Chapter 8

The car pulls up in front of my school and I look back at my mom in the driver's seat, obviously not ready to go in. She takes my hand and runs her thumb along my knuckles.

"Don't worry Ava, it's gonna be fine. Look at the bright side, two more days of this and you'll be on break until January. You can do it baby." Her words are somewhat reassuring but today, it's really not enough. I kinda just nod and get out of the car without answering her, afraid for my life.

Looking up at the school is already so intimidating as it's height overpowers me and makes me feel so weak and small. Passing through its doors almost feels like my first day of real elementary school, after being adopted. The anxiety, the fear, it's all there. Except it's worse now than when I was five. Everyone looks so much bigger than I am, so much scarier, and I feel like the little weakling of this building. The fat, ugly and worthless little weakling.

I'm already getting laughs and people pointing at me, but it's a lot more than usual and I don't get it. It's a hundred times more extreme than on Monday, but I ignore it for now. Until I get jumped on from behind. It's Charlie. She grabs me by the arm and bolts to the bathroom with me dragging behind her. We get into a stall and lock the door.

"What's going on," I ask in a panic.

"We'll wait until the hallway clears before we go to class."

"Why?"

"Oh shit you didn't see it did you?"

"See what," I ask, and all of a sudden my phone buzzes. About 10 times. They're all pictures of QR scan codes from other kids in the school and I don't know why. I look up at Charlie, aware that there's something she knows that I don't. She looks down at my screen, seeing what I received and then looks me in the eye, very serious.

"They're all over the school," she says. Okay. But I still don't understand. "Okay but Charlie what the hell is this," I ask. My best friend grabs my cell phone out of her hands and scans the code with her phone. What pops up on that screen is traumatizing. They're all these distortedly edited pictures of me with extra weight on, pictures of me eating, getting pranked, and even videos, one of them being the incident from art class that Brianna entitled "Piggy got her '.'" Every single humiliating event or thing about me is now not only accessible to Brianna and her clique, but to the entire student body, teachers, other members of staff... and the entire world.

"I tried taking some down but-"

Without a word, I don't even bother vomiting or letting Charlie finish. I just drive my shoulder into the door of the stall and bolt past her and out of the bathroom with fury, running through each hallway of the school trying to find and tear down every single picture of those scan codes from the walls. As humiliated and ashamed as I am to even show my face in public, I don't want even one additional student seeing this, even though it's most likely too late. The laughter of other kids rings in my ears like high pitched bells. Probably because they saw everything. But that's not stopping me. I keep running and running, through every nook and cranny of this high school in attempts to remove every single trace of this humiliation. I think I'm almost done. I reach the end. Or so I think. That's when I trip and fall face forward to find myself right in front of my locker, plastered in them, alongs with words like 'piggy' and 'swine' and 'faggot' written everywhere. At this point, I give up. It's too late. Everyone saw, even if I did take the rest down I was done for. I was, as she said, "roasted." Surrendering to Brianna's power, I run out of my school, in complete humiliation, tears pouring from my eyes. I take one blade out of my bag because I feel like I'm gonna need it soon. I don't even know where I'm going. I just run. As I do, my phone goes off again.

Aww. Piggy where are you running off to? Going home won't help you. No one loves you there remember? No one in this world loves you piggy. Why don't you just head on back to the farm? Or foster care? Somewhere you belong for a change.

I take my phone and throw it violently in some random direction as I run. I don't care where it winds up I don't want it anymore, especially if my number's in the hands of people who are gonna use it to ruin me. I continue running. I'm not tired and I don't know where I am at this point, nor do I care. I just wanna be as far away from everything and everyone as possible, because I'm starting to think that she's right. No one in this world loves me. As I'm about to take another step, I hear the loud honk of a horn and before I realize what's going on I feel my side getting rammed into as my body flies and rolls onto the hood of a vehicle. Before I fully land I feel a huge cut on my neck. I can barely breathe.

