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Your friend Syd has a FaceBook strategy: only friend someone if you'd buy them a pint at the pub.
You, however, prefer to friend anyone and everyone the damn site suggests. You have 597 FB friends.
IRL, you have maybe four friends who would ever take pictures of you and post them online, much less [[tag->Stranger Tag]] you.You open the pic. You don’t remember being in London. You don’t remember that girl, or standing on that bridge.
[[Who the heck posted this?->Tiresias]]You certainly don’t know who “[[Tiresias Goodfellow->Tiresias Profile]]” is. The only album on their page is of you. In London. Where you haven’t been in months. Yet there it is, the piercing you got last week.
You cast a glance around the office - everyone is too worried about whatever skiving site is on their own screen to worry about yours. You roll your mouse around, trying to decide whether to [[message this Tiresias guy->message Tiresias]] or just [[untag yourself]] from their weird photo album.They don’t even have any identifiable information on their profile – just a link to a <a target="_blank" href="https://youtu.be/dQw4w9WgXcQ">YouTube video</a>. Their status reports are generic, no one else has ever posted on their wall, you have no mutual friends, and they’re not tagged in any pictures. You [[close the profile->message Tiresias]].You send your 545th FB friend Tiresias a PM:
//Nice photoshop, dude. Who are you again?//
Not exactly "new phone who dis?" but it’s still probably rude. But how can they expect you to remember who they are out of the hundreds of sham friends you have?
You decide a mid-morning [[new pic<-coffee break]] will make the wait go more quickly.After about thirty seconds of staring at the pic, your brain begins to hurt. This is far too much thinking for its poor damaged, besotted cells.
Giving it up for one of those guerilla marketing campaigns that merges pics from your profile with stock images, you untag yourself and decide a mid-morning [[coffee and danish->new pic]] break will definitely help you be more productive.When you return, your new friend has posted [[new pics->dead pic]].
There you are, striding along, same shirt you’re wearing now, your sunglasses on even though the [[rain]] has dotted them completely over, coffee in one hand and soggy danish in the other. The [[danish]] is missing a bite.You stare at the danish in the picture, and at your untouched danish on your desk, obscuring that TPS report you forgot to put a cover sheet on.
Before you even think to close the blinds on your office window against the stalker, another [[pic->dead pic desc]] goes up.Before you even think to close the blinds on your office window against the stalker, another [[dead pic desc<-pic]] goes up.London again. Streetlights glow orange in a drizzle that muffles anything that might have been in focus. You can’t even really make out your own face in the first shot, until you roll your mouse over for the tag frame. [[There you are.->dead pic zoom]]Oh, shit. That’s not cool.
You’re naked. In a [[gutter->dead pic 3]]. Your eyes are shut, your head [[drooping->dead pic 3]] to one side.
The image is unmistakable: that’s your face. There’s the new stud. There’s the scar from that misjudged hockey stick.Your hand rattles so hard your ring plays a tattoo on the plastic mouse.
You should have listened to Syd. Tiresias is definitely not someone you know well enough to hail in the pub. You could have [[avoided]] this. Now you'll just have to [[cope->psycho report]] with the crazy.You’ve heard of them, those psychos who peep on their exes’ profiles, blogs, status updates. The freaks who just feel so close to the celebrity via their online identity, even though it’s probably just the star’s publicist tapping out their ‘innermost secrets’. The desperate parents who drive their children’s rivals to suicide with their endless insults and accusations in comment sections.
Surely these bizarre pics fall in there somewhere: a weirdo you should [[ignore->unfriend Tiresias and bail]]? some really innovative [[spammer->report to site]]? or a crazed stalker the [[police->call the police]] should know about?You pick up the phone to call the police, but you hesitate. Is this an [[emergency]], or just a run-of-the-mill [[crime report]]?You click the photos and report them to the site for abuse. Stalking and creepy Photoshopping are abuse, right?
