𝘾𝙃𝘼𝙋. 𝙁𝙊𝙍𝙏𝙔 𝙀𝙄𝙂𝙃𝙏 ─── 𝖲𝖤𝖠𝖲𝖮𝖭 𝟯
❝ 𝗘𝗩𝗘𝗥𝗬𝗢𝗡𝗘 𝖨𝖲 𝖠 𝗟𝗜𝗔𝗥 ❞
❪ 𝘛𝘏𝘌𝘙𝘌 𝘈𝘙𝘌 𝘈 𝙉𝙐𝙈𝘽𝙀𝙍 𝘖𝘍
𝙋𝙍𝙊𝘽𝙇𝙀𝙈𝙎 𝘞𝘐𝘛𝘏 𝘾𝙇𝘼𝙔 𝙅𝙀𝙉𝙎𝙀𝙉 ❫

𝟰𝟴. ╱ ✷ ❝ 𝗂'𝗅𝗅 𝗀𝗂𝗏𝖾 𝗁𝖾𝗋 𝗳𝗿𝗲𝗲 𝗿𝗮𝗻𝗴𝗲 𝗍𝗈 𝗵𝗶𝘁 𝘆𝗼𝘂𝗿 𝗮𝘀𝘀. ❞
▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁

     "𝙇𝙊𝙊𝙆, here's the problem with Clay Jensen. Wait, strike that. There are a number of problems with Clay Jensen."

Clay sits in the interrogation room of the Evergreen Police station, a laptop sitting on the table in front of him, a video of him, Riley and Justin outside of Bryce Walker's home from the night before Justin went on trial for Hannah Baker.

"Clay, a minute ago, you told me you just went over there to talk to him." Sheriff Diaz sits across from him after pressing pause on the surveillance video.

"I mean, I did."

"That's just talking?"

"It's not what it looks like." Clay tries to defend himself.

"What do you think it looks like?" Sheriff Diaz questioned him.

"Behind the nice guy surface, there's a whole bloody mess. And if you're a friend of his, you sometimes find yourself getting dragged into that mess along with him."

Justin sits in another interrogation room, the same video pulled up but with a different police officer.

"I talked him down and we walked away." Justin tells the police officer.

"What would've happened if you hadn't been there to talk him down?" The police officer asked him.

"I don't think anything." Justin scoffed, "I mean, Clay wasn't going to . . . ," He trailed off, "If anything, he would've hurt himself. I was more worried about him, and Riley, than Bryce."

In another interrogation room, Riley sat with her arms crossed over her chest as Alex's father sits in front of her, again the same video playing on the laptop before he paused it.

"Riley . . . ,"

"Yeah, no. That's what we're not gonna do." Riley cuts the police officer off with a shake of her head, "I don't care that you are a "trusted adult" or Alex's dad, but I know my rights. I'm not eighteen yet, so you can't ask me any questions without my legal guardian or a lawyer present, lucky for me she works in a law office."

Back to Clay, Sheriff Diaz was still asking him questions, "Did you go over there with the intention of killing Bryce?"

"No, I was just . . . angry."

"About what?"

"It was the day we found out that Bryce was going to get away with . . . everything." Justin tells his police officer.

"But he didn't get away with everything." The officer says, a smug look on his face.

"Yeah . . . he did."

"Riley, you looked afraid in that video." Bill leans against the table to look at the blonde, "Were you afraid of Clay?"

Riley scoffed, "Please, Clay's more scared of me than I am of him."

"Then what were you afraid of?"

"So, you were trying to avenge Hannah Baker by killing her rapist?" Sheriff Diaz asked the Jensen boy.

"No!" Clay denied, "If you look, I didn't do anything."

"Back then. Someone stopped you." Sheriff Diaz says, "Where'd you get the gun?"

"From . . . ," Clay begins to stutter, ". . . this guy I found on the internet. I never learned his name."

"Did you bring it to Bryce's a couple weeks ago when you threatened to kill him then?"

"No."

"Then where is the gun?" Sheriff Diaz questioned.

"And what happened to the gun?" The police officer in the room with Justin asked him.

"Justin got rid of it that night." Clay tells Sheriff Diaz. "He threw it in a dumpster downtown somewhere."

