I'll Be the One Read online

  I only have time to actually look at my phone when I step through the school doors. The notifications are still popping up, with no signs of stopping. This time, though, I’m ready for them. I read what each bubble says.

  Most of the notifications are from Instagram, but there are also a lot of texts. I don’t recognize most of the people who requested to follow or message me on Instagram, so I go to my texts first, glancing up occasionally to make sure I don’t run into people in the hallway. Since it’s way too late for me to meet up with my friends in the cafeteria, I head straight to my locker to get my books.

  Most of the texts are from Clarissa, and most of her messages are just full of emojis and long strings of “OMG.”

  CLARISSA HAN: OMG. OMG OMG OMG OMG. DID YOU AND HENRY CHO GO ON A DATE? OMG SKYE, WHAT’S GOING ON???

  Henry. I finally have an idea about what must have happened. I flash back to him taking photos of me. I didn’t say anything when he took a picture of me, but only because I didn’t think he would post any of them. But apparently, I was really wrong.

  I tap away from the long string of “OMGs”, exiting out of the conversation with Clarissa to read a text from Rebecca. Rebecca rarely texts, so it’s a big deal that she did.

  REBECCA NGUYEN: Um, Skye . . . You might want to check Instagram . . .

  After taking a deep breath, I finally open Instagram to see a post on Henry’s account that went up just a few hours ago. It’s a collection of four photos: the picture I took of Henry, the blazing glory that is the El Flamin’ taco truck, our tacos and fries, and . . . me. Fortunately, it’s a pretty good picture. I don’t look weird and there isn’t any food stuck in my teeth. I’m even smiling the perfect amount, so I’m not grinning too wide in a way that—according to Clarissa—makes me look like a serial killer. The caption simply reads Had fun grabbing tacos with @newskye16.

  He tagged me on Instagram. This must be where all the requests are from.

  I didn’t tell Henry my username, but he must have seen it when I posted the picture of our food on Saturday.

  I’m relieved that, all things considered, the post is relatively harmless. Sure, a few people stared at me when I walked past them in the hallway, but it’s not like Henry is as famous as Taylor Swift or any other mainstream American celebrity. Even still, I’m overwhelmed by how many people thought it was okay to randomly request to follow my private Instagram account just because I was hanging out with Henry. I have two hundred new requests and counting. A lot of them are from complete strangers and bot accounts, but some are from people I know at school.

  I feel utterly grossed out and don’t add any of them. These people never bothered to give me the time of the day before I appeared on Henry’s feed. Why would I become friends with them now?

  Before I can stop myself, I read through the comments on Henry’s post. And I instantly regret it.

  Most of them are pretty harmless, with messages like, “Wow, those tacos look really good!” or “ So handsome!” But there are also endless strings of pig emojis and lots of “oink oink” responses and even some comments that say extreme things like “Go die! Henry is mine.”

  My face heats up as I scroll through the comments. I always hear about celebrities getting bullied off social media, but I never really understood what that was like until now. I know I’m going to have to get used to this if I want to be a K-pop star. And if I were more established, or if I even had a heads-up before this happened, I’d have been more okay with it. But now, I just feel like the wind’s been knocked out of my lungs. And I hate how weak and crappy everything makes me feel.

  I’m thinking about deleting my Instagram when the one-minute-warning bell rings. I grab my books and run to my psychology class, where Rebecca’s waiting in her seat.

  Worry flashes across her face when she catches sight of me.

  “Hey,” she whispers as I sit down in front of her. “Are you okay?”

  Only then do I realize that I’m shaking from head to toe. Aside from the brief, stabbing feelings of hurt and panic, I’ve felt mostly numb this entire morning. But suddenly, under Rebecca’s concerned gaze, I have to fight really hard to not burst into tears. Since I can’t trust myself to say anything without dissolving into a human puddle, I just shake my head.

  “Oh, Skye . . .”

  The tardy bell rings.

  “All right, class,” says Mr. Peterson. “Clear your desks except for a pencil. I hope everyone’s ready for a pop quiz.”

  As if this morning could get any worse . . .

