Chapter 23 Different Body Types
The fallout was immediate.
Five boys were gone before lunch, suspended or expelled, depending on who you asked.
Some said they had been taken straight from school to the police station.
Others claimed their parents had already hired lawyers.
No one really knew, and no one trusted anything official anymore.
All anyone did know was that the basketball team had been gutted.
People noticed my appearance, of course, the new clothes, the hair, the way I carried myself, but compared to scandal and criminal rumors, it barely registered.
I had chosen the right day to finally look like myself. No one had the energy to care.
That night, I sat cross-legged on my bed with my laptop balanced against my knees and went back to my real obsession.
Ines Laurent.
I’d already learned the basics: she studied Social Work at UC Berkeley.
Graduated in 1999. Same year as my father.
Then I found a tiny mention in an old campus newspaper, buried between club updates and charity events.
International student, originally from France. On a visa that expired with her degree. So maybe she married my father quickly for a reason.
I sat there staring at the screen, imagining her in some tiny French apartment, packing clothes, closing the door behind her childhood bedroom. Did she plan to return? Did she think she’d marry? Have a child? Die in a place she never meant to belong to?
France… was a dead end. Searching for her in France was like throwing my name into the Atlantic and hoping it washed back with a face.
Laurent was too common.
There were hundreds of her.
So I changed tactics.
I filed a request for her death certificate. Attached a copy of my ID. Marked “daughter” in the relationship box.
Now all I could do was wait. If I was lucky, the certificate would list her parents. Her birthplace. Something real. Something I could trace.
If not…
Then I’d find her marriage records.
And if all that failed…
My gaze slid to my phone.
Amy.
I pushed the thought away. For now.
While I waited, I ordered an Ancestry DNA test with access to European databases. Another line cast into a deep ocean. If blood wouldn’t speak through paper, maybe it would through science.
I was mid-search when my door opened without a knock.
Apple.
She walked straight into my room like she owned the place and headed for my closet.
I closed my eyes for a second, pressing my thumb against the bridge of my nose.
“Oh, you won’t mind,” she said lazily, already pulling hangers aside. “I just need to borrow something.”
I watched in silence as she pawed through clothes that hadn’t existed in my last life.
Back then, my wardrobe had been a graveyard of oversized sweaters and faded colors. She’d never wanted anything of mine.
Now, apparently, I was useful.
“This one,” she said, pulling out a fitted red dress. She held it against herself in the mirror, twisting a little, smiling at her reflection. “This would look amazing on me.”
“It wouldn’t,” I replied calmly.
She blinked at me.
“What do you mean ‘it wouldn’t’?”
I finally looked at her.
“You’re at least a head shorter than I am,” I said. “And about twenty pounds heavier. That dress will hang wrong. It’ll hit your hips in the wrong place and make you look shorter.”
Silence.
Apple froze.
Then she shoved the dress back into the closet like it had bitten her.
“Why couldn’t you just say you didn’t want to lend it?” she snapped. “You don’t have to be such a bitch about it.”
And with that, she stormed out.
I looked back at my screen like nothing had happened.
Thirty minutes later, I went downstairs.
And there it was.
Apple curled into Marissa’s arms on the couch, crying softly, trembling just enough to look fragile without smearing her mascara.
A performance perfected over years.
“She body-shamed me,” Apple wept. “She mocked me. I just wanted to borrow something…”
Marissa looked up and her expression hardened instantly.
“Ashley,” she snapped, already angry. “What is wrong with you?”
I didn’t even blink.
“I only said we have different body types,” I replied. “The dress is too form-fitting to work on her. That’s all.”
Marissa scoffed, offended on Apple’s behalf.
“That doesn’t give you the right to embarrass her,” she shot back. “You could have been kind. You could have just said no like a normal person instead of saying something cruel.”
“I wasn’t cruel. I was factual.”
“It is not Apple’s fault that you’re so… huge,” Marissa snapped, her voice cold in that way she reserved only for me.
My mouth twitched. “You mean tall?” I asked smoothly.
“You know what I mean,” she snapped.
Apple sniffled delicately, nuzzling deeper against her mother.
“Mom,” she sniffled, “don’t be too hard on her. I just… I feel awful. Can we go shopping tomorrow? I really need new clothes.”
She sank deeper into Marissa’s arms, helpless little kitten that she was.
I almost laughed.
She was incredible.
Truly.
In my old life, that scene would’ve crippled me. I would’ve apologized for existing.
In this one…
I watched the performance with clinical fascination.
Apple wasn’t hurt.
She was jealous.
She wanted what I had.
And she’d just secured it with tears.
Marissa softened instantly, like someone had flipped a switch.
“I’ll talk to your father,” she said, stroking Apple’s hair. “We’ll go tomorrow. Don’t worry, sweetheart.”
Of course you will.
I turned and walked away before either of them noticed the smirk I no longer tried to hide.