"The gun, I was afraid of the gun." Riley sighs as she looks up at Bill, "Guess that's what happens when your father kills himself and your mother both in front of you."

"I threw it out, behind some restaurant downtown." Justin answered the police officer, "I really didn't want Clay to . . . try and hurt himself."

"Or try to hurt Bryce again?"

"No. that night was the end of it." Clay says.

"It wasn't really, was it?" Sheriff Diaz kept the questions going, "It wasn't the last time you confronted Bryce."

"It turned out there was a lot I didn't know about Clay."

"We found your fingerprints outside the driver's side door of Bryce's car." Sheriff Diaz spoke to the Jensen boy.

"My friend lives at Bryce's house." Clay shrugged his shoulders, "I've been around there a lot."

"Your friend Ani?"

"Yes."

"Your girlfriend?"

"Just friend."

"So, if she had a boyfriend, would you be jealous?" Sheriff Diaz grilled him.

"She didn't have a boyfriend."

"No, but you care for her, feel protective of her?"

Clay shrugged again, "Everyone feels protective of their friends."

"Yeah, but maybe you thought you needed to protect Ani, from Bryce, kind of how you thought you were trying to protect Hannah back then."

"I wasn't protecting Hannah." Clay denied, even though he knew that was far from the truth, "Hannah was dead!"

"Because you failed to protect her." Sheriff Diaz sits up in his seat, "Maybe without Hannah, you were looking for another girl to save."

"I wasn't trying to save anyone!" Clay exclaimed, raising his voice slightly at the Sheriff.

"And Ani was living with the person who hurt Hannah."

"That's not the same at all! Ani is . . . nothing like Hannah."

"Clay and I had fun together. At first."

˗ˏˋ 𖤐 ˎˊ˗

     "𝙃𝙀 had opinions, so did I. We had a good deal in common. We're both nerds. We were friends. Just friends. So, I never thought there'd be any reason for him to be jealous of anyone."

"What do you know about the interactions between Ani and Bryce?" Sheriff Diaz has his hands behind his head as he asks Clay the question.

"She told me they barely talked." Clay tells him, "That she kept her distance from him."

"You believed her?"

"Yes."

˗ˏˋ 𖤐 ˎˊ˗

     "𝘽𝙐𝙏 apparently, I was wrong. And I learned it wouldn't be the first time Clay loved a girl who didn't love him back like he wanted her too.

Ani closes her locker door as she notices Jessica coming towards her, pushing her bag strap up on her shoulder, "Have you heard from Justin? Or Riley even?"

"No. Why?" Jessica asked her.

"Them and Clay are with the police. They found security footage of Clay literally pointing a gun at Bryce and Justin and Riley trying to talk him down."

"Shit!" Jessica exclaimed, "Of course that house had a security camera."

"Wait, you knew this happened?" Ani stopped Jessica in the hallway, causing the Davis girl to turn in her direction.

"Yeah, Justin told me about it." Jessica said to her.

"Jess, do you . . . you don't think Clay . . . you don't think he could've actually done something, do you?" Ani asked.

Jessica shakes her head, "No, I don't – I don't know."

"Was he in love with Hannah?" Ani asked her.

"Did he tell you?" Jessica questioned in confusion, "About Hannah, the tapes, the trial?"

"Almost nothing."

"Jesus!" Jessica looks around, "In here."

˗ˏˋ 𖤐 ˎˊ˗

     "𝗦𝗢, Clay went after everyone on the tapes?" Ani leaned on one of the desks in the empty classroom that Jessica took her too. I mean, I knew he could be obsessive, but –,"

"And when the trial started, it was like . . . he cared more about Hannah than me or anyone else who was alive. I mean, that's not fair, because I think he knew that I was hurting, but –,"

" –but he didn't respect that you weren't ready to speak about it?" Ani asked.

"I mean, I'm glad I ended up testifying. After everything. It made me feel stronger." Jessica tells her, "But after that night, after Bryce, I was constantly afraid. I had to go to school every day and see him. And I was just starting to get over that, and Clay . . . God, he made me feel . . . hunted."

Ani pushed some hair behind her ear, "Do you know where Clay went after Homecoming? Did he go home with Justin and Riley?"

