Face-Slapping10 min read
Happy Planet, Red Dress, and the Moment She Broke
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I still remember the first time Kali copied me.
"Bianca," she said the morning she moved in, "where do you go so early?"
"I go for words," I answered, fumbling my bag. "I like to wake up before sunrise."
"That's great," she smiled. "I'll try it too."
"Okay," I said, and I meant okay. I thought she was just being friendly.
But she wasn't friendly.
"Did you get up at five?" she asked the next day with a tilted head.
"Yes," I said.
"I got up at four-thirty," she said brightly. "I'm keeping up."
"That’s—" I began.
"I'm just trying to fit in," she said, and I believed it for a little while.
"You don't have to copy everything," I told her one evening when she announced she'd done more vocabulary than me.
She blinked. "I just wanted to try harder."
"Don't make me the only standard," I said, my voice harder than I meant.
"Sorry," she murmured. "I'll stop."
She didn't stop. She learned my schedule, watched my habits, and matched them like a shadow. She sat beside me in class and peered at my notes. "Can I see what you wrote?" she would whisper, and when I refused she took a photo.
"Why are you taking my notes?" I snapped once.
"I'm studying," she said with a small smile. "You're my model."
She called me her model so often it felt like a brand, and brands make people uncomfortable.
At first I thought the worst of it was annoying. Then she started copying the rest.
"I bought the red dress too," she said the morning I planned to wear it for a confession I had rehearsed for months.
"You bought—" I stopped. My stomach turned like a fist.
"Yes," she said. "Isn't it cute? Are you going to wear it with that bag?"
"I am," I said, breathless. "Because—"
"Because you're brave," she finished, smiling at me in a way that felt like cold water. "Who's the lucky senior?"
"Ahmed," I said. "Ahmed Hall."
"Ahmed?" she repeated like it was a word she wanted to taste.
That afternoon, when Ahmed and I walked into the student square, I saw Kali standing there in the same dress, like a mirror made of fabric.
"Bianca, you two are matching!" she chirped.
"Yes," Ahmed said politely, smiling between us. "Sisters."
"Which one is cuter?" she asked, leaning close. "You tell me, Ahmed—Bianca or me?"
My throat closed. "We're going out," I said sharply. "Come on, Ahmed."
"Wait—" she reached to hold his hand. "I want to go too."
"No," Ahmed said, looking at me then. "We have plans."
I felt like someone had punched me. The plan I had rehearsed for months dropped into the gutter and smashed.
Back in the dorm, I exploded. "What are you doing with my things? What are you doing with my life?"
"What?" her face went blank. "I just wore a dress."
"You knew why I wore it," I said. "I told you."
She blinked, then frowned. "You told me? I'm sorry. I didn't mean—"
"Of course you didn't mean it," I snapped, and the other girls pulled me back, hushing us like we were animals.
"Kali cried," Susana whispered later. "She said she's new and trying to fit in."
"She cried about fitting in," I muttered. "Because she copied me?"
"Let it go," Keiko said. "She'll stop."
She didn't stop.
She copied my clothes, my study habits, my photos, my jokes, the little secret hand-sign Ahmed and I used in pictures—seventeen in five and one—and then she stole my photo, edited her face into it and posted it as though it were Ahmed and her.
"That's sick," Ahmed said when I showed him the post. "She crossed a line."
"She loves a show," Susana said. "She loves to make everyone watch."
"She's always been like that?" I asked a girl I met in the hallway—the old dorm leader Jaelyn.
"She broke my room leader," Jaelyn said without hesitation. "She made her nervous, compared everything. She cried and left. We thought when Kali transferred away we'd be free."
"And now?" I asked.
"Now she moved to your building." Jaelyn's eyes were tired. "Don't let her make your life small."
We sat together and plotted a pinprick war. "If she lives by copying, make her live by never matching," Jaelyn suggested.
"If she wants results," Susana said, "let's give her something she can't copy: real outcomes."
So we did the impossible small things that add up. I told only Susana and Keiko about a fake "project for graduate application"—a story to rile Kali. Jaelyn agreed to help with an unrelated campaign to interview famous professors for the campus magazine. We rented a camera; I met Professor Dolan Ludwig for a short, legitimate interview; we took photos; we arranged evidence that looked hard to fake. We posted carefully, setting the posts to "friends except Kali" or "limited circle" so she could see hints and get hungry.
"It's petty," Keiko said with a grin as we set up the camera, and I realized it was. It was petty, and it felt like heat in my chest that wasn't the old ache anymore. It felt like a weapon.
"She'll never stand what she can't recreate," Susana said, snapping a picture.
"Happy Planet," I wrote on a story to bait her—a place that didn't exist, a whim I invented to watch her search in the map app. She hunted for it. She pestered us. She tried to drag Ahmed into a group game under a cute character name—his messages showed her confessing. "You can't control my love," she typed, as though love is a law she could force.
