Bree The last day of finals. The last day in this wretched place. One more test, and then I could finally leave it all behind. I could walk away from the sneering hallways, from Jenna’s smug little smiles that curled just a bit too wide, just sharp enough to cut. I wouldn’t have to endure her mocking anymore—her up-and-down looks that said she’d won, like somehow she was the better woman. Like I had even been in a competition I didn’t know was happening. I could leave the pitying glances my mom kept throwing at me. The kind that lingered too long, that said she knew something had gone terribly wrong, even if I hadn’t told her. That silent kind of knowing only a mother could have. And worst of all, I could leave behind the constant feeling of being haunted. Because no matter where I turned, Oliver was always there. A familiar scent in the hallway. A glimpse of the back of his head in the cafeteria. A voice in a crowd that made my breath hitch before I realized it wasn’t him. It was like the universe had decided to rub salt in the wound every single chance it got. There was only one final left—the written English exam. I was more than ready. I would crush it, just like I always did. Words were easy for me. Language was predictable. It didn’t lie or cheat or leave you behind in the middle of everything. I just needed something solid to write about, something meaningful but not too personal. Definitely nothing that would remind me of what I saw that night, what I walked in on. Nothing that would unravel me on the page. “If only I had known,” someone muttered behind me as I passed, their eyes sliding down the length of me before shooting me a wink. My brows furrowed. I kept walking. I didn’t even recognize him—it wasn’t someone I’d spoken to before, not someone I’d ever even noticed. So, I told myself he wasn’t talking to me. Probably someone behind me. Maybe just a bad joke with weird timing. Definitely not about me. Why would it be? I walked past a group of girls clustered around their phones, giggling. That wasn’t weird. Not on its own. But the way their eyes flicked up at me? The way one of them whispered to another and then looked away quickly? That was strange. There was something behind those glances. Something I couldn’t quite piece together. Like they knew something I didn’t. Something about me. Still, I brushed it off. I’d become good at that—pretending nothing was wrong, pretending people weren’t watching me like I was a car crash they couldn’t look away from. I turned the dial on my locker and opened it, sliding my empty school bag inside. I’d come back for the rest of my stuff later. No point lugging everything around just for one more exam. The sooner I was done, the sooner I could leave. And once I walked out those doors, I wouldn’t look back. Tomorrow, all the seniors would be back. Yearbook signing. The whole chaotic goodbye tour. Everyone acting like we were all best friends, like we hadn’t spent the last four years divided into cliques, alliances, and invisible walls. Like they hadn’t ignored me for most of the year, only acknowledging me when they needed help with a group project or a partner for labs. Suddenly acting like they’d always known me. I wasn’t in the mood to fake it. “Maybe I should give you a ride home later, Bree.” The voice startled me, snapping me out of my spiraling thoughts. I looked to my right and found Brandon Chen leaning against the locker next to mine. His grin was obnoxiously wide, his white teeth gleaming. The years of braces had clearly paid off. I blinked at him, unimpressed. “Why would you do that?” I asked, closing my locker with a soft thud. “Because you’re always so grateful afterward,” he said with a smirk, like we were in on some kind of private joke I had never heard before. I stared at him, repulsed. “I have absolutely no idea what you’re talking about,” I muttered, rolling my eyes. “And honestly, I wouldn’t sit in a car with you if you were the last man on earth.” I turned to leave, unwilling to waste another second of breath on him—but his voice followed me like oil on water. “Maybe you shouldn’t be such a prude, even if I love watching your ass in those jeans, Morgan,” he called after me, his tone smug, slimy. “Though, gotta say—the green lace panties? Definitely my favorite.” My blood turned to ice. My body froze in place. I could feel the heat rush to my face, not from embarrassment, but from fury. Because suddenly, it all made sense. The looks. The whispers. The phone screens. Something of mine—something private—was out there. And I hadn’t even known. I turned right back around, my heart thudding in my chest, eyes fixed on a grinning Brandon as he casually pulled out his phone like he had nothing to be ashamed of. “See? I made it my screensaver,” he said proudly, holding the screen up for me to see. There it was. My ass, clad in the delicate green lace panties I had bought specifically for Oliver and me—our two-month anniversary. A moment that had meant something to me, something private, intimate, and filled with trust. Now turned into a joke. A trophy. A screenshot for locker-room gossip and whatever twisted amusement Brandon got from humiliating me. “How did you get that?!” I practically screeched, my voice breaking as I snatched the phone out of his hand, as if somehow grabbing it would erase the image, make it disappear off his device, off every device it had been passed to. Off the internet, even. As if that was possible. He just laughed—this low, smug chuckle that made my skin crawl—and easily plucked the phone back, not even slightly concerned about what he had just admitted to. “You didn’t know?” he asked, still chuckling. Then he leaned down, too close, his breath warm and sour against my ear, and whispered in a way that made me want to slap him across the face. “Try searching for Bree Morgan is a sl*t on Facebook.” The words hit me like a slap. Hard. My whole body went still. I couldn’t breathe. I couldn’t even blink for a second. And then, as if on autopilot, I fumbled for my own phone with shaking hands. I could barely type, my fingers trembling so much they kept hitting the wrong letters. I finally typed it in—his exact words—and just like he said, a page popped up. A public page. A real one. There it was, bold and unapologetic. The title alone made me feel sick, but the content—it was worse than I could have ever imagined. Every picture, every message, every private thing I had sent Oliver in confidence was there. My photos, my body. My trust. And people were liking it. Sharing it. Commenting. I couldn’t even process what I was seeing. My stomach twisted into a hard, painful knot. My vision blurred from the burn of unshed tears. My skin felt like it was on fire—every nerve ending buzzing with a mix of rage, humiliation, and betrayal so potent I could barely stand. This was all Oliver. Every image on that page had come from him. Every message was something we had shared. Every moment of vulnerability had been turned against me. This wasn’t a stranger doing this to me. This wasn’t random. This was him. Someone I had loved, someone I had trusted, someone I thought would protect me. He had promised. He had looked me in the eye and sworn that no one else would ever see the photos. And now they were everywhere. This—this—was why you never trusted men. Why you kept your heart guarded, why you didn’t let anyone in, why you didn’t share pieces of yourself that couldn’t be taken back. Because eventually, they’d betray you. They’d use it against you. They’d rip you apart from the inside out and laugh about it in the hallways. I looked up, scanning the hallway in a daze, and there he was—Oliver. Standing just a few feet away. Watching me. His expression almost looked pained, like he was actually feeling something. Maybe guilt. Maybe regret. But it wasn’t enough. Not nearly enough. His face didn’t show even a fraction of the pain he had caused me. Then Jenna appeared at his side like she belonged there. She wrapped her arm around his bicep, resting her head on his shoulder as if she was claiming him. She smiled at me—smug, victorious, full of venom—and I knew. She was in on it. Maybe not the whole thing, but definitely part of it. Her cruelty wasn’t subtle. It was calculated. And that was the exact moment I made a promise to myself. A vow, silently spoken and deeply rooted. I wouldn’t cry. I wouldn’t let them break me. They wanted to see me fall apart? Not happening. I would rise from this, higher than they could ever imagine. I would get the best damn education possible. I would thrive without them. And one day, they would choke on the memory of what they did to me. So I straightened my spine and shoved my phone into my pocket, refusing to let them see me crumble. In my mind, I flipped them off, cursed them out, screamed so loud it echoed through every hallway of this cursed school. But in reality, I said nothing. I turned on my heel and walked toward my final exam with fire in my chest and steel in my veins. They wanted to ruin me? I’d make sure they regretted that mistake for the rest of their lives.