At any rate, the pics disappear from your [[feed->new message]].You decide not to be a total dick and report Tiresias to the cops or the site. It's probably just a buddy playing a stupid [[prank]] anyway.
You unfriend Tiresias, and the pics disappear from your [[feed->new message]]. That should take care of it.You punch out the 3-digit emergency code, but the operator is having none of your shenanigans. "This line is for emergencies only. Please hang up and call your local police precinct to [[report a crime->crime report]]."You google your local police, finding an online form. You start to fill it in, but then get bored. At least [[Tiresias's antics->new message]] are rescuing you from your dullsville desk job.The notifications flag pops up again. This time it’s a new message. Grimacing, you [[open your inbox]].Last year you convinced Ashley to get a kanji tattoo, and even translated it, thanks to those manga to learn Japanese. Except it wasn't the kanji for "peace" as requested; instead, the tattoo proclaimed Ashley's heartfelt love for pork fat.
It makes you chuckle every time you think about it. And you never fail to bring it up with Ashley, [[on FB->new message]] or IRL.//From: Tiresius Goodfellow
Message: I was there. I took the shots, 12 hours from now.//
You know you should [[call->phone rings]] the cops, maybe even Mark Zuckerberg, but something tells you that if you dial the emergency number, it will all stop.
And so you hesitate. Because if it stops, you'll never [[know->phone rings]], will you?The phone rings under your hand, and you jump so hard your coffee explodes over all those files you meant to organize last month. You use your ruined report to mop up, [[answering->answer]] before even considering it might be the ubiquitous Tiresias Goodfellow.“Oh, thank Christ I caught you.”
“Andie?” You haven’t heard her voice in ages, and she sounds tired and rough.
“Babe, I’m stuck in London. Some dipshit stole my purse, I’ve got no cash, no ID, no nothing.”
“Damn.” You sit back in your chair, relieved to face an ordinary, if not everyday, problem.
“What I was hoping,” she says, “is that you could run by my apartment, pick up my passport and spare bankbook, and bring them to me. We can catch the early train in the morning and be back in time for the meeting. I know it’s shit of me to ask.”
You close your eyes. London. Those pictures, twelve hours from now. Ten minutes ago, there was no way that was going to happen. It was a joke, a hoax. But now…now you either risk [[going to London]] and the bizarre future in the pics, or you [[bail on a friend]] who totally doesn't deserve it.“Fuck it,” you say. You don’t believe in that Mulder and Scully shit anyway. “Yeah, I’ll be [[on the next train->thinking]].”
Before you go, you change your shirt, making sure you pick one that didn’t appear in any of the photos.Better that she spends a night sleeping rough and misses a meeting than that you maybe possibly (not that you even believe it) die, right?
Andie's not happy with you at all, but you agree to turn over her spare key to [[whomever she finds]] to go and fetch her.You step off the train at Euston, peering around for Andie, and for anyone with a camera. Pretty much all you can think about is seeing yourself lying there in that alley, naked and still.
Except, of course, everyone over the age of five has a cameraphone and a selfie-stick; if Tiresias is here, you won't [[spot->hair change]] him."Hey!"
You turn to find you’ve just walked right past Andie. “You changed your hair,” you say, stunned.
She pats the shorter, lighter style. “Thought I’d get a decent haircut while I was in the big city.”
She’s the girl in the photos. The one you didn’t recognize. The one with you on the bridge. The hair changes the shape of her face, her coloring.
You look around madly. Tiresias //has// to be here [[somewhere->transition]]. How else would he have known about Andie's new hair?“What?” she asks.
“Nothing. Just a long, weird day.” You shake your head, trying to get the paranoia out.
You hand over the ID you picked up from her apartment. You still have a key, even though you haven’t been there since those [[five weeks last summer]].
“Rad,” she says. “Buy you [[dinner->eat]]?”You wind up in a dark cafe, happy to eat whatever is on the menu, glad for a back booth where no one can see you. You feel [[exposed]], defenseless.