Jessica shakes her head, "Justin was with me, and Scott was in town, so he and Riley were off doing their own thing. But Tony was with Clay at the game, maybe he knows where he went after."

"Right."

"You don't think Clay had anything to do with Bryce?" Jessica asked.

"I don't want to."

"The trial was months ago. Hannah was a year ago. Why would he?" Jessica asked with a shake of her head, not believing that Clay had anything to do with Bryce's murder, "Now? It just –,"

"I don't know . . . I don't know anything." Ani said before the bell rang.

"I have to go." Jessica moves to grab her stuff, "Let me know if you hear from them."

"Right. Yeah."

"That fanboy shit is charming when it's about robots, but when it's about a real live girl, it doesn't seem so charming."

˗ˏˋ 𖤐 ˎˊ˗

      "𝗔𝗡𝗜'𝗦 fingerprints were found all over the inside of Bryce's Range Rover." Sheriff Diaz is now standing up as he talks to Clay.

"Okay."

"That's not odd to you?" He asked. "You said she kept her distance from him."

"Maybe he gave her a ride to the store or something." Clay shrugged, "She helps her mom out with groceries sometimes."

"Sure, that could be it. Or, maybe Ani and Bryce hung out together sometimes. Maybe they were friends."

"They weren't." Denied Clay.

"Living together, being around each other all the time. Hard to believe they didn't get to know one another."

"I think they knew each other a little bit, but that's all."

"You don't think it's possible that they were intimate?" The Sheriff asked.

"No."

Sheriff Diaz reaches down in the box that held evidence from Bryce's case, pulling out a bag with a pair of black panties and laying it on the table, pushing it towards Clay. "We found those in Bryce's room. Had them tested. We found semen that belongs to Bryce, and some blood that doesn't, not his type. We thought maybe they were his ex-girlfriend's. So, we asked Chloe Rice. Turns out not her blood type either."

"How was there blood?"

"Just traces. Not uncommon. Maybe menstrual. Might be aggressive sex."

"They never had sex. Those aren't Ani's." Clay denied.

"We're gonna get a DNA sample. We'll know for sure in about a week." Sheriff Diaz walks back over to the table, "I think that underwear do belong to Ani. And that she and Bryce were intimate. Maybe it was consensual. Maybe it wasn't. Either way, I think you found out, and it was more than you could handle."

˗ˏˋ 𖤐 ˎˊ˗

     "𝗖𝗟𝗔𝗬, is there something you want to tell me?" Sheriff Diaz is back in his seat, hands clasped together as he rests his elbows on the interrogation table.

"There's got to be a reason for those. She – she didn't have sex with Bryce."

"I know it's got to be upsetting to think of those two together. Because you loved her, didn't you? You loved Ani." He watches as Clay shakes his head, "Just liked you loved Hannah. And Bryce destroyed them both."

The door slams open to reveal Lainie.

"Excuse me." Sheriff Diaz stands up from his seat.

"We're done here. Clay, let's go." Lainie tells her son.

"We're having a friendly conversation."

"No, you're interrogating him. And you're harassing him. And we're done."

"Clay gave his consent."

"Did Justin? Lainie asked, "He's seventeen."

"We left word for you."

"At my old firm. That's hardly reasonable effort to contact."

"This is a homicide investigation!" Sheriff Diaz exclaimed to the blonde woman.

"Are you making an arrest?" Lainie questioned him. "I'm taking the three of them home. Now!" She grabs Clay by the arm, pulling him out of the room with her.

"And I learned that even his best friends have very different ideas of who he really is."

˗ˏˋ 𖤐 ˎˊ˗

     "𝗧𝗛𝗔𝗧'𝗦 fucked up." Alex sits at a table in the library with Ani and Tony. I mean, I knew Clay was messed up back then, but I didn't know it got that bad."

"It was a rough time for everybody though." Tony is quick to defend Clay. "For you, too."

"Yeah, but –,"

"Do you guys know where Clay went after Homecoming?" Ani leans forward in her seat to ask the two

"It was his night with Tyler, and they left together after the game." Tony tells her, him and Alex looking at each other.

"In the Prius?" Asked Ani.

"Yeah."

"Do you know where they went?"

"Ask Clay." Alex tells her. "Or Justin."

