A/N- Okay thanks for helping out with the whole "I FUCKING LOST MY STORY" shenanigan. I really freaked out there. This chapter was a painus in my anus to write for some reason. Just rewrite after fucking rewrite, and I have no knowledge whatsoever about laws and the justice system except that it's really fucked up today. Anyway hope you enjoy this chapter, I know I certainly didn't enjoy writing it.

Chapter 16

So many big words were said that on a normal day Clay would understand in a heartbeat, but right now he was numb to everything except for the girl sitting next to him, who was clutching his hand so tightly all feeling had been lost.

Bryce was sitting up the front with his lawyer, while Hannah's parents at with Mom across from them. Hannah had been asked to sit up there with them, but she had been too terrified to be anywhere near Bryce. Said asshole was constantly looking over his shoulder, his eyes screaming "bloody murder," in our direction.

Clay would answer with a glare of his own while squeezing Hannah's hand reassuringly before trying to focus back on the trial.

Tony, Zach, Alex, Sheri, Jessica, Justin and even Ryan and Marcus are there, sitting directly behind them. Clay was fairly certain that everyone besides Ryan and Marcus were there to support Hannah, but he was positive that Ryan just wanted something to add to his stupid gossip column, and Marcus... well, Marcus was just a nosey asshole. At least Courtney had the audacity to not show up as if she cared.

The trial had been going on for a day and a half, and Clay had to give Bryce credit; he had hired a damn good lawyer. "Fuck Bryce and his rich parents," Tony had grumbled on the first day.

It was a good thing that Mom was a good lawyer as well. Every argument Bryce's lawyer had was met with hard resistance by Mom, and honestly Clay had never felt more proud of his mother in his life. Watching her up there was like seeing Wonder Woman in action, taking on evil gods and monsters.

Despite mom's tenacity, Clay could tell that they were losing. The fact of the matter was that there simply weren't enough witnesses and the evidence was lacking as well. Any DNA that Bryce may have left behind when he raped Hannah had been washed away months ago. Jessica was still sitting on the sidelines, despite Justin's confirmation as to what happened as he was a witness/unwilling accomplice. If they lost, Clay hated to think of the consequences.

The judge called for a recess then, and Clay led Hannah and the others outside. They stopped off at the cafeteria to grab some lunch, though he didn't feel hungry. Apparently, neither did anyone else because nobody was touching their food. Except for Tony.

"Eat up," he instructed.

"I'm not hungry," said Clay, receiving agreeing nods from the others as well.

"Guys. Stop being little bitches and eat your food," Tony pressed in a condescending tone.

"What are you, our grandma?" snapped Sheri.

"Ew. No, that'd be weird," retorted Tony with a disgusted look on his face.

"And why is that? Are we too ugly for you?" asked Zach.

"No. It'd be weird if I was all your guys' grandma because Clay and Hannah are dating, and that'd be like two cousins dating each other," explained Tony with a pointed look at Clay.

Despite feeling pretty dull and moody, Clay couldn't help but snort in amusement. Hannah herself actually laughed out loud, earning a smile from Tony. Soon everyone was laughing and the foul mood was broken. Everyone began laughing and telling jokes like they were back at school, and for a moment everybody could forget the very reason why they were here in the first place.

But all good things must come to an end and the recess break was over, and with it came the glum mood. No words were spoken as everyone entered the courthouse and sat down, and the judge continued with the trial.

Clay felt tense for the rest of the day, and his mind drifted off to other places so he didn't hear when his name was called.

"Clay," whispered Hannah, nudging him lightly with her elbow.

"Huh?" said Clay, blinking in confusion.

"I said I call forth Clay Jensen to the stand," said Mom, shooting Clay an annoyed look.

"Oh, uh right," muttered Clay and he stood up and walked over to the front of the room.

His movements were stiff and numb as he sat in the witness stand, his voice devoid of emotion as he swore to tell the truth.

"Now, Mr Jensen, where were you on the night of the 17th November, 2017?" asked Mom.

November 17th? When was- oh, thought Clay as realisation sunk in.

"I was at Bryce Walker's house," he answered.

"What were you doing at Mr Walker's house, a boy who you believed to have sexually assaulted Miss Baker?"