Andie, however, is on a rampage. Now that you’ve come to her rescue, she’s livid about the robbery, and feeling confident enough to launch on one of her patented bitchfests. You nod and make the right noises, and you help her drink the wine she keeps ordering.
The restaurant is empty by the time you finally pick up your coat to [[leave]].Last summer started off pretty crap. Too much rain and too much work.
Then Andie started working at the office, and it got a lot better. Suddenly a little bit of overtime and some indoor-only activities weren't that big of a deal.
You barely took time apart for [[meals->eat]], and there was that one epic weekend in a not-quite-seedy hotel.
It was mad hot love. Your Instagram history confirms it.For once, you don't want to Instagram or Snapchat your meal. You don't try to one-up Andie on anecdotes or name-drops. You don't mind that no one can see your good hair or your bronzed skin.
It's a new feeling, to be comforted by quiet and dark, to be private rather than public. As Andie fills in the holes in your side of the conversation, you start to feel like maybe the YOU-ness of you is slipping away.
Who are you if you're nothing but flesh, here and now, without filters and snappy captions? Are you still you if there is no record of you?
You're glad when it's finally time to [[leave]]. This day needs to be over before you think about it any more.You both stagger when you stand up.
“Shit,” Andie says. “I think you’re drunk.”
“Not as drunk as you.” And suddenly it’s really fucking funny, and you both start laughing.
Outside the restaurant, Andie says, “Why do you keep glancing around like you’re the Pink Panther?”
This sends you off again, and you’ve stumbled half a block [[toward->direction]] the hotel before you can begin to tell her the story of your day. By the time you tell her how you nearly soiled your trousers over her new haircut, she is doubled over in laughter, wheezing in that way she does.You pass into a pool of gray, underneath a non-functioning streetlight.
Andie leans against the pole, squinting at you. “You shouldn’t have done what you did to me.”
“Sorry?” You cock your head in confusion.
“[[Last summer]]. That was pretty fucking cold.” Her voice is sharp as razors.
“I don’t understand. We had a thing, but…”
“'A thing?' Nice, asshole.” She nods at someone behind you. “Now you can have your [[thing]] back, you selfish tit.”Something whams into your kidneys. A fist, a really big, really hard fist. You gasp and drop to your knees in pain as she crosses her arms and smirks. The fist hits you in the side of the head, and you fall to the concrete, smelling piss and vomit and beer.
[[“Andie, what the hell?”->Andie explains]]Andie waves a hand, and the boots to your ribs cease. She hovers over as you as you heave for air.
“I just couldn’t help getting so obsessed," she says, poking a sharp fingernail into your bruised scalp. "I tried to become what I thought you might want forever.
“And you still shagged anything and everything. Seriously, that hairy-moled muppet from accounting? You’re disgusting.”
She slaps you, hard.
“I could have keyed your car, trashed your apartment. I fantasized about so many things.”
You hold your hand to your stinging face, struggling to [[defend yourself->not Andie pics]].“So you post weird pictures on Facebook and hire someone to beat me up? You’re nuts, Andie.” You spit on the pavement, flecks of blood spraying.
She frowns. “You think I'd pay this guy and then post pics to scare you off? Sounds like I’m not the only you've screwed over, bastard.”
Her hand flicks to your eye, snatching the metal ring from your eyebrow. It clinks away on the concrete, the sound registering in your mind before the pain does. Blood streams down your face, stinging your eye and tasting of old pennies.
[[Rage]] rushes through you. [[Walking away]] from this no longer seems possible, even if you wanted to.Shouting in fear and pain, you launch at her, anything to get her away from you. You spring from the pavement, your ribs screaming, and hit her on your way up. Her breath deflates over you, and you [[propel her backward]].You bite back the anger, somehow. You hold on to the rage for one second, then two, then three, until you're no longer in danger of Hulking out.
You pinch your eyebrow to stop the bleeding and squint at Andie through the muck.
