Unfriended (15 page)

BROOKE

MY PHONE WAS
having seizures in my lap.

We're not allowed to have phones at the table. Mine was on silent, of course, but it was buzzing pretty much nonstop, and Mom had already looked over at me with one eye closed a couple of times. That woman has the best hearing of any living adult, I swear.

I asked to be excused and cleared my plate. At the sink I checked my phone. The whole screen was filled with texts. I went straight to the bathroom and locked the door.

All my psycho friends were freaking out. Those stupid apps. I swear I don't know why everybody likes them so much, but I had to sign in to see what everybody was losing their poops over.

It was Natasha's page on tellmethetruth.com. She had asked:
Does everybody hate me?

What a stupid question, just fishing for reassurance. Why does she have to be such a bait-breath? But then some genius had to answer, anonymously:
Yes

Good one, Anonymous. Some of your poems are actually decent but that
Yes
was pure brilliance.

And then somebody else added, under it:
Everybody hates you! You have no friends AT ALL.

And then, somebody else added:
Loser

What is wrong with people? This is why we can't have nice things.

Of course by the time I logged in, everybody was posting under that crap stuff like
Don't be ridiculous
and
We all love you Natasha
and
Whoever wrote this is the loser
and so on. Like twenty of those. And then over on every other site, of course, everybody was rallying around Natasha. Because, yeah. I added my bit:
Haters gonna hate,
and then, in case that could be taken the wrong way:
We love you Natasha! Ignore this useless zero.

Lulu had texted me about twenty times in the past half hour, begging me to call her. She picked up on the first ring.

“Hey,” I whispered, turning the sink on full blast to muffle the sound. My dad is not a big fan of kids disappearing from the table, especially when grandparents are over, possibly to lend some money to tide us over. And double-especially to use phones.

“Here's the thing,” Lulu said. “Natasha kind of predicted this. Today. She thinks it's Truly who wrote that crap about her.”

“Truly?” I asked. “No way.”

“I don't know,” Lulu said. “She posted about us all going over there, and then denied it.”

“Yeah,” I had to admit. “But didn't Truly post something nice? I saw . . .”

“Yeah,” Lulu said. “Natasha predicted she would do that, too.”

“But does that prove . . .”

“We're gonna meet tomorrow at the wall, early, okay?”

“Yeah,” I said. “Thanks, Lulu,” I added, and hung up.

I turned off the water but sat against the door, trying to think this through, whether I had been completely wrong about Truly being just kind of a nice, smart, slightly wonkish, maybe boring person. And Natasha being awful. Maybe Natasha hadn't even written that nasty e-mail to Truly, dissing her brother and sister. Holy crap. Hadn't thought of that before. What if Truly wrote it herself and forwarded it to me?

No. Why would she do that?

Urgh, I hate everybody.

Why can't people just be normal to one another? And predictable? And say what they think? Unless it's mean or hopeless, in which case, get over it.

I stared at my phone. Then I took a selfie, making the face I felt like—eyes crossed, tongue out. I sent it to Clay. Then I randomly sent it to Hazel, too.

I just felt like it. I don't know why. Maybe because Hazel is probably the only kid I know who's not involved at all in the whole online mess.

CLAY

THEY GOT AN
e-mail from the school about algebra. Nobody in my family has ever before today gotten a progress report. They send them if your child is at risk of failing a class. Mom was a bit stuck on the discovery that they send an e-mail notice. “I never knew they did that!” she mentioned. More than once.

“They sure are something,” I said, after the third time.

Dad was less delighted with the diligence of the school. Also, of me.

“You can't glide through life forever on your ample charm, Clay, flirting with teachers and getting away with lazy lack of effort,” Dad started. Then he kept going. Words, words, words. They'll get me a tutor if I need it. But I have to pull my weight. I hid my problems from them, which is dishonest. Blah blah blah. I sat there in the kitchen with my hoodie hood up. Bucketfuls of words barfed from his mouth about what a piece of crap I am, worthless, shameful. Not those exact words, of course, but obviously that's what they meant, under all their concern-trolling. I'm paying attention to all the wrong stuff. Not paying attention to the important things, like algebra, and whatever else Dad was listing.

Progress report. What a stupid name for it.

Mom joined in. She was blaming herself for not being more on my case or some such nonsense, so condescending. Obviously she was mad at me, but she was saying she wasn't—she was mad at herself and worried about me. Please. I stopped listening.