I told myself I was only protecting my boundaries. I told myself Kali had started first. But when she took it further—when she posted a long, vicious thread accusing me of bribing professors and sleeping with older men—my blood finally boiled over.
"She said what?" Ahmed read the post aloud, his jaw tight. "That your father is—"
"She used a family picture and called it 'dirty'," I said. "She posted our private photo, claimed I bribed a professor—Dolan—and said I got early access to test questions."
"We'll show them the truth," Ahmed said. "I believe you."
"I don't want her to ruin other people's lives," Susana said. "She already broke her last dorm leader."
We leaked everything to the investigation board: chat logs showing her messages to Ahmed, the timelines, the camera rental receipts, the email with Professor Dolan confirming the interview. We collected witness statements: Ahmed's friends confirmed the timeline of his feelings; Keiko and Susana vouched for how the "project" never involved secret grades; Jaelyn testified about Kali's pattern.
The small campus that thrives on gossip blew up like dry leaves.
"She started the thread herself," I read to Elton Duncan in his tiny office. "She said you were in on it."
"Look," Elton said, looking tired, "if you have proof, bring it. We can't let public accusations stand without review."
"We have proof," I said. "We have everything."
We sat through interviews that lasted hours. I answered questions until my voice felt as thin as paper.
Finally, the university called a forum. They invited everyone, posted the investigation summary on the student board, and told us to bring any witnesses. I came because I wanted closure, but also because I wanted Kali to see the consequences of her choices—public, undeniable.
The forum hall smelled like too many bodies and coffee. Students packed the bleachers. Phones bobbed like a constellation.
"If she wanted a scene, she got one," Susana whispered.
"She started it," I answered, my hands small and steady.
Elton Duncan sat at the front, a face of rules. "We will present the facts," he said. "We'll hear from those involved."
"Start," Jaelyn said, and I stepped forward.
"I am Bianca Barker," I said. "I am here because a student named Kali Ford made false allegations and harassed multiple students. I hope this ends with clarity."
Dolan Ludwig stood next. "I am a professor in the humanities. I did not provide any special access or questions to Ms. Barker. I agreed to an interview with her as part of a student piece. Here is my email," he said, sliding a printout across the table. "This is a normal academic interaction."
Someone gasped. Phones lifted as murmurs rippled. "She said I bribed her?" a student parroted from the forum post.
"Here," Ahmed said, stepping up, his voice low but clear. "I liked Bianca long before Ms. Ford knew me. Here's our chat history from last year. Here's my friends' record. I never once told her anything she claims."
"She posted a family photo and called her 'old man'?" Keiko said, standing and showing the image with the family in it. "That's Bianca's father. He picks her up from the station."
The evidence pile grew: screenshots, timestamps, camera receipts, messages. Each paper felt like a small hammer.
Then we played Kali's posts for the crowd—the messages she sent Ahmed, the thread accusing me. She watched from the back with a face that started as bright and then hardened.
"Kali, do you want to speak?" Elton asked.
She stood slowly, a red mask of defiance. "They are lying," she said at first. "They set me up. They're gang bullying me."
"These screenshots are from your phone," Jaelyn said calmly. "You sent these to Ahmed."
"He's lying!" Kali screamed. "He left me on read. He—"
"That's his conversation," Ahmed said. "Those are timestamps. You confessed to him."
"You're making this up," she shouted, and the shouting became her armor.
A student in the third row started recording. "This should be on the board," someone said.
Kali's voice cracked once. Then she lunged at the table.
"Stop!" Elton yelled.
Campus security moved forward. Phones kept recording. The hall was a buzz, the kind that pulls in everyone like a storm.
"Kali, calm down," I said, and my voice surprised me. "Please, sit."
"No," she said, and then she yelled something I couldn't make out. She slammed her palm on the table, the sound echoing like someone striking a drum.
Then the collapse.
Her face changed from angry to blank, then to something like regret. "I—" she whispered, and the words broke. One moment she was roaring, the next she had tears running down her cheeks, mascara streaking like tiny black rivers.
"She's going to blame stress," a girl behind me muttered.
"Kali, people are watching you," Jaelyn said quietly. "You made the choice to post lies."
"You're a liar," Kali whispered to me now, and the whisper was a knife.
"Why?" I asked. "Why do this?"
She pressed both hands to her temples like it hurt to think. "I wanted—" she began, then stopped. The thread of a confession frayed.
"Everyone online has seen the posts," Elton said. "The investigation will recommend disciplinary action."
"No," Kali whimpered. "No, you can't—"
She staggered back and stumbled as the lights flashed from phones. Students leaned forward with eyes that were not kind. Some were stunned, some angry, others were quietly satisfied. Someone said, "She made up stories about a man," and there was a small ripple of revulsion.