  The quiz is so big a disaster that it makes the Titanic look good. At least some people survived that sinking ship. I’ll be surprised if I don’t get a big, fat zero.

  Rebecca tries to talk to me both during and after class, but I just shake my head. I’ve never been good at talking about bad things when they happen, and today’s no exception. I don’t want to think about the quiz. And I don’t want to think about what happened on Instagram. The only reason I haven’t already run out of the school doors screaming is because I have a precalculus exam during my last period.

  I already failed in one class today. I can’t afford to do the same in another. Mom made it clear multiple times this weekend that she won’t let me go to rehearsals if my grades drop.

  I’m not in the mood to talk to anyone right now—least of all my Henry Cho–worshipping friends—so I go to the library during lunch. My precalc grade is already hanging by a thread. And no way am I retaking the class.

  My phone’s still going off relentlessly, so I slide it to Do Not Disturb mode. I listen to music as I study, going through my usual playlist of K-pop girl-group power anthems. The songs are usually upbeat and loud enough to clear my head even on my worst days, and thankfully, today is no exception. I power through my entire lunch period without even a single thought about Henry or his Instagram post.

  Even with all my studying, the exam is still pretty horrible. But I expected as much, since precalc is my worst subject. I’m glad that I at least finished all the questions this time. And I feel way better about it than I did about the psychology quiz.

  With everything going on today, I’ve been in such a state of anxiety that I didn’t even go to the bathroom. So as soon as the last bell rings, I run to the nearest restroom. Only when I’m sitting on the toilet do I open up my phone again.

  The number of notifications has greatly increased since I last checked them. More follower and message requests on Instagram. More texts. Thankfully, my phone is freezing up a lot less now with Do Not Disturb on. But I still can’t look at the screen for more than a minute before feeling like I can’t breathe.

  And this is all from one single post. How does Henry handle this?

  Before I turn off my phone, I look at my text messages again. My friends kept texting me throughout the school day, and I can tell they’re really worried about me. Even Clarissa stopped her stream of OMGs to ask if I’m okay. I feel bad about leaving them hanging, but I’m too drained to answer everyone individually. So I go to my group chat with Clarissa and Rebecca and say: Hey, I’m okay. Sorry, busy day. I’ll explain everything tomorrow.

  I’m washing my hands in the sink when I realize that I haven’t heard from Henry during the entire day. None of my hundreds of Instagram notifications were from him. He either doesn’t care about what happened to me today or has no idea that anything even happened. I really hope it’s the latter, but heat still rises up inside me as I wonder if this was his plan all along. Was I part of some gimmick so he could get more attention on social media?

  I dry my hands, and I’m about to shoot him a DM on Instagram when two girls I vaguely recognize enter the bathroom. They freeze when they see me.

  “Is that . . .” whispers one of them. I think she’s a freshman, and her name is either Brenda or Brenna Kim. We went to the same Korean school, but I haven’t seen her much since then.

  “It is,” says the other girl.

  In almost perfect unison, they take out t
heir phones and send pictures of me to all their friends on Snapchat.

  Chapter Sixteen

  “HEY!” I YELL. “CAN YOU GUYS STOP? YOU’RE BEING incredibly rude.”

  The two girls gape at me before scurrying out the door. I try to run after them, but by the time I’m out of the bathroom, they’re nowhere in sight.

  “That’s it,” I say. “I’ve had enough.”

  I pull up Instagram and slide into Henry’s DMs. I don’t know Henry’s number, and I don’t know if celebrities like him even check their direct messages, but this is the only thing I can think of doing right now.

  Hey, can you please untag me from the taco truck pictures? Your fans are targeting me on Instagram. And people in school are being ridiculous.

  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 at least 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 a good thing? 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.”

  I give Rebecca’s arm a grateful squeeze. She always knows the right thing to say.

  We’re about to leave the ice cream shop when my phone starts ringing. I do a double take when I see the screen. It says, “No Caller ID.”

  Clarissa grabs my arm so abruptly that my phone almost goes flying out of my hand.

