Body, Boundaries & Safety
She Filmed Me
The games were over. The cake hadn’t happened yet. So the party had gone soft in the middle, like a marshmallow. Junie sat on the arm of the sofa in a paper crown that kept slipping over one ear. A runaway balloon had escaped the banister and was hanging in the hall at head height.
Tilly had her cousin’s tablet and was making a documentary. That’s what she called it. A DOCUMENTARY. So far she had filmed the mini hot dogs, Bramble the dog’s nose under the back bedroom door, and Marcus burping the alphabet, as far as F.
Then the tablet swung around. And Junie was in it. There she was, in the corner of the screen, small and shiny, crown half off. She put her hand up near her ear. “Don’t film me,” she said. Her voice barely made it across the room.
“I’m not,” said Tilly. “I’m filming Marcus.” But the tablet stayed exactly where it was, pointing at Junie. The little red dot kept going. Marcus was just behind Junie, doing a thing with his eyebrows. So it was sort of a tiny bit true.
Junie went where the tablet wasn’t. She stood at the hall table and stared into a bowl of lime candies, as if choosing one was very important. When she looked up, the tablet was in the doorway. And down in its corner: the small bright square of her own face.
Marcus came and did the eyebrow thing again, closer, for the camera. He loved it. He made Tilly play it back, watched himself twice, and laughed at himself both times. HA! HA! Junie stood next to him, arms down. Where do you even put your face?
From the kitchen Tilly’s aunt called, “CANDLES!” Everyone started drifting to the living room. Tilly walked backward down the hall in front of Junie, tablet up in both hands, always the same distance away. The balloon bumped the back of her head. Boing. She didn’t stop.
Kitchen door: on Junie’s left. Front room: four steps ahead. And the tablet: right there in front of her face. Red dot. Still going.
What does Junie do?
Any of these is fine to talk about. If something feels unsafe, telling a grown-up is always allowed.
Shout: “Stop filming me! I said NO!”
Junie stopped dead. Tilly had to stop too, so fast her sneakers squeaked. Eeek! Junie didn’t look at the tablet. She looked at Tilly. “STOP FILMING ME! I SAID NO!” It came out so loud the balloon gave a little jump on its string, and in the living room the talking stopped. Tilly’s mouth went tight. The tablet came down to her waist. The red dot went out.
“She was only messing around,” said Marcus, and went into the living room. Tilly said nothing at all. She sat on the second stair, tablet face down on her knees, picking at the corner of the case. Junie stood in the hall. Her hands had nothing to do.
The candles were lit and everybody sang, badly, the way eleven people sing. Tilly came in late and stood at the far end of the table. Nobody filmed any of it. Junie sang and ate her slice. Tilly stayed at the other end till the plates were cleared.
Afterward Tilly came over to the sofa. She held the tablet out flat, screen up, so Junie could see it from where she sat, and scrolled. Swish: hot dogs. Swish: Marcus’s eyebrows. Swish: a paper crown, small in a corner, there and gone. Then Bramble’s nose, under the door. Sniff, sniff. “Do you want to see the dog one?” said Tilly. “You’re not in it.”
Tell Tilly’s aunt: “She won’t stop filming me!”
Junie went left, around the tablet, into the kitchen. Tilly’s aunt was pushing candles into the frosting and counting under her breath. “She won’t stop filming me! I said no and she WON’T STOP!” The aunt stopped counting at seven. “Is she now,” she said. She wiped her hands on a dish towel and went out into the hall.
“Tilly. Tablet on the shelf till after cake, please.” She said it right there in the hall, in front of Marcus, the birthday girl, everybody. Tilly went red all the way up her neck. She put the tablet on the shelf by the phone charger. Clonk. “Who said?” Nobody answered. Everybody knew.
“Can I see what it filmed of me?” said Junie. The aunt took the tablet down and held it low, so all three could see. Swish. Junie, crown half off. Swish. Junie again. “I want my clips gone,” said Junie. “But it’s my DOCUMENTARY,” Tilly told the carpet. The aunt put it back on the shelf. Higher. “Before anyone goes home, Tilly. You, me and this. Junie’s clips come out.”
The singing was loud and mostly wrong, and it went on way too long, because Marcus kept going after everyone else stopped. No tablet anywhere. Junie sang the whole thing without checking a single doorway. And she blew out the candle the birthday girl missed. Fff! From the side.
After cake the hall turned into a keep-the-balloon-off-the-carpet game. Junie was mid-jump, both arms up, when she saw Tilly on the second stair, watching. Not filming. The tablet was still up on the shelf. Junie’s clips were still in it, for now. Then the balloon came down, and Marcus dove for it.
Put her hand over her face and keep going
Junie put her hand flat over her face and kept walking. Tilly walked backward in front of her the whole way: “Junie. Junie. Ju-nie,” in a voice like a commercial. Junie went around her into the living room, hand still up, and sat down at the end of the table.
And it did stop. Somewhere around the candles, Tilly got bored. She pointed the tablet at the cake instead. Then at Marcus, who wanted it. Junie put her hand down. She sat with her chin low, her eyes always finding wherever the bright screen was in the room.
They sang. Junie sang with one hand resting up near her cheek the whole time. Just in case. Nobody noticed, because everybody’s hands were busy: clapping, holding paper plates, pushing somebody. The candle smoke went straight up, and Tilly’s aunt opened a window.
Afterward Tilly played the documentary back on the sofa, and everybody leaned in. There was the bit with Junie’s hand coming up over her face. Tilly played it twice. Marcus laughed both times. Junie laughed too, from the arm of the sofa, behind them all, where she could see the screen and the screen couldn’t see her. Her crown slipped over one ear again. She checked the tablet first — still busy playing the film — and then she left the crown where it was.