Nick takes the bet.

I can’t help but think that I’m getting taken, but honestly I can’t see how. I get the help I need, I get advice and training on streaming, and a promise of more money than I expected to make throughout college but all in a couple semesters. With a shrug I hold out my hand accepting that I must be taking advantage of Sarah “Deal!”

Sarah beams as she shakes my hand up and down more aggressively than I thought she could. “Good, then we’ll get started right away.” She pulls out a tablet and starts making several lists, flipping between them faster than I can keep up with, muttering to herself all the while.

“Okay, we’ll need to catch up on your bills first so that you can have that off your mind. We’ll need to stop by the school to get your books and supplies.” Another list starts. “You’ll need a tablet and a laptop… I saw your chromebook and no. Just no.” She starts yet another list. “You’ll need clothes and bathroom supplies.” She brings up another new list. “You’ll need a stop at the salon and they can set you up with a haircare routine once we have a look for you. You’ll need a skin care routine. Some exercise. A diet.” She moves back to the second list. “Ear buds. Bedroom supplies. We’ll need a whole refurb of the bedroom.”

On and on she goes. I can’t even tell what all the lists are for as there are two different shopping lists, and seemingly two different to-do lists. Some of it makes sense as its what I expected… get me taken care of, start out routines for streaming, some equipment, but others seem frivolous or downright baffling. Why refurb the bedroom? Why so much care to my hair and skin. And what kind of cosmetics is she talking about.

After about fifteen minutes she looks up at me and smiles. “Okay, so in case it wasn’t clear, you’re moving in here. It’ll give you access to stream at all hours, and it’ll save me… you… on paying for rent and utilities. I’m also going to sign out for the rest of the week to all my streams. Well, I have one in the morning, but after that I’m clearing my schedule to get you ready. My plan is to have your debut Sunday night. Saturday would be great if you already had an audience, but Sunday is better for gaining and developing one. I’ll throw some attention your way and know some other popular streamers that can send people to you. So long as you show up and don’t screw up, you should get good retention.”

Sarah taps at the lists emphatically “But, that doesn’t give us a lot of time. We need to set up a mini studio in your room, get you looking good, get your equipment fully integrated into my system, and get you on a regimen. Trust me, getting you a starter audience is easy, but getting it big enough to snowball and pick up steam is going to take full commitment on your part. I don’t want to hear any whining or complaining…” she pauses, smirks, and winks at me “…well, maybe a little whining just because I’m sure it will be cute, but no dragging your heels. Now, first things first, let’s go get your school stuff setup and then go basic shopping. We’ll take a bigger trip Friday or Saturday for your streaming outfits, but we need you to have some around the house clothes. You’re starting to stink. We need to wash your clothes and I don’t want you prancing around here naked.”

Sarah gets up and gives me another of her playful winks before adding “At least not yet!”

I can start to see the bigger picture and see how she’s become so successful. At best, she had the same twelve or thirteen hours I did with my situation. She had some sleep, made breakfast, streamed, AND came up with this whole plan. In that same amount of time I wallowed, grieved, and barely got some breakfast into my stomach. And once we’re out, she’s a woman on a mission. Her mustang might not have the big V8, but it’s plenty fast enough rolling through town.

By morning’s end we’ve stopped by the college and updated my address and paid off the remainder of my bills for the semester. We were in and out of the bookstore and we had all the replacement books and supplies I needed for my current classes. We stopped by my old apartment and were told where to contact the owners. It took a little searching online, but we finally figured out how to get in touch and pay out my back rent. And she was fierce on the phone. While waiting in the Best Buy parking lot she berated some poor woman as they tried to say my lease said I still owed money for the rest of the year. She wasn’t loud, shrill, or even angry. She was just firm and consistent in that I didn’t have to pay and that the lease didn’t specify that a total loss of property meant I’d have to pay their reduced ‘damage’ rate. And she didn’t even have the lease in front of her! I’d probably have been begging for a further reduction in rent and she just saved me thousands of dollars.

Next, we stopped into Best Buy to get the tech equipment. I had to assume I’d be using one of her dining room rigs as we didn’t get anything gaming related. Instead, I ended up with a Googly Pixie tablet, a nearly top of the line Blade gaming laptop with all the bling and RRB one could stand, and a strange set of earbuds from a brand that I hadn’t heard of before. After getting some networking cabling and a new switch we moved over to the headsets. I saw the updated version of my Sanhouser’s, but it was a splurge back when I got it and figured she wouldn’t drop that much on a headset. I was right as she walked right past them and picked up a box, tossing it into the cart. I stopped pushing the cart as I looked closer at what she selected. I looked over at the shelves to see what she meant to pick out, but there wasn’t anything that made sense in that area.

“Umm, Sarah?” I tried to be careful. So far, she was fluid and smooth and fast and I didn’t want to act like I doubted her. But then again, she’d obviously made a mistake and I’d probably win points by indicating the error before we got to the check outs. “You got the wrong headset. I’m not complaining about the quality but…” I looked at the headset again then back up to her “…a pink cat-ear headset?”

Sarah let out a little sigh. “You said you’d go along Nick. This is the headset you’re going to wear. Trust me, I know how to build an audience. Don’t think of it as the audience that you want, think of it as the audience that will get you the most money the fastest. These are quite popular right now. Now, let’s get rolling!”

And with that she spun around and started marching off to the TV section. I looked again at the headset and finally shrugged my shoulders and followed after. I saw some streamers wear cat ear headsets before, but it was for fun and they had something else to wear most of the time. This looked like it was going to be… I mentally slapped myself for being stupid. Of course, she’d have another set I could use and just needed this for the fun side. That made a lot of sense!

