I worked as a hype man for tweens dressed as a giant emoji

A few weeks ago, I was blessed enough to be given the opportunity of my nightmares.

Even though I’m shy and loathe attention and it’s hard for me to even talk, let alone get on stage, I had to get up on stage to hype up a crowd of mutant preteens with three and a half second attention spans (only two seconds longer than my own) for VidCon 2016.

So, here I am, at VidCon 2016 on a breezy 105-degree day in the middle of drought-ridden California. VidCon is a convention of YouTube-obsessed preteens wearing animal ears and formaldehyde dancing to music by obscure artists who can kick it and groove like it’s 1954 — that’s a year that sounds like it would be cool, right?  The first task they give me to do is dress up like emojis and dance around. My friend dresses as a piece of shit, me as smiley face with heart eyes.

I’m having a great time getting people’s attention despite how shy I truly am, until I notice that my piece of shit co-idiot is getting all the attention. No, it isn’t from boys in their late teens who chortle over the thought of a dookie. These are little girls with dreams and ambitions. These little girls are not interested in the adorable smiley face with angelic heart eyes — they’re interested in poop.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BHK_frmBFq-/

Never have I thought I would be put lower on the list of important things to little girls than excrement, but I decide this is no excuse to stop trying my best. So I dance harder. It isn’t working.  No amount of gyrating or exorcism maneuvers are impressing the VidCon-goers. I fail. But no worries because we now fast-forward a day.

I’m at VidCon again, even though I don’t know why I got out of bed this morning considering I’m literally less important than poop.  But anyway, here I am just boppin’ around twiddling my thumbs and fisting my nostrils when some man comes up to me and says, “Hey yo fecal matter’s ugly step sister, ya wanna hype up a stage?” I give him a solid “rot in hell” retort, but it’s too late.  He’s leading me to the stage.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BPvxMcDAUA9/?taken-by=vidcon

Although I don’t remember consenting to any of this, I am now somehow in a crowd of people much better looking than myself.  Although it’s hard to understand how you can be hotter than someone who can make herself look pregnant after one serving of beans, when you get to Los Angeles/Anaheim area, anything is possible.

This hellacious man hands me a box of sunglasses and some t-shirts to hand out for free.  He says “Keep these kids screaming and don’t let them leave.”  In context, a statement like this can be ethical.  My goal is to hype up a stage of bored teenagers with free plastic and cotton for an artist I know nothing about.  I quickly ask around for the nearest vat of Vodka, but no one seems to know where it is.  Now I am stuck with a stage, a crowd of people, and my own sobriety. I black-out the few moments before heading on to stage from panic but now Satan’s godson is pushing me up the stairs.

Somehow the preteens are already screaming because that’s just how they exhale. I’m doing great so far. I don’t beat around the bush, commanding them straight-up, “Scream! Because I have free stuff!”

It worked, they understand my code. So I take the sunglasses and start throwing them into the audience and say, “Free sunglasses!”  It’s going great.  The preteens are happy to be getting free stuff and joy fills the faces of these pre-pubescent bottles of fun, until the first head injury.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BMHM7lzgKLi/?taken-by=vidcon

I have chucked a pair of sunglasses into the frontal lobe of an innocent little girl. The sunglasses have actually pierced her and she basically caught them with her face because they do not fall down. I ignore this. There’s no evidence that it was me. I keep throwing but I strike another preteen in the eye socket with the free sunglasses. It’s okay, I keep going. Now the third preteen has fallen unconscious from the sunglasses and it’s getting hard to ignore the bloodshed but I cannot stop.  I have to get people excited.  I tell them once again to scream and they do.

Whether or not the scream is from excitement or petrification, I cannot tell but I was not told which scream to bring out in these people.  I’m now out of sunglasses and it’s time to throw t-shirts.

Fewer flesh-wounds occur from this but I am now out of them too. What do I do? Thankfully my guardian angel walks up to the stage and says “I want the box.” So I throw that box at him and he walks away with his empty box full of missed opportunities and regret.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BG98UZaFnx2/?taken-by=vidcon

This easily-pleased man child gives me an idea. I jump to the bottom of the stage and find trash.  Not ordinary trash but trash that may have been touched by a famous YouTuber that shared the stage with me.  I grab plastic cups and water bottles from the bottom of the stage and climb back up.  I say “Who wants trash that might have been touched by a YouTuber?!” This makes them scream so I know I have it made. I start chucking.

All is well until I strike a woman in the face with a water bottle. I can’t be certain but she may have exploded on impact.  It could have been a coincidence though which is why she cannot press charges. Finally, the demonic man who got me into this mess in the first place calls from behind the stage and says, “You can get off now.”

https://www.instagram.com/p/BMj1T52ghVM/?taken-by=vidcon

So I run off as I mispronounce the artists name and then I start fainting and speaking to this artist.  She seems confused as to why someone would put such an idiot on the same planet as her but she acts polite nonetheless.  I then sit down and almost cry because I never thought life could be so horrible.  Some of my friends come up to me now and through clenched teeth say “You were great!!!”  At this point I couldn’t care less because all I want to do is have a seizure in the comfort of my own stupidity. I don’t know what this sentence means but it’s unimportant and I must go.