I watched their eyes flickering to each other's. Them against me.

They're a team, with JT as their quarterback and mascot.

Me? I'm the
problem
.

When they ran out of words, Dad sent me to my room. Okay by me. I could work twenty-five hours a day and I'd still never be as smart and successful as them, or my brother. What's the use? Why even try?

On my way up the stairs, my phone buzzed. Brooke with her eyes crossed like such a goof. Yay, Brooke. Leaning against my closed door inside my room, I sent back a picture of myself with
x
's drawn over my eyes and a big blue frown over my mouth.

Brooke called me two seconds later. “What happened?”

So I told her. The whole story. And, okay, I fully expected her to feel bad for me or just say stuff to make me laugh and forget. But she was like, “So why don't you just do your damn homework?”

“Thanks, pal,” I said. “Whose side are you on?”

“Seriously,” she said.

I flopped down on my bed. “What? Who put the bug up your . . .”

“It's just, you're making a problem for yourself when . . .”

“When what?”

“Nothing.” Then she shouted, “
Leave me alone!
”

“You called me!”

“No, Margot's frigging pounding on the—
I'm in here!
”

“Are you on the toilet?” I started laughing. “You're calling me while pooping? That is hilarious.”

“No! I, it's the only place I can get any priva—
fine!
Hold on, Clay, I'm not done with you I'm going to the basement hold on hold on.”

“Did you at least wash your hands?”

“Shut up,” she said. “I wasn't—ugh. Did you see all the crap online about Natasha?”

“No,” I said. “I was too busy getting my ears chewed off by my parents. What happened?”

“Bunch of drama. The Internet is gonna break. People being stupid.”

“Same ole stuff?”

“And then some.” Brooke said. “I'm just—Here's the thing, okay? I am down in the disgusting basement and I have no shoes on and everybody's freaking out online so I only have a sec. So listen quick. Okay?”

“Okay.”

“You know the problem with you?”

“Too charming?” I asked.

“Hardly. It's JT.”

“My brother is what's wrong with me?”

“Your
idea
of him. You're so busy protecting yourself from falling short of how awesome JT is, you won't even do your frigging homework! You're good at math. Maybe do a bunch of practice problems each night. Just work at it, you know? Take some responsibility.”

“What if I can't get it through my thick head no matter what?”

“Maybe you just have to keep trying.”

“I'm better at hanging out than slogging away at stuff.”

“Maybe you've just had more practice at hanging out.”

“Definitely. My only skill.”

“You're smart, Clay. You're just scared. You think your brother is like the Second Coming, but he's just a guy. Why are you so in love with him?”

“What?” I couldn't believe my ears. “I am so not! In love with JT? Are you tripping? Are there weird fumes down in your basement? Evacuate, dude!”

“I'm completely serious, for once.”

“In love with—my brother? Ew, I don't even miss him. I'm glad he's away, kind of. I'm just pissed because now the pressure's all on me.”

My mom was knocking on my door. “Clay?”

“Sorry, Mom.”

“I think you should be doing your homework,” Mom said.

“Yeah, I know!” I yelled. “Brooke is giving me the same lecture.”

“Good,” Mom said. “I'm making popcorn, when you're ready.”

“My mom's making me guilt popcorn,” I whispered to Brooke.

“Well,” she said. “Sucks to be you.”

“Yeah,” I agreed. “It kind of does.”

“You really don't miss him?”

“I do.” I closed my eyes. “I miss him. Whatever.”

“I know you do.”

“But not . . .”

“Not what?” she asked. Her voice was soft.

“Sometimes? Not as much as I thought I would.”

“Yeah,” she said.

I waited for her to try to convince me that was good, or that it is what it is, or not to be such a drama queen about it, or that I was a selfish jerk who didn't really love my brother if I didn't miss him as terribly as I'd thought I would, sometimes. But she didn't say anything.

“Do you think it means I'm, like, a crappy brother?” I whispered.

“No,” she said.

“Or that we're not as close as I thought?”

“Maybe it just means you're dealing,” she said.

“Yeah.” I said. “Maybe. He's right, of course. My father. About me.”

“That you should do your homework?” Brooke asked. “Yeah, he's a certified genius, that one. What an insight. I never could've come up with—”

“No, that, you know, I'm lazy. That I just do what's easy.”

“Easy stuff is easier,” she said.

“He's right about absolutely everything, as always, like you,” I said.

“Ha,” she said. “As if.”