"I was there to get a confession from Bryce." Clay's mouth tasted foul just saying his name. At Mom's silent encouragement, Clay continued. "I went there to under the pretense of buying weed from him, but I was really there to get him to admit to assaulting Hannah."

"Did Mr Walker contain any marijuana?" asked Mom.

"Objection! Mr Walker's possession of illegal substances is not the focus of this trial!" shouted Bryce's lawyer.

"Seconded," said the judge, though judging from the look on his face, Bryce's possession of weed was something that would be brought up later.

"Continue Mr Jensen," said Mom. "Did Mr Walker admit to sexually assaulting Miss Baker?"

"Yeah, he did," said Clay, allowing himself a small smile. "I was also able to record his confession with an old tape recorder I had hidden in my bag, so if you need that the cops could give it to you."

Bryce's face looked positively murderous then, something which both leased and frightened Clay.

"And the bruises on your face, where did you get those?" asked Mom.

"He beat me up after I punched him," admitted Clay.

"Objection! Mr Jensen freely admits to attacking Mr Walker first and thus the tape recorded for his confession is null, having been told under duress," called out the defence attorney.

"I only punched him when he insulted Hannah!" snapped Clay and the courthouse quickly become drowned in the muttering of all in the room.

"Order!" barked the judge loudly.

Silence soon fell as Clay's temper cooled.

"Thank you Mr Jensen. Is there anything else you would like to add?" said Mom.

"There is actually," said Clay. "When Bryce was beating me, he admitted to sexually assaulting another girl."

The colour from Bryce's face drained considerably then and his eyes widened in horror. Jessica squeaked and Tony scowled deeply. Mr and Mrs Baker looked horrified at the news while Mom's face paled as well. Hannah, on the other hand, she looked tired, and Clay couldn't blame her really.

"Another assault?" said Mom, sounding like she couldn't quite believe Clay.

"Yes," affirmed Clay.

"Can you tell us her name?"

Clay looked over to Jessica, silently begging her to allow him to tell the court. She stared right back at him, looking like a scared child and Clay feared that she would refuse him. But to his astonishment, Jessica nodded her head with a resigned look on her face.

"Jessica Davis," said Clay loudly, so that everyone could hear.

The courtroom descended into chaos then. Bryce was swearing heavily and threatening to murder Clay, while a great many others were calling for justice be done on Bryce. Mrs Baker had broken into tears, the same with Jessica and Hannah. Tony had reached over to comfort Hannah while Sheri pulled Jessica into a hug. Justin and Zach were stunned by the whole thing, Marcus looked pissed off and Ryan stayed sitting while he watched the chaos unfold as if it were some spectacular TV show he was watching.

It took the judge pounding with his gavel several times for the courthouse to settle down, though the tension in the room was so thick it couldn't have been cut through with a knife.

"Yes, well. Thank you for that Mr Jensen, that will be all," said Mom then, and Clay felt sorry for her because she looked pretty shaken.

"Is Miss Davies with us today?" asked the judge once Clay had taken his seat next to Hannah again.

Mom looked back to the audience with an inquisitive expression, then her face turned into surprise when Jessica actually stood up and walked to the front of the court.

"Is what Mr Jensen said true?" said Mom, dispensing with formalities.

"Y-yeah," said Jessica shakily.

Clay could see that she looked absolutely terrified of being in front of so many people.

"Can you tell me what happened?" asked Mom.

"I think so. I was having a party at my house. A welcome back to school sort of thing," began Jessica. "I was with my boyfriend- ex-boyfriend," she gave Justin a dark look, "and we got pretty drunk. Justin took me up to my room to have a rest... and I honestly don't remember much after that, but I think that's when Bryce..." she trailed off with a faraway look in her eyes.

"So you don't actually know for yourself if you were sexually assaulted?" asked Mom.

"No! I do I just... I sometimes see things that I'm not sure happened. But they're horrible things," Jessica started crying then and couldn't continue.

Mom told Jessica she could sit down, then called up Justin. the boy walked up to the stand, avoiding Bryce's intense gaze as he sat down.

"What do you have to do with all this, Mr Foley?" asked Mom tiredly.

"I saw Bryce rape Jessica at the party," stated Justin.

"What happened?"

