Girl Online (34 page)

“Penny! Penny! What is it? What’s wrong?” Mum races into the bedroom and turns on the light.

I’m lying curled up in a ball on the floor. Why am I on the floor? What’s happened?

“Rob! Rob! Come here!” Mum yells. Then I feel her crouching down beside me and her hands clutching my arms. “It’s OK, darling, it’s OK.”

I’m wailing now. I can hear myself but I feel disconnected somehow, like it’s not really me, like I’m not really in my body.

“Can you sit up?” Mum says gently.

I hear feet pounding up the stairs.

“What’s going on?” Dad says. “Oh no, Pen, what’s happened?”

I feel his arms around me, big and strong. I somehow find the strength to ease my way into a seated position and lean into him. I can’t stop crying. I want to cry and cry my way back to being a baby again so that I don’t have to worry about anything anymore.

“What happened?” Dad says again softly.

“Is it . . . ? Did you have another panic attack?” Mum says. I hear her moving about behind me, then I feel her wrapping my duvet around me.

I nod, unable to speak. My teeth are chattering like crazy.

“What caused it?” Dad says. He hugs me tightly. I want to stay like this forever, snuggled in a Dad-and-duvet cocoon.

How can I even begin to tell them? Noah lied to me about everything and now the whole world hates me. Or
will
hate me, once they’ve all found out.

“I don’t know,” I mumble. “I was just stressing about going back to school.”

I feel Dad tense. “Has there been any more nonsense about that video? Because if there has I—”

“No. It’s all cool. I was just being silly. And tired. I’m probably still jet-lagged.” I start grabbing at excuses.

“Hmm.” Mum doesn’t sound too convinced.

But one thing I do know for sure in all my panic and confusion is that I can’t dump this on them. I can’t freak them out. I have to try to find a way to sort it myself.

“Do you want a cup of tea?” Mum says.

“Yes please.”

“And how about some breakfast?” says Dad. “Shall I make you some pancakes?”

I nod, even though I’m not at all hungry.

Once they’ve tucked me up in bed and I’ve reassured them that I’m OK, they both head downstairs. I grab my laptop and log on to my blog and delete all of the posts about Noah. Then I change the settings so that no one can post comments. Instantly I feel a tiny bit better, like I’ve managed to shut a door on the haters.

I go back onto my Twitter account. I already have over twenty new notifications. I don’t check them. Instead I fumble around in the settings and finally find the option to delete my profile. A message pops up:
Are you sure you want to delete your account?
I click down hard on
YES
. Another door shut.

I go to Facebook and take my account offline, once again ignoring all the new notifications.

Then I shut my laptop and stare at the wall in front of me. As the brain fog from my panic attack begins to lift a little, I start searching for answers. How has this happened? Who told
Celeb Watch
about me and Noah? Who told them about my blog?

My first thought is Ollie. He’s the only person who knows that Noah is Noah Flynn. But I only told him that I’d met him. I didn’t tell him that anything had happened between us. And there’s no way Ollie knows about my blog. The only person who knows about that is Elliot.

I get a queasy feeling in the pit of my stomach. Surely Elliot wouldn’t have done something like that. But he’s been acting so weirdly about Noah. And he posted that snarky message on my blog yesterday. I never thought he’d do something like that so maybe . . . But Elliot didn’t know Noah’s true identity. Or did he . . . ? I think back to when I showed him the photo of Noah. He’d said something about him looking familiar. Had he recognized him then but not said anything? Is that why he changed the subject so abruptly? Oh my God, did Elliot leak the story? I stare at my bedroom wall, picturing Elliot on the other side, sending an anonymous message to
Celeb Watch
. It’s all beginning to make a horrible kind of sense. Elliot was jealous of Noah and my blogging about
him. Then he saw his picture and realized who he was and he saw the chance to ruin things for good. He must have canceled going out with me yesterday because he already had it planned. And he hasn’t contacted me since. It’s unheard of for Elliot to go so long without knocking on the bedroom wall at least. And he must have seen what’s been happening online. I think of how he reacted when Megan posted the stupid knickers video. How he’d sent me a text to warn me and come around straightaway. But this time I haven’t heard from him at all.

As the terrible truth dawns on me, I feel as if I’ve been punched in the stomach. First Noah and now Elliot. At least I’d only just met Noah—at least I can put what happened with him down to an appalling error of judgment. But Elliot? Elliot and I have known each other forever. He’s my best friend. Or was.

I’m just about to start crying again when Mum comes in with a mug of tea. She places it on my bedside cabinet and sits down on my bed. “Are you sure there isn’t something more specific troubling you, sweetie? Something you want to talk about?”

I shake my head, not daring to talk in case a sob escapes.

“OK, well you know where I am if you change your mind.”

I nod and focus what little energy I have left on forcing my mouth into a smile. After she’s gone, I sit with my eyes closed until Dad arrives with a plate of pancakes.

“I used Sadie Lee’s special recipe,” he says with a grin.

I feel another blaze of pain as I think of how much I’d liked Sadie Lee. But she’s just another person who betrayed me.

After Dad’s gone back downstairs—having made me
promise to yell for him the second I need anything—I put the pancakes down and stare into space. I feel so numb and so exhausted. All I want to do is stay in bed until this all blows over. If it ever does blow over.

