When The Day Met The Night

47

"We're gunna get this motherfucker if it's the last thing I do" I tell Rian.
"What if I don't care to take him down?" She asks.
"What do you mean? He hurt you and other women. He needs to be taken care of"
"Yeah but don't you see? It's ruining me! And my reputation." I cry out as I lay on the bed.
"Rian...I know this hurting now but it'll be so much better when you see him put away. I love you and I don't want to spend the rest of my life knowing the person who did this is still out there" he places a sympathetic hand on my back.
"I guess, I just don't want people to see me as some broken girl who got raped at a party" she shrugs.
"No one sees you like that Ri. You know how I see you? As my beautiful and talented girlfriend who I love and adore" I try to make her feel better which that does earn a smirk.
"Thank you Brendon" she says before closing her eyes.
I decide to leave and let her nap. Yesterday was a trying day. It's so irritating to have a case against a guy who practically raped my girlfriend.
I go to the living room and call my lawyer to see what she has for the next trial.
"Hey Tracey. So, for tomorrow's trial. What do you have?" I ask.
"Well tomorrow is also verdict day so we have to have our final statement and it has to have a lot of composing arguments. Right now I'm looking up the other girl he did this to, the one they tried to get him prosecuted for. If I can find her hopefully I can convince her to come forward and talk about what happened. All we really need right now is to make the jury sad"
"Well this hopefully will work. She's really beaten up about this."
"I know, I'm working as hard as I can to make sure she's safe and so are all the other women"
"Thanks Tracey" I say and hang up.

The next morning is a busy one. Rian barley even made it out of bed on time to get to court but she did, not presentably I may add but that I can understand. She refused to throw anything else on, just wanting to get the day over with-also understandable.
Once we arrived at the courthouse we found our way to where we needed to be and took our seats and waited for everyone.
A few people piled in the back but not many, there really hasn't been that many people to come in for this case.
Tracey comes in looking rather confident which makes me perk up a little.
"We've got this in the bag" she tells me, taking her seat.
"All rise" the plaintiff says and we all stand.