"Jess said that Justin was with her after Homecoming, not Clay." Ani shakes her head.

"Wait, she told you that?" Alex questions her next.

"Clay didn't do anything."

"He threatened to shoot Bryce." Ani argues with the boy.

"That was a long time ago."

"Where did he even get a gun?"

"It was one of Tyler's." Tony tells her, "Clay and Justin got rid of it after. Look, Clay doesn't have it in him to do something like this. He thinks too much. He doesn't just go off on people."

"He went off on Bryce. About Hannah." Alex says, "Everyone heard it."

"Wait, you mean the fight at Bryce's house?" Ani leaned forwards again.

Tony shakes his head, "That was one time."

"Okay, I'm just saying. He got crazy about Hannah." Alex says, neither him or Tony noticing the look on Ani's face at the words coming from his mouth, "Like, when he found out that Zach slept with her, even when he found out that I just kissed her, like, as a friend."

"That was just jealousy. What does he got to be jealous about now?" Tony asked.

˗ˏˋ 𖤐 ˎˊ˗

     "𝙄 learned that Clay could be jealous. Which I hadn't realized."

"If the two of you want to catch a nap under the table, we'll kick you at the bell." Ani says to Zach and Riley as they have their heads down on the table they sat at in art class, Clay sitting next to her.

"We were up till midnight. Doing laundry." Zack tells her, hitting Riley on the arm as her eyes close. "My mom makes me do it."

"And Zach made me come over to help, cause he doesn't know how to separate correctly." Riley yawns.

"Yeah, mine too."

"Yeah, but at midnight?" Zach laughs, "Like, it can't wait a day?"

"With you? No." Riley joked, earning a pinch on the hip from Zach, "Hey! I bruise easily, you asshole!"

"I know that's why I did it."

"Well, you have to learn how to work." Ani tells Zach, "Nothing will be handed to you on a plate."

"Yeah, she made sacrifices so that I could have opportunities."

"My mom used to make me clean, but then I just made a point of being really bad at it, so . . .," Clay says, causing the three to snort.

"Yeah, I don't really have that option." Zach laughs, "And then on top of that, I asked my mom if she could make a list, like, which chores I had to do on which day, but . . . . she doesn't show me the list. She doesn't show me anything. Which is Why Riley is following me to college, cause then who else is supposed to help me separate my reds from my whites."

"Or your Lightning McQueen boxers." Riley laughed.

"Hey! We said we wouldn't speak about those!" Zach pushed the blonde, "Then every day, there's this new list and that just never ends."

"Well, she doesn't want to leave you any time for trouble."

"Yeah, well, if I actually do have free time and I want to spend it, I have to come up with a really elaborate lie."

"Oh, yeah, I know." Ani says, "I'm a member of at least six non-existent academic clubs."

"Six?" Zach asked, "Can I join?"

"Oh, absolutely."

˗ˏˋ 𖤐 ˎˊ˗

     "𝗪𝗛𝗬 didn't you call me right away?" Lainie asked as everyone sat at the table in the kitchen.

"I didn't want you to worry." Clay tells her.

"Well, we're worried."

"Clay . . . Justin said you were brought in last week, too." Matt tells his son.

"That was just random." Clay said to them, "They were talking to a lot of kids."

"And why would you agree to talk to them again without a lawyer when they clearly think you had something to do with this?"

"Because I don't have anything to do with it."

"We're getting you a lawyer."

"Clay didn't do any–,"

"Okay, let's just – let's take a minute." Matt tries to defuse the situation.

"He had a gun in his hand, Matt." Lainie turns to her husband.

"Yeah, that was nothing."

"Nothing? A gun is nothing? A gun killed your aunt and uncle! A gun traumatized your cousin, who was there with you by the way!"

"Technically, my dad killed himself and my mom." Riley mumbled, holding her hands up in surrender at the look Matt sent in her direction.

"Where did you get it?" Lainie asked her son, head tilted to the side, "Where is it now? Clay, what the fuck were you thinking?"

"It doesn't matter, okay?!" Clay exclaimed, "I was upset and I borrowed the gun from a friend and gave it back."

"What friend?" Lainie asked before turning to Justin and Riley, "Justin, Riley, do you know?"

