The Lift

3

Right after dropping off Jason, David went straight home, much to the dismay of his friends. With Jason back after a week away they were ready to party. Everyone except David. He bailed under the premise of a headache. ("More like heartache," Jason muttered under his breath so only David could hear. David flipped him off.)

On the drive home he made a deal with himself that he could call Preston tomorrow but only after editing and uploading the vlog. Once home, David sat in his bed exporting footage to his computer. He had every intention of starting to edit, but all he could think about was how he'd one day tell the story of his airport encounter.

Getting nowhere with his edits, everything felt wrong and not funny, he dropped his computer to the floor and simply stared at the ceiling. Too distracted to turn off the lights or even change, David eventually fell asleep under the bright white lights and in his jeans and T-shirt.

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David pretended to edit and ultimately fell asleep thinking of Preston while the woman herself was still wide awake. She couldn't stop watching old vlogs, looking for bits and pieces of the David she met today with the person she'd been watching for months. All things considered, she was pretty late to the David Dobrik party, but she'd still seen a number of his videos.

After finally shutting her own laptop, Preston couldn't resist the urge to check Instagram and David's story. She logged in with one of her company's accounts (she wasn't going to get caught creeping) and hesitantly typed each letter of his name.

She'd already seen some of the bits from that day's story, having watched them while waiting to take off for LA. But she hadn't seen any airport footage or anything from later in the day. There was David ranting about how stupid busy LAX was even on a Tuesday morning. David ranting about Jason missing his plane. David at Chipotle. David goofing off and using what she was pretty sure was his vlog laugh. David saying he was about to start editing the Wednesday video. The last portion was posted a mere 20 minutes ago.

Preston shut off her phone before her imagination could get the best of her. Or so she thought. As she fell asleep, her dreams were still assaulted with images of the two of them together, him editing videos and her editing photos.

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David woke up bright and early to his phone's alarm. He'd accidentally set it for the same time on Wednesday as he'd needed on Tuesday to wake up in time to pick up Jason from the airport. He groaned as reached for his phone somewhere on his bed, refusing to open his eyes as he knew the room lights were still on from the night before.

Finally he located his phone, shut off the alarm, and lay there giving himself an internal pep talk for the day. He had to finish his edit, upload the video, do some laundry, talk podcast stuff with Jason, and... call Preston. At that thought he shot out of bed and stripped off his clothes from the previous day. He seriously considered wearing the same thing again, he did it plenty often, but he needed to feel fresh (even if he would be putting on an outfit that was nearly indistinguishable from the last).

He took a quick shower and got dressed in another black-on-black outfit. Sitting on the couch, he watched over footage again. It wasn't as bad as he remembered it being last night, but he still wasn't totally satisfied. Not every vlog could be the best vlog.

As he edited, his mind kept going back to what Preston would think of this vlog in particular but also all his vlogs. How does one go about introducing a stranger to the YouTube world? There was a reason David didn't talk with many women about YouTube. And Preston clearly knew something about YouTube, so it might not even be that big of a deal. Except who was he kidding... This wasn't just introducing someone to the concept of YouTube as a platform. This was introducing someone to an entire way of life, a way of life he would ultimately drag them into at least partially by way of spending time with him.