the driver. The poor man had to go to the ER. He didn’t even crash the car, but still managed to sustain two broken ribs and a cracked collarbone in the attack. And now, you’re wearing a new mask, one of ignorance. But each time you step outside and hear a caw that doesn’t sound quite right, you recoil, worried they’re coming back for you.”

“So, what I was talking about was an LED light-up mask,” Billy said. “Basically, it’s a screen you can wear, and you can control what’s on it with your phone.”

“Oh,” said Uncle Norman. He took a bite of the coffee cake. “Wow, this is good stuff!”

“All that about the birds,” Billy said. “That was just–”

“A hypothetical example,” said Uncle Norman, “of how people can be online.”

“Sure,” said Billy. He stood. “I better get going. I’ve got more coffee cakes to deliver.”

“Of course,” said Uncle Norman. “Oh, and Billy, if you ever see a Blue Jay with orange wings and a red crest, don’t try and take a picture. Just run. Okay?”

“Okay,” said Billy. On his way out to his car, he kept his eyes on the sky.