"Leave them out of this." Clay defends the two.

"Clay, you don't understand what's going on here."

"I didn't do anything."

"But the police think that you did."

"Yeah, but I didn't!"

"You know as well as I do that the court system is not perfect and that innocence is not a perfect defense!"

"You don't believe me?" Clay asked his mother in disbelief. "You think I did something? I don't fucking believe this!" He pushes himself out of his chair.

"Okay. Hey, let's just take a breath." Matt holds his arms out.

"Dad, you believe me, right?" Clay asked his father.

"Of course I do."

"Clay, we will take care of this. We will move heaven and earth to keep you safe." Lainie tells him, "But you need to tell us everything. No more lies."

"I never lie!"

"You withheld."

"You think . . . I could kill someone?"

"It doesn't matter what I think."

"Yes, it does!" Clay yells before he walks away, out of the back door to the shed where he and Justin sleep.

Riley scoffed as she stood up from her chair, "Unbelievable."

"Riley, sit down." Lainie points to the chair she was standing in front of.

"No, I'm not gonna sit down! I'm gonna go check on Clay, you know, because I believe him." She tells the group sitting in the kitchen before making her way out the back and into the shed, stopping as she notices the mess now all in the floor.

Clay sits on the floor against his bed, flinching as someone sits next to him.

"Hey, it's just me." Riley crouches down next to her cousin, sitting on her knees as she pulls him into a hug, the boy gripping the back of her hoodie tightly in his hands as he sobs into her neck, "Shh, it's okay. I believe you, Clay. I believe you."

˗ˏˋ 𖤐 ˎˊ˗

     "𝗛𝗘 dropped me off around eleven, then left again." Tyler stands in the photo development room in the school, hanging pictures up as Ani stood with her hands on the table between them.

"Did he say where he was going?" Ani asked.

"No, but I figured he was headed home." Tyler tells her before shaking his head at the look on Ani's face, "Clay didn't do anything to Bryce. He wouldn't."

"He hated him."

"Everybody hated him." Tyler states to her, knowing that it was true that most people in the school – and their group of friends – hated Bryce, especially after the trials. "But Clay's a really good person, and he wouldn't hurt anyone."

"Jessica told me that he hurt you once." Ani says, "Sent a photo of you around."

"Yeah. He did." Tyler nodded, "And I guess I hated him for it. Back then." He grabs his keys to unlock the metal locker to get inside, "I mean, I did worse. To Hannah. And Courtney."

"That doesn't make it right, though."

"I don't know what makes what right anymore." Tyler tells her, "All these people hurt me. Well, Riley stood up for me a lot of the time."

Ani looks through the photos Tyler slid towards her, photos of all of their friends.

"And I hurt some of them, and I don't know how any of that gets made right. All I know is the only one who ever reached out, the only one who ever really gave a shit about me, was Clay. And we can't forget Riley. Even before the Hannah thing, and the trial, and this – Riley was there for me."

"I knew Clay didn't like Bryce. I just didn't know how much." 

˗ˏˋ 𖤐 ˎˊ˗

     "𝙄 didn't understand the depth of his feelings. All his feelings."

"Holy, shit." Justin walks into the shed with Riley, who had gone back to the house to grab her cellphone and car keys. "Your side looks like my side."

"They talk to you about me?" Clay asked him.

"Yeah. I didn't say anything." Justin told him.

"How does it feel?" Clay asked, causing Riley to look down at him in confusion.

"What?"

"To be the good kid."

"Dude . . ." Justin moves to sit on his bed, "Come on. I'm on your side."

"Whatever."

"What did the cops say to you?" Justin questioned.

"They think Bryce and Ani . . . had a relationship. Had sex."

"What, like, he raped her or, like, they had a thing?" Justin asked.

Riley rolled her eyes mentally, though with Ani living with Bryce and the way he was, she wouldn't put it past the new girl to fall into Bryce Walker's trap and sleep with him.

"Either. I guess."

"Well, what do you think?" Riley asked her cousin.

"She told me they never did."

"You believe her."

"I don't know."

"I should've realized that Clay was . . . invested in our friendship. In a different way than I was. I should've seen that he has a problem with boundaries."

