Today we elected Cameron. He’s sixteen. It wasn’t legal but a few months ago Congress got together and changed the laws so that he could run for office. And it was a landslide. He refused to do any of the debates. He’d just drop another video on his channel that’d get tens of millions of likes. The networks needed the viewing numbers so badly that they would just play his videos when the other candidates were finished speaking. Even the other candidates liked it. The conservative (what was his name?) was caught on a hot mic, and as they watched Cameron crush a dance to “Makeba” by Jain, he said that Cameron’s moves were “fresh as shit”.

On election night, Steve Kornacki didn’t even bother clicking on any of the states on his touchpad map. Every time the news anchors would cut to him in studio, he’d just look at the camera and go, “come on guys. He’s going to win.”

I was there during the inauguration. I wasn’t expecting to lose my virginity, but that was kind of the vibe. Everyone was really amped. The White House lawn sort of felt like Coachella. When Cameron took the podium and got behind the turntables, he was already well on his way to deliver his first campaign promise.

To hit the sickest beat drop in history.

It was simulcast around the globe. He built to the drop for like, twenty-five minutes. We danced so hard some of us passed out. And when the music went quiet it felt like an eternity. And then, arm up, big jump, he comes down hard and the beat just –

-Wen –

-OFF!

Afterwards, scientists would say the beat was so sick it shifted tectonic plates. The bouncing and bass shattered glass windows and screens across DC. It was the best night of my life.

We rode that high for like six months. You’d step out your front door and there’d be a delivery of Monster Energy waiting there for you. Everyone got like 10,000 v-bucks to spend in Fortnite. Free iPhones if you lined up at the giveaway places. The last one didn’t go perfect, I mean there were riots and there wasn’t enough water to put out the fires because it’d been diverted to the Monster Energy factories, but my iPhone 15 records in 6k and has an anamorphic lens.

Looking back on it now, I can honestly say that those were the best days of my life. It was like waking up to a new festival every night. Just went you thought the drugs were going to wear off, here comes another high. You’d hear some of the complaints and the voices of opposition, but we weren’t listening. No one needs to hear that shit and lose their buzz.

I actually got to meet him in person. He was signing autographs outside a LIDS and I got my Orioles caps signed by him (I didn’t want him to sign the cap. I was holding out a notebook, but he just took the hat off my head and signed that instead. It wasn’t a big deal, but I was planning on having Jorge Mateo sign it when I went to the game the next day. But like I said. Not a big deal).

When he was done signing it, I told him about my situation, and how a lot of other people I knew were in situations like that. And he seemed real cool about it, nodded along, and only looked around and over my shoulder a few times. When I was done, he nodded really deeply and shook his head.

“Yeah man. That fucking SUCKS. The war took a lot out of everyone and the economy is still recovering. A lot of people are scared. I mean…124! In April! But for real? Don’t even sweat it dog. I gotchu.”

Then he dapped me up and Secret Service pushed me aside. As I went down to the metro, all I could think to myself was “he really does got me.”

And even when those voices kept getting louder, all that “shadow government” shit and the talk about he’s just a distraction, man no one paid attention to that. Because he gave you hope. You know what I mean? Maybe it wasn’t even hope. But you felt good.

You’d go down the street and there’d be another block party, or you’d get assigned people to play with you in Destiny so you always had a full party to go on raids, or you’d be so hopped up on taurine that the little shit didn’t matter. You couldn’t hear your mom in the next room in pain, or you dad would still be around, or you’d have a real job instead of being a bike messenger when the drones do all the deliveries, and you mostly just park down by the harbor front and smoke with the other messengers who don’t have much to deliver either. You could leave your body and just not have to worry about it. Would it have been nice if mom’s medication cost less? Sure. But Cameron wasn’t responsible for that. At least I don’t think so.

But they had to fucking ruin it. We had a good thing going and people just couldn’t leave it alone.

You’d see the videos online. They were building something out in the desert, and it became harder and harder to deny what it was. Someone with a GoPro got into the White House and snuck around. Before they got arrested and we never heard from them again, they put out some footage. The whole world saw the House Majority leader called our President a “pussy” and when Cameron said he wasn’t, the House Majority Leader got right up in his face and asked him what he was going to do about it. It was hard to hear on the video, but you could tell Cameron wasn’t going to do anything. Then the VP got in Cameron’s chair in the Oval Office and swiveled in around, RIGHT IN FRONT OF HIM, and kept calling him a little bitch until Cameron started crying and ran out of the room. It really hurt to see, if I’m gonna be honest.