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I finish the last of my recordings for today and walk outside to find a few fans waiting outside the studio. So I stop for them and pose for a few pictures. They're such sweet kids. They get so excited to see me but so afraid to scream when I walk out. Not to mention a few of them get really shy. They tell me they're so excited for the tour to start and ask a few questions about it. I see a short little girl in the crowd with dark brown hair trying to get my attention. She looks familiar too. I try to look over some fans so I can see her whole face, shocked as to who I find there.

"Charlie?"

"Stefani," she cries, trying to make her way to the front. She's Ava's best friend, and I always tell Ava to stick with her at school, especially on those days where her bullies get to her. Charlie looks absolutely terrified and that worries me. So I tell Robert to get her from the tiny crowd and tell my monsters that I need to go. I get in the car and bring my daughter's friend with me. She's white as a ghost and she's panting like she ran a marathon.

"Charlie what happened? Shouldn't you be in school?"

"Ava ran away," she answers worriedly.

"WHAT?" Now I start to panic and wonder where she could have gone or why she would even think of taking off. The answer to that comes in a matter of seconds.

"Brianna was messing with her and she took it way too far and Ava must've lost it and then she took off by the time I got out the door I couldn't find her so I told the headmistress and then I came to you." Tears pour out of her eyes and they begin to well up in mine as well. "Gaga I can't reach her she won't answer her phone." That puts me in a position of greater panic. I wrap my arms around Charlie and let her lean into me. Then, through my tears, I pull out my phone and contact NYPD to have them look for her. Once that;s done I turn back to Ava's friend, the two of us still crying.

"Charlie, we're gonna get you back to school okay?" I say, kind of shaky. But she refuses.

"I wanna help you look for her," she cries.

"It's not safe sweetheart, don't make me worry about you too." She continues to cry so I hold her close. She's almost like a second daughter to me. I want her to be safe too. "Just go back to school and focus on your classes. If anything happens I'll have the school let you know alright?" Through my blurry and teary vision I can see her head nodding, so I have my driver turn the car around.

Once we pull up to Ava and Charlie's high school she hugs me one last time and walks into the building. I stare at it through the window, remembering every second I had spent here with my baby girl this morning. When she was scared to go in, and I made her go anyway. How this could've been my fault. If I would've paid more attention to the worry on her face this morning rather than insisting that she go to school, she wouldn't be gone. My baby would be safe with me, either at home or at the studio. I would have her in my arms and hear her beautiful voice just like any other day. I continue crying from all the guilt and panic dwelling within me until my phone rings. Taylor.

"H-hello," I mumble into the phone.

"Stef, I gotta tell you something. Like, it's an emergency."

"Tay I really need to go Ava ran away from school I'm going to look for her."

"I know that. I'm on the road looking too. But it's something else."

"What?"

"Amy, she-" Suddenly my phone rings. It's the other line and it's the police station. I feel sorry for Taylor but without hesitation I answer, hoping they have a lead on Ava.

"Hello?"

"Is this Stefani Germanotta?"

"Yes," I answer, panic in my voice.

"We found your daughter, Ava Marie Kinney. But... there's some bad news. We need you to come to Lenox Hill hospital. They're taking her there." In that moment my heart is torn to shreds. She's being brought to a hospital. She could be injured, she could be sick. What if it's so serious that she might not make it? As all kinds of extreme case scenarios play in my head I don't even realize the police hung up until I hear Taylor still calling my name at the other end of the line.

"Stef? Stef are you there? Are you okay?"

"They found her, s-she's at Lenox Hill. Taylor she's hurt." I find myself freaking out over the phone.

"Stef, calm down. Panicking isn't gonna help us. Just take deep breaths, we'll talk at the hospital. Hang in there alright? Stef... I love you."

Right then and there, my heart practically pops out of my chest.

"What?"

Guys shit just got real. I'll probably update on Christmas but I'm not 100% sure yet. I'm trying hard for both stories. Someone also sent me a prompt suggestion for a Christmas Tayga story so y'all might get that on Christmas day. Have an amazing night darlings.