“That was such a dick move.” Saying, she fishes her phone out to call a specific powerful person.
Louis lifts the call, “Louis, can you track back a picture of who’s cyberbullying me?”
“Cyberbullying? What the fuck happened again?”
“Someone posted a picture of me sucking someone’s dick. I wanna know who that is. Right now.”
“What!? Jeez, I’m going to kill that bastard.” Cassandra cuts the call.
The second bell was rung as the classes commenced all over the campus. However, Cassandra races down the hallway towards a specific target. She wanted to confirm if that person was behind everything that was happening to her.
“Ravine!” She roars her name. Interrupting the roll call, she enters the class and dismisses the teacher, asking her to leave.
“You whore,” Lifting Ravine by her collar, Cassandra makes a huge commotion out of the mishaps and false pieces of information spread about her.
“Were you the one behind my photoshops and shit? The letters… I know it was you.” Ravine doesn’t answer. Pulling her closer, Cassandra spits through her teeth in boiling, bubbling anger.
“Answer me, dammit!” Ravine turns to look at the dishevelled girl.
“I have no reason to do those things to you, Cassandra. I wouldn’t stoop so low to bully you.” Cassandra clenches her jaw. For an odd reason, she finds genuineness in Ravine’s eyes.
Pushing her back into her seat, she angrily watches the girl against the silent classroom background.
“At least feel a bit of sympathy for me, you fucker. I’m facing all these without the help of my brothers or my friends. You aren’t here when I need you the most. I hate you. I HATE YOU, RAVINE!” banging on her desk; Ravine almost flinches at her angered expression. When Cassandra duly concludes that Ravine wasn’t the one behind those absurd images and the hateful letters, she walks out of the classroom with heavy steps.
She drives herself back home, a little under the weather because of everything hoarded on her shoulders. She was responsible for the peace that she had to maintain for the Cassandra of this Era. But it seems as though her undying wit and courage were clapping back on her, taking everything away from her that she built with her own personality.
“Ugh, why am I even bothering about them? They don’t deserve a bit of my peace. It’s not even my life that I’m living.” She mumbles to herself.
That’s right.
It wasn’t her life to begin with.
After a few moments, her phone rings, and she picks up to say the most boring, “Hello?”
“Cassie, we couldn’t trace their location. They’re good with hacking somehow.”
“Hmm…”
“Hey, you alright?”
“Yeah. I just came back home and I’m a li’l sleepy-”
“Cassie, are you kidding me? Are you feeling sleepy when someone is spreading fake pictures of you out there? You’re gonna be printed in the newspaper tomorrow if we can’t find them! Do you know anyone in specific who is capable of doing this to you?” Louis asks at the end.
“Yeah. I thought it was Ravine, but I knew she wouldn’t do such a thing to me. I confronted her and well… she wouldn’t do it. I believe her.”
“You’re being too lenient, Cassandra. She broke up with you and Alex just because we’re Johnsons. Jealousy is the worst kind of disease there is.” Louis speaks facts, Cassandra sighs loudly as she says, “I don’t care anymore, Louis. Could you just ask someone to delete the picture from the internet on the whole?”
“I’ve already done that.”
“Thank you. I’ll go to sleep now. I’m fucking tired of everyone’s mess.”
“Okay. Don’t do anything stupid.”
“Yeah.”
At around 2, Zayn comes back from his internship early with permission. He barges into the house, and he sees Cassandra on the couch, enjoying popcorn and watching TV. Most importantly, she looked so unbothered and unfazed.
“Cassie?”
“Hi.” She softly says, an annoying bored expression on her face.
“Aren’t you the slightest bit bothered with what’s happening around you? About you?” Zayn says, walking towards her.
“This is the life of someone rich, someone who isn’t me. If I try to indulge anything more than usual, I’m not being myself.”
“I understand. But do you suspect anyone?” He asks the same question.
“Maybe Ravine, but…” she explains to the details as he cools down as well.
In the evening, Alex and Dan express their concern about the issue again. Cassandra grows tired of everyone asking her the same thing. Zayn prayed that she wouldn’t snap at them like she did yesterday. Cassandra snapping at them without a trigger was nasty, and it was going to break the bonds between them as siblings.
He tells her to be calm and is vigilant of her behaviour for the whole day.
“It’ll die down. Don’t worry.” She says to her brothers and Framton. It was as if her confidence in Louis deleting it from the face of the internet was enough to be unbothered about the mishap.
“This is how you’d face the real world, Cassandra?” Framton asks the girl.
She wasn’t sure how to answer his question. Framton turns to Louis who is looking down at his lap as well.
“Cassandra,” he calls the girl; she lifts her head to look at the old man, “Do you realise that this is just the beginning?”
Cassandra nods after thinking about it.
“Yes, papa. I’m strangely aware now. Even if Lousi can’t handle the problem, I can surely not give a fuck about it. Ignorance is bliss because everyone wants to see my reaction to it. I know it’s not true; better not respond to it, too.” Framton nods, acknowledging her.
“On that note, why don’t you make a tie with the CBI to keep yourself safe?”
“How do I do that?”
And yet again, Framton teaches her the way to be rich and the ultimate online security structure to keep petty fake news from the bay.
She liked the structure, but then again, it was the CBI, and she should be diplomatic enough to confirm whether the news was fake or not.
And after that day, Cassandra was protected by the ultimate weapon from cyberbullying.
Although, someone at a distance was watching everything. She was growing jealous and delusional.
It was forming into a sickness.