chapter three

“Tell me again how it happened, exactly," Danika Mallick, Iris's best friend demanded. Her strong voice almost echoed throughout the empty restaurant. Both girls worked at a small French restaurant called Êtes-Vous Faim, owned by Madame Bisset - if that was even her real name. They were wearing the required uniform consisting of a pair of jeans and a T-shirt with the restaurant logo printed on it.

Iris straightened from where she was wiping a table's top and giggled at the sight of Danika. Her friend stood tall with her fists on her hips, her thick, dark eyebrows raised as her cinnamon eyes glared down on Iris. Her black, glossy hair was in a high ponytail that still managed to trail down to the middle of her back. The sunset kissed her tawny skin, creating a picture Iris desperately wanted to take.

Iris and Danika stood eye to eye, but with the way Danika was looking at her made her feel smaller. She was standing in her no-nonsense pose, something that made even the bravest of men go on their knees and confess all the wrongs they've done.

Iris threw her rag down and sighed. “Why do I have to tell you again? You already heard what happened.”

“I want to know who the bully was. You didn't give me their names.”

“So?" Iris shrugged. "It's not like that will change anything." She moved around the empty restaurant and continued stacking the stair onto the tables.“Besides you're forgetting where they come from.”

Danika threw her hands in the air. “What does their background matter? They're bullies. The school and their parents should know about this!”

She sounded so passionate about it, and Iris knew why. Danika used to be bullied at school because she was different. She was the only Indian girl that attended the school at the time and didn't really fit in anywhere. Her skin was not dark enough to be considered black and wasnot light enough to be considered white. Some -not all- children from both groups use to call her mean slurs. Girls with rough hair use to pull her glossy and naturally straight her. They would sit behind her in art class, take her hair tips in their hands and dip them into various colored paint.

The girls with pale skin would turn away and even help them by helping them with harsh and hurtful pranks. They would paint her skin white and tell her that she's finally one of them. This continued until a shorter than average, freckle covered girl had enough and reported them, but not after putting different things into their hair. Things like glue, gum, and paint.

“That's easier said than done, Danika,"Iris sighed softly, her whole body sagging at the breath of release. “You seem to forget in which school I'm in. I say something and their rich mommies and daddies may come down on my not-so-rich mommy and daddy.”

“They seriously couldn't have that much power," Danika protested.

Iris just looked at her friend, wondering if she really was that naive. The moment Iris set foot into Crawford, was the moment she entered an entirely new board game. This was not Westwood public high school where the pupils with the most athletics trophies ruled the school or where people were congratulated for achieving high academic standards and everyone wanted to participate in the school yearly production. Crawford went about what your parents have achieved financially and how many times your face has appeared on the front page of People magazine. These people didn't recklessly fight with their fist. No, they preferred cunning words and using social media to their advantage.

Stephanie Nicholson was a perfect example of a cyber and vocal bully. During the time in which Iris has attended the school, she has heard about three girls who already changed schools because of what she did. Iris did not know what Stephanie actually did, but she knew from personal experience that it must have been horrible.

Honestly, it was a bad crossover between Gossip Girl and Mean Girls.

She didn't know how to explain this to Danika, who believed the world was divided into good and evil.

“Hey," Iris spoke up, "Did you bring your laptop today?”

“Yes," Danika replied. "But what does-”

Iris hurried to the back locker room where they usually kept their things, grabbed the laptop bag from the locker, and ran back into the dining area of the restaurant.

She got the laptop out - it was a second hand one, with black spots on the screen and scratched out keyboard - and turned it on, grabbed a chair, and sat at a table, typing in the username password when it appeared. She completely ignored the bewildered look Danika sported and quickly opened up a Google search page.

“Come here. I need to show you why I can't just report them to the school board.”

Danika grabbed another chair and sat next to. Iris could see that she was somewhat sceptical about it.

With quick fingers, Iris typed a name into the Google search.

“Iris, I don't understand-”

“Shh!”

Iris clicked on the first page and waited for it to open. When it did, she swung the laptop screen towards Danika and said, “Read it out loud.”