Bully Yanked The Freshman's Ponytail — Didn’t Know She Was Trained in Krav Maga
Chapter 19
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Claire looked at her hands. "What about Diane?" she said."She called me this morning at 8:00," Marsh said.Claire looked up."She said she would come," he said. "She said she wanted to bring the letter."Something happened in Claire's chest—something quiet and solid. "And Will Garrett?" she said.Marsh allowed himself a small expression, not quite a smile—the expression of someone who had spent years in courtrooms and had learned not to show too much. "Mr. Garrett sent me the video at 11:30 last night," he said. "With a written statement attached."He turned his laptop to face her. She watched it: 41 seconds of video. Parking lot, poor lighting, but clear enough: Tyler coming in from the right, both hands on Claire's shoulders, the spin, the elbow, the push, Derek against the car hood, Claire stepping back, standing in the light, walking away. It was exactly what she remembered. And it looked exactly like what it was: a person defending herself.She watched it once more. Then she looked up. "He was scared to send it," she said."He said you told him you weren't asking him to fight for you," Marsh said. "Just to show what he actually saw.""That's all I asked," she said."He said that was why he sent it."She thought about that: about the specific thing that moves a person from staying quiet to speaking. It is rarely the big argument; it is usually something small and specific and honest. She had not asked Will Garrett to be a hero; she had just asked him to be accurate. That turned out to be enough."One more thing," Marsh said. He looked at her with that assessing expression she had come to recognize. "The panel has five members. One of them is a faculty representative named Dr. Eleanor Voss. She is a tenured professor of constitutional law. She has been on this campus for 22 years." He paused. "She and I went to the same law school. Fourteen years apart, but she knows what I stand for."He did not say more than that. He did not need to.She had six hours before the hearing. She went back to Caldwell Hall, showered, changed, and ate something she did not taste.Sophie was in the room when she got back. Her roommate was sitting on her bed with her knees pulled up. She had been crying, or close to it; her eyes had that rinsed quality. Claire stopped in the doorway.Sophie looked at her. "I was there," Sophie said. "In the library last Friday.""I know," Claire said.Sophie's jaw tightened. "I didn't do anything.""I know that, too.""I was scared," Sophie said. "I know that's not a good enough reason."Claire sat down on her own bed across from her roommate. She thought about what to say: about what was true, what was useful, and what was kind. Those three things are not always the same thing, but sometimes they line up."Being scared is real," Claire said. "It doesn't make you a bad person.""I saw the post he put up," Sophie said. "The one calling you a liar. I knew it wasn't true." She looked at her hands. "I just kept thinking if I got involved, it would come back on me somehow."