Porsha Crystal

I knew it was going to be scary. Of course the courtroom was going to be scary. All the reporters were asking me if I knew my father had been like this all along. Of course I knew he wasn't a nice guy, but he didn't just tell me he murdered people. I didn't know for sure if it was people, but I assumed that his first time wasn't something he was going to show on the show. He was too comfortable with it. He was too comfortable trying to grab me while I was singing. He was used to this sort of thing.

The report kept shoving their microphones into my face. It was real annoying, though I wasn't about to tell them that. I tried to be nice, but not on the day I was seeing my own father in court. If they wanted a word out of me they'd have to do a lot better than just trying to bother me. I didn't even say no comment. I glared a little, maybe even a lot, but I didn't say anything. Instead I shoved through them, getting a pretty solid advantage from being a wolf, and wondered why the court had me come in through the front door. Maybe it was supposed to be a way of showing that they had things under control, but to me it was just annoying.

Even once I was in the courtroom it didn't stop. Everything around me was so loud. The judge kept calling for order in the court - I thought they only did that in cheesy shows! - but no one was listening. People were all murmuring. They were probably being mean to my dad. I hated to admit that he was a bad guy. He totally loved me. He gave me everything I ever wanted except the play. That was love. One time trying to be scary wasn't terrible. He was really stressed and it was a fit of rage. I couldn't blame him. Besides, it's not like he reached me. He just tried to.

I didn't want to listen while the case started. I didn't even really want to be there. I kept twiddling my thumbs and trying to pretend I was somewhere else. I was sitting where the spectators sat. It probably wasn't the right spot, but it was where I settled. Johnny was sitting right by me. If it wasn't for him I probably wouldn't have come at all. I thought I could let the court do its job, but he said I should "try to help justice happen" and "make sure my friends knew I had changed." I thought they should just forgive me, but I wasn't about to hurt anyone else's feelings. I'd done enough of that already.

Witnesses came and went for both sides. I was a little annoyed when Jerry said that Dad had never done anything bad to anyone. He'd heard the yelling and the slammed doors. It wasn't abuse, no, but it was frustrating. And he'd tried to hurt Buster. I could forgive him for attacking me but Buster was different. Buster was actually a good guy.

My ears perked when the... plaintiff? called Suki up. She was a real brave woman. I was Jimmy's kid, sure, but that meant I had stuff to fall back on. Suki was risking her whole career by talking bad about Jimmy. I'd seen him get people fired before. Those people didn't get hired again. I usually never saw them again at all, come to think of it. It sucked to see all the things I had never noticed before the court case, but even as the tears were welling in my eyes, I knew it was important to put the pieces together.

"Mr. Crystal has always been a maniac," Suki replied to the question I hadn't heard anyone ask. Dad growled while she spoke, but she ignored him. It was really cool. "At first I thought he was just eccentric, but then he started acting crazy. I've seen lots of people walk into that office and never walk out. I should have reported it before, but I was scared." It was earthshattering to hear Suki admit that. She was so cool and so brave and speaking out against my dad and she was scared. How scared should I be?

"And are you sure he's actually a maniac? You're not being a little overdramatic with your statement?" Suki glared when she was asked that, and I knew why. I got called overdramatic a lot. I was overdramatic a lot, but not as often as I was called it.

"I watched Mr. Crystal dangle men over the edge of buildings. He threatened to do it to me, too, if I ever bothered him. If that's not maniacal I don't know what is." It didn't take long for them to finish questioning Suki. The guy asking her stuff was clearly getting mad.

I was called next, and I shook a little as I walked to the weird box I had to sit in. I may have acted in a play, but I still didn't like all those eyes on me. With how many people Dad had hired, a lot of them were glaring. I clenched my hands on my chair while I waited for the questioning to begin, worried I would say something wrong and be the reason my dad got off scot-free.

"Porsha, have you ever known your dad to be the violent sort of person?" the guy asked me, giving me the sort of face that meant "this is so ridiculous I shouldn't have to ask." I really thought about my answer, as if I didn't already know it.

"He yelled at me a lot," I replied carefully. That wasn't really violence, but it was something. "He slammed doors. Sometimes he threw plates at me, but they never hit me. The one time he did hit me he apologized." My dad was the bad guy and I knew it. I hated myself for defending him. "Doesn't change the fact that he hit me, though. Or that he won't tell me how mom died."

"Objection," the guy said without hesitation. "That's clearly conjecture. I move to have it struck from the record."

"Sustained," the lady in the cool wig said. I didn't know what any of that meant, but I knew the twelve people sitting up front with me were staring at me.

"Porsha, of course this was the first time your dad had threatened someone like this, right?"

"I don't really know," I replied honestly. "Dad didn't let me get involved in the work much. All I really know is that he took credit for things he didn't do and-"

I screamed. I threw myself back in my chair and screamed and cried while my tail tucked between my legs and my fur raised. I didn't know my dad could move that fast. I didn't know anyone could. One second I was giving my testimony and the next my dad's claws were where my face had just been. If I hadn't flinched so fast I'd be dead. My dad had gone from cool to willing to kill me just because I insulted him.

He was growling. My own dad was growling at me, his lips curled back and his claws struggling to reach me across the table. "Daddy, please," I sobbed out, shaking in my seat. He just about vaulted over the table, but as fast as he could move, someone else grabbed him. I didn't even realize who it was at first. I was too scared to really notice things. It was only after Dad was completely across the room, surrounded by several gorilla guards, that I realized Big Daddy had saved me. Of course he had. No one else could hold my dad back.

Even as he was being restrained, handcuffed back to the table, Dad was lunging for me. He was yelling a hundred things I could barely hear, but I knew the meaning behind them. I didn't have to be able to process them to know that the tone meant he was angry. I was shaking and sobbing while my father yelled and the judge called for order. I could barely hear myself begging him to stop, to forgive me for making him this mad. "Please, please, please, I love you, I'm sorry," I cried out through the chaos. He didn't hear me or he didn't care.

I could only clearly make out one sentence my dad said. "That girl is not my daughter."

It hurt more than his claws would have.