Most of your brain is telling you to [[smack the bitch]] right back. A teeny part of it knows you kinda [[deserve this]].Into the pole.
She strikes it like a gong, and the vibration spreads through her body to yours. Slack, her eyes roll back in their sockets and she crumples to the pavement.
“What did you do?”
You turn to her heavy, her thug, his face covered by a lint-balled balaclava. “We was just gonna rough you up some!” He darts off, the slapping of his boots fading into static as the misty rain begins to lick the [[street]].Half a block away, a car passes, its headlights casting a dim glow over the scene, glinting off Andie’s watch. She doesn’t move. She doesn’t breathe. The foul exhalation you forced out of her was her last.
You kneel to [[attempt CPR]], but the scratch of rubber on concrete [[startles you]].You tug out your mobile and dial 999, hoping an ambulance comes in time.
You lay Andie out on the ground, your hand on the back of her head coming out wet and sticky with blood.
You have no CPR training, but your self-involved life has left you with plenty of hours to watch medical dramas, so you set to pounding on her chest and blowing into her head.
There's a crunching from her ribs, and she tastes like vodka and bile. You start to [[sweat]], feeling the gorge rise in your throat.“Shit!” You try to yell, but a trembling whisper is all you can manage. Your chest hurts, and your heart is trying to get the hell out of there.
“I did warn you,” the newcomer says mournfully. He’s small, wearing a gray suit with a hat and a waistcoat. A watch fob hangs from the waistcoat, and in his hand is a small box [[camera]].You back away from him as he raises the camera. “This isn’t what you showed me. In those pictures, it was me. [[I was dead]].”
He shrugs. “Futography is not an exact art. I do my best.”
You stand there, staring at the man, unable to look at Andie at all. “What…[[What do I do now?]]”The shutter clacks, and the futographer cranks the film wheel. “I’m not god.” He fires off two more shots, then turns to face you. “She looks cold,” he comments. Then he walks away from you.
You follow, but the gray suit on the gray street on the gray night disappears in only a few strides. You are left with your torn clothing, your aching bruises, and the corpse of the woman you were once so intimate with. Your [[train ticket]] is in your left pocket, your undamaged [[mobile phone->attempt CPR]] in the other.
The choice is yours.The friend Andie sends turns out to be Syd. Syd being Syd, he doesn't buy your BS "redistribution" excuse, so you tell him the whole bizarre pics story.
"So you ditched a friend because you saw something weird on the internet," Syd says. "Someone's messing with you. You gonna [[come with me->go with Syd]] to get Andie, or are you going to grow the hell up and just [[go get her yourself->going to London]]?"Syd's a grumpy bastard, but he's right. "Fine, I'll go with you," you say.
Syd plops the key back into your hand. "She doesn't need both of us. Have a good time. Don't die."
Well, that's you going to [[London->thinking]], then.6 Sept 2016
Began hypertext draft, based on previously written print story "FuturePics/LoveSounds".
Finding that I don't like the game-y quality of giving a multiple choice of options at the bottom of the lexia, though these are the most obvious of "basic navigation". I'm not really classifying the links as I write, either...it's probably going to be a post-drafting application.
Most of the links seem to be Affective Navigation, maybe a few Narrative Exploration. I apparently like to stay away from the extremes. Depending on what it looks like at the end, I might need to create a version that incorporates BNs and AEs just to make sure they're in the text for research purposes.
Stopped writing at "transition" for the day.
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7 Sept 2016
Completed hypertext draft. It has numerous endings, some loops, some bubbles, and I've gotten rid of all the game-type options, so it's basically pure hypertext.
Next tasks:
DONE 1. Save this draft version, work on a new one.
ROUND 1 DONE 2. Alpha test for length, bugs.
DONE 3. Revise for length, bugs.
ROUND 2 DONE 4. Record and classify the links according to the typology.
DONE 5. Incorporate any elements of visual design (if time). At least get rid of Harlowe's default "back" option.
