CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
ARIELLE
By Monday night, the internet still thought I had the perfect birthday.
Cam’s post stayed up.
The flower wall stayed in my tagged pictures.
People kept commenting under the video of his toast.
This is real love.
Y’all better never break up.
Need me one like him.
I laid curled on my bed with my knees against my chest and watched strangers congratulate me on a life that no longer existed.
My face hurt from crying. My hair had started slipping from the bun. The sweatshirt I wore had a small period stain near the hem from where the heating pad leaked warm water earlier.
Cam had called twenty-three times.
His messages moved through every version of him.
CAM: Let me explain without an audience.
CAM: Sade manipulated the whole situation.
CAM: Kye is using this to clear her conscience.
CAM: I said I was wrong.
CAM: Four years should mean more than one mistake.
CAM: You really blocking me after everything I’ve done for you?
CAM: Arielle answer me.
The last one came at six fourteen.
CAM: You always make things bigger when you’re hurt. Sleep and call me tomorrow.
I read it until anger dried the next tear before it fell.
Then, I blocked him.
Almost four years of reflex lived in my hands. Good grade, bad shift, outfit crisis, headache, funny video—Cam had been the first person I reached for.
My mother knocked softly.
“You need food.”
“I’m not hungry.”
“I didn’t ask.”
The door opened enough for her to slide a plate onto my dresser. Chicken, rice, and green beans. Nothing romantic about it. No speech. No attempt to make me sit up.
She looked at the flowers missing from the vase. “Trash?”
“Yes.”
“Good vase.”
“I kept the vase.”
“That’s my girl. Heartbroken, not wasteful.”
A laugh came out of me and hurt my chest.
My mother sat on the edge of the bed.
“You want me to stay?”
“No.”
“You want me to leave?”
I didn’t answer.
She leaned back against the headboard without touching me.
My phone buzzed from the pillow.
Not Cam.
DAY ONES OR DIES
NAE: The host confirmed everything. I can cancel if y’all don’t want to go, but we lose the first deposit.
JORI: Ari doesn’t need to decide tonight.
KYE: Agreed.
NAE: I wasn’t asking her to.
KYE: It looked like you was.
JORI: Stop.
Three dots appeared beneath Kye’s name.
Disappeared.
The chat went quiet again.
“They keep texting?” my mother asked.
“Not me. Around me.”
“They scared.”
“Good.”
She nodded. “Yeah. Maybe good for tonight.”
I opened Kye’s private message.
KYE: I made it home. My mom changed the locks. Trell sent old screenshots to me but not you yet. If he contacts you, don’t answer him. I am sorry. I’m not asking you to respond.
Below it were pictures of her bruised shoulder, the mark on her wrist, and a screenshot of Trell saying she made him look stupid.
My anger and fear crashed into each other.
I typed: Are you safe right now?
Her answer came immediately.
KYE: Yes. Mom in the room next to me. Cameras on. Jori has everything too.
ME: Okay.
Both felt true, so I sent neither.
Jori had messaged separately too.
JORI: I was wrong to wait. I also sent Kye a voice note last night saying hurtful things about all of us.
I told her to delete it, but I need you to know it exists because somebody is accessing her messages.
The anonymous account may be Trell. Police may need to be involved if he keeps contacting her.
I read that twice.
ME: What did you say about me?
The typing bubble stayed for a long time.
JORI: That sometimes your insecurity makes everybody perform around it. It was crueler than that when I first said it. I’m sorry.
My throat tightened.
At least she answered.
I put the phone down.
“How many people can hurt you in one weekend before it becomes funny?” I asked.
My mother looked at me. “It don’t.”
“Feels like it should.”
“That’s because you tired of crying.”
I wiped my nose on a tissue. “Jori thinks everybody has to perform around my insecurity.”
“Do they?”
I turned toward her. “Whose side are you on?”
“Yours. That don’t mean every criticism is a lie.”
“I don’t need this right now.”
“Then, don’t open it right now. Put it down until you can tell the difference between somebody being mean and somebody saying something you don’t like.”
I stared at the wall.
My mother wasn’t defending Jori. She was refusing to make every uncomfortable truth disappear because I was already hurt.
A message request appeared.
The blank account Jori had mentioned.
ANONYMOUS: Now you know about Cam. Ask your girls who else been talking about you.
A voice note sat beneath it.
One minute and forty-eight seconds.
My pulse quickened.
“What?” my mother asked.
I showed her.
“Don’t play it.”
“Why?”
“Because whoever sent it wants you bleeding.”
“That doesn’t mean it’s fake.”
“It means you choose when you listen, not them.”
The phone felt hot in my hand.
For years, I had chased information the second it appeared, thinking quick pain meant control.
I forwarded the message to Jori without opening the audio.
ME: Save this. Don’t respond. Tell Kye.
Then, I restricted the account.
My mother looked surprised.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“Don’t fucking start.”
She smiled a little. “You learning.”
I rested my head on her shoulder.
It made the room easier to breathe in.
At eight, Nae sent me a private message.
NAE: I get paid Thursday. Jori gets her money first, then everything goes back. I’m not asking you to forgive me. I’m sorry I made you feel like you wouldn’t show up for me.
I typed: Amir okay?
NAE: Yes. He keeps asking where the biting dinosaur went.
The dinosaur was still beside the armchair downstairs.
ME: Tell him I got it.
I didn’t say anything else.
At nine thirty, I archived every picture of Cam from my profile. I wasn’t ready to erase four years because the ending was ugly. Some days inside the lie had still been real, and I refused to let Cam rewrite those too.
I changed my relationship status without making a post. Then, I removed his name from my bio.
My finger hovered over DAY ONES OR DIES.
The last real conversation in the chat had been about birthday clothes, before every secret took its turn.
Kye began typing.
Stopped.
Nae began typing.
Stopped.
Jori’s name appeared.
Stopped too.
Anger.
A question.
A rule for what happened next.
Instead, I muted the chat until I decided I was ready.
The screen went still.
For the first time since seventh grade, none of us knew what to say to one another.
And for the first time in my life, I let silence exist without rushing to make it look better.