Sam and Colby: The Penitentiary

22

"Bye baby. I love you," Sam said for the third time, giving Kat another kiss before following me and the guys out the front door to the Uber. Colby and I climbed into the furthest backseat, Corey and Jake sat in the middle row, and Sam took shotgun seat with the driver.

"Hey, kids," the driver said. "Name's Jack. You guys headed to LAX, yeah?" he asked, squinting at his phone with the destination on it.

"Yes, sir," said Sam. Jack put the car into drive and we started the trek to the airport.

"Where you guys going?" asked Jack. He was pretty old, his black eyebrows not matching his dark grey hair and deep smile lines.

"Nashville," said Sam.

"Good old Music City," said Jack.

"Yes sir," said Sam.

"Any special occasion?" Jack asked.

"Filming a YouTube series," Sam replied.

"Ah, you guys are... what do they call them? Video bloggers?" Jack asked. We all chuckled softly.

"Vloggers," said Jake.

"We're not really vloggers. Okay, well, we are. But our series aren't really vlogs," said Corey.

"Yeah? What are they, then?" asked Jack.

"They're...," Sam trailed off.

"Paranormal docuseries?" Colby suggested.

"Yeah, that," said Sam.

"Ooh! Nice. My friends and I used to break into small places and use Ouija boards back in the day," said Jack with a smile, reminiscing on his old times.

"Seriously? No way," said Colby.

"We used to do the exact same thing," said Sam.

"Why'd you guys stop? Stuff get too heavy?" asked Jack.

"No, they got arrested," Jake said.

"Oh! Wow," said Jack. "Where in Nashville are you guys going to? Seems like a pretty old city, there's bound to be a lot of spooky stuff there."

"We're actually headed to Petros. We're going to check out the Brushy Mountain State Penitentiary," explained Sam.

"Well that sounds appropriately terrifying," Jack laughed. "Seems like a cool thing to watch someone else do, though. How many followers do you guys have on YouTube?"

Jake and Corey held back snickers when Jack referred to subscribers as followers.

"Sixteen million as of last week," Sam said casually.

"Holy guacamole!" exclaimed Jack. What a cute old man thing to say. "What's this channel called?"

"Sam and Colby," Colby called up from the back seat.

"You're Sam," Jack said, pointing at Sam. He'd been the one to order the Uber. "Who's Colby?"

"That'd be me," said Colby.

"Do the rest of you guys do the videos, too?" Jack asked.

"We sure do," said Jake.

"Lord knows why," Corey chuckled.

"You choose to spend your time with these four? You must be a... what is it called? A mom friend?" Jack asked, looking at me through the rearview mirror.

We all immediately erupted into laughter.

"Yes, I guess you could say that. I'm stuck with this one, though," I said, pointing at Colby.