DONE (changed to Tiresias Goodfellow) 6. Consider changing the name "Tiresias". It's not making sense with the current evolution of the story.
DONE 7. I think, instead of all the "begin again"s, I should integrate that into more of a "Could you have made better choices?"
____________________________________________________
8 Sept 2016
5,746 Words
70 Passages
94 Links
0 Broken Links
I think this is too long, with too many endings. Need to bring it back to 3000 words or so. Based on some playthroughs, this is coming in at about 10-12 minutes for the main threads. The shorter threads are fine, but they need to be cut out so that I can be sure the readers are hitting the same lexias, even if they're not on the same paths.
Let's leave everything after the "Andie explains" - some multiple endings there, so that's good. Leave in any and all "bubbles", but get rid of the other multiple endings. More bubbles, less endings.
Have gotten it down to about 3800 words. 56 passages, 75 links. That should be a decent length. There are clear passages that all readers will visit, so paying attention to those links will be best. Now it's down to identifying the link types, determining if we have enough, and listing them properly.
Typology - clearly, I hate Affective Exploration, even when I write. I've classified all the passages as either FORCED (all readers will view that passage, regardless of what links they click) or OPTIONAL (probably change that terminology, but for now I get it). I've filtered out all the Optional passages for the purposes of this project (no sense in examining links if an unpredictable number of subjects will look at them).
Right now:
31 links in forced passages
BN: 21 (15 of which are just page turns - only link on passage)
AN: 4
NE: 5
AE: 1
So, I need more Affective links, and in particular, Affective Exploration. Tomorrow's task!
SAVING THIS VERSION HERE, MOVING TO DRAFT 3.
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9 Sept 2016
Have shifted a few links, and now the stats on the text are:
4,318 Words
58 Passages
76 Links
33 links in forced passages
BN: 18 (14 of which are just page turns - only link on passage)
AN: 5
NE: 5
AE: 5
Classifications and justifications are located on a Google Spreadsheet titled "Futographer Links Classifications 9 Sept 2016".
CMAP of hypertext walkthrough titled "Futographer CMAP". Also uploaded to my account on CMAP Cloud for sharing: https://cmapscloud.ihmc.us:443/rid=1QK5NLNC1-26GTDPT-2NY9CS
Session recordings are on https://www.getsmartlook.com/app/dashboard - user info in LastPass.
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13 Sept 2016
Changed the story format to "snowman". Was using site visitor session recording services to track mouse and clicks, and for some reason Harlowe was placing code outside the <body> tags and making the recordings wonky. Changing it to Snowman solved the problem, and also got rid of the "back" button option by default. Now all I really need to do is tweak the look of the text and the links, maybe play with the title page, and it will be set.
Scrap that. It was easier to figure out how to get the SmartLook script into the header directly here in twine in Sugarcube than it was in Snowman (by default they all add scripts into the body tags, instead of the head). So to avoid manually adding it to the html every time, now there's a passage titled "headAppend" - any script that I want to go into the head tags should be put into this passage. In the story's JavaScript file, I have added the jQuery line "$('head').append(tale.get("headAppend").text)", which grabs all the scripts in the "headAppend" passage and places them within the head tags of the html.
Then I customized the CSS to get the "Facebook" look: I used Glorious TrainWrecks' "Simple Box" template as a start (https://www.glorioustrainwrecks.com/node/5163), then used the background gradients to create the Facebook stripe instead of the generic gradient on Glorious TrainWreck (notes in the CSS code on how to do it), and a text box for the passages mimicking the style of FB. Changed the title page to be more title-y. And there, I'm happy with it.
Session recordings are on https://www.getsmartlook.com/app/dashboard - user info in LastPass.You really shouldn't have played in the office paddling pool, but both your jobs are boring, last summer was full of rain and indoor-only activities, and Andie's adoration of you was really really attractive.
Who could blame you?
