I'm bitter and I will start whining

“Did you call them?” Jamie called from the other room.

“Yeah. They said they’ll look into it.” Mikey called back, grumpily. This prompted Jamie to come barrelling into the room to grab the phone out of his hand.

“I cant believe your whole channel got terminated over that!” He muttered under his breath as he walked back into the kitchen and closed the door. Mikey had made a video about Jamie being openly gay. It was meant to be ironic, they were planning on revealing they were a couple in next week’s video. That was if YouTube would let them keep the video up. Due to being one of YouTube’s most popular creators at the moment, his channel gets pushed a lot. This also meant that content disrespecting his content immediately got taken down as ‘hate speech’.

A few minutes went by when he heard the door of the kitchen open with a slam, irritating hold music playing on speaker, and an angry looking Jamie. This caused Mikey to chuckle.

“I’m guessing you got put on hold.” He remarked casually, a smug smirk painted across his freckled face. He received a grumpy grumble in response.

“Don’t laugh. I’m doing this for you.” This caused Mikey to laugh louder. Jamie sat on the couch, crossing his arms and pouting childishly.

“I don’t know how long I can listen to this hold music.” Jamie complained, resting his head on Mikey’s shoulder.

“It’s not even been 10 minutes yet.” The latter replied, running his fingers through his boyfriend’s green locks. There was a comfortable silence that washed over the two, just the sound of each other’s breathing and the screeching of the hold music to break it. It had been raining all afternoon, so the rain beating against the window added a relaxing atmosphere.

“What do you think they’ll do?” Mikey whispered, afraid to break the feeling of calm that washed over them.

“I’m sure that if I explain the context behind what we were trying to do they’ll understand and give you your channel back.”

“If I do get it back, I might take the video down and opt for something more traditional before cancel culture comes for me.” This was the reality for them, always checking their past, making sure no one gets hurt. Jamie felt bad for Mikey as he knows it stresses him out, he cares about his audience and always does his best to make content that everyone wants.  

“I’m sure it’ll be fine.” Jamie attempted to sooth the taller boy, gently rubbing circles across his back.

I just don’t want to start all over again.” His voice cracked, he sounded like he was going to cry.

“You won’t though, your subscribers would see that you made a new channel and you’ll have your subscriber count again.”

“But my reputation’s ruined!” Mikey was panicking now.

“Michael, you’re a good man, your audience knows that.” Jamie doesn’t use Mikey’s full name often, only when he’s starting to panic as it has a grounding effect on him.

“It’s just so dumb. Trisha Paytas has been offending people for years, and her channel has never received anything like this.”

“Offending people is the main part of her content.”

“I bet Shane Dawson won’t get his channel terminated. His ‘taking accountability’ video was on the trending page, damnit.”

“I know, it’s terrible.” They both chuckled softly, Mikey feeling his wash of panic leave his body, fatigue setting in as a result.

For around the next 15 minutes, they fell back into a comfortable silence. They listened to the repetitive hold music while Mikey continued to run his fingers through Jamie’s hair. It had been about 40 minutes since Jamie had placed the call. They were feeling doubtful that anyone was going to come back to the phone. That was until they heard the hold music stop abruptly and a human voice rung through the phone speaker.

“Hello, YouTube headquarters, how may I help you today?”

“Hi, I’m Jamie Roberts and I wanted to ask you about a channel you recently terminated.” Jamie had put on his poshest voice when answering the phone, he always did.

“Please hold for a minute while I go find someone to answer that.” Before they had a chance to protest, the aggressively loud hold music was already blaring through the iPhone speaker.

“Great! Bloody great!” Jamie was fed up. He had other things he wanted to do today. For example, he wanted to mend the cabinet that was falling off, or try the new banana bread recipe that his sister gave him, or simply play video games, but instead, he was sat there, listening to the same piano riff for almost an hour.

“It’s not so bad.” No one knew whether Jamie was an extremely impatient person or if Mikey just had the patience of a saint. Maybe they were both. Yet again, they sat there and listened to the sound of the hold music.

“At least this is more fun than playing Fortnite.” Jamie joked to fill the silence. This joke, did indeed, manage to get a gentle giggle out of his boyfriend.

“I’ll never understand why you have a whole channel dedicated to something you hate.”

“You do it.”

“Yeah, but I tell people I hate something. I don’t just pretend to like something just for views and revenue.”

“You talk about topics you don’t care about because you know that’ll get you views.”

“ I suppose you’re right.”

“Of course I’m right.”

Another half an hour goes by and the hold music is still playing. Mikey had started a book during the time they were on hold and he had already read 6 chapters. Jamie had started sketching out ideas for new merch.

“I’m so bored!” Jamie whined, collapsing dramatically onto the sofa.

“Me too.” Mikey matched his boyfriend’s tone, opting to tall on top of Jamie on the sofa.

“Ow, get off, you’re heavy.” Jamie tried to push him off but he was too strong. Mikey sat up and pulled Jamie into a sitting position.

“So what do we do now?”

“We wait.”

“But I don’t want to wait anymore, I want to order food.”

“Well, we can’t yet. It’s only been a few hours.” Mikey wasn’t even fazed by the amount of time that they has been on hold which was something that amazed Jamie.

Another 5 minutes went by when Jamie went to complain again. Instead, he felt a soft hand cover his mouth, silencing him.

“Please, do not complain again.” It was Mikey’s turn to whine, his lead-thick patience wearing thin. They had both began believing that they have been forgotten about and a part of them wants to give up.

“They’re not coming to the phone, babe.” Jamie began reaching for the phone only to have it smacked away by Mikey.

“They’re gonna answer I’m sure of it.” And that they did. The hold music stopped and they were met with a voice of an older lady, the two assumed she was higher up in the company than the person they had spoken to before.

“Sorry about the wait, you wanted to talk about a channel termination.” Jamie excitedly jumped up and grabbed the phone, walking back into the kitchen and closed the door before continuing their conversation.