Page 37 of I'll Be the One

Almost immediately, the word “Seen” appears below my message. Henry types a response. Or at least, I think it’s Henry until I see the reply.

Skye, this is Henry’s manager, Portia,the message reads.Henry’s at a photo shoot right now. We’re so sorry for the major inconvenience we’ve caused you. Henry actually doesn’t manage his Instagram anymore. I do. We always have notifications off, so I didn’t realize what happened until now. I’ll take the post down immediately.

Hi, Portia, no problem,I reply.Thanks so much for the fast response.

I breathe a sigh of relief. Well, at least Henry and his team are nice people.

Suddenly, my phone starts vibrating. It’s Clarissa.

I let the call go to voice mail, but Clarissa just calls again.

“Skye!” she screams in my ear when I finally pick up. “WHERE ARE YOU? Did you go home already?”

“No, but I’m gonna head back soon.”

“Meet us at the front of school!”

I cringe, wondering if I should have lied and told her I already went home. Even though I do feel bad about isolating myself all day, I really just want to be alone. But I know my friends won’t stop bothering me until I meet up with them.

Clarissa and Rebecca are waiting for me when I reach the front of the school. Rebecca looks just as worried as she did in first period, while Clarissa looks concerned but also kind of jealous.

“YOU WENT ON A DATE WITH HENRY CHO?” Clarissa screams at me. She rushes closer, like she’s about to give me a hard shake, but Rebecca holds her back.

I shoot her a thankful look.

“Why have you been so unresponsive all day?” Rebecca asks. “We’ve been worried.Right, Clarissa?” She gives Clarissa a pointed look.

Clarissa frowns. “Well, yeah. Of course I was worried. But honestly, I’ve been so confused because I had no idea what was going on! I saw your picture on Henry’s Instagram. Everyone’s talking about you. Are you, like, famous now?”

“I... don’t think so?” I say. “And sorry for being nonresponsive. I panicked when everything happened, and then I had to study for my precalc exam in seventh period.”

“Man, brutal day,” says Rebecca.

“Yeah,” Clarissa says, looking a bit guilty. “Hey, want to go get some ice cream? Or shaved ice? You can rant about everything while we eat.”

That’s when I realize that’s exactly what I need right now. My friends aren’t perfect, but they know me. And sometimes, that’s more than enough.

We end up going to a Korean shaved ice place, and I tell my friends about everything over bowls of matcha, red bean, and taro shaved ice. We split the cost of all three flavors and get three spoons, like we always do. Rebecca and I wait until Clarissa finishes taking pictures of our shaved ice before we dig in. We’re pretty much used to it by now. She’s not as obsessive about photos as Henry is, but she’s close.

When I’m done telling them all about my last two weekends and about what happened today, Rebecca asks, “Did he atleast ask for your permission before he posted that picture of you?”

I think back to what Henry said as he took the pictures. I’d said I didn’t mind, without fully realizing what that meant. I tell Rebecca this, and she groans. Clarissa laughs, but then covers her mouth.

“Skye... you really just...” Rebecca trails off. “Wow.”

“For the record,” I say. “I didn’t think he would bother to tag me! Or even post my photo.”

Rebecca sighs. “What am I going to do with you?”

“Wait,” Clarissa says. “Sorry for playing devil’s advocate here, but I still don’t get why all this is a bad thing. Aren’t you in that K-pop competition? Shouldn’t all this publicity be agoodthing? I heard the show factors in popularity votes in the last round. You should be congratulating yourself on what happened! Not beating yourself up. All that exposure!”

In a way, she’s right. And part of me knows I should just grow thicker skin and be thankful for the free publicity. But I also can’t help but feel like there’s no way my friends could ever understand what it was like to see those pig emojis flooding the comments of Henry’s post. Neither of them wears anything larger than a size 4.

Instead of saying anything else, I look down at the sad puddles of melted shaved ice left in our bowls.

“Still,” Rebecca says. “It’s not like Skye was ready for something like this to happen so quickly. The audition hasn’t even aired yet! No one knows who she is.”

“True,” concedes Clarissa. “I guess I didn’t think about that.”

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