And so what if the final two weeks were just you trying to figure out how to move on to the Betty Page brunette at the coffee shop. Andie knew the score.
You are what you are, right? Andie shouldn't have tried to make it into a [[thing]].And then she coughs. She spews a bit of vomit and spittle right up into your face, but that's better than being left with a corpse.
You call an ambulance and sit with her during the long hours the docs place her under observation for severe coma. She doesn't remember you, and she might not be coming back to work, either.
The police talk to you, and you sly dog, you spin them a tale about a mugging gone wrong. Andie's missing purse and memory, and your battered face make it all too feasible.
Andie's family take her home, and you go back to the office. The following Tuesday, the photos from Tiresias [[begin again->Intro]].You leave her there. Lying in the street. Nothing else you can do, right?
You spend the rest of the night on a bench at the train station, and then take the next train home. You stumble in to work, but you can't hide your battered face, and it's not like your relationship with Andie was a secret.
"Your own social media accounts place you with her the night she died," the police sergeant tells you when they arrest you for her murder. "You've made some really stupid decisions, here."
You have, haven't you? You should have [[tried harder->Intro]].You don't smack her; after all, it's two against one, and ending the ceasefire would bounce back on you twice as hard. No, you charming devil, you use your mouth instead.
"Maybe if you were half as worth it as you think you are, I wouldn't have screwed around." And then you spit at her.
Whatever rage you felt, Andie must have felt it ten times worse. She screams, her tears garbling her voice, and [[shoves you]] so hard that you're sure you'll have handprint bruises tomorrow.You step away from both of them, holding your free hand up in a surrender flag.
"Look, Andie, I'm sorry. I was a dick. I mean, I don't think hiring someone to beat the shit out of me was the mature thing to do, but I understand why you did it."
She blinks in surprise at your shining moment of adult behavior. She and her thug exchange glances; he shrugs, and wanders off, his mission completed.
"I guess..." Andie flounders. "I guess that's what I wanted to hear. Thank you."
You stand there, nodding at each other awkwardly, you bleeding and she crying. Eventually you call an Uber to [[cart you both away->end]].Except you won't make it to tomorrow. Andie shoves you, and you stumble backward, catching a heel on the thug-for-hire's cliché combat boots.
You freewheel backward into the street, into a plain compact car. It wasn't even speeding, but when you get smacked square in the head with a grill at 40MPH, you don't get back up.
You don't get back up.
Your last thought is that no matter what you did, no matter how you tried, those pics were right. You were fated to die here, tonight. No other [[choice->Intro]] would have saved you.It's a little too much to expect you to share a hotel room and a train ride back to work with her, though, so you crash on a bench at the station and catch the first train out.
You go back to work, and she goes back to work, and other than some awkward exchanges in the corridors, you don't ever talk to Andie again.
From time to time you click on the picture, the one of you, in the gutter, corpsified and gross. It's the only remaining sign - well, that and your cool new eyebrow scar - of one truly bizarre day. Sometimes you wonder whether it would have come true, if you'd made [[different choices->Intro]].Don't put all your personal info online, Syd said. Use a fake birthday. Only accept connections for people you know - 9/10 of the ones you don't are phishers, scammers, bad mammerjammers (Syd has an inexplicable fondness for '70s rock).
You should be like Syd. [[Unfriend Tiresias->unfriend Tiresias and bail]], unfriend everyone, close the account, and find other ways of passing the time at work. Like work, maybe.
The thought makes you want to pluck your own eyeballs out. Syd is no fun at all.You track back over the choices you made today. Was there one that pushed Death onto Andie's track instead of yours? If only you'd [[walked away->Walking away]].
What the hell do you do [[What do I do now?<-now]]?@@.foo;text-align:center;font-size:36px;color:#3b5998;
The Futographer
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@@.foo;text-align:center;
by <a target="_blank" href="http://lyleskains.com">Lyle Skains</a>
[[Begin story.->Intro]]
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