Beyond the Reasons || JUSTIN FOLEY

Twenty-Two

COURTROOM
IMOGEN'S POV

"Being friends with him, it was about loyalty, but it was also about fear." Justin said. He was sitting on the witness stand. Me, sitting in the crowd with my parents. Clay was sitting with Tony a row ahead of us, and Dennis was up. Dennis wasn't the lawyer that made me nervous. It was Sonya, I had no idea what she was going to do for the cross. I just hoped Justin would be okay.

"And how would you describe Mr. Walker's relationships with girls? Were they fear based as well?" Dennis asked.

"Yes, sir. They were like conquests to him. He would always brag about what he'd done with girls. And then he'd call them sluts for hooking up with him." Justin said. It made me sick to my stomach to hear, but I had to sit through this.

For Justin and for myself.

"And did he ever mention an 'on again, off again' relationship with Hannah Baker to you?" Dennis asked.

"No, sir, because it never happened. Maybe they hung out, but there's no way he would've hooked up with her and not told me about it." Justin said.

"Because he liked to brag, as you said?" Dennis asked.

"Exactly."

"How would you describe Hannah?" Dennis asked, I took a deep breath. We were now switching gears. This is the part Justin told Clay not to lose his shit over. I know I wouldn't because when I first came back at the beginning of sophomore year, Justin and I weren't even on speaking terms.

"She was really kind, and funny. I liked her from the first time I saw her. We only had one real date, but it was. . it was nice. I walked her home, then I went home, but I. . I couldn't sleep. And I got in like, a fight with my mom's boyfriend. I texted Hannah and she said to come over." Justin said.

Justin explained how he went over to Hannah's house in the middle of the night, and explained about his mom and Seth. He talked about how she helped clean him up and then he just passed out on her bed, after Hannah hold him that it was okay to, because she knew that after a stressing experience, the body tends to shut down.

"She just let me sleep there, all night. She slept on her own floor." Justin said, and then he explained how when he was walking to school from Hannah's house, he saw Bryce in his car, but he didn't tell him what happened.

"I knew Bryce wasn't going to leave it alone. I knew I'd have to tell him something. I don't know why that was more important to me than doing right by Hannah. Friendship, I guess. Being a man. Wanting him to think that I was more than I was somehow." He said, as he explained how the picture got sent around.

"So that's how that happened." I whispered, mainly to myself.

"Maybe Bryce sent it around because he was jealous. Or maybe because he's just cruel. I don't know. I don't know why people send around photos like that. Bryce did shi. .-stuff like that all the time." Justin said.

"Tell me what you saw when you went back into the room that night." Dennis said. Now he was talking about the party. The party that Jessica and I threw over the summer. I think my dad could feel my leg shaking because he grabbed my hand and held it on his lap before giving it a tender squeeze. It calmed me a little bit.

"We'll renew our objection irrelevant and inflammatory." Sonya said, while Dennis looked at the judge.

"Your honor, we're establishing that Bryce Walker engaged in a pattern of behavior and that the school was aware of it. The defense claims no such behavior took place. We have a right to respond." Dennis said.