Mossy Hill Academy~ The Competition

Chapter 4

"It was her, I saw her, and I have evidence."
No she didn't.
NO SHE DID NOT!
I AM GONNA KILL SUE!
"WHAT?!" I yell
"Hold on girls, Sue, if what you say is true lets see this evidence. My office, now. Both of you."
We both follow Mrs Maple and my mother to her office, me looking glum and angry, Sue looking smug with false alarm on her face. I wish I could bash her head in right now.
Once we are inside her office Sue passes her phone over to Mrs Maple, they plug it in to her laptop and we watch the video. It's the video of Sue beating Snooker, but instead of Sue beating him up, it's me.
I look just as bewildered as Mrs Maple.
"Sue, how did you come by this?" Mum asks
"Well Mrs Grill, I was out for a walk after my shower, and I decided to brush Snooker, after our big ride today. Over the last few weeks I've been noticing some scabs on his rear end, but just thought it was a scratch mark from a fence. When I saw Zelie beating up her old horse I was too stunned to move, everyone knows how much she loves him. I was scared that if I went over there she would hurt me, so I took a video with it on my phone, hoping that Snooker would be okay." She adds in a fake sniffle at the end.
I glare at her, I'm pretty sure my face is red.
"Zelie, is this true?" Mum asks
"No, of course not! Can't believe you'd think I'd do that!"
"We are surprised too Zelie, but the evidence says another thing."
"Last night I was with James, and we saw Sue doing that-"
"Zelie, we can't deny the evidence. For this behaviour you will receive a horse suspension for a week, and you will have a detention every night for the next two. Snooker on the other hand, will need life saving surgery, and then rehabilitation. I would say that you have to pay for it, but, he's school property. Sue, well done for stopping this violence. We might need to involve the police, animal abuse is a serious crime."
Sue speaks up, not wanting the police involved.
"Mrs Grill and Maple, I don't think the police need to be involved, what Zelie did was heartless and cold, but I don't think we'll see a repeat of the behaviour."
Why wouldn't she want me to get in any more trouble?
Maybe it's because she doesn't want to get found out, because she knows that I didn't do it.
Storming out of the office I head straight to Jack, but Mrs Maple grabs me and hauls me back in the office.
"I know you want to be near horses, but this horse suspension includes being near them. You are also not allowed near Jack, he will be Sue's new horse. Your stall mucking and tack cleaning duties will be given to the other students, we can't afford another accident."
"I didn't even do it, I-"
"Leave it Zelie. No going near horses for a week, and after that we'll re assess the situation. Sue has also become scared of you, so we will be moving you to a separate dorm."
"Which one?" I ask
"The Mustang dorm." She tells me as she hands me a key with a mustang on it.
"WHAT! That dorm is empty, do you mean I'll be alone?!" I ask
"Sorry Zelie, but we have to be sure."
"You think I'm a danger?"
"You abused a horse."
"I didn't!"
Tears start to fall, and I walk out of the room, this time no one stops me. I cry for Snooker who may die, for Cloudy who can never be ridden, I cry for Jack who I can't have, and I cry for the friends who have abandoned me.
The tears flow, and I have no intention of stopping them, I race to my dorm and gather up all my stuff. My suitcase is stuffed to the brim with my clothes and belongings, and my toiletries are stuffed in there too. With my bag in tow I storm over to the mustang dorm. It's the biggest dorm here, for us year sevens, and it's the only vacant one.
Each year level has their own part of the school with their own dorms, this one is for people who are new to the school during the year.
The key is in my hand, and as I open the door my tears start to stop, the door swings open and I collapse on the floor.
A plan begins to form in my mind, but I'll need my phone. For the moment I dump my suitcase under the bed next to the window, and climb into my bed. The beds are already made, and they're snug. I don't worry about attending dinner, I'm not hungry, and I can't face anyone yet. And if I see Sue, I'll most likely strangle her.
After dinner I get a visitor, it's Weslow, and I shyly welcome her in.
"Hey Zelie, I just wanted to see how you were going." She says
"I'm lonely." I truthfully reply.
"I thought I'd let you know that I asked Mrs Maple if I could share a dorm with you. Well, when I say asked, I mean I went p to her and said I was moving into the dorm with you."
I smile warmly at her, "Thanks, it means a lot."
"Is it okay if I stuff my bags over there?" She points to the other bed opposite mine.
"Sure."
"I'm sorry for the way I acted before, with Mali... It's just that she told me that you didn't really want to see me, but after a while I knew it was a lie. You'd never do that to me, we're friends."
"Yeah, friends." I agree.
We unpack together, and I tell her all about my meeting with Sue and Mrs Maple.
"OH MY GOSH ZELIE! I KNOW WHERE YOUR PHONE IS!"
I grab her and bring her close, "Where?" I urgently ask
"I saw it in my dorm, does its cover have rainbow paw prints on it?"
"Yes!"
"Wait, who else is in your dorm?"
"Katrina and Payton Dallas." She replies.
'Oh, they must be working with Sue." I mutter
"Why?"
"Because it's not the first time they want me gone."
"Oh..."
We race out of the dorm, not caring that we're both in our onesies, she whips out her old room key and opens the door. Their mess is scattered everywhere, and none of it is Weslow's.
"Oh my gosh..." I say
"At least they won't know we've been in here."
I nod to agree. We hunt around, when Weslow remembers that she saw it in Payton's bathroom bag in the bathroom. We race in there, luckily no one is here, they're all still probably at dinner, Weslow always demolishes her food. We open each of the toiletry bags, and we find it hidden under a pair of undies, thankfully clean ones. We grab my phone and race our again, and then head to our dorm.
Once we are seated on my bed I unlock my phone, and go into the camera roll.
Nothing. Everything is gone, even my first picture of Cloudy, my only picture of my first horse show, all gone.
Even all of my apps are deleted, I don't get it. Why didn't she just delete the video? Of course! To photoshop me into the video she would have had to put it on her computer, so now we are back where we started.
"How about your recently deleted photos?" Weslow suggests
Yes!
I open my recently deleted album, and all my photos are there! She was smart, but not smart enough.
I recover all of my photos, when I see a selfie of Sue and Mali, an accidental one. They're both sneering and have obviously forgotten about the screen. I have evidence, and I see the original video of Sue beating up Snooker. However, if I show Mrs Maple she will notice the videos are exactly the same, and she will think I photoshopped it. Not the other way around, so we need a plan.