"Jessica was really drunk that night so I took her up to her room to..." Justin paused. "To take her to bed," he finished. "When I went out of the room to get some water for Jessica Bryce was there waiting for me. He said something along the lines of sharing, so I let him inside Jessica's room. I was drunk as well, so I didn't realise what he meant until the door was closed.

"I went back inside to stop Bryce, but he's a lot stronger than me and shoved me out of the bedroom and locked the door so I couldn't get in. I didn't know what to do," he finished.

"Did you tell Miss Davis what happened?" said Mom.

"No," Justin answered firmly. "I thought that if she didn't know I was protecting her."

There were gasps from the Bakers table, and several people in the audience shook their heads in anger.

"You do realise that keeping something as serious as this constitutes as acting as an accomplice to the felon?" said Mom darkly. Everybody's attention was on Justin now.

Justin took a deep breath and looked Mom straight in the eyes. "Yes, I understand."

oOoOoOo

"Holy shit, we did it," muttered Alex in awe.

Clay felt that Alex had taken the words right out of his mouth. After Justin's testimony, it was all a matter of the jury deciding Bryce's guilt. With the amount of evidence stacked up against him, not even money could save him. Added to the possession and distribution of illegal substances, Bryce was looking at being in prison for a long time.

Unfortunately Justin was going to jail as well, though nowhere near as long as Bryce. Jessica looked almost happy about it, and Clay worried about that. Everyone had changed in the months since Hannah's attempted suicide, and Clay wasn't sure if it was for the better. He never would have thought that he would end up being good, if not close friends with the likes of Zach and Alex, and he wasn't so socially inept all the time. Oh, and the best thing of all; Hannah Baker loved him.

That being said, everyone involved had grown up so quickly in such a short time. There were moments where Clay could see one of them get caught up in the past, and they'd become sombre and withdrawn for the rest of the day. Clay himself still suffered from nightmares, and he had often had to break Hannah out of one of her PTSD spells.

"It's over... it really is over," whispered Hannah from beside Clay, and he leant over and pressed a kiss on the top of her head in response. She gave him a grateful look and took his hand in her own, not taking her eyes off his.

"Oh great, they're doing it again," groaned Alex dramatically.

"Oh shut it you," snapped Sheri, cuffing Alex over the head with her palm. "It's romantic, let them be."

"It's sickeningly romantic," argued Alex, "No teenager should look at their lover like that. It makes them look like they've been married for years."

"Settle down mate. Just because you're jealous," laughed Zach. Only Clay saw Alex's eyes dart over to Jessica briefly while a small blush crept into his face.

"I'm hungry. What say we head over to Rosie's for a celebratory lunch?" suggested Tony, and everybody agreed enthusiastically.

Everyone in their 'squad' turned up to Rosie's and had an amazing time. Clay couldn't remember a time where everybody was having a genuinely good time together. It was made even better for him when he saw that Hannah's smile had not left her face at all, her eyes sparkling so brightly that Clay swore he would end up blind if he stared too long.

When lunch was over, everyone returned to their own homes, promising another get-together sometime in the near future. Clay went Hannah back to her place, and was surprised to know that her parents wouldn't be home till night time.

Hannah grabbed Clay's hand as they walked into the door, and she shut it behind them. Clay lifted an eyebrow in amusement as Hannah sauntered over to him, swaying her hips dramatically. She wrapped her arms around the back of Clay's neck, and his hands automatically grabbed her waist as they pressed closer together.

"Have I told you how much I love you?" Hannah whispered huskily into Clay's ear, sending shivers down his spine.

"I think so, but maybe you should remind me?" teased Clay.

Hannah complied and kissed Clay passionately, and soon they were lost in each other's embrace. Hannah pushed Clay towards the bed, not letting go of him and they collapsed on top of each other with a surprised yelp and giggle. Clay could feel that things were heating up very quickly, and Hannah could tell as well as she ground against Clay's crotch, eliciting a groan.

"Hold on a sec," said Clay breathlessly, gently pushing Hannah away.

"What's wrong?" asked Hannah, biting her lip in worry.

"Are you sure?" said Clay hesitantly. He didn't want this to be a mistake on either of their parts.

"More than anything," answered Hannah. "I want you."

That did it for Clay, and the couple went straight back into their game, this time with no restrictions, willing to let themselves show each other exactly how much they loved one another.

A/N- Happy ending? NAH! There's still more to come!

Also fuck this chapter.