After selecting out a TV and mounting equipment that could be mounted in what was now being called ‘my’ room we checked out. I blanched at the price, knowing it was all going on my increasing line of credit with Sarah. She’d saved me a couple thousand on the cheating landlord, but this haul ate up that savings and added a couple more grand to the total.

We didn’t have to move the car as Home Depository home improvement store used the same parking lot. Once the car was packed with our tech haul we moved over there next. I grabbed one of their huge carts and we started moving through the store with speed and purpose. A whole set of smart bulbs and decorative lights were the first things in the cart. I knew these would be really useful in setting up a colorful background for my streaming. Next up was a few boxes of cheap laminate ‘hard wood’ flooring. I recognized it as the same style as she had in her garage studio, just in a different color. A light grey as opposed to her darker mahogany. Next, we slid over to the paint and this was where I stopped again.

My old mini setup had included a green-screen background so that I could show whatever I wanted, but evidently Sarah wanted me to have a painted backdrop… in pink and lavender? I let her keep going through the various shades until she took her final selections and started holding them up to my face, comparing them to my skin tone.

“Umm… Sarah. I think the whole 80s, vapor wave, Miami Vice can be cool, but it’s not really my style. Plus, isn’t that supposed to be pink and cyan? Not light purple?” I tried to be diplomatic, but even as was speaking I could see that Sarah disapproved of my disapproval.

Sarah, with her head cocked stiffly to one side asked “Nick? Do you trust me?”

“Umm… yeah. Yes.”

“And are you reneging on our bet?”

“Uhh… nope. No.”

Her neck straightened and she smiled as if we didn’t have a little tense moment. “Then all’s good. I think the Grape Haze and the Little Pink Princess colors are the way to go. Let’s keep moving. I want to have you at the… oh wait, I should call ahead. Follow me.”

I wonder how she can multitask so much as Sarah turns, pulls her phone from her belt, dials a number, and continues walking while looking up at the aisle signs. “Hey Marci, it’s me Sarah. Yup. Oh, I’m on to a new project. Abso-fucking-lutely Not! I love my hair. You’ve done magic there and I’m not getting it cut or re-colored until it falls out.” She listens a bit as we turn down an aisle and then laughs heartily. She has a good laugh. “Okay, maybe not that long! Anyway, I’m calling about a new project. Yup, they’re right here. I’ll leave the exact style up to you but know that they’re a novice and will need instruction too. Mmm, Hmm, I’m going for a whole gamery look and will base the rest on what you start with.”

We slow down just enough for her to grab some shelving and drop it into the cart before we move on. “That’s right. It should be similar to mine, but different enough that we can’t get confused. I’m thinking overall… girly girl. You’ll see…” she spins on her heel to look toward me, starts walking backward without missing a step, takes a picture of me, types on her phone a bit, then finally spins back to walk forward and continues her conversation “… there, lemme know what you think. Can we get in today? Four? That should work fine. You’re the best Marci!”

Sarah gives a very loud air kiss to her phone before hanging it up and attaching it to her belt. As she looks at bed frames I go over her conversation in my head and wonder what she means. New project makes it sound like she’s talking about me. She did talk about a novice and needing instruction and one of the things on her list was a salon trip with instructions for care. But then a look similar to hers? Girly girl? She can’t possibly be talking about me because there’s just no way we’d ever be confused for each other.”

As she selects a new head and base board for the bed, we move on and look at some planks of wood. I nod appreciatively as she’s obviously looking at something to make a desk out of. Put this on the shorter shelves that we got, and we’ll have a bigger better desk than anything from Ikea. And then it hits me. Sarah was mentioning how much time she had and acting like she knew how to teach this streaming stuff… she has to have another person she’s helping! A girl that looks like her.

I nod to myself, happy with that answer and happy that I’ll get to meet this girl at the salon. The pic of me must have bene sent with some text like ‘basic clean cut’. Guy guts are simple after all!

With everything purchased we go outside and I start to worry. How are we going to fit all of this into a hatchback? Then Sarah pulls her phone up and looks at it before glancing across the parking lot. When she spots what she’s looking for she waves and a big pickup truck rolls over. She seems happy to see them. “Hiya guys! Thanks for agreeing to work on such short notice. Remember my spare room where I had you put all the boxes? Well, I need it set up but it’s a little tighter. The bed has to stay so I want the desk setup on the other side. That way we’re not hiding that it’s a bedroom and in fact emphasizing it for the camera. Paint, floor, bed accessories, desk, wall mounted TV, network cable run, and shelves. Can you get all that done by tonight?”

While Sarah’s talking, we’re moving over toward her car. By the time the big buy with the mustache answers that he can get it all done by dinner time she squeals with evident high levels of happiness, leans into the truck, and gives him a kiss on the cheek. “You’re the best Hal! Email me an invoice and I’ll get you paid by the weekend. And include your rush fee. I really appreciate it!”

She pats him on the arm and the other guys in the truck start unloading everything from our cart into the bed of the truck. One of the guys also comes over and helps Sarah get the TV and the mounting hardware from her car into the truck. Once they’re packed and we’re in the car Sarah pulls her phone out and starts flying through our lists, several social media platforms, and finally responds to some emails and messages from various apps.

Not wanting to disturb her I pull my phone out, but it only takes me a couple minutes to see that I don’t have any texts, no new email, and check up on my Tremble feed to see that no one even asked why I wasn’t on last night.

Once Sarah’s done she puts the car in drive and smiles at me. “And now for a girl’s best shopping friend. The mall! Unless you need a break?”