“Flipping BANANAS.” He started doing this weird flapping his hand thing, and I couldn’t tell if it was out of joy or panic. “Check Twitter.”
“Can’t you just tell me what happened?” I demanded, cramming my fingers into the tight spot and prying my phone loose.
“Ohmygod-ohmygod-ohmygod.”
That was definitely dread in his voice. I think. Maybe. I growled at him and reached for his phone, but he held it out of reach.
"Just look at it yourself!" he barked.
“Mother…” Cash swatted at the air. “How did a fly get in here?”
“Oh shit, and it’s trending.”
I got my phone unlocked right when Cash started to roll down the windows, and the stifling Los Angeles heat poured in. I ignored it, opening Twitter and checking the trends. #CashandEmma was the third result, and I clicked on it with trepidation. The first few tweets made no sense, then I saw one from three minutes earlier. Cash's Twitter account. Four simple words. No hashtags or images or brand tags.
@mrcashmitchell: Will you marry me?
I looked at him, and the ring box was out, a tentative grin pulling at his gorgeous face. I looked back at my phone, then at him. "Are you serious?"
“Never wanted something more in my life. Will you marry me?”
"You're proposing to me by tweet?" I frowned, but the smile tugged through, and this couldn't be actually happening.
"I thought about IG, but know you're trying to diversify your platform use."
I laughed and grabbed his shirt collar.
"SAY YES ALREADY!" Someone yelled out, and I looked out the window to see Bo in the car beside us, Eileen beside him. I looked around and realized that every car around us was familiar, all of their windows down. My parents, somehow not in Kansas, beaming at me from two lanes over. Johno and Marissa, in a Range Rover to our left, with Paul and Dion in the backseat. Ahead of us, the curtains parted on a school bus back window, and Wesley jumped up and down in the middle of the aisle, waving with both hands. Someone started playing the chorus of "Will you marry me" by Jason Derulo, and everyone started singing along.
“There isn’t a flash mob dance planned, is there?” I asked.
“No. I didn’t want you to see my dancing and change your mind.” He grinned at me. “Please say yes. This is going to be hella painful if you break my heart in front of the entire internet.”
I grinned at him through watery eyes. “Yes.”
"Yes?"
I laughed. “YES.”
And then, on a live stream from Edwin's phone and broadcasted to over a hundred million people—he slid a ring on my finger and kissed me. And I didn't care about any of them except for the people around us. The ones who truly loved us.
79
Quote
"The reunion show tanked. It was soooo boring. Johno was clean, Marissa was still vegan, and Cash and Emma were madly in love. Like, not a single catfight or juicy moment the entire time. I kept waiting for them to unveil that Layton was actually a woman, or that Eileen had slept with Cash—but there was nothing. A complete waste of an hour of my life. Like, who wants to look at happy people all day long? Ugh. Gag me with a spoon."
@emilyshouldbeshopping14
"Their wedding would have been the social media event of the year, but they did it all incognito. Some of the guests took photos, so we could piece together the details, but considering how much of their life is online—it's so weird that that night was kept from us. Anyways, it looked beautiful from the pics. Their entire backyard was lit by candles, and Emma wore this simple white cotton dress with an open back, and he wore a suit, and they had karaoke and a buffet by the pool, and Cash's brother was his best man. They honeymooned in Fiji in one of those huts on top of the water. There was a rumor that Emma was a virgin until their wedding night, but no one actually believed that. I mean, come on. Cash Mitchell? You could give him an extra nut and leprosy, and I'd still rip off my clothes and be ready for action."
Rachel Gladden, Crew, House of Fame
Two years after the reunion show… on May 14th, both Emma and Cash deleted all of their social media accounts. Like… deleted them. Gone. Followers. Photos. Videos. Branded posts. Everything from the two arguably most famous internet celebrities in the world, gone in less than five minutes, and with no warning whatsoever.
The internet flipped a shit. There were scavenger hunts going for screenshots and saved posts and articles that had featured them—it was crazy. People who had never followed them were getting pissed that they no longer had the chance, and you had thousands of girls snapping videos of them bawling because they couldn't find their profiles. It legitimately shook every social media and dominated every airway. My grandma heard about it, and she still thinks George W is president.
And at first, we thought it was a publicity stunt. And then people were saying they died. And then we found out that Wesley Mitchell had been moved out of the Ranch and that was when the conspiracy theories began, and an entire new wave of media circled and honestly—it was brilliant. It was all so damn brilliant. I wanted to stand up and applaud them for it, but it's hard to applaud someone who wasn't there, and Emma and Cash were just flat out … gone.
Poof.
From a hundred and twenty million followers to 0.
Like I said, brilliant.
Ingrid Long, The Celebrity Report
80
#dontlookoverhere
EMMA
We spent over a year on the plan. The first six months was making sure we really wanted to do it, then six months in the implementation. Wesley was our chief concern and priority, and we wanted to make sure that he was happy with the idea and would be in a location around other teenagers with Down's.
It took three months to find what we needed—a town where we could disappear but not be isolated, and somewhere close to a city where Wesley could have frequent interaction and instruction with other Down's Syndrome teenagers. Most importantly, a big piece of property that had secure access points and privacy.
I recognized our home the moment I saw it. Thirty-two acres that butted up to a top-secret government facility, the sort with twelve-foot electric fences and KEEP OUT signs that threatened deadly force. It had a six-thousand square foot house in terrible need of remodeling, a barn, and two guest cottages. It was in a small town with poor internet access, more bookstores than restaurants, and an average resident age of 63.
In January, we closed on the property, hiding it behind a string of LLCs that would take a forensic team to trace. We were welcomed, shown how to program the property's entrance gate, and then left to fend for ourselves.
In February, we moved a caretaker into one of the guest cottages and started renovation of Wesley’s room and our master suite. We applied for our change of names and moved our money into a variety of trusts and stocks. It was staggering, when you looked at our assets. More than enough to live the rest of our lives on, with only a slight reduction in our annual charitable donations. All in all, it was more than enough to disappear with.