˗ˏˋ 𖤐 ˎˊ˗

     "𝙏𝙃𝙀𝙍𝙀 was never anything romantic between me and Clay. I mean, we never even kissed or anything. But I realized now that didn't stop him from being jealous."

"How could I go in there?" Clay asked Justin and Riley, having driven them to school instead of the two taking Riley's car like they usually did. "Everyone thinks I'm a murderer."

"Shall we just skip or something?" Justin asked.

"That seems like not a good idea, right?"

"You know, you just gotta walk back in there like . . . like you know the truth and just fuck everybody else." Justin tells his adoptive brother, "It's the only way to walk back in there."

"Justin's right, Clay." Riley leans forward to talk to her cousin, "It shouldn't matter what anyone else thinks about you, just that you know the truth. That's it."

˗ˏˋ 𖤐 ˎˊ˗

     "𝗛𝗘𝗬, Clay!" Tony walks up to the boy.

"Hey, Tony."

"What the hell?" Tony asked, "They had you down there all day."

"Yeah." Clay sighs, "I was trying to break your record and stay all night, but . . . sorry, that was humor."

"Listen, Ani has been asking around." Tony stands in front of him so they two come to a stop in the middle of the hallway. "About Homecoming. About where you were after the game."

"She was?"

"If you need cover, I got you." Tony tells him, lowering his voice.

"Cover?"

"For anything."

"Why would I need cover if I didn't do anything?" Clay asked, moving around him.

"Come on, Clay."

"Where were you that night, Tony? Did you account for every minute?"

"Wait, Clay. Clay!"

˗ˏˋ 𖤐 ˎˊ˗

     "𝗛𝗘 came home at like one-thirty." Justin burst through the door with Ani following behind him, the boy dragging Riley along with him, knowing that if he wasn't holding onto her, that she would most likely hit Ani.

"Where was he before that, do you know?" Ani questioned, "Any ideas?"

"He wasn't killing Bryce!"

"How do you know?" Ani asked.

"Justin, I swear to the highest God above, if you don't get her away, I will smack her all the way into the answers that she wants." Riley hissed through her teeth, struggling to get out of his hold.

"Because that's not who he is."

"Oh, but he's the guy that brings a gun to Bryce's house? The guy you have to talk out of using it?" Ani kept her paces behind the two of them.

"One night." Justin says loudly, turning around to look at her, "He was that guy one night. And the rest of the time he's' the guy that'd save your life if it needs saving."

"One night he was that guy, he could've been once more."

"Do you really think he could do it?" Justin asked, "Do you believe that? Or are you trying to do anything to deflect the fact that you fucked Bryce?"

Ani looks at the two in disbelief, "What? I'm sorry, what gives you the idea that I–,"

"We don't have secrets with Clay, you fucking bitch." Riley spits out, "Do you?"

"If he wasn't with you two that night, then where were either of you?"

"You know what, Ani? Fuck off." Justin says, tugging Riley down the hallway with him, "Or next time, I'll give her free range to hit your ass."

˗ˏˋ 𖤐 ˎˊ˗

     "𝙄 know Justin feels like Clay saved him but in the beginning, at least, it was for Clay's own purposes. And "saved" is debatable."

Ani sits in the dark robotics classroom, staring out the window at the rain falling from the sky, a guilty expression on her face.

"Why didn't you tell me?"

She turns around to find Clay standing behind her with his arms crossed over his chest.

"You don't know the whole story." Ani shakes her head, hoping to defend herself.

"You were lying to me the whole time." Clay says to her, an upset expression on his face, "As long as I've known you."

"No!"

"You're a liar! You even told me that yourself and I was so stupid. People always tell you who they are. You just have to listen. And you're a fucking liar!"

"That's not fair."

"You know, all this shit about Bryce that keeps coming out, I keep giving you the benefit of the doubt. And all that time, I thought I did something wrong." Clay tells her, growing more angry by the second, "You didn't want to kiss me because you were kissing him."

"No, that's not the whole story!" Ani exclaimed, trying to defend herself from Clay allegations.

"Then what is the fucking story, Ani?!" Clay asked, moving closer to her, "Because I had to sit there as the cops showed me your underwear with Bryce's fucking cum on them!"

