SETH
I stared at the screen, watching Staysha getting fucked for the zillionth time.
"How do you know it's not me? She’s moaning my name!”
"I can hear just fine." Emily sounded annoyed. "Look at the hand holding her."
She paused the video and zoomed in further. A male hand splayed on Staysha's ass came into clear view. The video was a little grainy, but one could see the hand clearly.
"Do you notice a small tattoo just below the thumb and the forefinger?"
I looked closely. It was a tattoo design of an Anchor.
She reached out for my right hand and inspected the place there. A zing of pleasure went through my body as her fingers traced that part of my skin and I was finding it hard to concentrate on what she was saying because my body was humming with her touch.
"Are you listening to what I'm saying?"
"Yeah...I heard you."
She put her hands on her hips and shot daggers at me. "Repeat what I said."
"Sorry."
"I was saying. This can't be you unless you got some laser removal surgery and got the tattoo removed."
"I never did that." I explained, "The only tattoos I have are on my left arm, my chest and a dragon on my back."
"So that proves my theory that this is some other guy." Her eyes glimmered mischievously.
I couldn't believe this girl. She was helping me clear my name. The shame that they had put me through for the entire day could be wiped out because of what Emily-Mae had just discovered.
"I'm confused, though. Why would you agree to record a sex video?" she looked up at me, doing that adorable thing with her eyes again that made my heart go pitter-patter. Did I mention she had lovely long lashes and a cute as fuck bottom lip that I could latch onto for an eternity and suckle.
"Seth?"
"Uh...Staysha got off on it."
She made a face.
"It was never my idea. She liked the boys to take videos of her having sex with them and I was never game for it, but she pleaded with me for days and finally got her wish on her birthday. I never thought it was a big deal, you know? She took videos with everybody. Which girl in her right mind would ever make her own sex video go viral?" I sighed, "I asked her to delete the video the next day and made sure it was gone."
"Well, you made a rookie mistake. We all know high school is everything about scandal and drama."
I groaned, "I'm really sorry, Emily."
"Why are you apologizing to me for?"
"I don't know." I said simply, "I'm not that kind of guy...I just made a lot of mistakes."
"Clearly." She rolled her eyes. "Are you still...
"Messing around with other girls? No, I'm not." I blurted out.
"I was asking...are you still with Staysha?"
"Hell no. Remember, I went out to dinner the other day? It was to break things off with her. Staysha and I were never serious because she knew I didn't do relationships, I mean...at least not until now...and I thought she would be cool with that."
The way she kept looking at me like that made me nervous and hot. I shifted from one foot to the other. Damn! Where was that confidence and finesse that I used to have when I approached girls before? I was a blubbering mess for Emily.
That answer seemed to please her.
I threw a quick glance around the room. This was the first time I'd entered her bedroom. I did a quick survey of it, mostly just out of curiosity and almost cracked up when I saw the fluffy Princess pink bed, the same kind that I imagined she would have. A long full-body mirror was on one side, bookshelf by one side of the wall and two other doors to the room which I assumed would be a walk-in dressing closet and an attached bath.
A crystal chandelier hung low. The room was so spacious, my entire old apartment would fit into this. I noticed the window that had a clear view of the studio that I currently lived in.
"That means she has a reason to make the video viral." Emily said thoughtfully.
"I guess. Well, it doesn't matter if it was me or someone else. We can't prove anything."
"Do you want to get back to her for doing this? I would certainly help you."
"Nah, it's cool. I mean, if she was a guy I would have probably murdered her ass, but I'm not really keen on dragging this. The talk will die down."
"But you will most likely be sitting in the principal's office by the end of this week! And you will take the blame for this, Seth. You could lose your scholarship.”
"You're right. I don't know what to do."
"Perry Foster."
Dude played on the basketball team. He was also the guy that Staysha was hanging out with in the parking lot, and screwing around occasionally.
"What about him?" I asked.
"He has the Anchor tattoo on his hand."
My eyes probably bulged out of their sockets as I recalled that particular detail. "Fuck! You're right."
"Maybe the term you're looking for is 'Genius," Emily wiggled her eyebrows.
"Totally. More like a Goddess." Then I realized something else, "but that still doesn’t explain why she's moaning my name."
"Have you heard of voice-over softwares? It is possible that she got someone's help who is good at this and changed the frequency of the pitch to match yours."
“I didn’t think of that.”
