Jerk in Sheep's Clothing

Uh Oh

"WHAT THE HELL, LILA?!"

Lila Rossi was trapped in a circle of predators, thirsty for her her blood, that were her formerly manipulated and very betrayed classmates.

"You lied to us?!"

"Marinette was right all along!"

Adrien sat nearby, watching the whole thing unfold, loving every second of this.  Now he knew why people said revenge was sweet.

"How could you do this, Lila?", Rose whimpered. "You didn't have to lie to us. We would have been your friends if you had just been honest!"

"Friends? Ha!"

That's when everyone turned to see Henri right outside their circle, smirking at Lila with a mean glint in his eye. Marinette lingered a step behind him, not wanting to get involved in this. This situation had left her tired for months, and when Henri came along, she felt rejuvenated, able to leave the draining experience behind. The last thing she wanted was to get sucked back in.

"You think she wanted friends? You think she faked all those injuries and disabilities to make you her friend? You think she gave you all those empty promises to make you her friend? Gimme a break! Friends weren't what she was looking for! It was followers! Lackeys! Gullible lemmings! Puppets that she could control to do her dirty work and worship the ground she walked on!"

"Shuddup!", Lila barked, but she went ignored once again.

"See? She's getting testy at me because I'm calling her out! Just like she did to Marinette. If she really wanted to be liked to be liked, she wouldn't have tried to defame Marinette. She would have gone back on her tinnitus story as soon she realized it upset Marinette. She would have pleaded with her in private instead of trying to frame her as the bully. She would have tried hard to be friends with Marinette and get on her good side instead of get all whiny that she didn't like her for some reason, even though she wasn't putting in virtually any effort to be nice to her, because all her 'niceness' depends on making false promises and expressing phony sweetness that Marinette could right see through!"

Henri gave Lila a nasty smirk. "Lila doesn't give two licks about having friends! She only cares about becoming the queen bee and getting everyone around her to lick her boots! She only pretends to be nice and to want friends to trick everyone into thinking she's the kind of girl everybody can like! And you all fell for it, hook, line and sinker!"

The class exchanged guilty and embarrassed. Every word that came from Henri's mouth cut like a knife, because every word was true.

"Why, you—". Lila jumped to her feet and thrust back a hand, but Henri snatched her wrist just in time, looking down on her and grinning victoriously from ear to ear.

"Save it, Rossi.  Don't you get it?  It's over.  You lost.  I've closed the curtain on your little play.  No one here is believing your performances anymore.  Even if by some miracle you are allowed to stay here at this school, you'll never be the queen again.  No one at this school will ever touch you with a ten-meter pole after today.  Why make things worse for yourself?  You'll never get a chance to start over until you go off to university, and even than, it'll have to be pretty far away to rebuild your rep."

A thick silence fell upon the group.  Lila narrowed her eyes.  "Wait...what do you mean, you've closed the...". Her eyes widened, doubling in size.  "It...It was you.  You tipped off my mother.  You told her to come to school so she'd expose me!"

All of Adrien's joy evaporated at that, his smile turning into a scowl.  What?!

Henri chuckled.  "Well, look at that.  You're not as dumb as you look."