“Except for one thing.”

“What's that?”

“That I don't care. That I don't mind possibly failing eighth grade math. That it doesn't bother me that I'm the stupid one in a family where the only thing that matters is how smart you are.”

“Clay . . .”

“If he really thinks that? Maybe I'm not the only idiot in the family after all,” I said, and then, “I gotta go. Sorry.”

I hung up and was about to turn off my phone when it rang in my hand. It was JT. He wanted to FaceTime.

Just what I wasn't up for. “Nice timing, dude,” I said instead of hello.

“I miss you, too,” he said.

We just hung out on the phone, talking about nothing, for a while. It was good to see his face, in spite of everything. And to make him laugh.

It was kind of like if you get one of those rocky tables and every time you put your elbows on it, the drinks all spill, but then somebody has the good sense to fold up a napkin and shove it under one of the legs and then everything's fine.

NATASHA

I KNEW THEY'D
rally to my side if somebody went this far in being mean to me. And really, all I was doing was putting it in text, on the screen, out in cyberland for everybody to see exactly how they were making me feel.

It wasn't a lie so much as a, like, boom. There it is. This is basically what you're saying or how you're all acting: like you hate me, I'm a loser, I should die. That's exactly how it felt when I was kicked out of the group, just dumped and unfriended, left like roadkill to slump off and die in the library by myself.

So: how do you feel seeing it right out there?

Bad. They felt bad. I knew they would. They're not heartless. And I think they do still care about me. Maybe Evangeline doesn't. Maybe she's the real one behind the kicking me to the curb. She doesn't care about me. But she's tough, and Brooke knows her, loves her, more than Truly. Truly was the one I could turn them against, not Evangeline, so I could get back to where I belonged.

And Truly deserved it anyway.

So when my mother came bursting into my room holding her own laptop demanding to know what was happening on my pages online, I didn't tell her that I had posted the insults. Because then who knows. Maybe she would drag me back to therapy or tell me I was a sick duck or get all disgusted with me even more than if she thought a friend did it.

“Did Truly post these mean things about you now?”

“That's what people seem to think,” I said.

“That little . . . what is going on with her lately?”

“I don't know.”

“Well, I don't
care,
” Mom said. “You reached out to her and invited her to join in with
your friends . . .
”

“Yup,” I said. “That'll teach me to be generous, huh?”

“It wasn't enough she had to make a complete fool of you, with that obnoxious
you're invited whoops no you're not
nonsense? Now she's posting just flat-out nastiness?”

I nodded.

Mom slammed her laptop down on my desk and groaned. Fully on my side. Ready to fight. For me.

“And now, did you see this? She just posted a whole bunch of
oh, Natasha we love you
baloney.”

“She did?” I sat up. “Where?”

“
We
, she said.
We love you Natasha
. Look!”

I looked at Mom's computer. She was open to a site where Truly had posted a very cute photo of all of us, with her cheek right next to mine. We both looked pretty. “Huh.”

“Who does she thinks she's talking for?” Mom was saying while I enlarged the photo. “We? We?
We
love you. Like she's suddenly, what? Homecoming queen? Spokesmodel of the clique
you
invited her into? Where does this girl get her nerve? Just like her mother, she's turning everybody against us.”

I clicked onto another site. Truly's photo was there, too, and also one of the two of us in second grade, holding hands and kissing each other on the lips.

Mom rolled her eyes. “Give me a freaking break.”

“Right?” I said. The likes were clicking up fast. “Though we did look cute, don't we? Awww, look at us.”

“Nobody's buying her bull, I hope,” Mom said. “Especially you.”

“No way,” I said.

“She's bullying you, Natasha. But what she's forgetting is that hurt people hurt people.”

I nodded.

“We have to hit her back. I don't know how. But we can't let her get away with this.”

Great minds.
“I was thinking, actually, that we could post, anonymously, somehow, that we know she's the one who posted that mean stuff about me.”

“Hmmm,” Mom said. “Yes. Smart. I like it.”

“Really?” I asked. “And maybe also start some rumors . . . ?”

“How do we do it?”

I intertwined my arms with hers and typed the words I'd been planning.

Mom giggled. “Nice,” she said, and hit enter.

As we waited for the reaction, she braided my hair for the first time in forever. Like she did to Truly's hair one night in fifth grade when they thought I was asleep. I closed my eyes and wished I had Rapunzel hair so it would take her all night. But we had more work to do, anyway.