The Group Chat That Shipped Them, The Application I Sent Chapter 09

The Group Chat That Shipped Them, The Application I Sent Chapter 09

After Ethan went home, he was a wreck.

What I’d said kept replaying in his mind.

That night, he opened the company group chat, something he hadn’t looked at in a very long time.

He searched for the messages from that day

The farther he scrolled, the less he could sleep.

For the first time, Ethan saw just how much I’d endured.

Because he’d refused to acknowledge our relationship publicly, because he’d insisted on keeping his distance from me at work, my coworkers had felt free to talk about me however they wanted in the company chat.

Every little sign of affection I’d shown Ethan had been twisted into something ugly.

They’d convinced themselves that I was delusional, that I’d somehow decided Ethan was my boyfriend even though he had never felt the same way.

Everything I did at work became gossip.

Someone was always posting about me in the group chat, dissecting my every move and whispering about me behind my back.

Ethan’s veins stood out on his forehead as he read through the messages.

Early the next morning, he went straight to Human Resources and found Brenda.

“Was Clara targeted by people at the company while she was here?”

Brenda didn’t answer directly.

Instead, she said, “Once everyone realized you were keeping your distance from Clara, most of them treated her like she didn’t exist. They didn’t want to risk getting on your bad side, so they basically made her invisible.”

“Clara ate lunch alone most days. Even during company outings, almost no one wanted to sit with her.”

“At first, Clara didn’t seem to care. But then her promotions kept getting blocked. And after people found out she had matching things with you, another rumor started spreading that she was trying to get with the CEO.”

Brenda sighed.

“After that, people started treating her like office entertainment.”

“Clara usually ignored the petty stuff. Given enough time, most of the gossip would’ve died down on its

own. But every time you went out of your way to distance yourself from her, people would drag all those old rumors back up again.”

“They’d start posting about her in the group chat, and everyone else would pile on.”

Ethan listened in silence.

It felt as though someone had ripped a hole straight through his chest.

He realized that he had never truly cared about what Clara was going through,

Whenever she complained about people at work, he’d simply told her to ignore them.

They didn’t matter, he’d said.

She should focus on herself and work hard.

He’d never imagined that things had gotten this bad.

This wasn’t just workplace exclusion anymore.

It was bullying.

And the worst part was that it had happened because he’d allowed it.

No, more than that.

He had set the example.

By constantly distancing himself from Clara, he’d made everyone believe they were free to do the same.

Ethan opened his notes app and started writing down the names of everyone involved.

Then he sent the list straight to Human Resources.

[Terminate every employee who spread rumors about Clara.]

When the long list of names landed in HR’s hands, one by one, those employees went pale.

They knew exactly why Ethan was firing them.

For three years, they’d mocked Clara, isolated her, and made her life at the company miserable.

At the time, they’d followed the crowd because Ethan himself had made it clear that he wanted nothing to do with her at work. No one could tell where the two of them really stood, so everyone simply went along with

Later, when Sienna entered the picture and people started noticing the unusual closeness between her and

Ethan, they began rooting for the two of them instead.

They had convinced themselves that Ethan and Sienna made a perfect couple.

Now that they were being fired, the employees decided Sienna was to blame.

They told themselves that if she hadn’t acted so ambiguously around Ethan, they never would have gotten the wrong idea.

Their anger turned toward Sienna.

On the day she resigned, Sienna was added to a group chat.

Within minutes, wave after wave of vicious messages flooded the screen.