Chapter 13 The message
Maya's POV
The silence was unbearable.
His pinky was still touching mine. Barely. Just that small point of contact. But it was everywhere, on my skin, in my chest and behind my eyes.
I've never felt this way about anyone before.
The words were still hanging in the air between us. Why the fuck did I say that? I couldn't take them back. I couldn't pretend I meant something else.
Why did I say that? Why did I SAY that?
Justin didn't move or speak. His eyes were locked on mine, and I couldn't read them. Was he shocked? Uncomfortable? Disgusted?
He said little sister. He thinks of me as a little sister and I just ruined everything.
I opened my mouth to say something, anything, to fix it.
My phone buzzed. I ignored it.
Say something, Maya. Take it back. Laugh it off. Tell him you meant as a friend.
It buzzed again and again.
The vibration rattled against my thigh. The screen lit up in the darkness of the car. Once. Twice. Three times. Four. Five.
Justin's eyes flicked down to my pocket, then back to my face.
"You're going to check that?" he asked. His voice was quiet.
I should have said no. I should have stayed in that moment, in that unbearable silence, and fixed what I'd broken.
But my hand moved on its own and I pulled out my phone.
The screen was flooded with notifications stacked on top of each other like bodies in a grave. Tagged posts, shared posts, screenshots and comments. So many comments.
What did she do now?
My thumb trembled as I tapped the first notification.
It was an anonymous page. One I'd never seen before. The profile picture was a black silhouette and the name was blank.
But the post….
"Westbrook's golden girl isn't so innocent."
Underneath, a long caption. My eyes snagged on fragments:
"She seduced the hockey coach the same week she got exposed."
"She's been manipulating men since she got to this school."
"The photos weren't leaked. She planned them. She needs attention."
"This is what happens when you let girls like her into Westbrook."
Girls like her.
Girls like me?
Poor girls, immigrant girls. Girls who don't belong.
My chest was caving in. Each sentence was a hammer.
Then I kept scrolling and I saw them.
The screenshots, fake text messages. Made to look like they were from my phone. My name at the top and my profile picture, the one I'd taken last year, the one where I was laughing, the one I used to love.
Message 1:
"He's so easy. All I have to do is act vulnerable and he eats it up."
Message 2:
"Once he's on my side, no one can touch me. That's the whole point."
Message 3:
"Luke was just a practice. The coach is the real prize. Watch me work."
Message 4:
"You should see the way he looks at me. He has no idea he's being played."
Message 5:
"Don't feel bad for him. He's a grown man. He should know better."
I stopped breathing. This isn't me.
I didn't say these things. I don't talk like that. I don't think like that.
This isn't me.
But the screenshots looked real, the formatting matched and the time stamps aligned. Anyone who saw them would believe them. Anyone who saw them would think I was a monster.
And Justin?
He's going to see them and think I was using him. He's going to think everything I said was a lie.
Even the confession I just made.
The thought hit me like a physical blow.
"This isn't me," I whispered. "Justin, this isn't… I didn't…"
My voice crumbled. It fell apart in my throat.
I couldn't even defend myself anymore. What was the point? Words didn't matter. She had screenshots and proof. Fake proof, but proof all the same.
How do you fight something like this? How do you prove a conversation never happened? How do you prove words aren't yours when they're already out there, already spreading, already being shared by people who don't know you and don't care?
I couldn't.
That was the thought that broke something inside me. Now even the truth won't sound real.
"Maya."
Justin's voice. It sounded distant. Like he was calling from underwater.
"Maya, what is it?"
I couldn't speak. I just handed him the phone.
He took it and I watched his face as he read.
The first screenshot. His jaw tightened.
The second. His grip on the phone hardened.
The third. His eyes went cold, not cold at me but cold at what he was reading.
The fourth. His lips pressed into a thin line.
The fifth. He stopped breathing. Just for a second, long enough for me to notice.
He believes it. He's going to believe it. Everyone believes it.
Then he looked up.
"This is fake," he said.
No hesitation or question. He didn't even pause.
"You don't have to pretend with me," I whispered. My voice was hollow and empty. "You don't have to.…."
"I'm not pretending."
"Justin, this is how it starts. People see things like this and…"
He cut me off. His voice was firm and final.
"I'm not people."
The words landed somewhere deep in my chest. Somewhere I'd been protecting. Somewhere that was starting to crack.
"Those aren't your words," he said. He wasn't asking. He was stating a fact. "That's not how you talk and that's not who you are."
"They look real."
"They look designed to look real. There's a difference."
He turned the phone back toward me, scrolling through the screenshots again.
"Look at this. 'Eats it up.' 'Watch me work.' 'He has no idea he's being played.'" He shook his head. "That's not you. You don't talk like a villain in a bad movie."
I almost laughed. It got stuck in my throat.
"How do you know?"
"Because I've been talking to you for days. I've seen you cry, I've seen you throw up from fear, I've seen you worry about your dad and your underwear and whether I peeked." His voice softened. "That's not a girl who's playing games. That's a girl who's drowning."
The tears came then. Hot and fast.
"But everyone else…"
"Everyone else doesn't matter."
He said it like it was simple. Like it was obvious. Like the whole world could burn and he wouldn't care as long as I was standing.
I wanted to believe him. I wanted to so badly but the phone was still glowing in his hand. The screenshots were still there, the comments were still loading and somewhere out there, Sarah was smiling.
He's going to regret getting involved with me. He's going to wake up one day and realize this is too much. He's going to walk away.
"You can still walk away from this," I said. My voice was small and broken. "You can still…."
"I'm not going anywhere."
He meant it.
I stared at him, at his jaw, set like stone. In his eyes, burning with something I couldn't name. At his hands, still holding my phone, still holding my proof, still holding me.
He's not going anywhere. He said he's not going anywhere.
Why do I still feel like I'm falling?
"Don't take me to school tomorrow," I heard myself say.
The words came out quiet. Defeated.
Justin paused.
Say yes. Please say yes. Let me hide. Just for one day. Just until I can breathe again. Just until the world stops spinning.
He looked at me.
His eyes were heavy.
"If you hide," he said slowly, "they win."
They win, Sarah wins, the screenshots win, the comments win, the videos win and everyone who ever looked at me like I was nothing wins.
"But if I go…." My voice cracked. "If I go, they're just going to…"
"Let them look."
Let them look?
I stared at him.
He wasn't backing down or giving me an out.
Let them look at me, let them whisper, let them point and think the worst.
What choice do I have?
He held my gaze for a second longer.
"We're going to school," he said.
We're going. Not you're going. We're going.
He wasn't sending me into that building alone.
He put the phone down on the center console. His hand didn't move back to the steering wheel, it stayed there, close to mine.
"I'm not letting them decide who you are," he said. "Not anymore."
The tears came again, running down my cheeks without permission.
I didn't wipe them away. Neither did he.
We just sat there in the dark. In the quiet. In the space between what I'd confessed and what came next.
We're going to school, let them look, I'm not going anywhere.
I didn't know if I believed him yet but I was starting to want to.