Stomach sinking, I open my Twitter account. And there I am. In all my naked, eyeblacked glory. Picture after picture, all the way down my timeline, with my Twitter handle attached. Some of them are screencaps from local TV stations. One’s a screencap from ESPN.
God. Everybody in the world has seen my tits at this point.
Blurred out or not, it’s still too much. This isn’t who I am. I didn’t do it for attention. I did it for Austin. Tears start to prickle at the corners of my eyes, and my chest is tight, then I start to hyperventilate.
This is more than an invasion of privacy. It feels like a physical attack. Violation. To have my private pictures smeared all over the Internet, exposing me to any asshole mouthbreather with a social media account. Whoever did this has no consideration for my personal safety, my privacy, or even my status as a human being.
I get a cold washcloth to put on my face, trying to get myself back under control. To settle my galloping heartbeat and ease my breathing back to a normal speed. Once I calm down a little, I realize it would be a good idea for me to figure out where this all started.
It’s not hard to follow the chain of events back to the social media source. Which turns out to be Reddit. Somebody posted a picture of the screen at the game there, and then it spread. Somewhere, it got my name attached to it. I’m guessing via Facebook, but the original’s been deleted there because of the Showing of the Tits. This is the first time I’ve been happy Facebook is so prudish. Not that it helps much—it looks like I’m all over the Internet in spite of it.
I glance over the emails. The calm I managed to dredge up is falling apart again. My eyes are going hot; the edges of my eyelids feel like they’re on fire.
I will not cry. I will not cry.
The mantra beats in my head, but nothing in my brain seems to actually be paying attention, because there are tears escaping from the corners of my eyes even as I focus.
I start deleting emails, stabbing the mouse button extra hard to make it feel more final, more violent. The links all go back to the same thread sequence—a Reddit picture of the screen at the game. It’s followed by the same picture being propagated on Twitter, Instagram, and Google Plus. God. I didn’t even know anybody used Google Plus anymore.
Then I see a link that looks different. The preview in the email is small, so it’s hard to tell at first glance, but it doesn’t look like the picture from the stadium. I click on it, because apparently I’m stupid. The picture loads into my browser, filling the screen. It’s not the picture from the stadium. It’s much clearer, much more detailed, and there’s no Jumbotron frame.
It’s the original photo off Austin’s phone.
My face goes numb again. There’s no way to make any excuses for him. Austin took the selfie I sent him—just for him—and spread it everywhere. It’s the only explanation. Nobody else had that picture. Nobody else had access to it, or to my phone.
Why? Why would he do that?
He asked me that question, and I realize I have no answer.
Because he’s an asshole.
He hasn’t been, though. He’s been sweet. Good to me. He’s acted like he’s actually interested. Like he cares about me. Surely a man wouldn’t open up the way he has if all he wanted to do was humiliate me.
That doesn’t mean anything. If he cared about you, he wouldn’t have done it.
My brain just keeps chasing itself around in circles like a rabid hamster on a wheel. Nothing makes sense. I can’t make it stop. I slump over the computer and put both hands over my face, trying to block everything out.
And then my phone rings.
Shit.
I pick it up and glance at the caller ID. Double shit.
It’s Dr. Richards.
Might as well get it over with, I guess.
“Hello?”
“Chloe.” His voice is thin, hard. “I think you probably know why I’m calling.”
I take a slow breath, trying to keep myself under control. Bursting into tears immediately isn’t going to accomplish anything. “I can guess.”
“I thought so much better of you, Chloe. You know getting involved with a client is not only inappropriate, but so thoroughly unprofessional it goes beyond just crossing a line.”
He pauses, as if he expects me to respond, but I know if I say anything I’ll lose the tight hold I’ve got on my emotions. After a few seconds, he continues.
“Everything you’ve told me about your relationship… You lied to me, Chloe. I can’t condone that. That’s the worst part of it. I could understand a mutual attraction, and wanting to move forward, but you lied to me. I didn’t want to believe the rumors, but there’s no doubt now.”
“Rumors?” I manage to force out the single word. My voice shakes. “What kind of rumors?”
