34. June
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
JUNE
Itext Cinna while speed-walking back across campus: Need you. SOS. Bean There.
Her reply comes in three seconds: On my way.
The bench outside Bean There is empty so I take it, pressing my back against the cold iron slats. My knee bounces, and I’m clenching my phone.
Cinna rounds the corner at a full sprint, honey-blonde hair streaming behind her. Her cheeks are pink and she nearly takes out a guy carrying a coffee before dodging. She stops in front of me and doubles over with her hands on her knees, chest heaving.
“So… what’s the… emergency?” she pants out.
I hand her my phone.
She starts scrolling. I watch her face because I need someone else to see what I saw and react the way I need them to react. Her champagne-brown eyes go wide. Wider. Her mouth falls open as she swipes through image after image.
“Oh, she’s dead.”
“I know.” My voice shakes. “All of that is completely out of context. Big sections were left out. I love Aeron but these fucking images make it seem like I don’t.”
Cinna hands my phone back. “I know exactly where she is.”
I think about what day it is. “Right. You both have a math class.”
“Yup. It just ended, but she goes to her part-time job right after.” Cinna straightens and pushes her hair behind her ears. “Let’s end this because she’s psychotic and needs to stop.”
We cut across the quad toward the student center. My legs are moving fast, not quite a run, and Cinna matches my pace. Students part around us, aware that we’re ready to plow through them to our destination.
Food court smells hit me as we push through the glass doors: French fries, sizzling meat, coffee. I scan the tables, the counter staff, the clusters of students bent over laptops.
Then I spot her.
Aubrey is weaving through the tables near the far wall, heading toward the smoothie bar where she works. Her dark bob bounces as she walks. Her messenger bag is slung across her body, strap cutting diagonally over her denim jacket.
“Aubrey.”
She turns. Her amber eyes land on me, then Cinna, and surprise shifts to caution in half a second. “Umm… hey?” she says as we approach. “What’s going on?”
“You know exactly what’s going on.” I’m already too loud. A girl at the nearest table looks up from her laptop with her mouth making an O. “You stole my diary and took pictures.”
Aubrey’s eyebrows shoot up. “What?”
“Don’t.” I shove my phone toward her face, the image thread bright on the screen. “This. You did this like some psycho.”
She leans away from the phone. Her eyes glance at the images and confusion moves across her face, but I don’t trust it. I don’t trust any of her expressions right now. “June, I have no idea what you’re talking about. I didn’t steal anything.”
“Stop lying!” My voice cracks across the food court. More heads turn. A guy at the smoothie counter pauses mid-pour. The attention should embarrass me, but my skin is burning from the inside and embarrassment requires a level of self-awareness I no longer have access to.
“We need to go outside,” Aubrey says, glancing at the place she works. “Please.”
I don’t want to go outside because I don’t owe her anything. I want to scream at her right here and make a scene until she admits the truth.
Cinna touches my arm. “She’s right. You don’t need any more rumors about you.”
I grit my teeth and follow Aubrey through the side exit. We end up behind the building on a concrete landing near the loading dock. It’s deserted except for recycling bins and an open door leaking kitchen noise.
Aubrey faces me. “I don’t know who sent you those pics, but it wasn’t me. I swear on—”
“Who?” I step closer. “Who then?”
She shrinks back. “I-I don’t know. I swear, I wouldn’t—”
“You’ve had a problem with me for weeks. You’re jealous I got into the exhibition because you think your performance art is so much better than boring painting.”
“No. No! I swear on my life.” She isn’t yelling. Her voice is firm and she’s looking me dead in the eyes. But she does look scared. “I value our friendship. I would never do this to you.”
“Then explain the phone in your luggage! Explain my diary missing! You could’ve had someone take it from my bag. Or you snuck into my house when no one was home because you know where the key is hidden outside.”
“What? No! That’s insane.”
“The burner phone was in your luggage.”
She falls silent, her mouth remaining open. She closes it and shakes her head, looking away.
That’s right. You can’t explain it.
Cinna steps up beside me. “She’s lying. Who else would go this far?”
“Exactly.” The word comes out ragged. “Who else?”
Aubrey looks between us and her entire body sags in defeat. “I’m telling you the truth. I can’t explain anything. But I didn’t do it.”
Every anonymous text. Every whispered rumor. Every sleepless night trying to figure out who hates me enough to dismantle my life piece by piece. It’s been months of this crap. Threatening my brother is the last straw.
I’m so tired. I’m so tired of being afraid and I want it to stop.
I push her hard enough that she stumbles back. Her messenger bag swings with the momentum.
Aubrey’s eyes are round and then they narrow. She’s not the kind of person who backs down.
She pushes me back just as hard, and my spine connects with the concrete wall. Pain jolts my shoulder blades.
I lunge forward and grab the strap of her messenger bag with both hands.
I yank sideways. The strap catches her neck and she spins, trying to stay balanced.
I yank again, harder, and pull the bag strap over her head.
The force sends Aubrey to the ground. Her hip hits the concrete hard and she lets out a sharp cry that bounces off the loading dock walls.
My hands are shaking. I open the bag then flip it upside down and dump everything. Textbooks hit the concrete. A makeup pouch. Pens. A crumpled receipt.
And a small emerald leather book. My diary.
It lands face-up between us as the air leaves my lungs. There’s no way she can deny everything now.
Aubrey is on the ground, propped on one elbow, staring at the diary. Her expression doesn’t match guilt. Her mouth is open and her eyes are locked on the leather cover like she’s seeing it for the first time in her life. She blinks rapidly, as though she’s trying to make sure it’s real.
I snatch my diary off the ground and toss the empty messenger bag at her. “Stay out of my life. If you come near me or my family again, I’m calling the police and getting a restraining order.”
Aubrey’s voice is weak. “June, I… I didn’t…”
Cinna steps forward. She bends over Aubrey, grabs a fistful of dark hair, and smacks her across the cheek with an open palm. The sound cracks through the loading dock.
Aubrey screams. Her hand flies to her face and she curls in on herself, knees drawing up, the scream dissolving into loud, ugly sobbing.
I’m frozen.
Cinna straightens and walks back to me. Her face is a version of my best friend I have never witnessed.
Her eyes are flat, emptied of everything warm, and the set of her mouth sends ice through my veins.
This isn’t the girl who braids my hair during movie nights or the person who cries at dog videos.
“You didn’t have to take it that far,” I whisper.
“I knew you wouldn’t,” she says, adjusting her silk pink blouse, “so I did. The bitch deserves it.”
She links her arm through mine and steers me away from the loading dock. My legs move because she pulls me forward.
Behind us, Aubrey’s sobs fill the corridor. “I didn’t do anything,” she’s crying. “I didn’t. I swear…”
The adrenaline leaves my body and I crash hard. The fire in my blood cools, and what replaces it is worse than any rage I’ve ever felt.
I glance back.
She’s still on the ground. Still holding her face. Still crying the same broken sentence over and over.
If she did this, she would have admitted it by now. That’s who Aubrey is. She doesn’t hide behind tears. She doesn’t grovel. If I’d caught the real Aubrey doing the real thing, she would’ve looked me in the eye and said, “Yeah, I did it, and here’s why.”
But she looks like I just broke her heart.
Guilt is a nasty beast inside me. I hug the diary against my stomach. I should feel vindicated because the evidence was in her bag. Case closed.
All the proof points to Aubrey. So why does everything about this feel wrong?