Chapter 6 The Only One I Trusted

 ~MILA~

I stood in the middle of the room with my phone still shaking in my hand. The screen kept lighting up with more messages, more pictures, more cruel words, but I could not look at it anymore. I turned to Janet instead. She was still standing by her suitcase, folding a shirt slowly like she wanted to disappear into the fabric.

"Janet," I said, and my voice cracked in the middle of her name. "How did anyone know where I was going?"

She did not look up. "I don't know, Mila."

"You said no one would find out." My hands were shaking so hard now that the phone almost slipped. "You said it was a secret. You said it was safe."

"It was supposed to be." Her voice came out fast, too fast, like she had rehearsed the words in her head already.

I stepped closer to her. "Then how are there pictures of me outside the hotel? How are there pictures of me in the hallway? Someone followed me, Janet. Someone knew the address. The only person who knew was you."

Her hands stopped moving over the shirt. For just a second, her eyes looked up to mine, and I saw something there. Something quick and scared, then it was gone, and she shook her head hard.

"I didn't tell anyone," she said. "I would never do that to you. You have to believe me."

"I want to believe you," I said, and my voice broke apart on the last word. "I really do. But someone took those pictures. Someone planned this."

She turned back to her suitcase and grabbed another shirt, folding it with hands that were not stable either. "Maybe someone followed you from campus. Maybe they recognized the car. I don't know, Mila. I really don't know."

I felt my throat tighten. I wanted to grab her by the shoulders and make her look at me and tell me the truth. But instead I just stood there, feeling smaller and smaller with every second that passed.

"There's something else," I said quietly.

She glanced at me, waiting.

"I only found three thousand dollars. Not five." I wrapped my arms around myself. "He said five thousand, Janet. That was the whole reason I agreed. And I passed out. I don't remember anything after I drank what he gave me. I woke up and the money was short and I don't know what happened while I was unconscious."

For a moment Janet's face softened, and she reached out like she might hug me. "Oh, Mila. I'm so sorry. That's terrible. That's really terrible."

"Do you think he took the rest?" I asked her. "Do you think he did something to me and then just... paid me less like it was nothing?"

She bit her lip and looked away. "I don't know what happened in that room. I wasn't there."

"But you set it up," I said softly. "You knew him. Or you knew someone who knew him. Please, Janet. I need to understand what happened to me."

She shook her head fast, too fast, and stepped back from me like my words had pushed her. "I told you, I just heard about the offer from someone. I didn't know who it was going to be. I didn't know it was going to be Aaron Revencrest. I swear, Mila, I had no idea."

I wanted to keep asking. I wanted to keep pushing until the truth came out. But something in her eyes told me she was not going to give me anything else, no matter how many times I asked. So I stopped, and I just stood there, feeling the ache in my chest grow serious.

Janet turned back to her suitcase and zipped it closed with a quick, final sound. I watched her hands moving and a cold feeling crept into my stomach.

"Why are you packing?" I asked, even though part of me already knew the answer was going to hurt.

She did not answer right away. She picked up a small stack of books from her desk and placed them carefully into a box.

"Janet."

She finally looked at me, and her eyes were wet. "My parents saw everything, Mila. The pictures. The comments. All of it. They called me an hour ago."

My heart sank low in my chest. "And?"

"And they're furious." Her voice shook. "They said they don't want me living with someone who... who did what you did. They said it could ruin our family's name if people knew I was your roommate. They told me I have to move out today."

"Today?" I whispered.

"Today," she repeated, and she looked down at the floor like she could not stand to see my face while she said it.

"Janet, please." I felt tears building behind my eyes again, hot and quick. "You're the only person I have here. You're the only one who ever treated me like I mattered. Please don't leave me alone right now. Not now. Not after everything."

She wiped her eyes quickly with the back of her hand. "I don't have a choice, Mila. I'm sorry. I really am. But my parents pay for everything I have. If I don't listen to them, I lose all of it."

"I'm not asking you to fight the whole world for me," I said, my voice breaking apart even more. "I'm just asking you to stay a little longer. Just until I figure out what to do. Please."

She grabbed the handle of her suitcase and pulled it upright. "I can't. I'm sorry, Mila. I really am sorry."

I watched her move around the room, gathering the last of her things, and every single item she picked up felt like another piece of my world falling away. The pictures on her side of the wall came down. Her blanket got folded and shoved into a bag. Her side of the room grew empty and bare, and mine still had sauce stains I had not managed to wash out of an old sweater sitting in the corner.

"Please," I said again, so quietly I almost did not hear myself say it.

She did not answer. She rolled her suitcase toward the door, and I felt something inside me crack wide open. I had already lost my job. I had lost my reputation in this campus. And now I was losing the one person who had shared this tiny room with me for two years, the one person who used to bring me biscuits when I skipped dinner, the one person I thought would never leave no matter what happened.

I realized, standing there in the middle of that half empty room, that I had gone from having almost nothing at all to having absolutely no one.

Janet reached the door and pulled it open. The hallway light spilled in around her. She paused there for a moment, her hand resting on the frame, and she turned back to look at me one last time.

Her eyes were full of something I could not quite name. Guilt, maybe. Or fear. Her lips parted like she wanted to say something important, something she had been holding inside this whole time. I waited, my breath caught in my chest, hoping she would finally tell me the truth.

But then she closed her mouth, looked away, and walked out the door without another word.