"Okay. Right. You need to calm down." Ani said to him.

"You're always whoever you need to be, right?" Clay spits her own words back at him, "Who were you with Bryce who you couldn't be with me?"

"You just thought I was some lonely girl with her walls up, waiting for the right guy to break them down and save me from myself."

"Bryce!" Clay says in disbelief. "To save you from Bryce! The guy who –,"

" –who you refused to see as anything buta monster rather than a human being who was actually trying to change." Ani comes to Bryce's defense.

"Bullshit!"

"Would you want your entire life to be judged by the worst thing you'd ever done?"

"He was a rapist!" Clay yells at her.

"Okay, Tyler nearly murdered all of you and you did everything you could to help him." Ani shouts back.

"That is not the same. Bryce didn't deserve–,"

"So only Clay Jensen gets to decide who's worth saving?"

"Oh, so that's why you fucked him? To save him?"

"Clay, just don't be a fucking child."

"Were you in love with him?" Clay asked.

"It's not that simple!"

"It's super simple, Ani. Yes or no?" Clay asks, but Ani stays silent so he asks again, but this time louder than the first time, "Yes or no? He was never gonna get better, Ani. No matter what you did. He was always going to be who he was. This whole fucking world is better without him in it."

Ani stares at him in disbelief before asking the one question she had been asking everyone else besides the man in front of her, "Where did you go after Homecoming? After the fight? What did you do?" Her phone buzzes before she can get him to answer her, "It's my mum. I've got to go."

Clay shakes his head, "Of course you do."

"Clay sees the world the way he sees it. Does what he thinks is right. And has trouble seeing it any other way."

˗ˏˋ 𖤐 ˎˊ˗

     "𝙒𝙃𝙀𝙉 Sheriff Diaz called me in last week for that first interrogation, I lied. I lied about Bryce. And if Clay had known the truth, well . . . . it could've been enough motive for him to kill."

"Bryce and I, I mean we were just two kids, alone in that big empty house, you know? It was just . . . it was something that happened.

"Wait, did you just tell me what you just told me?" Scott asked as he's facetime Riley, back in his college dorm.

"Yeah, apparently, little Miss Accuser was sleeping with Bryce, and she lied to Clay everytime." Riley rolled her eyes, running a brush through her wet hair to get the tangles out.

"That's so fucked up, poor Clay."

"I know. I feel so bad for him." She sighs as she plays with the ring on her finger, causing Scott to smile at the sight of it before glancing at the ring on his own finger, "What?"

Scott chuckled, "You play with your ring often?"

"No, I forgot that I took it off the chain." Riley tells him with a smile, "I miss it being on my finger when I have to wear it on my necklace so sometimes when I"m alone I'll put it back onto my finger."

"We need to tell them soon, before they learn from someone else."

"I know. I know."

˗ˏˋ 𖤐 ˎˊ˗

     "𝙔𝙊𝙐 were right about a lot of things. Clay Jensen was a dangerous kid. He's self-righteous, entitled and obsessive."

"Clay!" Ani calls out as she walks into the bedrooms of Justin and Clay, the rain still coming down hard outside. "Clay are you here?"

"But could he kill someone? Could he take a life? I'll admit, I was beginning to wonder."

"What are you doing?" Clay's voice is heard behind her, causing her to spin around to look at him.

She looks at his dripping wet form, "What happened to you?"

"I walked home from school. What the fuck are you doing in my room?" Clay asked, walking closer to her, making her back up away from him.

"Are you . . . afraid of me?"

𝗔𝗨𝗧𝗛𝗢𝗥'𝗦 𝗡𝗢𝗧𝗘,
I'm away that this chapter didn't have much of Riley, but I didn't know where to really put her in this episode!😭 I promise, she will be in more of the next chapter.

And while we're on the topic, I think I want to write like and original chapter of Ani putting like the blame on Riley, and we get a couple of flashbacks from her point of view with like Bryce and stuff.

I feel like, with Riley and Scott now being engaged, I don't want them to hide it very long just because I dragged out where everyone found out that they were dating but I just don't know what to write it about.

So give me some ideas about what you wanna see about Bryce and Riley, and yes, we will learn about home giving Riley they check that he did, and we'll get more into her engagement!