When We Were Wildflowers

Chapter 14 - Principal's Office

When solemn-faced Principal Evans steps aside, a laptop lights up with a familiar scene on his desk: Poppy and I sitting side by side on the bus, frozen in time. Her head is down, eyebrows scrunched, posture slumped and the sight of it breaks my heart all over again.

"I know what this is about," I whisper, "and I'm not sorry."

"Not sorry?" Principal Evans scoffs and point as the empty chair beside his desk. "You better take a seat."

I obediently sit and notice my hands are shaking when I place them on the arm rests. You didn't do anything wrong. Alicia started it. You finished it, I remind myself. Be strong.

"Are you aware this video began making the rounds on social media last night and was reported to me in not one, but seven emails from concerned parents? And what else do I find in my inbox this morning? A message from the victim asking for assigned seating on the bus."

"Poppy emailed you?" I scrunch up my nose, thoroughly confused. "For assigned seats?"

Principal Evans looks just as dumbfounded. "Poppy? No. Alicia."

The injustice rises like flames all around me and I hop off my seat, rage burning every inch of my skin. "Alicia?! Alicia is the one who started everything. She was picking on Poppy, calling her names and talking bad about her dad."

Principal Evans folds his arms across his chest and looks just over my shoulder. "Is that true?"

I spin around and take a wobbly step back when I lay eyes on the 'victim' Alicia sitting as quiet as a mouse in a cute, cotton dress on another chair in the corner of the room--so quietly I didn't even know she was there.

"How dare you!" I scream and lurch toward her with clenched fists and gritted teeth.

"Now, now, restrain yourself." Principal Evans places a hand on my shoulder as a warning. "We're going to work this out so we can all be friends again."

"Friends?" I spit out the words. "Friends don't betray each other. Friends don't spill someone's biggest secret to a bunch of strangers on the bus."

"I did nothing wrong." Alicia speaks sweetly with her hands folded neatly in her lap like she has a halo above her head.

"You make me sick, sitting there all innocent when, in fact, you are a dirty, little liar." My hands are planted firmly on my hips and my voice is dangerously high-pitched. Tears sting at my eyes and I wipe them away with the back of my hand.

"Like I said, I did nothing wrong. It's all there on the video." Alicia extends her delicate arm from her lap to point at Principal Evan's desk.

The video! Thank goodness I have proof. "Play it and you'll see I'm telling the truth."

A satisfied grin crosses Alicia's heart-shaped face and I raise an eyebrow wondering what trick she has up her sleeve. She's awfully confident in herself for someone who picked a fight, then complained about it to the principal. "Play it."

Principal Evans spins the laptop around to face us and taps the volume button, cranking the sound all the way up, then clicks on the play icon.

There is a bit of silence and I'm waiting to hear Alicia's cruel jabs at Poppy over the speaker but my voice rings out first. "She said stop it, you bitch. You don't know the whole story. But I know all about you. You're a liar and a cheater. A slut."

My harsh words and contorted features strike up fear deep in my belly, followed by the searing heat of shame. To hear anger come spewing out my mouth like vomit within the four walls of the principals office turns my blood cold. I shake my head, not believing my own voice. That's not me. That' can't me be. But more venomous words come dripping out of my mouth.