‘Callie is a bitch.’
Well, that was a hot take.
I stood up too. “Darla, I have tried to figure out, over the last few months, whyyou’d remove us—me, in particular—from your life without a reason. I’ve gone over every single one of our exchanges and I don’t understand if I hurt you or—”
“Cut the act, Ella.” She scoffed. “You know why I stopped talking to you both. I’ve seen your conversations with Callie.”
Huh? What was she talking about?“I’m sorry, but I’m not following. What conversations?”
Darla braced her hands on her hips, practically shooting me daggers with her eyes.
“Darla,” I hedged calmly when she remained silent, apprehension swirling in my gut. “What conversations are you talking about?”
She inched a disgusted expression my way. “The ones where you’re insulting me and talking shit about my family.”
I felt like I was going to collapse.
What was she talking about? Why would I insult her or her family? I loved the Hill women—and Alberto—like my own. “I have never, in my life, spoken a bad word about your family, Darla.Never.”
My vehement tone jolted Darla. She recovered quickly and scowled. “I have proof. Don’t even bother denying it.”
“Show me,” I challenged. “Show me this so-called proof you have.”
Usually classy and collected, Darla looked like a bomb about to detonate as she pulled out her phone, unlocked it, opened her gallery app, and thrust her device against my face with an angry huff. “There you go.”
I grabbed her phone, glaring at the screenshot. It was aprivate conversation on social media between Callie and me.
Reading through the contents, I blanched.
It was horrifying and extremely disturbing.
I scrolled through all the screenshots and read one lie after another, feeling my blood boil, my heart rate skyrocket, and my need to break something grow increasingly stronger with every second.
In the conversations, it was made to look like I was calling Darla a pathetic bitch for being afraid of her mother, calling Principal Hill a cunt for giving us detention after we pranked the boys on the hockey team, and the worst of them all? I was made to look like I hated Dacia for being bi and calling her all sorts of derogatory terms I’d never heard in my life. And Callie was seen ‘agreeing’ to all these messages. But fuck, none of this was actually me. I’d rather cut off my own fingers than to hurt—insult—anyone like this. The Dacia one slashed the deepest. She was like the older sister I never had and I adored her with my whole heart. She didn’t deserve to be spoken about in such a horrible light.
“This is fake.” Repulsed, I shot the phone back at Darla. “I swear on myabuela’sgrave that I would never fucking say anything like this. Not about your family or anyone else’s, Darla. That isn’t me.”
My ex-best friend bristled. “Then how do you explain this?”
With jerky fingers, I unlocked my phone, which thankfully still had some juice, and went into my conversation with Callie. I scrolled up to the same time stamps as those screenshots and turned my phone towards Darla. “Look at this. Read through myrealconversation with Callie. It’s just memes and the occasional text about where to meet up for our hangouts.”
To be honest, I wasn’t a big texter. I preferred to call. Typing up long messages—let alone the kind Darla showed me—wasn’t my style. Nor was shitting on my childhood best friend and herfamily.
The colour leeched from Darla’s face as she read through our conversation. The truth was right there. “Are you…Are you trying to tell me these texts are fabricated?”
It was the only logical answer because I sure as hell hadn’t written them. “Darla, you have to believe me. I would never say those horrendous things. You know me. You’ve known me my whole life. I’d never utter such despicable words about you or your loved ones.”
“But…you think Callie would?”
Nodding, I stared at the floor. “Unfortunately, I’m beginning to realize that Callie may not be the person I thought she was.”
Considering she hasn’t even left a single call or text on my phone asking me if I’m okay after Initiation Night.
Now I was certain that Callie had a hand in this whole fake screenshots situation. On top of her and the masked guy being involved with our arrest.
Thewhystill remained to be discovered.
Darla gazed at me like she finally saw through the lies. “The evidence was there, Ella. How was I supposed to think otherwise?”