“Rumors that you and Sherwood were involved in inappropriate behavior. That you weren’t being discreet.”
“Who said that? Who told you we were involved?”
Only one person has ever seen Austin and I together in anything close to a compromising position. Only one person could have had a reason to hurt me.
“Never mind that—”
Another realization hits me. Dr. Richards hates football. Ironic, yes, but it’s the truth. “Why were you even watching the game? You never watch football, even if our clients are playing.”
Another moment of silence, this time straining over his end of the phone line. He’s not going to answer the question, I realize. It doesn’t matter. I can answer it for him. He’s willing to protect a male colleague who basically posted revenge porn where it would be broadcast on national TV, but he’s not willing to protect me.
“None of that is important, Chloe.”
“I’m not so sure it isn’t.” The tears are coming now, hot and fast, though I’m still keeping my voice under control. I’m angrier now than anything else, and I hate it that fury makes me cry. “This was a deliberate attack on me.”
“You still took the picture. You still were involved in relations with a client.”
“Prove it. How do you even know it’s me in that picture? All it shows is boobs and eyeblack. It could be anybody.”
There’s a moment of silence.
“Can you honestly tell me that’s not you in that picture? That somebody deliberately took a picture and tagged it with your name on the Internet? That someone went to that much trouble, rather than just stealing a picture off your phone, or out of your cloud storage?”
Now he’s got me. Because even though my brain’s mostly back in gear, when I open my mouth to lie to him, nothing comes out.
Into my beyond-awkward silence, he adds, “Can you honestly tell me you’re not involved with Austin Sherwood?”
Again, I can’t answer. Rather than admit to my transgressions, I say nothing. I hear a small sound over the line—almost a tsking sound but not quite. It’s Dr. Richards being non-verbally disappointed in me. I feel about an inch and a half tall. He believed in me. Gave me a second chance. And I fucked it up.
“Don’t bother coming to work on Monday,” he says finally, and his voice is even tighter. “I’ll find someone else to work with Mr. Sherwood.”
“Dr. Richards—” But he’s already hung up.
There’s no point trying to talk my way out of it, anyway. I’m just going to have to pull up my big girl panties and face the consequences of my actions.
I turn off my phone and lay it very gently down on the table. I can put the pieces together—I’m not stupid. I dug this hole for myself, but as to how far it’s managed to go? That’s Roger’s fault.
But that doesn’t explain how he got the picture. Austin still has to have been part of it.
Or does he? Could Roger have gotten access to my phone somehow? I went into the office the day after the party. I know Roger was there because I went out of my way to avoid him. I left my phone on my desk to go to the bathroom – that would have certainly been enough time for him to get the photo off my phone.
I did. I left it on my desk for about five minutes when I went to the bathroom. As to whether Roger was there—well, he must have been. It’s the only explanation that doesn’t involve Austin betraying me on the deepest possible levels. And it’s getting harder and harder for me to believe he would have done that. Austin isn’t Roger. He’s not Mason. He’s a good guy.
We could have had something together. Something good. And now it’s over.
Chapter 12
Austin
“Who the hell is this idiot? I need Chloe. I’m not starting over again in the middle of physical therapy.”
Chloe just took off in the middle of the game. Didn’t give me a chance to defend myself, didn’t wait for me to figure out what I could do to help. Didn’t even wait for me to give her a ride home—she just hopped into the nearest bus. The last I saw of her was the door closing behind her and the bus moving away from the curb when I was still too far away for her to even hear me yelling after her.
Whatever happened to get Chloe’s picture up on the Jumbotron, the fallout has been horrible. Photos of the big screen have spread all over the Internet; every single one of my social media feeds is plastered with it. The narrative at first was that the woman was just an overly obsessed fan. But then Chloe’s name got attached to the picture—I don’t know how—and now she’s being branded unprofessional, a football groupie, a whore, and every horrible thing the nasty underbelly of the Internet can think of to call her. Worst of all, the original picture has made it online. Somebody got into my phone, or got into her phone—got hold of the picture somehow.