"Okay, leave this to me. I'm going to make sure your name is cleared." She sat down in her chair and started clicking on the laptop furiously. You'd think the FBI appointed the girl to get this classified job done.
I leaned against her chair as I watched her clicking on Photoshop. “What are you doing?”
"I asked you to let me handle this. The truth needs to come out. This isn't for revenge, only so we could clear your name." She reached out to take a cracker I'd prepared and popped it into her mouth. "This is so good...hmm..."
Chanel was curled up in the center of Emily's bed like a huge fluff ball, staring up at me with large grey eyes. She had a feeling I was a peasant, and watched me with curious interest when I usually cleared her litter-box as if I was scooping the turd balls to sell them in the Farmer's market to make a huge profit that she wasn't getting any share of.
I don't recall being envious of a cat before. Chanel didn't have to worry about high school, or making money, she just lay around Emily's bed all day, every day.
Something I would have loved to do.
Emily was so engrossed in whatever that she was doing, she hardly paid me attention as I stood at the door admiring her.
"Anything else you need me to do, Emily?"
She shooed her hands. "Go do your homework or something. You don't have to play housekeeper every single minute you're in this house." She scolded me.
I chuckled, "I'm in the studio if you need something. Just Text me."
"If this works out, you're treating me to your world famous blue-berry cheese cake."
"Deal." I agreed, walking out of the room and shutting it behind me.
My heart worked into an excessive overdrive thinking about the fact that she'd just called my cheesecake a world class, the best in her words.
* * *
EMILY
I hadn't helped Seth out of pity. I kind of felt bad for the guy, and okay, maybe eighty percent of the reason I had done this was because I liked him, but the other twenty percent was only for the food he made me each morning that had impressed me to no ends.
This guy could have girls eating from his palm after they had a taste of deserts that he could whip. I guess his cooking talent came from his mother.
I drove to school that morning feeling proud of myself.
There's a school website, a secret one, the type that is used mostly for unnecessary drama, scandals and all the spicy gossip. Seth's video had circulated on that particular website. It was still up there as a grim reminder of his stupidity.
But we were all teenagers, and we did a lot of stupid things, so that didn't mean that we should judge him all year for a single mistake.
Seth told me he wasn't messing around with other girls anymore, and that had me skipping to school.
Anyway, so back to this website. It had a feature where you could make a thread anonymously and post the juicy details.
I made a post titled "What is the truth?”
And then I posted a video below explaining why she could be lying. I showed a picture of Perry's anchor tattoo, and posted the same clip that had gone viral, but my video was zoomed, and non-grainy version revealing the Anchor tattoo on the hand that was holding Shaysha.
MilkshakeGirl17: oh my god, guys, see this! My guy just showed me the video, and we noticed something so FREAKY, so I made a comparison video. It's so clear that the guy in the sex video is not Seth Monroe. What do you all think? 🤔
It had taken exactly ten minutes for the website to blow up. I know this because I'd spent my time breaking the refresh button.
Starbucks45: HOLY MOLY! 😱@MilkshakeGirl17, you're right girl! I don't think Seth has that tattoo 🤭
QueenBee has entered the chat
QueenBee: my mind is blown! 🤯 It is so clear in the video that the guy dicking the girl is Perry! 😒 I'm so mad I didn't notice this first.
MilkshakeGirl17: I thought it was weird too.
ILoveBacon420: I love this recent development 😂 I'm all for the drama folks.
QueenBee: No wonder she would do that. I had seen her yesterday afternoon after school fooling around with Perry 😅😈 👀
Starbucks45: Omg! Same 😅 and I thought it was weird. She wasn't acting like a victim at all.
I was scrolling through the messages on the website that morning by my locker, it had crossed five hundred comments and two thousand likes.
Perry was going through what Seth had, and he didn't seem happy. He passed a heated glare towards Seth and even shouldered past him in the hallways.
Seth noticed me, our eyes met, and there was gratitude in his expressions and something else that I couldn’t point my finger on.
He smiled and waved at me. I waved back. He glanced down at his phone and began typing.
A second later, my phone buzzed.
Seth: Thank you ❤️
Me: just don’t forget the blueberry cheesecake you promised ❤️❤️
Seth: It will be ready when you get home❤️❤️❤️
It’s like we were having some kind of heart emoji competition.
Me: oh, and I don’t share ❤️❤️❤️❤️😘