When you write a message to a former friend, then add a stranger and a former enemy

My high school friends have been unfriending me in waves. It’s been happening for months. But they aren’t just unfriending me. They’re unfriending my best friends too, and even people I thought we were all still on good terms with. They’ve kept the Facebook friendships coming from a small percentage of classmates, but it’s pretty obvious that those friendships are likely whatever is left of the high school cliques I was never a part of. The acne-ridden football player, the cheerleader who got the best grades, the late bloomer who smoked weed in the toilet. <br><br>It started with Julia. She didn’t unfriend me but wrote a scathing message. “You should just kill yourself,” she said. “You’re so pathetic. You’re disgusting.”<br><br>At first I was in shock. What had I done? Why would she say such things? Then I realized it must just be a bad day for her. Maybe she had expected me to take the rap for her shoplifting or something, and then I told her the truth, and now she thinks I’m the devil. Maybe she was misled by the fact that I’d somehow gotten dropped from the Plot Thickens list of suspects. <br><br>“Maybe she’s still mad that I didn’t tell Marc and Natalie about her and Paul,” I said to Nathan.<br><br>“You’re really blaming her for your problems?” Nathan asked. “That’s weird.”<br><br>“I’m just speculating,” I said. “I don’t have any reason to be mean to her. I have no motive. Let’s just go over the facts.”<br><br>“They aren’t your friends,” Nathan said.<br><br>“At least they are people I know. You don’t understand.”<br><br>“Yeah, I know what it’s like to have a friend in high school who betrayed me,” Nathan said. “And that person is you.”<br><br>I ignored Nathan and wrote a message to Julia. “Why are you writing me hurtful messages?” I said. “We were always good friends. I’m still happy to help you with anything that you need. I have always been very generous. But I don’t take well to being badmouthed. Please stop it.”<br><br>“I’m not talking about you,” she wrote back. “I know you’re a little dim-witted but that should be obvious. I’m talking about the person you think you are.”<br><br>I stared at the screen, confused for a moment, and then I realized that she must have added a third person to the thread. “Wait a minute,” I said. “Who is this?”<br><br>“Hi,” I heard a voice I hadn’t heard in years. “You’re just figuring out that it’s not you?”<br><br>“Courtney,” I said. “You shouldn’t be involved in this conversation.”<br><br>“I don’t know why you’re getting death threats,” the voice said. “But I’m a witness to it. So that makes me your friend.”<br><br>I stared at the screen. Then I started typing. “This is so unreal,” I said. “All of these years I was running around making sure you were happy. When something went wrong, you were the first person I called. And now you’ve been gaslighting me for months.”<br><br>Julia chimed in. “You’ve been gaslighting us too,” she said. “Or fake gaslighting or whatever it is.”<br><br>“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I said.<br><br>“You’ve been telling us all that you’re the missing child,” she said. “We all knew that was a lie.”<br><br>“I’m not trying to gaslight anyone,” I said. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”<br><br>“You’re creepy as hell,” Julia said. “We’re blocking you now.”<br><br>Courtney wrote again. “She thinks you’re the missing child, but I knew you weren’t.”<br><br>“I never wanted to be the missing child,” I said. “I was never trying to fool anyone into thinking I was someone I wasn’t.”<br><br>“She told me that she believed you were the missing child and that the reason you were so feral was because you had to live off the land for years.”<br><br>“I lived off the land for years?”<br><br>“She believed that. Because you were so feral.”<br><br>“I never lived off the land for years.”<br><br>“Obviously,” Courtney said. “We were all in high school together.”<br><br>“Wait, so the opposite is true,” I said. “She was gaslighting me by trying to convince me that I was *not* the missing child?”<br><br>“Yes,” Courtney said. “I think she’s been gaslighting people for years. Her mom was the same way.”<br><br>“She was so mean to me,” I said. “Do you think we can talk about this in person?”<br><br>“Yes,” Courtney said. “I’ve always wanted to.”<br><br>I met her at a restaurant I’d never been to before. When she walked in, I didn’t recognize her at first. She was taller and thinner. Her skin was glowing. Her hair was a shade darker than I remembered.<br><br>“I know you’re a vegan and other things now,” I said. “But do you still have bad acne?”<br><br>“I don’t have bad acne,” she said. “And it never really was that bad.”<br><br>I held up my phone. On the screen, there was a photo of a person with blackheads and red rashes. “This is you, right?”<br><br>“I never had a Facebook page,” Courtney said. “I don’t know who that is.”<br><br>“Wait a minute. You have been gaslighting me too.”<br><br>“Yes, I have.”<br><br>“You put up an imposter Facebook to make me think you were fat and ugly?” I said. “Who would do that?”<br><br>“I’m your enemy,” Courtney said. “If you’ve realized that by now, then all of this has been worth it.”<br><br>“Why would you be my enemy?”<br><br>“You’ve been gaslighting me for years.”<br><br>“How have I been gaslighting you?” I said.<br><br>“You told me I was a victim,” she said. “I thought that was a joke at first. But you kept saying it. You were so much older than me. I thought you were smarter. And you convinced me that I was a victim.”<br><br>“You were a victim,” I said. “The whole school was against you.”<br><br>“The school wasn’t against me,” she said. “I was never more popular. And you were never more hated.”<br><br>I thought about it for a moment. She was right. I had been the one getting bullied in high school. Courtney had been the one doing it to me.<br><br>“So you’ve been talking to Julia,” I said. “And organizing my old classmates against me.”<br><br>“Yes, I have.”<br><br>“I hope you haven’t told them,” I said. “But they will never believe you.”<br><br>“Believe me about what?” she asked.<br><br>“About the fact that I’m not who I thought I was.”<br><br>“I never told them that,” she said. “Because that’s not what I believe.”<br><br>“What do you believe?”<br><br>“I believe you’re him.”<br><br>I laughed. “So that’s what you’ve been telling them,” I said. “You’re saying I’m the person who kidnapped and murdered a child.”<br><br>“I am saying you’re him. And I believe it.”<br><br>I laughed again. “I guess you’re just jealous.”<br><br>“Jealous of what?”<br><br>“You don’t have to tell me,” I said. “I know you’ve always been jealous. That’s the reason you were so mean to me in high school. You were jealous. But you’re still jealous.”<br><br>Courtney leaned in. “I’m not jealous of you,” she said. “I’m jealous of her. Everyone is jealous of her. Because she cut you off early. And now you act like you all had this great friendship when really you didn’t.”<br><br>“She didn’t have the opportunity,” I said. “Because you were bullying her. She didn’t have the chance to cut me off.”<br><br>“Oh, poor you,” Courtney said. “You still think she was your friend. But she wasn’t. She was my friend. She was a lot of people’s friend. But not you.”<br><br>I laughed. “So we’ll see who believes who, then.”<br><br>“Yeah, that’s what I’m counting on.”