The plot thickens. In the days following the James Charles and Tati Westbrook feud, not many people in the YouTube community have rushed forward to defend the makeup mogul … until now. On Tuesday, May 14, James’ friend and fellow beauty blogger Nikita Dragun took to Twitter to share her side of what really went down with James and Sugar Bear at Coachella by leaking alleged texts from the 19-year-old. 

“Heard a situation needed some clarification,” the 23-year-old began. “My friend was in an emergency and texted me in the moment … unfortunately, since @dragunbeauty used all of our marketing budget on the fantasy, I connected him with Sugar Bear. Nothing shady.” ICYMI: Tati, 37, called out James for promoting Sugar Bear on his Instagram despite the fact that her company, Halo Beauty, is a direct competitor. 

As a result, Tati felt deeply betrayed by her longtime friend. However, James claimed that the only reason he worked with the vitamin brand is because he was being mobbed at the music festival and needed additional security. That’s when Nikita came to the rescue. During the supposed conversation between the pair, James tells Nikita that he’s getting “attacked” and needs “extra artist passes.” He then asks if she can connect with him Sugar Bear and that he’ll “story” something for them on social media. 

To this day, James insists that he never received any monetary compensation for the exchange. However, James also said that Sugar Bear approached him, not the other way around. With that, fans are hardly absolving James based on Nikita’s post. In fact, a lot of them think the whole thing is fake.

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For starters, a lot of people think that the dates don’t add up. James needed security during weekend one of Coachella (April 12 – April 14), but his conversation with Nikita clearly reads “April 20,” which was the following weekend. Others are suggesting that the texts appear “scripted,” as if the whole conversation was premeditated. Lastly, the time between messages was incredibly fast. That may not seem odd in ordinary circumstances, but the reception at Coachella is notoriously awful, making it difficult to communicate with people.

As it stands, Nikita vehemently denies faking the texts. “You really think I have the time to fake texts? The only thing I edit is my waist on Facetune, sis. They have the screen recording of the messages,” she wrote on Twitter hours later. Sigh. We don’t know what to believe anymore. *Kanye shrug.*

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