Page 12 of Someone Just Followed You

But when I click into it, I see it’s Mom in our kitchen, talking direct to camera. I hit the unmute symbol and hold my breath.

She’s talking about parenting. How tough it is to see your child upset when she’s the butt of a classroom joke. But how hormones and menstruation and neural pathways all play a part in making teenage girls overdramatic or morose or too emotional. How she’s learned that the most important thing is to just be there for me.

I confided in her, and now she’s telling the world about it.

I scream and throw my phone across the room.

Chapter 15

Him

He leans forward over his phone, hunches his back. He doesn’t want anyone to see what he’s doing. To judge him for it. Because he knows what they’d think, his workmates. They wouldn’t understand. He should wait until he gets home where it’s private, but he doesn’t have the willpower for that. He needs to see her now.

He presses play on the YouTube video, watches a commercial for hair loss treatment, hits ‘skip’ as soon as he’s able. He runs his hands down his grubby jeans. How long since he washed them? He doesn’t like being dirty, but stuff like that, he finds it hard to prioritize.

It’s childish, the film, all those sounds and stickers, and he likes that, he thinks. Although it is confusing, lots of different feelings prickling his skin. But he likes the innocence of the bright colors and bubbly music.

And she’s beautiful. God, so beautiful. He fights the urge to stroke the screen, to pretend he’s touching her hair for real. It’s so rich and warm. It reminds him of his mother’s and for some reason that makes this thing he’s doing, connecting with her in the only way he’s able, feel right somehow.

She’s standing on a deck overlooking a garden. Not a big backyard, but neat and lush with a swimming pool in the distance. He wonders if she likes to swim. He used to swim too, but that was years ago. Not sure he’d even remember how to do it now.

She’s holding hands with her little sister, Aspen it says in the comments. A twin. She’s cute, but too young to be interesting to him. She backs away as Maple takes a step forward. Or Maybe Maple. Her handle is so perfect that it speaks to him on an almost spiritual level.

He watches the bucket above her tip, the water flood out, splatter her head, drip down her face. Soak her white T-shirt. He runs his tongue over his lips.

He wonders if she knows that the water has turned her top see-through, that her lilac bra is now on show. He feels bad for her. Like it’s his job to protect her but he can’t do that because he’s not there, just watching on a tiny six-inch screen hundreds of miles away. Sat in the back of a work truck on his lunch break, workmates in scruffy clothes milling around.

Maybe he should just go see her. Fuck it. Jack in this job and drive to Utah. He doesn’t know where she lives, but he’s sure he could find her if he put his mind to it. A girl with millions of followers leaves her mark.

But is that really what he wants? Or does he prefer to look at her like this?

When she doesn’t know he’s watching.

Chapter 16

Maple

There’s a rap on my door and I twitch at the sound, but otherwise don’t move.

‘Come on! Wake up!’ Mom hollers. ‘We need to be there by eight and I want you looking your all-American best!’

I groan into my pillow, then prise my eyes open. I check the time on my phone, groan again, and fall back against the mattress. It’s Sunday. I will be spending the whole day stressing about Dylan arriving tomorrow, and now, thanks to Mom, I get to do that from six a.m. Awesome.

But what else would I expect from the woman who invites a famous TikToker to stay without asking me, and then tells all her Instagram buddies my deepest darkest secrets?

‘I’m not going!’ I shout back, even though I don’t actually know where she wants me to be by eight. But then my door flies open, and Mom is standing there. She claps her hands, and I flinch, the sound like firecrackers in my ears. She marches up to me, her face glowing with self-righteousness.

‘Come on, get up,’ she instructs, flicking her hand over my bedsheets. ‘I do not have time for teenage dramas today.’

‘I don’t even know where you want me to go,’ I mutter, but I can already feel myself wobbling. And it’s like she can smell weakness, because her vibe changes too. Suddenly she looks like the cat who’s drunk all the milk.

‘I’m sorry, that’s my bad,’ she says, her voice almost purring now. ‘I wanted to tell you yesterday, but you didn’t seem in the mood to talk.’

Of course I didn’t after her Instagram reel. And I still don’t. But I’m not sure I’ve got the energy to keep fighting her. Especially when I feel like I don’t have anyone else.

Yesterday I decided that I needed my friends back, so I forgave them for the video nightmare, and we met for sodas in the afternoon. But all they talked about was the amazing summers they’ve got planned. Taylor’s going to a swim camp in Canada, then to Vancouver Island with her family for a vacation. Martha and Scarlett are going on summer camp together in Arizona, and Milly’s going to visit her cousins in Montana. While we’re staying in Utah because, according to Mom, there’s no window in the schedule for a vacation.

Coco understands a bit more, but she lives six states east, so it’s not like I can hang out with her. Anything that might have been starting with Theo is over now because of that video, and while I love the twins, they’re only eight. Dad never has time for me, so it looks like Mom is all I’ve got.