I pointed at her because if she cried right now, I would come apart, and I was too angry to survive that. “Do not look at me like that.”
“I’m not—”
“Yes, you are. You’re looking at me like I just admitted I’m breakable when both of you know exactly how breakable I am.”
Charm’s eyes went glossy, but her voice remained firm. “Ay, you’re hurting.”
Something inside me went almost manic.
“I’m sorry, did both of you forget?” I asked, laughing once because if I didn’t, I was going to start screaming. “Did we all decide my history got less fucked up because Easton is sad now and it makes an uncomfortable mess for you?”
Bliss went pale. “No, that’s not what I’m saying.”
“No, but it’s how you sound.” I pointed at her, then Charm, my hand shaking hard enough for my bracelet to slide down my wrist. “You both know exactly what Darian did. What all of them did to me. You know they drugged me. You know they left the lights on, and there was no denying it was me. There was no cute little maybe-it-wasn’t-her escape hatch.”
My chest heaved.
“Darian said my name thirty-seven times. Thirty-seven. He made sure nobody watching could pretend they didn’t know whose body they were judging.”
Charm’s eyes filled, but I cut her off before she could say my name like a bandage.
“And they did judge it,” I snapped, my voice shaking hard enough that I hated myself for it. “They judged my face, my body, every sound I didn’t even remember making. They argued about whether I looked like I wanted it, whether I looked good enough to deserve it, whether I looked ruined enough to pity or used enough to laugh at.”
I dragged in a breath that hurt.
“Darian, Maddox, Jerod, and Iver all knew. They all knew, and they still walked those halls like kings while I became a rumor with a pulse.”
Bliss stepped toward me. “Stop, Ay. We know.”
“Stop?” I hit my chest with one trembling hand. “Stop reminding you that yes, you both fucking know?”
My voice climbed, filling every corner of the room.
“You know the truth, and not just the video. You know what it cost me to keep my spine straight. You know the cops were involved. You know there were no charges. No trial. No one dragged into court. No one forced to stand in front of a judge and explain why a girl too drugged to remember her own voice ended up under lights while a roomful of boys raped her.”
The room vibrated with my rage, and Bliss started crying harder.
I kept going because stopping now would kill me.
“You know Darian and his little pack of future felons went back to school afterward like they had survived something.” My laugh broke apart. “They tortured me. All of them. They made jokes in the hallways. They said my name like it was dirty. Boys who sat beside me in class watched me like they knew what I looked like under my clothes.”
My throat burned.
“Girls we grew up with, girls I shared lip gloss with, spit on me, jumped me, called me a slut, called me a liar, and told stories on my name because it was easier to hate me than admit their boyfriends had watched that video.”
Charm whispered, “Baby.”
“Do not baby me through this.” My voice cracked, and I hated that too. “I was either a slut or a liar, but never the victim. If I said I didn’t remember, I was lying. If I said I was drugged, I was desperate. If I admitted it was me, I was disgusting. If I stayed quiet, I was guilty. There wasn’t one door in that school that didn’t open into another way to punish me.”
Bliss covered her mouth, but I saw it in her eyes.
She knew. She had been there. Charm had been there.
They had walked those halls with me, my chin lifted while every piece of me shook beneath it. They had taken on the same hatred for defending me.
That was the problem.
They knew, and tonight, they had still looked at me like I was too much.
