Confessions of a Teenage Alcoholic

Chapter 14

Check out last chapter as well, updated 2.

"Miss James, I would just like to ask you a few questions. If you need to stop or take a break that if fine." Layton's defence attorney approached me.

I look up and see my friends faces in the watcher's pit and I know they're here to support me, but they just provided evidential photos of what he did to me and now I don't know if I can breathe, or look them in the eyes.

"I'm going to suggest to you, that you had a level of familiarity with Mr Wright where having some physical contact, whether it may be a hand on the shoulder, holding hands... not something out of the ordinary, for you in your relationship to that point."

I look at my lawyer and she nods at me gently. "It wasn't the norm, but I didn't think much of it. We were all close."

"Yes or no Miss James."

"Yeah."

"And people were drinking, it was a party no? A high school party where people, underage would most likely be drinking."

"Yes."

"And that includes you? And Mr Wright?"

"I was drinking, but I don't know about him."

"And quite naturally, you don't have a little notebook where you are carefully noting down each millilitre of alcohol you ingest, fair enough?"

"Right."

"And so if I were to suggest to you, that as with any person out for the night, quantities of alcohol consumed inevitably are estimates. Right?"

"yeah."

"And those estimates can be high or low can't they?"

My lawyer objects against Layton's defence, something to do with relevance, but the judge allows it.

So I answer.

"They took my blood levels." I say. 

"They did." Layton's defence agrees. "You weren't that intoxicated Miss James, did you know that?"

"I remember everything he did to me so yes, I am aware."

My lawyer gives me a warning look and I calm down, taking a deep breath.

"So in your initial statement, you said you followed Mr Wright up the stairs because you were drunk and hiding from the police, if this true?"

"Yes."

I knew where he was going, he's trying to persuade the jury that my story wasn't the truth, that I wasn't a reliable witness. He's going to say that Layton perceived that act of following him into the room as consent.

"But Miss James you weren't that intoxicated so, do you have another explanation as to why you followed your, at the time, boyfriend's best friend up the stairs and into a spare bedroom at a party?"

"It was because I trusted him, because I thought we were hiding. I thought I was safe." I say and my hands are gripping the wood in front of my so tight that I find my mums eyes in the audience.

She reassures me.

"But Miss James, is it fair to say that you actually happily, placed your hand in his, and followed him into a locked bedroom."

"Only because I didn't know I was unsafe at the time."

"Yes or no?"

"Yeah."