Rumors don't define me

To be quite honest, rumors are far more than just “rumors”. Gossip can be dull, pernicious, fiendish things that are spread to cause pulverization. Bits of gossip have been around since the very beginning, and are more grounded now like never before. They go through the grapevine and most of the time these rumors are believed by people although they might not be. It is shown that rumors tend to be 80% accurate but what about that other 20%? It leaves people believing that whatever rumor is going around is more than likely true. We might question why people spread rumors, but no matter the questions we may have they happen today and will probably unfortunately never stop. A time where a rumor was spread through the grapevine was my freshman year of High School. The day that everything happened actually started to be a pretty good day. My classes went very well and I had found out I made the varsity Water Polo team. I was so happy I couldn’t wait to go to practice. That is saying something too because I hated practice. Although rumors might be more exciting than the truth, this rumor hurt me more than ever. This rumor broke me because instead of just accepting this rumor, I couldn’t because it wasn’t true! Now let's get back to my freshman year of High School. Like I mentioned it was a good day until I walked into my water polo practice and one of the girls called me aside. They tell me that rumors are going around that they have inappropriate pictures of me. I could not believe this especially because there could be no way. It went something like this… So she called me over. I prefer not to use her name but in these exact words she says, “Are the rumors true”. Of course I have no idea what she is talking about. My heart begins to pound. I start to sweat because I am just so worked up. She eventually tells me that there are rumors about pictures going around. I immediately ran to the locker room unconcerned about my first practice as a varsity member. Although it may sound incorrect to skip my very first practice I was in absolutely no condition to go out there with the condition that I was in. So back to the locker room. I ran out of the pool into the locker room and immediately began to cry. I wasn’t crying because I had been caught up. I was crying out of frustration and anger. My friend had followed behind me to comfort me and I needed to know more. A dozen questions were going through my head. Who started the rumor? Who knew about this rumor? How could I possibly stop this rumor?! So my friend told me that it started with my best friend, believe it or not. So she says, a boy in her class went to the bathroom with her phone for some odd reason. Who knew why she was allowing him to take her phone to the bathroom, but that is besides the fact. While he was in the restroom he decided to open her phone because I guess he had known her password and open it up and go to her camera roll. Of course being that I am her best friend, this boy assumed that the inappropriate pictures on her phone with two girls were her and I. He was just assuming so in that moment the first thing he decided to do was to screenshot these pictures and send them to himself. He returned the classroom they both had together and gave her back her phone very suspiciously. She wondered why he had been acting so strange than figured out later on the real reason he was being so odd. Again, so many questions were going through my head. How did she miraculously get these pictures. Did she take them when I was unaware. I was very confused, but more frustrated to say the least. I immediately called her in frustration telling her about this whole situation thinking she had already known. She didn’t so I had to start from the beginning with everything I had heard from my friend. She sounded very upset and wanted to get down to the bottom of it just like I did. I wanted to see these pictures because I knew they couldn’t have been me. Later on in the week things got worse for me. It went from it not even being pictures of my best friend and it was narrowed down to me. There was no talk about it being the girl whose phone it was . It was just me and the name that was going around was mine. It wasn’t fair nor could I ever justify that it wasn’t me because after that first week there was no way I could have ever tried and stopped this. People talked and rumors went through the grapevine.. I started to get very paranoid walking around school, I couldn’t even be comfortable in my own skin. The thought of people talking about me as I walked by. It no longer turned into a thought, it was actually happening. I didn’t even want to go to school at this point. I was getting tired of being paranoid and feeling like I wasn’t worth anyone's time. The picture eventually got back to me and this was the moment that I had been waiting for. I wanted more than anything to validate that these pictures weren’t me. I was right. They weren't and they happened to be my best friend for sure. In this moment as much as I wanted to tell everyone that it wasn’t me and it was her, I couldn’t let her go through what I had been going through. Everything was finally coming to an end and the rumors weren’t exciting anymore. Everyone had known. I never told anyone it wasn’t me because I didn’t want my best friend to hurt like I did. I still live with this everyday of my life, but I will never regret not throwing my friend under the bus. I understand that I should have stood my grounds but in my heart I knew it wasn’t me. That was all that really mattered to me. My friendship still lies unbreakable and I am so thankful I never ruined the friendship because it is one that will last a lifetime.