The Way I Am Now (The Way I Used to Be, #2)

by Amber Smith

I want to be here for this—all of it. I want to feel everything. I don’t want to let these fucking ghosts in my head win.

I’ve never been so present. Never this connected to anyone, not even him. I’m holding on to him so tight and I have to bury my face in his neck because, I realize, I’m crying. Crying because I’ve never felt this way before. About him, about myself. I don’t even know what it is, but I feel it in my body, my heart, my mind, everywhere—it’s everything. And then I know, all at once: This feeling is freedom.

I look down at my hands in my lap, and I see my dandelion sticking out from under the cuff of my shirt. “There was no question,” I hear myself say, quietly, into the microphone. “Please speak up,” the judge says. “There was no question,” I repeat. White Hair sighs and says, slowly, enunciating his words: “The question was, did you, at any point during the encounter, say no?” “And my answer is, there was never a question.” I hear my voice shaking. “He never asked.” The lawyer repeats himself, this time adding, “Just yes or no.” “There wasn’t a question to answer,” I say again, and I can see how mad I’m making him, his face turning red and his mouth going all rigid as he speaks. “Yes or no,” he says. “Did you tell him no?” “I couldn’t answer a question that was never asked.” “Did you ever say the word no?” he almost yells at me now. I look down at my tattoo again. Then back up, except this time, instead of looking at White Hair or CeCe or Mara or Lane, I look at Kevin. He’s watching me closely, that same knifelike stare he used to control me, all this time, up until now. I lean into the microphone, even as my whole body is trembling, even as I feel the tears rushing to my face, and say with precision now, not breaking eye contact with him: “He. Never. Asked. The. Question.” I bypass White Hair and look up at the judge, sitting there perched above my shoulder. “That’s my answer.”