As soon as I got to school on Tuesday, I immediately sought out Ms. West. She was the rare person I could trust to understand the horrible situation I was in, and one of the few people I said mostly nice things about in the blog.
“June, my dear,” she said as I walked into the newspaper lab. “How are you?”
“I’ve been better,” I said. “I’m sure you’ve heard the news.”
“About you doing a great job in the school play? We were about to publish some photos of you onstage for the paper. You did great!”
“Thanks, but I don’t think people really want to read about me.”
I explained to her what had happened: the blog, the leak, the everything, hanging my head in shame with each detail. She looked at me with raised eyebrows, then a puzzled look, then actually let out a laugh. “I can understand why you might feel sad.”
“I feel like such a fool,” I said. “I feel like…the worst person on earth.”
“I’m sure a lot of people are hurt by what you said,” Ms. West said. “But you still did have your private diary leaked to the world. And I’m sure everyone has a private diary or journal or place where they share their private thoughts with the intention that they wouldn’t ever be shared with anyone else. You must feel very betrayed by whoever stole it.”
“Yeah,” I said. “But I also feel like the most hated person at school.”
“What do you think you want to do?” Ms. West asked.
“I need to apologize to everybody who’s in that blog,” I said. “My friends, my family, my teachers. I pretty much offended everyone I know.”
“An apology is a great start,” Ms. West agreed. “Do you think you’re going to do this in person to each person you talked about?”
“I thought about it a lot last night, and I would like to write a column in the school newspaper, if you’ll let me. That way I can reach everyone at once and apologize with a thoughtful letter.”
Ms. West sat back in her chair. “Why not publish it on your blog?”
“The last thing I want to do is attract more readers there,” I said. “It’s caused enough trouble. Besides, I set it back to private.”
“Okay,” Ms. West said. “Then a column is a great idea, June. We can save you some space for this week’s issue. Can you get me a draft of whatever you want to say as soon as you can?”
“Okay,” I said. “I’m not sure what I’m going to say yet.”
“Just speak from the heart,” Ms. West said. “Don’t worry about length or editing. I’ll help you with it.”
I felt slightly better as Ms. West looked at me. “Cheer up, June—an apology is a step in the right direction. Get me a draft as soon as you can.”
After a dozen different attempts, I returned to Ms. West’s office with a working version of my apology. “Wow, June,” she said. “This is very brave of you to write.”
“Well, it’s the truth,” I said.
“Okay,” she said, looking over the draft. “You ready to publish this for all to see?”
“I have to apologize for what I’ve said about everyone.”
Ms. West uploaded the story to the newspaper layout and squeezed the copy to fit in the desired spot. She typed a headline and my name to the top of the page, and then added a photograph of me from the play. I didn’t know if this was going to work or not. But I had to try.
“Okay, all done. Ready to hit send?”
I looked at the computer screen. I looked at Ms. West. “It’s all I’ve got.”
I hit the return button on the keyboard, and the files were sent to the printer immediately. I took a deep breath and hoped for the best. I turned away from Ms. West and walked toward the exit.
“June,” Ms. West called back. “Really, it’s going to be okay.”
I’M SORRY
By June Jackson
My name is June Jackson, and I am truly sorry.
Many of you may have received a link to a private blog that I created that included some not-so-nice opinions about my friends, family, and neighbors. I created it because I have a big problem: I’ve spent my whole life telling people what I thought they wanted to hear, because I wanted to avoid potentially hurting people with my real feelings. Sometimes I even lied: small lies, exaggerations, about anything or anyone, as long as it could help me avoid the truth. Recently something in my life changed, and I’ve been trying to tell the truth about everything to everyone no matter what. This is very hard for me to do every day, especially when I see or believe things that others may not like or agree with. I didn’t want to hurt people with my words, so I wrote down whatever feelings I thought people wouldn’t like in a private blog that only I could see.
But of course, that backfired. I wrote down things about people that were my opinions, and some of those opinions were wrong and extremely hurtful. I never meant to hurt anyone. In an effort to not hurt people’s feelings, I hurt them even more by being harsher in private than I was in public.