Every time the email notification goes off on my phone I feel a stab of fear. In the end I turn my phone off and put it and my laptop in the bottom of my wardrobe, buried beneath a mound of clothes. For a while, this makes me feel safe, like no one can get to me anymore. But then I start picturing a mountain of abusive messages piling up inside my wardrobe, just waiting to engulf me as soon as I open the door.

And once again panic starts to take hold of me. But this time I remember what to do. This time I close my eyes and picture it inside my body: a large black ball of fear inside my rib cage.
It’s OK
, I tell it—and myself.
It’s OK
. And instead of panicking and trying to block it from my mind, I make myself picture it, right there inside of me. All black and dense and scary. I take a deep breath in through my nose. And another. “It’s OK,” I whisper out loud. And the fear starts to shrink a little. And as it does, I realize that it really is OK; it’s not going to kill me. And then another thought pops into my head—what’s happening to me won’t kill me either. Yes, it’s terrifying and yes, it’s hugely painful, but it’s not going to kill me.
It’s OK
. I take another breath. The fear shrinks again. Now it’s about the size of a tennis ball. And it’s slowly fading, from black to grey, to white, and now gold. I take another breath. Outside a seagull squawks. I think of the sea and I actually manage a weak smile.
It’s OK
. I can control this. I picture myself sitting on the beach, my entire body filling with golden sunlight.
It’s OK
.

I sit like this for at least an hour, with my eyes closed, focusing on my breathing and listening to the seagulls. Then there’s a knock on my door.

“Pen, can I come in?” Tom says.

I open my eyes and sit up straight. “Sure.”

As soon as he walks into the room, I know he knows. I’ve never seen him look so worried.

“I’ve just been online,” he says, sitting on the end of my bed. “Is it true? Did you and Noah Flynn . . . ?”

I look down at my lap.

“Is he the Noah Mum and Dad have been going on about? The one you were staying with?”

I nod, then I look up at Tom. “But I didn’t know who he was, honestly. I’d never heard of him before. Had you?”

Tom nods. “Yeah. I’d heard on a music site that he’d been signed to the same label as Leah Brown and that they were an item. Didn’t he tell you?”

I shake my head. “No! I’d never get involved with someone who had a girlfriend.”

Tom frowns. “So he lied to you?”

I nod. “How did you find out?”

“It’s all over Facebook. And Twitter. And Tumblr. And—”

“OK, OK.”

“Have you seen what people are saying?”

I nod again and hot tears start burning my eyes. “I don’t know what to do, Tom. I’m so scared.”

Tom takes hold of my hand. “It’s all right, sis. We’re gonna sort this. How did that website find out?”

“I don’t know. Someone must have told them.”

“But who?”

I shrug. There’s no way I can tell Tom I think it was Elliot—not until I’m absolutely sure.

“OK, well that doesn’t matter for now. What matters is getting your side of the story out there.”

Instantly, I start to panic. “Oh no. I can’t. I can’t go online again. No way.”

Tom looks me straight in the eye. “Do you remember when I started secondary school and that kid Jonathan Price started picking on me and starting rumors about me?”

“The one who used to take your lunch?”

“Yeah. And do you remember how I’d pretend to be sick and beg Mum and Dad not to make me go in?”

“Yes.”

“And then one day you said to me”—Tom puts on a squeaky high-pitched voice—“
But if you don’t ever go back to school, no one will realize that he’s lying
.”

“Did I say that?”

Tom nods.

“But I didn’t sound like a Smurf.”

Tom smiles. “Oh, yes you did. But you were right. And it was the one thing, out of everything that everyone said to me back then, that I actually listened to. It was the one thing that made me go back to school.”

I stare at him. “Really?”

“Yes. Because you were right. If I hadn’t gone back and kept hiding away in my bedroom, everyone would have believed him.” He grins. “And they’d never have got to know what a truly incredible, gifted, and wonderful person I am.”

I smile. “Not to mention modest.”

“Yeah, that too. But it’s the same for you now. If you hide
away and let them say all that crap about you, then they’ll never get the chance to see what an amazing person you are.”

My eyes fill with tears. “Tom!”

“It’s true. You are. And you know that I’ll stick up for you always, but I really think you should say something. Tell your side of the story.” Tom pulls his fierce face, the one he always used to pull when he had play-fights with Dad. “Then I want you to give me Noah Flynn’s address and I’m going to go around there to New York or wherever and I’m going to kill him.”

I laugh.

“I mean it, Pen—well, the bit about telling your side of the story anyway.”

“OK, I’ll think about it.”

“Don’t just think about it—do it. You’ll feel way better. I know I did when I went back to school and told Jonathan Price where he could shove it.” Tom gives me a hug. “Love you, sis.”

“Love you too. Please don’t tell Mum and Dad about what’s happened, though. You know what they’re like about the Internet. I don’t want them worrying.”

Tom nods. “OK. I’ll put off going back to uni for a couple of days, just in case you need me.”

“Really? But won’t you get into trouble?”

“Nah, I never get into trouble.” Tom grins at me and I feel overwhelmed with gratitude. I might have lost Noah and Elliot but I’ll always have my family. The best family in the world.

Chapter Forty

As soon as Tom’s gone, I put my laptop back in my wardrobe and go to run myself a warm bath, rummaging through my basket of bath bombs until I find one called Chill Out Bliss. As the warmth of the fragrant soapy water soaks into my bones, I feel a weird kind of calm. I’m still hurting and sad but I no longer feel helpless. I dunk my head right under the water and feel my hair floating out around me.