Wordlessly, Wyatt starts the car and pulls back onto the highway, and we spend the rest of the fifteen-minute drive to my house in awkward silence. And I’m not even mad about it.
Sixteen
Despite the upset stomach that I suspect was a mild form of food poisoning, I manage to get to school on Monday. I spent the rest of Friday night puking into my toilet until there was nothing left to puke, and Saturday and Sunday I recovered in bed, sleeping on and off. Wyatt never texted me, not that I was holding my breath. I’m sure he’ll run in the opposite direction if he sees me in the halls this last week before exams. I texted Emi and Kalani and told them it wasn’t going to work out between me and Wyatt, but I didn’t give them any other details even though they wanted to know. I was too tired to look at my phone, but I’m ready for their grilling today. I’ve taken my stance, and I’m not swaying from my decision of stopping the dates and going to prom single like I’ve wanted to from the beginning.
As I walk to my locker, people go out of their way to avoid my path, which is weird, because usually you have to zigzag through groups of kids to get anywhere in the halls. Girls whisper when they notice me, and boys shove their friends and point. The hair on the back of my neck stands up. Something iswrong. My legs work faster to get me to my locker, as if it’s home free and will make everyone stop being weird and staring at me.
“Hey, Pukey,” a boy says to me, though I’m not sure who it is, and everyone in his group laughs. I shove past them without engaging. I have no idea what’s going on, but as more people notice me, more people openly stare, point, and laugh. This has to do with Friday. Has Wyatt told everyone what happened? Have the rumors spread already? Before the first bell of the day?
I finally reach and open my locker, but I don’t feel any better about what’s going on. I want to stick my head in it and disappear.
“Oh my God, Carina! There you are,” Emi says as she rushes over to me, panting like she’s been sprinting through the halls. Her short purple hair is sticking up all over the place.
“What’s going on, Emi?” I ask as more people look at their phones then laugh at me as they pass by.
“Don’t worry. I’m already on damage control,” Emi says. “Emmett too. When Kalani finally shows up to school, she will be too. We’ll have everything settled.”
“Damage control? For what?”
Emi’s mouth pops open. “You haven’t seen the video or heard what people are saying?”
My heart pounds in my chest. Video? “Emi, you’re scaring me. What’s going on?”
Emi bites her lip and cringes before she’s able to stop herself. Oh no. This is bad.
“No wonder she’s so desperate,” Elena says obnoxiously loudly to her friends as she passes us. She’s in my math class and always swaps makeup tips and product recommendations with me. I thought we were friends. “It’s obvious now why her friends have to pay people to date her. Did you see the video? Pathetic.”
Carly, her friend whom I’ve had every English class of my high school career with and have often shared notes with, replies, “Iwouldn’t take any money to be set up with her just to get puked all over. She’s so messy.”
They laugh as they pass, oblivious to the fact that I’m standing right here and heard everything. Paying people to date me? I turn my wide eyes to Emi, who’s staring at me with the same panicked expression. She curses.
“Emi?” I ask, almost scared to know what’s going on. This has to be about what happened with Wyatt. But I didn’t puke on him, and no one paid him. Also, what video? “Tell me what’s going on.”
She chews on her lip. I’ve never seen Emi this nervous before. Not even when she borrowed her dad’s Lamborghini without asking when she first got her license andliterallydrove through a Tim Hortons drive-through window.
“There are . . . rumors . . . about you . . . and the blind dates,” Emi starts, pausing every few words like she’s trying to think about what to say next. “There’s also a video circulating . . . and memes . . . with very mean captions . . . and also video edits . . . with even meaner captions . . .”
For a few moments, Emi and I just stare at each other as I process what she’s told me.
I swallow. “What are the rumors? What’s the video?”
Emi hesitates for a brief second before pulling her phone out of her back pocket, but that hesitation makes my chest squeeze.
As she clicks something on her phone, a group of eleventh grade girls walk by, all looking at their phones. One girl who I don’t know laughs and says, “Wow, Carina’s so pathetic even clingyArthurdidn’t want her.”
Emi growls and throws her hands in the air. “Okay, I’ve been trying to stay calm and not snap on people to not make things worse, but I’ve hadenough!”
She turns to march after the eleventh graders, but I grab her arm to pull her back. I can’t wait anymore. Everyone is talking about me and laughing at me and passing around a video of me, and I have no idea what it’s about. I can’t be the last person to know when it’s aboutme.
“Emi, justshow me.”
She sighs, her chest deflating, before pressing something on her phone and passing it to me. It’s what happened Friday night, and looks like it was taken from a car that was keeping pace beside us. I’m leaning out the window, puking my guts out. When I move my hair out of my face, you can clearly tell it’s me. There’s no mistaking it for someone else. Whoever posted the video has made edits to it. Me puking in slow motion, the puke going out then coming back in, then out again to catchy music, words likeloserandCarina PukesAlotstamped over the screen, and more. It’s terrible. I can’t even finish watching it, never mind read the comments or watch the already high viewing number climb higher, so I pass the phone back to Emi.
“Who did this?” I ask, my voice breaking as I try to keep it together. Everyone’s still staring at me.
“I don’t know,” Emi says quietly, then mentally debates something before reluctantly adding, “There’s more. Do you want to see the memes?”
I wrap my arms around myself as if it can make everyone stop looking at me. “Do I want to see pictures of, I’m assuming, me mid-puke with mean words written around it? Let me guess, based on the gossip, something like, ‘Pays to date someone, pukes all over his car’?”