Well?” Kevin pushed.
Lily put her food down.
“You might start with asking yourself why the opinion of strangers means so much more to you than your own opinion of yourself.”
Kevin was speechless.
Page 47
Author: chungwipff
Page 46
Kevin joined Lily for lunch at her house. They ate in silence until…
“Nothing’s going right,” Kevin moaned.
Lily waited for him to continue.
“My grades are in the toilet, my YouTube channel is in the toilet and I am in the toilet!”
Lily looked him in the eyes and listened.
Kevin wanted her to say something, but he realized that there was nothing for her to say.
“What do you think I should do?”
Page 45
“Are you feeling Ok?” asked Mr. Dennis.
“No, not really,” Kevin replied weakly.
“You didn’t do well on the test, Kevin. That’s not like you.”
“I know and I feel terrible. I didn’t study. I really messed up.”
Edgy from lack of sleep, low in energy from poor diet, and frustrated with himself, Kevin sulked.
Page 42
Lily realized Kevin just wanted to pout and work on his channel, so she went home.
For the next few hours, Kevin watched YouTube tutorials on how to record himself playing video games. Then he had to learn how to play one. Finally, he recorded himself playing the video game and posted it. Anxiously, he checked the number of his subscribers, likes, and dislikes.
Three followers! He gained two! But he also had only 3 likes and ten dislikes.
It was late, but he wasn’t sleepy. What to do? How to get people to like his channel and subscribe? He laid in bed thinking and thinking. He fell asleep only to wake suddenly in the middle of the night.
Geometry quiz!
He forgot to study.
Page 40
He refreshed again. He sighed.
“OK, I have one like and one dislike. Five views. No subscribers.”
“C’mon, Kevin. Let’s work on the rainforest. Check it later.” Lily moved on to the sloths. Sloths are so cute, she thought.
Kevin felt sick to his stomach. He felt humiliated, sad, and out of control. His heart was beating out of his little chest – he had to do something. But what?
As he molded the toucans, his mind was on his channel. Why don’t people like me?
Page 39
“What now? Want to work on our rainforest project?” Lily asked.
“Um, OK,” Kevin said distractedly.
As Lily worked on the insects, Kevin refreshed his YouTube page. Lily could see Kevin was stressed. He was turning red.
“Look! Look! I have 4 views!”
Lily looked at his screen. Indeed, there were four views. Kevin refreshed.
“What? One dislike?! A thumbs down?”
Lily went back to her insect-making. “Our video was great. Ignore the dislikes.”
“Ignore? How can I ignore that? I don’t even have any likes!” Kevin wondered how the other three views garnered no reaction.
Page 38
“Yes, it’s perfectly fine.”
“You don’t think we need to do it over?”
“No, but we can if you want to.”
“If you say it’s fine. I’ll go with it.” Kevin just wanted to get it over with. This wasn’t as fun as he thought it would be.
He uploaded the video onto YouTube.
Page 36
In his kitchen, Kevin nervously moved furniture and set his phone against a bowl on the counter.
“So I thought you could go to the refrigerator and take the cake out. I’ll come by and say, ‘Wait! Don’t you want a better snack?’ and I’ll hand you some carrots.”
“OK,” Lily waited for her cue.
Page 33
“I’ll ask Lily. I bet she’ll be in my videos with me.”
Kevin walked home with his tail between his legs. His dream of being loved by thousands or hundreds of people was fading. He was tired of being ordinary.
He wanted to be special.
Page 30
This wasn’t what Kevin expected at all. He thought they’d be as excited as him. A cloud of doubt began to form in his head and in his heart.
He tried to push it away.
“I don’t have to be the expert on any of those topics. I just need to make it entertaining to watch.” He thought of Nastya and how he didn’t find it particularly captivating, but…190 subscribers sure did!
“Meh, no thanks,” Carlos said.
“Yeah, I don’t want to be on YouTube,” Minji concurred.
Kevin was bewildered.