  “Oh my gosh! I bet it’s Henry Cho! He’s calling you. He’s actually calling you!”

  “Shhh!” I say. “Everyone be quiet so I can talk to him. Clarissa, calm down. I don’t want to scare him.”

  Clarissa rolls her eyes at me, but silently nods.

  I accept the call.

  Put him on speaker! Rebecca mouths at me.

  I nod and tap the speaker button. “Hello?”

  “Skye?” Henry’s voice is so sharp that it catches me off guard. I’ve only heard him sound like this when he was telling off Bobby. “Are you okay? Sorry I was MIA all day. I just got out of a photo shoot. Portia got your number from the competition committee. Hope it’s okay that I’m calling you right now. I just wanted to make sure you’re all right.”

  “Yeah,” I say. “I am now. Thanks. And I appreciate you getting in touch with me.”

  Even his voice is hot! mouths Clarissa.

  Rebecca face-palms.

  “Sorry,” Henry says again. “I didn’t realize that something like this could happen. That people would react this way.”

  “It’s fine. You didn’t know.”

  Rebecca elbows me in the gut, knocking the air out of my lungs.

  “Ow!” I hiss.

  “It was not fine,” Rebecca blurts out. “He’s a celebrity. He should have been more responsible!”

  Oh. My. God.

  We all freeze. Clarissa looks like she’s about to scream again, this time in pure horror. I want to scream too. My face heats up, even though Henry is nowhere nearby. Even Rebecca seems shocked at her own outburst.

  There’s nothing but silence on the other end of the line. At first, I think Henry hung up on me. But then he slowly says, “Oh, am I on speaker?”

  “Um . . . yeah, sorry. I was hanging out with my friends and—”

  “We wanted to make sure you’re not a creep!” Rebecca cuts in.

  I love Rebecca, I really do. But right now, she’s giving me serious Asian-mom vibes. Then again, I guess it’s mainly my fault. I really shouldn’t have put my phone on speaker.

  I walk a few steps away from my friends and take my phone off speaker. “Sorry about that. You’re not on speaker anymore.”

  “It’s fine,” Henry says. “I get it. It’s great that your friends are looking out for you like that. And the one that spoke up
—she’s right. I should have been more careful. Sorry, I won’t bother you anymore. Hope you have a good rest of the day.”

  The call ends before I can say anything. Baffled, I stare at my phone for a good long moment.

  “Did he hang up on you?” Rebecca gasps. “After everything that happened today? Wow, he’s trash.”

  I expect Clarissa to defend Henry, but even she’s pursing her lips.

  “I mean, he apologized,” I say. “I don’t know. He sounded really weird. He wasn’t like this before.”

  Except he was, once. I wonder what my friends would say if I told them about what happened between Henry and Melinda. I skipped over that part, since it didn’t seem like my business to tell, but now I wonder if I should have.

  What if this cold and mean Henry was the real Henry all along?

  Chapter Seventeen

  IT TAKES A FEW DAYS FOR THE EXCITEMENT ABOUT Henry and me to die down. Even though Portia deleted the original post, a lot of Henry’s fans and even some online journalists had already taken screenshots of it and shared it elsewhere. Gossip articles popped up about how Henry and I are “dating,” with a lot of them discussing how “interesting” of a rebound I am after Henry’s relationship with Melinda.

  I lose count of the number of times I’ve rolled my eyes. I hang out with Henry one time and people are already calling me a “rebound.” And it’s really disgusting how people think it’s “interesting” for Henry to date “a girl like me.” People are so transparent with their fatphobia sometimes.

  My first instinct is to uninstall all my social media apps, so I don’t see what the thousands of strangers who shared the gossip articles online are saying about me. But since we only have one other official dance practice before the second elimination round, I keep Instagram. I need it to contact Henry.

  But when I message Henry’s account to ask if he wants to meet up sometime to practice, neither he nor Portia responds. They just leave me on “Seen.” After obsessively checking my phone for an hour, I make myself stop. Even though my chances at the dance part of this competition are crumbling into little pieces, I still have the voice portion. And at least that part I can do something about.