𝙨𝙝𝙖𝙩𝙩𝙚𝙧𝙚𝙙, justin foley ✓

x. the subject that troubled them

[ 'my chapters are coming in a little later in the day than usual, my apologizes. im writing these on the day of right now until the weekend :)' ]

   THE FOLLOWING TUESDAY morning, Cassie noticed a change. A couple lockers down from her own stood Clay Jensen. A pair of headphones occupied the position around his neck along with a cord attached to a Walkman. The tapes, Cassie thought.

   Before she knew it, he was approaching her as she kept her eyes locked on the inside of her locker, "Cassie."

   "Hi," she smiled, like she didn't know what he was about to bring up, "how's it going?"

   Clay almost looked confused, "hi...listen, I need to talk to you about the tapes."

   "You listened to mine?" She asked as she closed her locker before training her eyes on his.

   He nodded, and a wave of resurgence washed over them softly. The silence taunting at them almost as if it were happy communication was lost for some people in this town.

   "What did I do?" He asked softly, "please tell me."

   "You need to listen, Clay," she advised, and began walking down the hall.

   He followed close beside her, "Cassie, I— I have no idea why I'm on here."

   "That's why you listen. You're impatient, I get it, but Hannah is telling a story. You cant always skip to the last page, Clay, that's not how stories work," Cassie finally said.

   As her meaningful words hit him, she left him frozen. She knew he realized she was right, but there was no doubt he would go crazy if he was taking as long as he was with the tapes. Cassie wanted to guide him in the right direction, Hannah's tapes had to have taught her something. The message was still somehow hidden, but Cassie wasn't stupid. She would get it one of these days.

❁❁❁

   WHEN AFTERNOON CAME, Cassie found her small group of friends in a heated discussion at her lunch table. When she sat down empty handed, she began listening into the topic.

   "If he opens his mouth, we all go down," Justin warned the people around him.

   "He doesn't have to open his mouth if he knows what's good for him," Marcus quickly replied.

   "Are you guys talking about Clay?" Cassie questioned with a sudden interest.

   Justin, sitting on her left side nodded whilst giving her a look full of longing. She looked away from him, turning her head towards Zach who sat diagonal across from her.

   "Clay's a good guy, he'll make the right decision. Right, Zach?" She asked, not expecting any kind of a right or wrong answer.

   He only shrugged, "he could do anything, Cas."

  "Why would that be such a bad thing? Half of us are mostly innocent. Why are we covering for Bryce?" Cassie demanded earnestly.

   "We cover for Bryce, we cover ourselves, too," explained Courtney Crimson, almost as if it was dumb to even ask.

   "He's a rapist, Courtney— a fucking rapist," she spit out, growing irritated of the honors student.

   Courtney only leaned her head in, glancing sideways for eavesdroppers, "so Hannah says."

   "Besides, we're not like you, Cassie," started Sheri, a cheerleader from her squad, "some of us did something beyond worse than you did, and would like to keep it between the thirteen people who are on the tapes. Not to mention, I'm not the only one who feels this way."

   "It's the right thing to do—"

   "Why didn't you turn it in then?" Ryan Shaver, head of the high school's hit magazine questioned critically.

   Cassie kept quiet for a second, "because everyone needs to listen. That's the whole point of the tapes: we listen."

   "No, the whole point of the goddamn tapes was to make us feel like shit about ourselves, because she took her life," Jessica snapped, slamming herself into a seat next to Zach, "you're awfully quiet."

   Justin glanced up, "I have nothing much to say. These tapes aren't going away anytime soon whether we want them to or not."

   Cassie's head was spinning way too fast, and the conversation the group was having was only going to get worse. There wasn't a solution besides watching what Clay would do. He was hardly done with the tapes, but Marcus, Courtney and the others seemed 'dead on' on keeping him quiet. Who knows if he's even planning on going to someone about it anyway? Although these were people she's known since middle school who might be screwed if these tapes got out, Cassie secretly hoped they would, and she didn't know if she should feel bad about it or not.