Get A Life

By: Riley

Summary – Kendall had been able to ignore some nasty things fans had to say before, but he couldn't keep quiet any longer. Inspired by Kendall's recent tweets.

When it comes to being in the spotlight you're opening yourself up for people to have a negative opinion of you for whatever reason they decide. They—the audience—just doesn't like you and there's nothing you can do to change it. So you should just accept it and move on, you can't please everyone.

If you mention it and say 'hey, you're being really shitty for no reason, you don't know me' you'll just get it twice as hard.

Suck it up.

Not everyone's going to like you, deal with it.

Life is going to be really hard for you if you don't learn this lesson now.

So when you go through media prep—as you always are when you're about to put yourself out into the public space—it's drilled into your head; don't feed the negativity. Easier said than done. But it's possible. At first the words will hurt, there's no way around that. You'll be confused and wonder what you can do to change it, but nothing can be done. And as time goes on and you learn to ignore it, because there's no point in wasting your own time with it.

The negativity continues to lose its strength until you just give it a passing glance and move on to the next person that was asking a question or saying something positive.

But what do you do when it's someone you really care about being that's being attacked?

Are you just supposed to sit back and watch as the horrific and disgusting words swirl around them in a hurricane with shrapnel pelting at them on all sides, waiting to throw them that life raft to take them to safety? Or do you break every rule that had been drilled into your heard and just take it, watching as it progressively continues to knock them down.

Kendall never thought he had to worry so much about it, he dealt with it before. There were people that commented online that he and Jo looked too much like siblings to be date. That his mother must've had an affair because Katie looked more like James than she looked like Kendall. When pictures of their father re-surfaced it seemed to further prove their point. Then there were the people that continued to say that boy bands were lame, that they didn't know what they were doing, that their music sucked and they sucked by association. That Carlos was a hyperactive idiot, that James was a self-absorbed asshole, that Logan only thought with his dick and had a toxic relationship with Camille that should've ended ages ago, and that Kendall was a hockey obsessed jerk who really only cared about himself.

Kendall worked hard to get to the point where he didn't care what other people—haters—had to say and continued to live his life. Yes, there were people who had something to say when BTR ended and he started to play hockey. Then there were the hockey fans that didn't take Kendall playing the game seriously because he was a 'boy band' and not serious despite his many years of playing. All of that rolled off his back but he didn't handle it well when his mother and sister were attacked online and shut it down quickly and with one message to his fans that he wouldn't tolerate it.

That when he was still in BTR and Gustavo and Kelly quickly reprimanded him, telling him that while it was a noble gesture—and they completely understood why he did it—it wasn't a good idea to engage like that. He needed to focus more on the real fans and what they were saying.

"Fine," Kendall replied. Though in his heart he knew it was anything but fine. But he took their advice and kept going.

Then on one of his trips home from Minnesota he noticed something was different. When he stopped by his mother's and sister's place to catch up—keeping his promise to Katie that he'd go see her first—they didn't talk much about their social media presence, which was weird. Katie had grown a lot of fans as she continued to go on more and more auditions and land commercials and small and fairly large guest spots on TV shows. She always loved to show Kendall the nice things that were being said and the funny conversations she and her best friend Lizzie Zevon would have as well as the pictures they'd post.

Then his mother—who was only just starting to understand how social media would help her new winery venture and would become excited every time her posts got even a few likes let alone the hundreds and thousands—didn't bring up any of her posts either.

He was suspicious about it but didn't think about it too much. Then he went to go visit James, Logan, and Carlos, who had been eagerly waiting at the Palm Woods for him to return. After getting through the initial small talk about what was going on, then going out to lunch, Kendall found it weird that they were laughing over the things they put into their group texts and chats with all of their friends, but were speaking so specifically.

Carlos was never a good liar as it was but this time he was being even weirder, practically throwing Kendall's phone from his hand when he mentioned something that came up on his timeline or in his notifications. He demanded to know what Carlos's problem was but James and Logan waved it away saying, "It's just Carlos being Carlos."

That made sense.

Carlos did have a certain way of thinking and reacting to things and that was okay.

But now he was really starting to feel like there was something going on that people weren't telling him.

