Beyond the Reasons || JUSTIN FOLEY

Ten

ZACH DEMPSEY'S BEDROOM
IMOGEN'S POV

"Hey, you ready?" I asked Zach when he walked into his room. He was dressed for court while I was dressed for school. I was going to try and sneak into the courtroom later so I could hear his testimony, but if I couldn't manage to sneak out, I would probably just read about it online later.

"Nervous. . but yeah, ready." He said.

"Zach, you'll do fine, okay? Just get up there and tell the truth. We could've saved Hannah's life with the truth, now it's time to just honor her memory." I said. He nodded his head.

"I know. . you gonna be okay today?" He asked. I nodded my head.

"Don't worry about me. I'm not worried about Justin showing up at school. I guess Clay has him on lock at the house with babysitters, until he's feeling better from being sick. Besides, I still have Monty and Jess." I said.

"I know, but. . you never know what Justin will try." Zach said. I laughed while shaking my head.

"You'll always be the best fake dad, Zach, but I'm telling you that you don't have to worry about me, not today. Nothing needs to be distracting you from court." I said. Zach nodded his head before wrapping his arms around me in a tight hug.

"I love you, Mimi." He mumbled.

"I love you too, Z." I whispered back. We stepped away when there was a knock on his door, where we saw his mother standing there.

"Zach, you ready for this?" She asked him.

"Yeah, I'm all ready. Yeah." He said, then he gave my hand a gentle squeeze. "Have a good day, okay? I'll probably be there around lunch or a little after." He said. I nodded my head before both him and his mother a smile.

"Good luck today."

•

I now sat in the lunch room, with Monty. I was on the blog, reading about Zach's testimony. Right now, he was just talking about the culture at Liberty High, what it was like for girls, he was also talking about the note that Hannah wrote in our communications class, expressing how she wanted to kill herself, but no action was taken about it. I was also talking with Jess and that new girl, Nina. Jess seems to like her, but I'm not so sure.

"I spent the entire night in my whole bed, and my dad only stayed for half of it." Jessica said. I smiled at her from across the table.

"Jess, that's amazing." I said. Monty leaned close to my ear.

"Hey, I'll catch up with you later, okay? Jess probably doesn't want me to hear all of this." He said, which was probably a good idea. I nodded my head.

"Okay." I said. He gave me a quick kiss on the cheek before he went to another table where the jocks were sitting at.

"It's too easy to get sucked back into old shit. I can handle it now." Jessica said, then the girl, Nina gestured for someone to come sit with us, he ended up sitting down next to her, because she was next to me.

"Jess, do you know, Michael?" She asked.

"Hi." He said.

"Hey, Michael." Jess said.

"I'm Imogen, by the way, hi." I said. I really don't know how I feel about Nina. I mean, I'm not doing the whole possessive best friend, thing. Jessica can have other friends, I don't care, but something about Nina just rubs me the wrong way. Then around me the lunch room got weirdly quiet, then Jessica tapped me.