Cameron put out a video calling the releases fake, but it seemed forced. Then there were like twenty videos decoding Cameron’s video and all the secrets codes in it, that he was trying to get out a message that he was trapped in the White House. Something about how the clock in his background was 12:30 PM, the same day that Kennedy was shot, and that the yellow light blinking from his PS 7 was a warning that something was wrong. But I think that might have just been the time that Cameron recorded the video, and the yellow light might just be the PS 7 in rest mode.

But the movement grew. You couldn’t avoid getting an invite. Everyone was supposed to rush out to the thing they were building in the desert to stop them from whatever. I didn’t want to go. But all my friends were going, packing up in their trucks and bikes and heading west, and it got to a point where the cities seemed empty that it felt scary to be alone, so I left mom with enough food and water to get her by and headed out.

And the trip felt good too. Man, people would huddle up in caravans at night out under the stars and just jam. I met a girl who didn’t mind how big I was and I had sex again. I had gotten laid twice under Cameron’s presidency and non under the previous presidency. A lot of times I look back on that trip, and I just wish it had taken longer. We all felt like a part of something, all of us, moving together, towards something big and unknown. It felt nice for a little bit.

There were thousands of us (someone said 1.7 million, but I was there and how the fuck would they know? I swear science can be so bullshit sometimes). You couldn’t see the sand there were so many feet. We gathered outside the gate, and the military that was there to stop us, you could tell they were scared shitless. There weren’t enough bullets in the world.

Behind them on these little paved roads were motorcades and a bunch of important looking men and women. Cameron was there. They all talked to him for a little bit, and he nodded and came over to us.

“What up subscribers?!”

Roars and cheers echoed across the desert.

“I know you have all have a bunch of questions, and that’s so tight! Curiosity is dope. But I gotta go do something real quick. I’ll be right back!”

“Promise?”

You could barely hear the voice.

She was near the front. Five, maybe. I never saw her again after that. This girl in pigtails wearing a “Last Dance in Foreverland” t-shirt. And when Cameron looked down at her, he got choked up. I was pretty far back, but even I could tell. His eyes just sort of glazed over, like he went deep inside himself, and then when he came back out, he just smiled that perfect smile.

“I promise!”

More cheers.

He jogged off, and the people in suits followed him. Then a few minutes later, all the soldiers left too. But we waited. That’s how much we liked him.

It was a low rumble at first. Then we saw the light. Everyone bent over and covered themselves. They say some people real close to the fence actually got blinded and burnt.

The smoke raced at us so fast you could barely breathe. We were choking and burning. Then it started to peel back. And all we could see was the light.

A long, bright column of fire, an arc into the night. We watched it rise and rise for nearly an hour, until little bits of it split off, and the head of the fire ran into the stars and became like them, and then it was a star, and then gone.

I don’t know how long we stood out there, all covered in soot, the same color as the desert, clay shapes leaving one by one. I know I was one of the last to leave. Because I knew that once I left, that was it. The party was over.

We got back to the cities but they felt emptier. Like people had gone out in the desert, and lot had decided not to come back. I don’t remember how long I stood outside my house. The front door had been broken in, and I could see a trail of mud and dirt tracked into the living room. I didn’t want to find what was inside.

Mom was sitting up in her bed, waiting for me when I got in.

“Everything good? Someone broke in, I think,” I said.

“Thirsty” was the only thing she said.

I ran out to the well and pumped out a little bit and brought it to her. She didn’t really ask me about the trip. Not out of rudeness. I just don’t think she remembered.

But I told her anyways. I told her about the parties, and how it felt to be swept up in something, and the trip, and the night sky and how it all looked. And then I told her I was afraid it was all over, and that I missed it, and that I didn’t want to have to come back. Her eyes were a little glazed over. But at the end of it, she smiled, and put a hand to my cheek.

I reset the power to the house, and I saw we had just a little bit left for the month. So I sat in her room with her, and we watched Cameron’s videos, starting with the first one. She hadn’t seen them before. I don’t know if she liked them. But it was nice to watch them with her anyways.

– Saleh Karaman