CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE #4
“Don’t say yeah to me like I asked whether you wanted coffee,” his mother snapped. “I told you exactly what people would hear. You waited until I turned away and posted it anyway.”
“I know,” Wes said.
“No, you know now because Bee had to sit in front of a camera and defend herself against the story you told,” his mother replied. “She asked you for time. You ignored her. Then you punished her for making you leave.”
Wes lowered his attention to the phone. Bee’s face remained frozen on the screen while the words from her video repeated in his mind.
“That girl sat beside you when nobody knew whether you would wake up,” his mother continued. “She came to this house after you hurt her at the hospital. You knew she cared about you, and you still let strangers call her heartless because she didn’t give you the answer you wanted.”
“I wanted somebody to understand why I was hurt,” Wes said.
“You wanted them to take your side,” his mother replied. “You got what you wanted. Now look at what it cost her.”
Wes looked at the comments beneath Bee’s video again. People were arguing over who had ended the relationship. Others were apologizing for attacking her. Bee had been forced to explain something she never wanted to make public.
“I need to fix it,” Wes said.
“Then stop sitting there,” his mother replied.
Wes opened his profile and found the breakup video. His thumb hovered over the delete button before he pressed it. A message asked whether he was sure, and Wes confirmed it without hesitating again.
The video disappeared from his page. His mother remained standing across from him with her arms folded.
“That was the easy part,” his mother said.
“I know,” Wes replied.
“Then tell them the truth,” his mother said. “All of it this time.”
Wes opened the camera and propped the phone against the stand on the coffee table. His mother watched him adjust it with his good hand before he pressed record.
“Hey,” Wes said. “I took down the video I posted about Bee. I need to correct what I said.”
He rubbed his palm against his leg before continuing. The nervous movement stopped when he looked directly into the camera again.
“I told everybody Bee ended our relationship,” Wes continued. “That wasn’t the whole truth.”
Wes swallowed and forced himself to say the part he had deliberately left out.
“Before I went to her grandmother’s house, Bee told me she wasn’t ready to talk,” Wes said. “She asked me for time. I showed up anyway because I wanted her to talk when I was ready.”
His mother remained quiet across the room. Her anger stayed visible in the way she held herself.
“I was the one who said maybe I shouldn’t be with anybody,” Wes continued. “I was the one who said maybe we needed space. Bee agreed to the space I asked for.”
Wes drew a slow breath before looking into the camera again.
“When she told me to leave her grandmother’s house, I used that one moment to make it sound like she walked away because I was hurt,” Wes said. “That wasn’t true.”
Shame tightened his throat. Wes looked down for a second before continuing.
“Bee didn’t abandon me after the accident,” Wes said. “She was hurt too. She still tried to be there for me, and I kept taking my anger out on her. I left that out because it was easier to tell the version where I was the only person who got hurt.”
His mother’s expression softened slightly, but the anger did not leave her face. Wes kept his attention on the phone.
“I told everybody not to bother her while giving people a reason to do exactly that,” Wes said. “That was wrong.”
He looked directly into the camera. Bee deserved more than an apology spoken into a phone, but this was where he had hurt her first.
“Bee, I’m sorry,” Wes said. “I should never have made something private public. I shouldn’t have told people we were over before we had even agreed on what happened.”
Wes leaned closer to the phone. His voice became firmer as he addressed the people who were still filling Bee’s page with comments.
“If you went to Bee’s page because of what I said, delete your comment,” Wes said. “Don’t tag her. Don’t ask her to explain anything else. She already told everyone more than she should have needed to.”
He looked down once before finishing.
“She asked me for space,” Wes said. “I’m going to respect it now. You need to respect it too.”
Wes stopped recording. The room became quiet while he watched the final frame freeze on the screen.
His mother walked closer and looked down at the phone. The anger in her expression had not disappeared.
“Don’t ask her to forgive you in that video,” his mother said. “Don’t turn this into another thing she has to answer.”
“I wasn’t going to,” Wes replied.
“Good,” his mother said. “Post it.”
Wes watched the video once without changing anything. Then he posted it.
Notifications appeared almost immediately. Wes turned them off without opening a single comment and placed the phone facedown beside him.
“This doesn’t make what you did right,” his mother said. “It makes it less wrong.”
“I know,” Wes replied.
“Then give Bee the time she asked for,” his mother told him.
Wes nodded and left the phone untouched. Bee had asked him for space, and this time he finally gave it to her.