An hour later and I'm already exhausted but I know Tracey will call me to the stand soon so I have to have my head in the game.
"I'd like to call Mr. Urie to the stand now" Tracey says. I stand, adjust my shirt and give Rian a peck on the head, she looks so exhausted and like she really doesn't want to be here, which I can understand.
"Mr. Urie can you please tell the court what happened that day from your perspective please"
"I uh, I came in from parking. It was a mad house in there, you could tell from the inside. I walked in and started looking for Rian. I couldn't find her anywhere so my second bet was to look for Dylan. When I found him I asked if he knew where Rian had gone, he said he saw her on the couch. I didn't see her on the couch so I went looking for her. I decided to look upstairs and that's when I found him- Steven on top of her on...on the bed" I stop for a second, looking at Rian who seems so out of it it's like she isn't even here. Her leg up on the chair, her elbow propped up on her knee, her head facing down, her eyes look tired and she looks like she wants to be anywhere but here and I wish her to be anywhere but here.
"Mr. Urie, could you tell the court what you did next" Tracey asked.
"I uh...I pushed him off of her and started screaming at him. I-i took the bed sheet and laid it over her chest. That's when Dylan came in and started yelling at Steven. Then I picked her up and took her home"
"And why did you go to Dylan's party?"
"To see Rian. I didn't like Dylan and I didn't like him being around her"
"Why didn't you like him?"
"Because he kissed Rian once and then came to her house and started asking her dumb questions."
"And seeing him kiss your girlfriend made you mad?"
"Well...she wasn't my girlfriend at the time."
"But you liked her?"
"Yes"
"So you admit to going over to Dylan's not for Dylan but to get Rian. And instead you saw this awful incident" she asks.
"Yes I did"
"Did you know Steven before this?"
"No I didn't"
"So you had no clue as to who he was and why he was on top of Rian?"
"No I did not."
"But we're told about his past behavior"
"Only by Dylan that same night."
"So in conclusion you came to Dylan's in hopes to grab your girlfriend and leave because you didn't wish to stay at Dylan's cause you didn't like him but instead you walked in on your girlfriend being raped by a man you'd never seen before?"
"Yes that is correct"
"Thank you Brendon" she says. "No further questions"
"For my last witness I'd like to call Jessica Bagley to the stand" she announces. I have no idea who that is. But hopefully she'll help us. I look to Steven, and he looks at her and his eyes go wide and now I know who she is.
"Ms. Bagley, would you like to tell the court who you are?"
"Yes...I'm Jessica...the girl Steven raped 2 years ago. My parents and a few other people I knew tried to get him put in jail but no one would do anything"
"And why wouldn't they?"
"The school said it could hurt his football career"
"And if you could, please tell us what happened to you?"
"It was my freshmen year." She lets out a sigh. "I went to a party for the end of the semester to blow off steam."
"It was Dylan's. Apparently he invited everyone from everywhere to come party. My friend and roommate asked me to come and I did." Her eyes move to what seems like Rian and my thoughts are confirmed when she frowns.
"When we got there I started talking to Dylan and we practically hung out the whole night. But eventually he got busy with other people. That's when I met Steven, he handed me a drink and I took it. Before I knew it I was out of it and then soon I blacked out. The next thing I remembered was waking up under him...I could feel him inside me. Hurting me, his arms pushing against me to keep down but the weird thing was...was that I wasn't resisting. I didn't have the ability to do so. After-after he finished, he dropped his body on top of me and rolled over. He threw his clothes back on and left without a word. Like I was just something he had done, like it was routine." She finishes, tears streaming down her face.
"Thank you Jessica. I know that must have been hard." She sighs.
"What did you do after all of this?" She asks.
"I dropped out" she squeaks. "I couldn't go back to that school and be able to walk through the building knowing he was there. And I couldn't transfer, my parents barely had the money to keep me there."
"No further questions" she says sadly. "Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, what we have here is the everyday case of woman gets raped by a man. And as you've heard this man has done it before and had no consequences. This is a tragedy that happens everyday. And you sit here and listen to the stories of these 2 young women, ask yourself. Do you really want to be the person who keeps a rapist like Steven out on the streets?" She nods and sits down.
"Your honor id like to counter" the defense stands.
"Jessica you said you went to the party. What led you to want to go to this party, knowing there'd be older guys there?"
"I figured it'd be a good way to let off some stress from school"
"And what did you expect?"
"I didn't know what to expect really. Just a party I guess"
"And do you expect older college men to be at this party."
"Yes."
"And did you know about Steven and his past?"
"I'd...id heard some rumors. Yes"
"So you took a drink from Steven knowing what he could do?"
"No...they were rumors then. I didn't know he'd drug me, I thought he'd do it to girls when they were drunk."
"But didn't you go there knowing you'd get drunk?"
"No, I didn't plan on it"
"But you took a drink, I'm guessing with alcohol from a man you'd heard rumors that hurt other women?"
"Not-I didnt know it was him at the time"
"But you just told the court you accepted a drink from Steven, is that not correct?"
"Yes-it is, I just didn't know it was Steven when I took the drink."
"Who did you think it was"
"No one, just a random frat guy"
"So you willing accepted a drink from a guy you didn't know? Isn't it possible you might have accepted sex from him too?"
"No, of course not"
"And isn't it possible, that maybe he didn't drug you and you might have gotten drunk off the one drink or maybe you had been drinking all night that's the one that made you drunk. And maybe you accepted sex from him without realizing it."
"No, no! No!"
"After all, we have no real evidence of this occurring."
"He drugged me and had his way with me end of story" she sighs.
"No further questions"
"Ladies and gentlemen, we have no true evidence of Steven ever raping any women. Just accusations. Are we really going to let a potentially innocent man go to prison over hearsay and rumors?" He says.
"The jury will now consider all the facts and everything that has been said and come up with their verdict" the judge announces and they all get up and go back.