Today, after getting my articles done (my idiot editor wanted 500 damn words—what kind of online news article is 500 words?), I went and hung out with my friend Violet. She’s going to school down in Baltimore, but we met halfway in White Marsh to catch up on a few things.
Violet is one of the few people I know who is so completely comfortable with herself, it’s disgusting. She knows exactly who she is, what she wants—and she likes it. Her hair is purple, people, with a pink underlayer, in case anyone questioned whether her name was Violet Varda (which, alliteration aside, means “purple pink”). She’s an art student at MICA, one of the most talented artists I know. She loves pigeons (for the love of god, don’t ask) and her boyfriend, Riley Collins, is commonly referred to as “R.C. Cola.”
Luckily, she’s also one of the most unique, refreshing, honest, kind individuals I know. I used to have a huge girl-crush on her. Vi is perfect. If I didn’t love her so much, I’d probably hate her.
Not to mention that she’d already known before even I did that there’s been something up with one Rosephanye Ginger Powell.
(By the way—don’t know if I mentioned this—is it obvious yet that Rose and my mothers went to art school together, where they decided to name their respective daughters like they were starring in a soap opera? No? Well, now you know).
Anyway, Vi already knew there was something wrong when I asked her about it, but she didn’t know what it was from any more than I did. We munched on sushi while I explained to her what I found in Rose’s notebook yesterday. Then the weirdest thing happened. Vi was worried, but when I mentioned the weird circle-X and stick figure drawings, she suddenly laughed.
“Oh!” she said. “Sounds like she must’ve seen Marble Hornets. Either that, or she’s being haunted by the Slender Man!”
She said the last part in a jokey tone, wiggling her purple-nailed fingers at me over the soy sauce in the middle of us. I’ve known Vi long enough to know when she’s making a reference to something, but usually, I know what that something is—I’d never heard of either of these things before.
I asked her about it, and apparently this “Slender Man” is some meme I’ve missed out on. Marble Hornets is a YouTube series about it. Evidently, Slender Man (or “Slendy,” as Vi kept referring to him, which I must say, made it hard to think Rose could find it scary. She went on to say that Slendy is better than his other nicknames: “our slender friend,” “Mr. Thin,” “Mr. Happy,” and “That Tall Skinny Motherfucker Over in the Bushes.”) is a creeper who follows his victims around, makes them super-paranoid (and gives them a wicked cough, which I just don't see the point of) and finally either kills and guts them or just...disappears them. The only thing that she said that really freaked me out was that he goes after kids. That is just not cool, not even a little bit.
She told me he was created on some forum and took the internet by storm, and maybe that’s what’s got Rose so freaked out, but I’m kind of doubting that it is. I’ll be the first to admit that Rose is a movie-pansy, even when I’m there explaining how they achieved each shot. But a YouTube channel freaking her out this bad? I don’t know about that.
I haven’t been to the YouTube series yet—I literally just walked in the door and I got my edited article back from my jerkass editor, so I’ve gotta get that done. Meanwhile, is there any advice that you, O Almighty Interwebz, can give pertaining to this nonsense?
Oh, and while we’re at it, does anyone know how to change the time-zone setting on this blog? It’s saying that I do everything about three or four hours before I do it.
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