The Lies We Tell

Chapter 6

Over 200,00 views. 10,000 likes. More than 100 comments. I couldn't help but groan as I stared at the screen. How did this happen? I know I didn't change the privacy settings of that video. How did it suddenly become public?

I buried my face in my hands. What could I do now? Too many people had seen it for me to take it down. By this point, I had a few fans that I knew had reposted or would repost it. I couldn't deny it had happened. Even if I tried, there's no way to get it completely off the internet.

My friends had seen this. They knew almost everything I hadn't been saying. There had also been a lot of strangers commenting on it, and I wasn't sure which was worse at this point.

As I scrolled through the comments, trying to figure out what to do, several comments caught my eye.

Fake.

She's so fake.

This is completely made up.

She's exaggerating and I should know - I lost my dad too. Why did she make something like this up?

I stopped being able to see the good comments. I chewed on my lip, standing and pacing. The worst part were that there were some of the top comments. There was no way I could comment and claim I didn't know about the video. There was no way I could respond and take everything back.

Yet...

Before I knew it, I had answered more comments than I ever had. I had commented myself into a hole. There was no way to come back from this. I just had to go with this and see it through. No matter how I felt about it.

As I was about to close the app and call YouTube, something caught my eye. Not only had this become my most viewed video ever, but my follower count had jumped by about 10,000.

No way.

I was excited to have more, but at the same time, I was mortified this was what it took.

---

I was dreading Monday. Before I went to bed, I had gotten so many calls and texts from people at school that I knew meant well, but I couldn't face any of them. After hiding my home life from all of my friends, this only made me want to hide in my bed. I knew they'd just be looking at me with pity in their eyes. That's part of why I didn't tell them in the first place.

It was Sunday, so I forced myself to record a couple of things. I hoped it would take my mind off of things, but it didn't. Instead, my mind kept lingering on what things would probably be like the next day. Even while I somehow managed to edit that night.

I ended up going to bed early, wishing I didn't have to go back to school yet. I just kept reminding myself that it wasn't always as bad as my mind tried to make it seem. It would be fine and I would be okay.

The next day, I forced myself to get up when my alarm went off. Dread made my movements slower, but I still managed to make it to the kitchen at a decent time. To my surprise, even my mom was there. But then, she had to go to work and all that, so maybe it shouldn't have surprised me as much as it did.

I told myself things were normal. Mom was normal. When I left, I went to Riley's house. Normal. Things would be okay. They were okay.

The first crack in those words came when Riley got in. She was actually silent at first. Not normal in any kind of way. Neither was the frown on her face. I sighed after a minute. "What is it?"

"I thought you weren't going to post a video."

"I wasn't going to. It was supposed to be a private video but something happened and YouTube changed my settings."

"Oh."

Silence fell on us again, but this one was full of things there were being left unsaid, and I left it until we were pulling into the school. "Just say it, Riley. Go ahead."

She swallowed hard and turned to me. "I'm so sorry I didn't know what was going on and that I wasn't there for you. I should have been."

I reached into the back and grabbed my bag, taking a moment to compose myself so my words weren't as harsh. "I don't want sympathy, and I don't want pity," I said calmly. "That's why I kept it to myself in the first place." I smiled at her. "Let's go meet up with Mary." I got out, closing my door a little too hard.

Just as I was afraid of, students kept looking at me. Some with pity, some with curiosity, and some with confusion. But that last one was understandable. I had taken the time to do my makeup and I was forcing a small smile. I was trying to not look like the girl in that video. Even though I was doing it mostly to prove to myself I was fine.

"Hi Mary," I chirped as I walked past her into the school. I heard them following me as I walked to my locker, as well as their hushed voices. They were discussing me. I felt myself blush, knowing it wasn't just them that had to be discussing me. For as used to being a common topic at school as I was, this would probably make me more popular that Courtney. I wasn't sure how to feel about that.

Ryan caught my eye. He was walking away from us down the hall. I felt more than just butterflies at seeing him. How would I deal with what happened between us at lunch?

With a heavy sigh, I opened my locker. Once I had put up my books and gotten what I needed, I felt a hand on my shoulder. "You know," Riley said quietly in my ear, "it's okay to not be okay."

I teared up. It wasn't okay. It wasn't. I didn't want pity. I didn't want people to feel bad for me. I didn't want them to talk about me. I closed my locker and turned to her. "Riley, I'm fine. It's all fine, okay? You don't need to worry about me. If I wasn't, I would say so." I smiled at her. "You're going to be late for class. I'll see you later."

She opened her mouth to reply, but I just shook my head and walked off. We were many things, the three of us, but we were never late and we never skipped. I didn't want that to start today. I didn't need that extra stress.

At the door to the classroom, I paused outside the door where the students couldn't see me. Not being okay wasn't okay. How could she not see that? I dug around my bag until I found a tissue and dabbed at my eyes. I had to stay okay so my mom wouldn't worry, so that I didn't get pitied, and so that I could just be normal. I'd swallowed everything that had ever happened, and I would keep doing it.

I took a deep breath and walked into the classroom. Students turned to look at me before going back to talking quietly.

This was going to be a long day.