Page 38 of Everyone Is Lying to You

Cricket waves her hand in the air as if to say this information just exists in the atmosphere, and maybe it does. “Everyone’s been talking about it for a year. It’s also all over the snark sites.”

The snark sites have become a media ecosystem all to themselves. I only recently found them when I began researching Bex for a potential story. They’re simple threads, usually on Reddit, and they’re essentially burn books of nastiness and unsubstantiated rumors.

“Search ‘Veronica Smith and Grayson Sommers’ and stuff will come up.”

That’s helpful. While I can’t write about a rumor, Icanwrite about someone else writing about rumors with a link to the sites. A dodgy loophole for sure.

“Wait…the Smith triplets? If they’re called the Smith triplets that means none of them changed their names when they all got married? That seems completely against everything they talk about online about how their husbands rule their households,” I say to the woman who just asked her husband for permission to speak to me.

“Oh, they changed them. Their names are definitely legally changed. The Smith triplets are just like their stage names or whatever you want to call them. Probably their manager’s idea.”

“Interesting.” I’m already clicking over to the snark sites, though I want Cricket to keep talking as long as possible. She seems more than happy to, but she also seems to have run out of information, because she starts fiddling with her napkin.

“The last part of all that was off the record, you said. Right?”

“For sure.”

“But you can include the part where I said I idolize Rebecca. I truly do. I respect her so much.”

She doesn’t. But she wants her name in my article.

“Of course,” I lie to her. She won’t be in the story unless she answers my next question.

I’ve made a command decision in the past ten minutes to level with every woman I speak to here and ask them exactly what I want to know. What do I have to lose?

“Do you really think Rebecca didn’t do it?”

Cricket bites her lip and looks behind her again. “I don’t.”

“Do you think Rebecca is in danger?” I ask.

She doesn’t hesitate. “If she’s alive. Then yes.”

We both sit there and let that sink in for a moment.

“Have you been to her ranch?” I ask. Even though I know the two aren’t close, I assume the answer is yes since Rebecca and Cricket seem to have run in the same circles in the same tight-knit community. But she shakes her head.

“Rebecca is super-duper protective of the ranch. Or at least she was. I heard she was planning some event there for next month. She’s been reaching out to florists and caterers and a big tent rental company. That’s what some of the girls told me.”

That lines up with what Olivia said about Bex wanting to take her brand more public.

“It looks beautiful on her account though, doesn’t it?” Cricket says. “It’s always been my dream. That much acreage, all those animals, living off the land. It’s perfect. She’s truly influenced all of my influencer aspirations.”

Nothing in Rebecca’s life was perfect. Cricket knows that and I know that, and yet the gauzy fever dream persists.

“I should head out,” she finally says. “I’ve been trying to find a way to get home, but my flight isn’t for a couple of days and the airlines are such a pain. We won’t get reimbursed for the room either. Chad is so mad. My mother-in-law was watching the kids for me and it’s a disaster back there. My husband is a terrible babysitter. But DM me anytime and don’t forget to tag me in your story.” She stands and then turns to offer her hand for me to shake, like we are making some kind of deal. Her handshake is firm and decisive, yet another surprising thing about her.

“Have you heard anything about, you know, what she cut off?” Cricket whispers while our hands are still clasped. I’ve been trying my best not to think about the severed body part rumors. And yet I also can’t shake the memory of an old video on Rebecca’s Instagram from a few years back where she very cleanly and easily castrated a young male bull.

“I haven’t heard anything,” I say.

When she’s gone, I step outside. I want to call Peter again.

I’m on the edge of the patio, creeping my way to that terrifying bridge and the inky blackness below. I don’t have the courage to step onto it, so I waver on the edges. Peter answers on the first ring with a jolly “Good evening, my love.” I can hear our children screaming in the background and I picture them naked, finding ways to annoy each other while Peter calmly sips his beer. He would never call what he does babysitting. Maybe in the beginning of having kids, but not anymore.

“You want to stay, don’t you? You want to report this out,” hepresumes before I can say anything. Some days it feels like my sweet, handsome husband doesn’t know me at all and then he lobs a surprise insight my way and I realize that no one will ever know me better.

“I want to find out what happened to Bex,” I say. And I do. I want that, but I’m also now completely activated by the thrill of reporting this out. It’s what I’ve always loved the most, chasing down a story, discovering something before anyone else.

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