And for that, I am truly sorry.
I’m sorry to my friends. My wonderful friends, especially my friends Nia and Lee and Olive and Alvin, who have been by my side for years. I’m sorry to my parents, who love me and care for me no matter what. I’m sorry to my teachers, who work hard every day to help us learn and study. I’m sorry to everyone in The Wiz, my teammates on the girls’ field hockey team, to everyone at school, in Featherstone Creek, and to anyone who read my blog.
I’m sorry that I hurt your feelings. I will do whatever I can to try to make things better.
Sincerely,
June Jackson
Sixth grade
It had been five days since the Leak. I’d sat through three very uncomfortable days of classes where I could feel other kids’ annoyance and withering stares cutting into my skull. I tried to keep my head down and ignore it all. Nia had been out of school for the past three days, and I didn’t know why—I didn’t see or hear from her at all.
The paper came out on Friday. Within an hour of the start of school, my phone and emails lit up with responses and feedback on my public letter. The older the sender, the more forgiving they were.
My fellow students weren’t all mean, but they weren’t scrambling to become buddies with me again. Some had completely canceled me. Either way, people had the right to give me their honest feedback about what I’d done. All I could say was, “I’m sorry. You’re right.”
Finally, on Monday, Olive reached across the aisle during homeroom to grab my arm and said hello. “Took guts to write the column,” she said. “I mean, especially knowing one of your best friends leaked your blog. I know you must feel betrayed, but you still apologized for your actions, and that means something, June.”
My mouth dropped open. I looked at her. I’d been so busy writing my apology and reflecting on what I’d done that I’d completely forgotten to think about how the blog had gotten out there in the first place. A best friend had leaked my blog? Olive and Blake couldn’t have leaked it because they were onstage and in the orchestra pit when it was released. As was Alvin. Lee was backstage working as crew. Chloe didn’t even live in Featherstone Creek and didn’t know half the people I mentioned in the blog. Plus she would never do anything to end me like that. That just left one person close to me who knew this blog existed, who lived in Featherstone Creek, and who would’ve been able to guess the passwords to my blog and my Instagram account. And there was only one other person besides Chloe who knew about the truth-telling spell. Then it hit me.
“Nia?”
“Yeah,” Olive said apologetically. “I think so.”
How in the world could this have happened?
“I thought for a long time about this before I decided to tell you my theory, June. I know you and Nia have had your fights, that thing about Lee, and things aren’t good with you two right now. But you’re not the only person she’s hurt. We had our own fight a few weeks ago, and she said something really mean to me, too. Something about how no one cared about the orchestra during The Wiz. And this was after she told me that she’s considered getting revenge on you for the whole Lee thing.”
My palms grew sweaty. My face felt hot. Olive continued talking.
“That Insta post went up during the show on Sunday. You didn’t have your phone then. But I saw Nia backstage. She looked guilty, like I caught her doing something, and hurried off before I could say anything to her. She must have gotten ahold of your phone and removed the password protection on the blog and publicized the link during the second act. And then she disappeared afterward. I think Nia’s the one who published your blog, June.”
I remembered not finding my phone at intermission on Sunday’s show. I was fishing around for it in my backpack to put up a photo from backstage on my Instagram. I only found it after the play was over. Which meant…
Oh. My. Goodness. Olive’s theory was right.
“Could my best friend really have done this to me?” I said out loud, dazed.
I thought back to when Nia would have seen me typing in the blog, when she’d come up behind me at my locker. She must have seen it then. She also must have seen me type in my password—my middle name and the year of my birth. And even if she didn’t see me type it in, this was information Nia obviously knew and could have easily guessed.
When she found out that I’d hidden the truth about Lee from her, she must have logged in and seen all the things I had written about her and everyone else. She must have decided to seek revenge.
My best friend leaked my private blog.
She humiliated me on my big night.
This is what Victoria meant by being in a pickle.