So he went back to his apartment and took a nap, jet lag always got to him, and waited for his girlfriend to get back from work so they could spend the rest of the day together. It took a little bit for things to slowly start to trickle in. First, he noticed some conversations online that he would be tagged in along with Riley saying something along the lines of 'You need to at least respect who he chooses to spend his life with' and other such saying.

Then Jo, Camille, and Stephanie all sent him messages, almost at the same time.

Jo: Hey Kendall, I just wanted to see how you were doing with what's been going on. Try not to go off the deep-end again, okay?

Camille: Logan told me what's up. Please try not to be mad.

Stephanie: Everything's okay and she's handling it well, but we know how you get really protective of everyone. Take a deep breath before you react, okay?

And that stumped him even more. He started to respond to ask what they hell they were talking about when he noticed Riley's siblings all saying something online. That was even stranger, they could be very outspoken but they were well versed in not dealing with negativity in public posts unless otherwise needed. Through a joint statement they all said "Despite the fact that we allow ourselves to be in the public eye and open to any and all criticisms, there is a difference between being criticized and attacked for no reason other than your fucking shit sense of humor."

Red flags were now waving all over the place and Kendall quickly searched to figure out what it was and why everyone was trying to protect him from it. It didn't take too long, there were enough people bringing it to his attention—whether to get acknowledgement from him or really because they cared. Screenshots and account names were brought to his attention, all centered on the same theme that his girlfriend was being attacked by some petty fans.

They had gone through something like that before, where fans had said they didn't understand why they were rumored—as Kendall was private enough about his personal life for a while he didn't confirm or deny the claims—to be dating because Kendall was such a nice guy and Riley was a bad influence on him. But this was different; this was completely slandering her name due to jealousy.

Calling her a cow, a slut, a bitch, less than shit, that she was nothing…all because over the past year or so he was finally comfortable showing their relationship online. And it wasn't just the messages; hate accounts were created by the second.

And within the first few seconds of seeing them Kendall saw red.

Everything around him turned into a nasty hue of blood red and he wanted nothing more than to get back at everyone that had something bad to say no matter how long it took. But he knew there wasn't much he could do. It wasn't like he could go and punch everyone that had something bad to say, that'd take too long and wasn't very realistic.

So when Riley returned to their apartment after a long day at the recording studio the excitement that completely illuminated her face at seeing her boyfriend in person after two months immediately gave way to a wary expression.

"Oh, you heard, yeah?" She took tentative steps towards her, as if she was afraid he'd lash out at her.

"Why didn't you tell me?" Kendall replied. He took her hand and led her to the couch, forcing her to sit down. "This has been going on for weeks."

Rile shrugged. "It's not a big deal."

He gave her a look. "Not a big deal?" He repeated. He knew she was just downplaying it as she always did when something happened that could potentially be upsetting. All because she didn't like being vulnerable in that way. Throughout her relationship he managed to open her up and speak honestly but there were still times where he had to work at it. "The stuff they're saying is disgusting."

"So? I don't even know these people."

Kendall eyed her warily and she turned away, scratching at her forehead to hide her face. Reaching out, Kendall pushed her hand away and forced her to look at him, immediately noticing the tears that came to her eyes.

"It's not like there's any basis in what they're saying anyway, right?" she continued and he could hear her voice start to wobble. Either she was embarrassed about the conversation or the buildup of keeping it quiet was starting to wear her down. Hearing the things that had been spat towards her in an abusive rage from her former foster parent had to hurt more than she was letting on. "I can be a jerk and everyone knows it."

"Riles, you can't ignore something like this," Kendall said gently.

"Why would I give power to people that don't know me personally?" She sniffed and wiped at her eyes. "Even if they know how to hit where it hurts." She started crying quietly and Kendall leaned forward to press a kiss to her forehead before she leaned to the side, curling up into a ball against the couch cushions.

Kendall immediately whipped out his phone and started to report any of the accounts that were linked to him then composed a message himself.

I usually keep my mouth shut about this stuff, but I have recently seen some posts that disgust me. I just gotta say…if you call yourself a fan of mine, then make inappropriate posts about my girlfriend, don't ever come to see my games or a show again. To all those who offend…GET A LIFE.

Then he powered off his phone and comforted his girlfriend, wiping tears off her cheeks and allowed her to cry against his chest.

Just because they didn't always respond to it, didn't mean it didn't hurt.

THE END