"She accused me of sleeping with a professor!" I said, and the words were strange in my mouth.
"You accused me of bribing teachers!" Kali screamed suddenly, frantic. "You made me look—"
"I didn't," I said. "I did interviews. I did proper work."
Kali's face contorted. "Why won't you believe me!" she cried.
"Because you've been doing this for years," Jaelyn said gently but firmly. "You compare, you copy, you escalate when you can't win. You hurt people."
"Stop recording," Kali begged, collapsing to her knees, hands clasped, eyes huge and raw. "Please. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I didn't mean—please."
She looked at the crowd with pleading that had no power now.
Phones still recorded. Students whispered. A few began to clap—sharp, scornful claps—not from joy, but from the thunderous satisfaction of seeing a liar caught. Someone said, "She ruined lives," and another voice added, "We need to protect people from this."
Security led her out slowly, and once she crossed the doors a dozen hands reached for phones to upload. Comments poured in, some furious, some mocking. "She cried like a child," someone typed; "Don't let her back in," another wrote.
Afterwards, Elton read the disciplinary recommendation. "Due to repeated harassment, false public accusations, and harm to the campus community," he read, "we recommend immediate removal from your dormitory and transfer to a different program pending counseling and parental notification."
Kali's reaction shifted in real time. First denial: "You can't do this." Then rage: "You're all a conspiracy." Then bargaining: "I'll apologize, please don't —" Then collapse: her shoulders shook and she begged on her knees in front of a sea of faces. People muttered and some took photos; others were silent in the kind of hush that follows a storm.
The punishment was public. It was not a court, but it felt worse to her: everyone she had named, everyone she had watched and copied, saw it. Her power to rewrite truth evaporated in that auditorium. Her friends looked away. Her small network of followers shrank as screenshots spread. She lost status, and the thing she craved—control over others—was stripped from her.
I felt nothing like victory. I felt tired. When the cameras stopped and the crowd dispersed, Susana took my hand.
"Do you feel better?" she asked.
"A little," I admitted. "But mostly I feel empty. This was not what I planned."
"It worked," Jaelyn said softly. "You protected yourself and others. She crossed the line."
"She needs help," I said. "And she will get it now. The university will require counseling."
Maybe she would get it. Maybe she would not. But she was no longer able to toss accusations and watch others crumble.
After the forum, the threads on the student board were cleaned; administrators posted timelines and facts. Kali was moved to another residence, enrolled in mandatory counseling, and her parents were called. A formal reprimand went into her record.
People said harsh things online. Some were mean. Some were merciless. A few reached out privately and said they remembered similar stories and were glad I stood up.
"Did you expect this to explode?" Ahmed asked me that night as we walked past the empty quad. He tucked his coat around me, like he had from the start.
"I didn't," I said. "But I wanted it to stop."
"And it stopped," he said. "You did the right thing."
"I hate that it had to go public," I whispered. "I hate that she had to break."
"She started it by breaking others," he said. "You only finished it."
It was simple and not simple. My heart wasn't a furnace of triumph; it was a tired thing that beat because it had to.
After Kali left our dorm, life was quieter. We slept without curtains being lifted. We studied without eyes at our shoulders. The small freedoms felt huge: late-night snacks, laughter that wasn't monitored. We hugged when we thought no one was watching.
I kept the red dress in the back of my closet. I never wore it to confess again; there was no need. Ahmed and I celebrated quietly—no dramatic gestures, only small jokes about our secret seventeen sign that no copy could mimic.
Sometimes I think of Kali when a new girl moves into the building, when someone sits too close or copies a scribble in the margin. I tell them, plainly, "Be yourself. Don't make someone else your map."
"How do you know it won't happen again?" Susana asked me once.
"Because we know how to set boundaries," I said.
We did more than set boundaries. We made evidence of the truth when lies spread. We showed that copying can become cruelty. We proved that public accusation without proof collapses when confronted by documentation and witnesses.
The punishment was public, and it was messy, and it hurt me to watch someone break. But when the forum ended, I walked home with Ahmed’s hand in mine and a sense that something heavier had been lifted—like finally closing a door I had been too afraid to shut.
I kept one small thing to remind me of the whole mess: a photo on my phone where Ahmed had stuck out his thumb like a silly little crown over my head—our seventeen sign. I dozed with it sometimes, like a charm.
"Don't let them watch you sleep," Ahmed said once, pressing his forehead to mine. "Only the people who love you get to see that."
I laughed. "Only the people who love me," I agreed.
And when I walk past the campus board now, I sometimes glance at the faded screenshot of that day—the crowd, the phones, Kali's fall—and I think about how small cruel things can make a life messy, and how sometimes you have to be louder than the lie to keep breathing.
The End
— Thank you for reading —