Chapter 3

Three minutes went by before she typed back.

"Ethel, the video caught everything, and you're still calling it a lie?"

"Ethel, I posted it for your own good, and here you are with no gratitude at all?"

I kept my eyes calm on the screen.

I laid it out word by word: "The window of mine facing your place is on the shaded side, and I almost never open those curtains. So how exactly did you shoot this video?"

Flora Finch from 708, who lives in the same stack as me a few floors down, spoke up.

"That's right, Ethel's got a point. That window's in the shade, and with the roadwork out front kicking up dust, nobody could open it anyway."

Rosemary, who'd had so much to say a minute ago, went quiet.

"@Concerned Resident Rosemary Lambert. Aunt Rosemary, say something. How'd you shoot the video?"

Thirty seconds later, she came back at me, angry now.

"You just picked your moment, figuring nobody would doubt you at a time like this."

"I filmed it on the spot, no big deal. It's only the tenth of the month and I've already run into it eight times, so grabbing a clip is hardly hard."

"Ethel, I didn't post it so everyone would tear into you. It was a heads-up for everyone, and for you too. Just apologize to the group and clean up your act going forward."

"I'm sure everyone will forgive you."

There it was, her retreat-to-advance routine, all wrapped up as being for everyone's good.

I knew that the moment I admitted anything, the moment I apologized,

not one person in that chat would let me off.

The video would end up online.

I'd be branded a pervert, and I'd end up exactly the way I did in my last life.

I didn't let it rattle me. I kept pressing: "You say you caught it eight times this month. Which eight? Which day, what time each one? Where are the videos?"

Another thirty seconds passed, and she snapped back: "Ethel, I only posted one clip to leave you a shred of dignity, and now you want me to put out all eight? Don't tell me it really is what everyone's guessing, that you're doing it to lure some woman's husband."

She was clever. On the surface she was covering for me,

and without so much as raising her voice she'd shoved me right into the storm.

"Post them, post them all. Once every clip's up, let's see if she can keep wriggling out of it."

Anita from 408 tagged Rosemary, pushing her to post the rest of the videos.

"She's got no shame herself, so why are you still covering for her? Let everyone see just how far this little tramp will go."

Stacy from 709 couldn't wait either, prodding Rosemary to post the clips.

"Oh, an old woman like me shouldn't be sticking her nose in, but she runs around her apartment naked."

"If nobody gives her a warning, who knows what she'll pull one of these days."

"I really am doing this for her, and for all of us."

There she went again, trotting out the same lines, playing the victim in the chat.

I tagged her straight out: "Don't change the subject. Where are the rest of the videos? You say I run around naked. I want all of the proof."

"Otherwise you're the one spreading lies. There are one thousand two hundred thirty-six people in this chat. You've framed me for running around naked and passed around a fake video, and that's illegal. I have every right to call the police."

This time, she went silent.

Five minutes passed and she still hadn't answered me.

Kenneth from property management tagged me directly: "@508 Ethel Fox, it's not that big a deal. Don't go scaring people with the police. Aunt Rosemary meant well."

"Meant well? If someone said you run around your apartment naked, would you call that meaning well?"

He swallowed whatever he'd been about to say about me just apologizing and letting it drop.

He turned the gun on me instead: "You think everyone's like you, shameless enough to run around naked at home? Aunt Rosemary's giving you kind advice and you're threatening her with the police. You're completely unreasonable."

Just as I was typing fast in the message box,

Rosemary, silent all this while, posted one line.

Right there it read: "I was wrong."