If James can prove to her that he was there and saw her then I can get my name cleared, and the video that she showed Mrs Maple sounds nothing like my voice.
Once again we rush out o our dorm to find James' dorm, the Welsh dorm. Once we get there we knock and then barge in,
"Woah!" He calls out, I could have been getting changed.
"Sorry," Weslow apologises, "We need your help."
"What for?" He asks
"We need to get Zelie's name cleared of horse abuse. Sue set her up when she was whipping Snooker."
"Wait, didn't we see that?" He asks
"Yes, and you need to tell Mrs Maple what you saw, or Zelie won't be able to go near a horse for AGES!" Weslow half yells.
"Okay, what do we do?"
"Here's the plan, we head to Mrs Maple's office, tell her and then show her the original video and show her how the voices sound different."
"Hang on, the video we were shown by Sue only had half of it, she didn't show the part where the phone was dropped and you could see us running away." I remember.
We al look at each other and then fast walk to the headmasters office, hoping that she's still there.
We don't bother to knock, and just open the door. We are stunned by what we see, the police are in there talking to Sue, mum and Mrs Maple. I'm horrified.
"Here's Zelie." Mum says.
"Are you the one who abused this horse?" The police ask
"No, but I've come here to show you that I didn't, and that it was Sue." I proudly say.
"If you show us real evidence, the we will have to look into that too."
I AirPlay the video onto the smart board, the real one.
"Where James and I are in a selfie position, and then I point to Sue in Snookers stall. It shows her beating up Snooker and then her coming to chase us. We drop the phone and run away.
Sue is awestruck.
"Sue, this looks exactly like the video you showed us, except with them running away from you." The police say.
"They photoshopped." She confidently replies.
"Maybe, or maybe it was you? It shows them taking a photo, and then running away. Let's see the two videos played played at the same time."
Sue looks like she's about to reject, but then hands over her phone. The videos are played at exactly the same time, and suddenly the chief officer pauses them both. He zooms in on the photos and then pulls out a notepad.
"It seems we have our culprit, Sue Stark. You may have been able to fool the teachers with your Photoshopping skills, but not federal police. This here," He circles the pict with his finger "Is evidence of photo shop. The image of Zelie in Sue's video has grass in her legs, like she was in another picture. I bet that if we look through Sue's phone we will find a matching head for this." He beckons for her phone.
Once he has her phone he looks thorough her camera roll, and finds the picture of my head cut out.
It's me and Mali at Perfection Stables riding our horses on the trails there.
How did she even get that? Mali was the only one with that photo...
"Zelie, you have been framed by Sue. Very bad for you Sue, and you have a one month horse and school suspension. Go start packing your bags, you leave in the morning." Mum tells her, "I start to leave with James and Weslow, when mum stops me, "Zelie, you can move back to your own dorm if you want."
"No, Weslow and I are staying in the dorm we are in now, and can I be with horses now?" I ask
I get nods from the police and mum, Mrs Maple looks away, ashamed. She doesn't even have the guts to say sorry, so I'll still stay away from her and mum.
I walk out with my two friends, and now that Sue is suspended, Katrina, Payton and possibly Mali might get really upset and come for revenge. Mali was the only one who had that photo, and not even I know her phone password.
I have to let James and Weslow go, or I might get them hurt. Friends can't be counted on anyway, Mali proved that, and who says that they weren't just pretending to be nice to gain my trust, then hurt me.
I quicken my pace and head to my dorm, then cover myself in my blankets.
I have to stay away from them, they can't hurt me, and I can't hurt them.