3: 3
3
But Alice suddenly panicked, her finger stabbing toward me.
"It was her!"
"Rowena's the one who told me to go to the club. If you're investigating anyone, you should be investigating her character."
For a second I just froze, turning to stare at her.
"What did you say?"
"What does any of this have to do with me?"
Her mother, Evelyn, went white in an instant, her eyes locked on me.
"Rowena Fox, what's that supposed to mean? My Alice says you're the one who sent her there, and you still won't admit it?"
I looked at Alice.
She dragged the blanket tighter and curled herself into a ball,
but I knew her too well.
In my last life, in that courtroom, this was the exact face she'd turned toward the judge.
And then, word by word, she'd delivered all those fabricated lies as testimony.
"Alice, look me in the eyes and say it again."
She didn't dare look at me. She turned her face away and hollered at her mother in a muffled voice.
"It was her… she messaged me, said the place was fun, told me to go…"
"Rowena's jealous of me! She got first in the arts exam herself, and she was scared I'd get into the National Film Academy too and steal her spotlight, so she set me up to make a fool of myself…"
The words came out halting, full of holes.
But Evelyn believed her, and swung her palm at my face.
"Rowena Fox! My Alice treated you like a real sister. Is this how a decent human being behaves?"
"I'm calling your mother right now. I want to see just what kind of thing she raised!"
I dodged the slap easily, and Evelyn stumbled, nearly falling.
She still managed to pull out her phone and dial. "Grace Henson, get to the hospital right now and see the lovely thing your daughter Rowena has done!"
She piled it on thick, twisting the whole story.
My mother's calm voice came through the line.
"Your daughter has two hands and two feet. Did my girl tie her up and drag her to the club?"
"You can't keep your own daughter in line and now you come running to interrogate someone else's? Don't be ridiculous."
"And besides, I know my own daughter. She isn't that kind of person."
With that, my mother hung up.
Evelyn was so furious she called the police right there. "Fine, fine, fine, Rowena Fox, you really are the fine daughter Grace Henson raised."
"Since your mother won't deal with this, I don't believe there's no one who will!"
When the police arrived at the hospital, I was still perfectly calm.
Only then did I finally produce the original video, along with the chat logs.
In them, every single time, I'd urged Alice to focus on her studies and stop running around with that punk, because we still had a bright future ahead of us.
But she'd never once listened.
The last time, she'd answered me coldly.
"Henry isn't some punk. He's my boyfriend."
"Rowena Fox, if you keep trying to stop me from being with him, I won't consider you my best friend anymore!"
After that I'd stopped replying.
The moment those chat logs were laid out for everyone to see,
every onlooker in the hospital was stunned.
"Rowena here seems perfectly decent to me. She never told you to go to a place like that club."
"A best friend this good, and you don't know to treasure her? You turn around and bite her like this?"
"If you ask me, you're the one with no self-respect, and now that something's gone wrong you want to find someone to take the fall for you!"
"Anyone who calls you their best friend must have the worst luck of eight lifetimes!"
The officer, taking all of it in, turned to Alice with a flat expression.
"The evidence here is complete. Do you admit it?"
Alice hadn't made a sound through any of it. Only at the last moment did she suddenly scream.
"Officer, don't believe her!"
"These chat logs are all forged, because Henry is actually Rowena's boyfriend!"
