Page 52 of You Will Never Be Me

“Oh, Aspen.” Liv puts a hand on my back. “Sorry, guys. Be right back.” I hear her put the phone down, and I rein the sobs back. “Here,” Liv says, handing me a tissue.

I struggle to get control over myself, taking the tissue from her and dabbing at my eyes. “Thanks.”

“Wow,” Liv says, wonderment shining in her eyes. “That was powerful.”

“Really? It was short.”

“Yeah, but you conveyed so much emotion in like, three seconds. That’s amazing. People are going to love it. I’ll post it now.” She picks up her phone and uploads the video, hesitating when she comes to the caption. “What should I put as a caption?”

I blow my nose and think for a bit. “Um…maybe, ‘We just heard about Meredith, and we are devastated. Hashtag RIPMeredith hashtag WeLoveYouMeredith.’ ”

“Perfect,” Liv says, typing rapidly. She tags me and posts the video. “Okay, let’s do another one? Maybe a longer one this time. I’m thinking over three minutes, since the algorithm likes that length now?”

I nod. Three minutes sounds like an awfully long time, but I have so much to share—so many overwhelming emotions that I need to let out. This is exactly what I need to do right now. This is exactly what Meredith would’ve wanted me to do. It’s the least I can do for her.

Liv and I spend the next hour making more content. We do everything: Stitches with news reels, where we share a snippet of news and then react to it. (“The body of thirty-two-year-old Meredith Lee has been uncovered in a lake a hundred miles outside of Los Angeles.” Cut to me and Liv, in tears. Me: “A lake. I can’t believe it. Someone took my best friend out into the middle of nowhere and left her there.” Liv: “It’s sick. It’s disgusting. Who would do such a thing?”). We share more photos and videos of Meredith in which I wax on about what an amazing mom and friend Meredith was, and how I vow to help look after little Luca for the rest of my life. (Me: “I swear to Meredith—I know she’s up there listening, I love you so much, Mer—I swear to you, I will take care of Luca. Don’t you worry. He will be loved.” Liv: “Meredith would be smiling down at you right now.”) We post about women’s rights, and how important it is to raise little boys into good men. (Me: “She was killed by some sick fuck who thought he was entitled to her life, just because she was a woman. You are going to be caught, you asshole. You’re going to be behind bars for the rest of your fucking life. Justice for Meredith!” Liv: “Justice for Meredith! That’s right.”)

At one point, Ben comes out of the home office and strides toward the front door. He pauses long enough to say, “I’m going out for lunch. I’ll pick up the twins from school.” He only glances at us for a split second, just enough for me to catch the sneer still snug on his face. My cheeks grow warm. I have no doubt that he’sbeen listening to Liv and me this whole time, probably judging every word we say. Well, he can fuck right off. Easy to take the high road when you know you’ve got someone on the ground to count on.

But I don’t dwell on Ben’s contempt. There is no room in my attention span for Ben right now, because everything is blowing up. We are reaching numbers previously unheard of. The little ten-second video of me breaking down, posted a mere hour ago, has already reached nine million views. My follower counts are shooting up in real time. Seven and a half million followers on TikTok. #JusticeForMeredith is already trending everywhere. My phone is still on Silent mode, and I get missed call after missed call. A few of them are from Clara. She’ll need to wait; I’m busy getting her even more donations for her GoFundMe account.

“Oh my god, we are growing so fast,” Liv says, echoing my thoughts. “This is amazing. I’m so glad that we’re able to help Meredith.”

The absurdity of her statement does not escape me. Surely, Meredith is beyond help now. But I know what Liv meant, and I can’t be mad at her because I’m so grateful that she’s here. Every detail that is revealed about Meredith sickens me, and without Liv here, I would’ve lost it for sure. But because of her presence, I’m forced to keep myself together, and I’m thankful for it. Sabine stirs then and starts to cry.

“Break time, I guess,” I say. Good timing, as I feel so empty after all that crying and talking in front of the camera.

“I’ll order us lunch,” Liv says. “Kale salad okay?”

“Yeah.”

“With or without avocado?”

“With.” I need the extra calories to keep shooting videos. I’mjust picking Sabine up from her crib, inhaling the sweet warm scent of her, when I hear Liv curse.

“Uh, Aspen?”

Something in Liv’s voice makes my ears prick up. “Yeah?”

“I think you need to come out and see this.”

Sabine smiles at me, cherubic and delightful and so utterly distracting. “What is it?”

“It’s Tanya. And she’s saying some really bad stuff. About you.”

Tanya. It takes a second for me to place the name. When I do, my insides turn to ice. Tanya Dylan. The influencer who had posted videos with Meredith months ago, declaring herself as Meredith’s BFF. The mega-influencer who, for whatever reason, seems to hate myguts.

26

I can’t get to the livingroom fast enough. Sabine whines, but I barely hear it as I run down the hallway with her bouncing in my arms. I pause just long enough to deposit her in the playpen, ignoring her complaints, and leap to Liv’s side. Liv looks up from her phone, and the expression on her face is unreadable, but one thing’s for sure: she’s not looking at me the way I’m used to.

“Um, let me just—start it from the beginning,” she mumbles.

She taps at the video, and Tanya appears: her face perfectly done up as usual, her bee-stung lips glossy, her skin smooth as silk. “I can’t keep silent anymore, you guys,” Tanya says. “I haven’t said anything out of respect to Meredith, and also because…” She pauses, sighs. “Okay, I guess part of me was scared. Aspen has a huge following, and I didn’t want to turn myself into a target.”

What? My lips part. What in the world am I listening to right now? With just one sentence, Tanya has turned me into a villain.

“But I heard the news about Meredith’s death, and then I saw all these videos that Aspen’s been posting about how they were best friends, and they were soulmates who did everything together, and I can’t stand it anymore. I’ve just—I’ve had it with all the lies. You guys deserve the truth. So here it is.” She pauses for dramatic effect, and in the short silence, my blood pressure shoots up. “Aspen and Meredith werenotbest friends. In fact, Aspen had hurt Meredith. Hurt her deeply. See, when Meredith found Aspen, she was nothing more than a wannabe YouTuber, floundering, going nowhere. Meredith was the one who showed her the ropes. She reached down the ladder and basically heaved Aspen up. That was the kind of person Meredith was. She was—” Here, Tanya’s voice cracks, and she pauses to take a breath. “Meredith was one of the most generous and kind people I knew. But when Aspen became big, she ditched Meredith completely. Like, we’re talking complete ghost mode, you guys. She’d overtaken Meredith by then, and she started being condescending toward Meredith. She only had time for her new influencer friends. This bitch dropped Meredith like a pile of hot bricks. And you know she is perfectly capable of it. Nobody buys that helpless nice-person act she puts on. You’ve all seen that video of her screaming at some poor woman and calling her a ghoul by now, right?”

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