Chapter 3

13 My brother gave me a nudge, his voice low. "Watch it, Kat. I can't take him in a fight." "Right. I'll shut up now." Sometimes you gotta know when to fold 'em. And I'm a fast learner. 14 I was busy devouring my crawfish when a photo of Ethan holding Emily suddenly went viral. The caption, get this: "Encountered a violent assault. This guy was protecting his girlfriend the whole time. This is the kind of boyfriend you need." Seriously? The comments were all gushing, people practically worshipping Emily. I mean, I guess I was a little jealous. You could see my hand in the bottom right corner of the photo, along with a smear of blood. What a joke. I finished off the rest of the crawfish, polishing them off faster than those two could peel. 15 I thought it was over. I'd even managed to sell the house I'd bought, outright. The buyer? Some hardcore debt collector, looked like he could snap someone in two. He tossed Ethan out three times. Ethan, with what little money he had, rented a place for Emily. He had to go back to living in the dorms. But then, my Weibo blew up. All those posts I'd made about our relationship, Ethan and me, now they were flooded with hate. The top comment, the one with the most likes, screamed: "Go die, you homewrecker! If you were the real girlfriend, why didn't he save you? Go dig up your ancestors, they're probably rolling in their graves because of you!" I was shaking, I was so furious. And then Emily, that snake, replied to one of the comments, saying she was the girl in the photo. She even had the guts to comment on my Weibo, all sweet and sour: "As long as Ethan's happy, that's all that matters. He was protecting me the whole time, after all." After that, it was like a war zone. People were leaving comments, split between praising Emily and spewing the most disgusting things at me. So, I did something petty. I liked that top comment, the one cursing me out. Then, I took a screenshot, tagged Ethan, and wrote: "You and I both know the truth. It's noon now. If you haven't cleared things up by 8 PM, I'm going to ruin you and your little mistress." I also got my uncle to help. He sent out legal notices to those trolls, threatening to sue. They didn't back down. They dug up my address, my name. I started getting threats. 16 Eight PM. Ethan hadn't said a word. The hate against me hit a new level, and now they were going after my family. So, I posted all the proof I had of our relationship, everything from the past few years. I even had a private investigator dig up dirt on Emily - turns out, she'd dumped Ethan for money a year and a half ago. I posted screenshots of our WeChat conversations from the past two weeks, showing how many times he'd bailed on me, all the crap I'd put up with because of her. I made it into a video. Then, I added the recording of Emily's little performance in the hospital room, her taunting me. I captioned it: "When Ethan and I were together, he bent over backward for Emily. Even during that attack, I, his actual girlfriend, got stabbed three times. He shielded her, and she didn't even get a scratch. He kept saying he was just protecting the public. Since when is Emily the only member of the public? You two are nothing but a cheater and a homewrecker! Stop hiding behind your lies!" I bought a trending hashtag and hired some writers to post about how I'd been wronged, spreading it across every platform I could think of. Within three hours, Ethan and Emily were being dragged through the mud. People found their addresses, their schools, their workplaces. One comment was particularly intense: "I'm near that homewrecker, Emily. I'm gonna go pay her a visit!" Then, someone posted a video of Emily being chased down the street, people yelling at her, throwing rotten vegetables and eggs. She was crying, looking pathetic. But no one felt sorry for her. 17 Ethan borrowed someone's phone to call me. He started yelling right off the bat: "Why are you doing this to Emily? She almost jumped off a building today! Do you want her dead?!" I kept my voice level. "I'm pretty sure you saw Emily's shady replies. I told you to clear things up. What were you doing? Did you not see them dragging my ancestors through the mud?" He sputtered, "Emily said a lot of the comments were really sweet, and she wanted to read more of them. I was going to clarify things!" "So, I deserve to be dragged through the mud? Tell me, what did I post that wasn't true?" "And another thing, Ethan, you seem to have forgotten. We're broken up. I don't owe you anything. What gives you the right to question me?" He started breathing heavily on the other end of the line. "Kat, I'm sorry. I messed up. Can we please get back together?" "I know you still don't think you did anything wrong. But why didn't you help that homeless woman at the hospital?" "You were so wishy-washy. You felt sorry for her, and you thought I could handle it, so you kept hurting me to protect her. Do you even realize you're just like your dad? Why don't you tell this story to your mom, without the names, and see what she says?" "You should also remember what I was like when we first met. Are you sure you can handle me?" 18 Emily tried to flip the script. She kept insisting that I was the other woman, that I was the one who broke up her and Ethan. But no one believed her anymore. Her company fired her. And without me to bail him out, Ethan couldn't help his damsel in distress anymore. He was in deep trouble himself. The police academy put out a statement saying he was being expelled for his serious personal misconduct.