Chapter 2

The weight of their lies pressed down, a physical force. The stares from the audience were heavy with judgment. They saw a crazy girl, a stalker.

My mother, Mrs. Davenport, smiled a victor's smile. "Dean Harrison, please have this person removed. She is ruining our daughter's special day."

But they weren't done. Mr. Davenport snapped his fingers, and two people were escorted to the front by a campus security guard. A man and a woman, both looking nervous and shifty.

My foster parents from Detroit.

"Tell them," Mr. Davenport commanded, his voice low.

The woman, Maria, wouldn't look at me. She stared at the floor. "She... Ava... she was always a difficult child. A liar. She used to cheat on her tests, tell stories... we tried to get her help."

Her husband, Rick, nodded eagerly. "She's a pathological liar. Always obsessed with her sister, with the family that gave her up. We were worried she would do something like this."

The last bit of sympathy in the room evaporated. I was no longer just an impostor, I was a mentally unstable criminal.

Security guards started moving toward me.

This was the moment. In my past life, this was when I broke down, when I screamed and cried and they dragged me away.

This time, I was calm.

"Just one more piece of evidence," I said to Dean Harrison. My voice was quiet, but it cut through the noise. "If you'll just let me connect my phone to the projector."

"This is a circus!" Mrs. Davenport hissed. "We will not indulge her fantasies!"

But the Dean hesitated. He looked at me, at the absolute certainty in my eyes. He was a man of academia, a man who believed in evidence. The story of the foster parents felt a little too convenient.

"One minute," he said, overriding the Davenports' protests.

A tech assistant helped me plug my phone into the system. The huge screen behind the stage, which had been showing the Northwood University logo, flickered and then changed.

The image was crystal clear. It was the inside of a high-end tattoo parlor. Stella was sitting in a chair, her wrist outstretched. My mother, Mrs. Davenport, stood beside her, pointing at a design on a screen.

The camera zoomed in. The artist's needle buzzed, carefully tracing a perfect, star-shaped birthmark onto Stella's skin.

A collective gasp went through the auditorium.

The video had no sound, but it didn't need any. The image was damning.

Stella's face went white. Mrs. Davenport looked like she had been struck.

"That's a deepfake!" Mr. Davenport shouted, his voice cracking. "It's a fabrication!"

But no one was listening to him. They were all staring at the screen, at the lie being created in high definition. The perfect birthmark was nothing but ink.