XXXII

                                    

                                          
I was released from the hospital a few days later. We spent a day at the beach and then packed up our dorm room and shipped our stuff home. My brother and all of my friends were staying in Miami for a couple more days and we'd be meeting them at the airport back home. We drove for about three days, staying the night in Atlanta and St. Louis. We pulled up to the airport and I laid back on my bike to watch the airplanes flying overhead. 
"Yo, Clover. You good over there?" Ryder asked from a parking space over. 
I threw him a thumbs up. Not being able to speak was ass. I wanted to give him some sass. 
"Their flight was delayed by a couple minutes but they should be here soon," my dad said, looking at his phone. 
"We should all learn sign language. Or Morse code or something," Ryder said a while later. 
"That actually isn't a bad idea," my dad agreed. 
I waved my hand to get them to stop talking. A while later, everyone else met us in the parking lot and we headed home together. We pulled into the driveway where everyone but Ryder and Gem and my family eventually left. 
"Clover, why don't you show Gem to the guest room," my dad suggested.
She followed me into the house and upstairs to her room.
"It's going to be great being your roommate for a while longer. Even if it is in different rooms."
I smiled and nodded.
-------------------------
A few weeks later, we were settled back into our normal lives. My dad didn't want me doing any job hunting until I could talk again, afraid it would hurt my chances. Every night, we sat around the table with all of my friends, practicing sign language together. I was struggling and just wanted to be able to talk out loud. In a rage one night, I shoved my notebook off the table and watched it hit the floor.
"Clove, I know this is tough," my dad began. "It's tough for all of us, but we're trying to be strong."
I wanted to go off on a rant, but not a sound would leave my mouth and that just made me angrier. The doorbell rang, saving me from having everyone watch me struggle. I crossed my arms and glared at the table in front of me. The door slammed, hard enough to shake the chandelier above our heads. 
"Son of a bitch," my dad swore.
"What's going on?" Kai asked.
"The front yard is full of news reporters."
I perked up and put all of my attention on my dad. 
"They want to speak with Clover about what happened."
"Well, that isn't happening," Kai said, looking to everyone else to see their nods of agreement. 
I slowly signed I'll do it, much to my dad's surprise.
"Clover, how? What will you say?"
Ryder handed me my notebook and I wrote, Just how I do with you, write it all down. I'll answer their questions.
"I'm going to come with you, at least. If there's anything too invasive that they ask, I'll be shutting them down."
I nodded, agreeing to his terms and stood to follow him outside. He hadn't been wrong, the front yard was full of people, new vans lining the street. Upon our arrival, the reporters crammed together and started shoving cameras, microphones and sound equipment in my face. 
"She'll be answering questions as best she can, but it needs to be one at a time. Understood?" my dad said in his scary authoritative voice.
"How do you feel about finally being released from the public's suspicions?" one reporter called out.
How would you feel? I wrote.
"How are you coping with the loss of two of your friends?"
We're all taking it day by day, hoping the pain gets easier to deal with.
"What comments do you have about the rape that happened last spring?"
My jaw dropped.
"Rape?" Ryder whispered.
My dad nearly gave himself whiplash looking towards me. 
"What about the gay affair?"
I looked back at Ryder and he pulled me closer to his body.
"What are you talking about?" my dad asked, finally finding his voice.
"It's all on Instagram, on Alice's page."
Ryder nearly knocked me out trying to pull his phone out to look. There, on Alice's page, uploaded only that morning, were all of our secrets. Things she'd no doubt found out about with her handy little bug on our phones.
"Is this some kind of sick joke?" Ryder asked.
"You...didn't know about it?"
"Questions are done," my dad said. "Get off our property."
He shoved Ryder and I inside, locking the door behind us.
"Guys, have you looked at Instagram at all today?" Ryder asked when we walked into the kitchen.
"No, why?"
"Alice has done even more damage."
It was silent as everyone read the multiple posts about each of us. Callum and Houston's alleged gay affair, Niko's "betrayal" of Alice, Gavin's apparent huge crush on me, Griffin and Emily's secret tryst, texts between Ryder and Niko about me, and worst of all, the texts between Gem and I about the sexual assault that had happened to me. A strangled sob escaped me, but I couldn't even focus on the fact that a noise had actually came from me. Callum put his head in his hands and mumbled something to himself.
"Okay, there's a reasonable explanation for this. I'm sure of it," Emily said, looking slightly pale.
"Instagram posts can be scheduled to upload, I think," Griffin said, sounding far too unsure to put any of us at ease.
"Can it be posted this far out? She was arrested in July of last year. Someone other than Alice had to have done this," Niko said, running his hand through his hair. 
I couldn't look at anyone. All I could stare at were the screenshots of mine and Gem's texts. That night slowly started flooding back to me and a silent tear slid down my face.