"Hello?"

"Hi. Is this Riley Kessing?"

"Yes it is."

"Okay, hi, my name is Jo and I'm calling from the Art Institute of Atlanta. I'm calling because I have a record that says that you worked as Sebastian King's assistant for two years, is that correct?"

"Um, yeah, that's right."

"Alright, well I know this is going to sound a bit weird but we have reason to believe that Dr. King has been fraternizing with his female employees and we're trying to get enough testimony from his past employees to take to the school officials. Were you ever sexually harassed or coerced during your employment with Dr. King or do you have any reason to believe that he was sexually harassing another girl during your employment?"

"Is this phone call being recorded?"

"No, it's not. But if you'd rather meet in person, we can meet for coffee or something to talk," I suggest, crossing my fingers for her to agree.

"Sure," She decides. "I'm leaving town soon but I can meet you on Sunday. How about five o'clock at Bernie's Coffee. That's close to campus, isn't it?"

"Yes, Bernie's at five. Okay, great, thank you so much," I grin and give Noah a thumbs up, who's sitting beside me on the couch going through the files. He offered to make phone calls too but I decided that was a bad idea since I think that a woman is likely to talk more about sexual harassment to somebody of the same gender and we need as much help as we can get with this.

"I'll see you then," Riley says on the other end before hanging up the line.

I check her name off of the printed list of girls along with a few names of the other girls that I'd called already. I also write beside her name "Bernie's Sunday @ 5" so that I don't forget to meet her there.

"We're making a lot of progress," Noah says, reading through the papers that I'd printed out from Sebastian's employee records.

"We are," I agree excitedly. "I still don't know how I'm going to put it all together. It has to be presented to the school officials and it has to look really good so that they take it seriously. But I'm not sure how to do that."

"Well, you go to an art school. Do you know any film majors?" He wonders.

"Kind of. Why?"

"Okay, so what if you film all of the testimonies from the girls and put it all on DVD. If they want to stay anonymous, you can wash out their faces and warp their voices but they can sign a form that confirms that it really is them. That way, only the people who absolutely need to know who they are will know who they are. I can talk to my dad about it but I think that it could work."

"You are such a genius," I grin at Noah. "Thank you so much for your help."

"Sure, this is kind of fun."

Yesterday, on Thursday, I'd been going through everything upstairs, trying to figure out where to start when Conner and Noah showed up at the house to hang out with Jasper. Ever since I started dating Scott, I haven't really talked to Noah that much because it's a little weird but it's not like we don't like each other or anything, we still get along. So when Conner and Jasper went up to Jasper's room to do bedroom things, Noah looked all bored and alone downstairs and so I invited him up to help me figure out the papers. And, because his dad is a lawyer, he's picked up some lawyer knowledge during his life and he's actually been really helpful and as a result, he offered to come back today after class to help me out again, which is really nice of him.

"I'll talk to the girls that I've already talked to and ask them if they'd be willing to do that. And I'll try to find a film student to help us out with the recording too," I say, suddenly incredibly excited about that idea. It sure as hell beats a lame PowerPoint.

"But I don't think he can be charged with much in the legal sense. I mean, I think that coercing people to sleep with him can be considered sexual assault but the statute of limitations in Georgia is only three years, I think. I can ask my dad, but I'm sure that it's three years. So he can really only be charged for Tara and Marie and you can get him on sexual harassment maybe," Noah explains, looking down at the papers. "What is your end game here?"

"I want to get him fired," I decide. "And I want to turn his golden name into dirt. I know that the legality of it all is wishy washy so I'll settle for ruining his career."

"Okay," He says with a laugh. "Well, that I'm sure we can do."

"Good, because he's scum," I mutter.

"Are you going to put your own testimony in here?" He asks me.

"Yeah, of course," I assure him with a nod. "I mean, I'm the one who started this all so if I'm asking other girls to go on camera and talk about it then I have to too. Although, I guess that my experience won't come near to any of these. These girls worked with him for two years and I only worked for him for about a month before he moved in on me so they went through this for two whole years, terrified that if they disappointed Sebastian that he'd ruin their unborn careers. It's so awful."

"And you weren't worried that he'd kill your career?" Noah wonders.

"I was absolutely terrified of it," I sigh. "But my career isn't worth my dignity. These girls couldn't afford to think like that and Sebastian took advantage of that and I'm not going to let him get away with it anymore."

"Good for you, Jo," He nods at me. "You're so tough."

"I'm tough as nails," I joke, causing him to laugh and then when I start laughing too, the front door opens and I turn to greet who I assume to be Jasper but I'm a bit surprised when I see Scott.

"Hey," I greet my boyfriend, walking over to him and giving him a quick kiss on the lips. "I thought you had a study group tonight."

"It got rescheduled," He says, glancing at Noah and then back to me. "What's going on?"

"We're going over the files that I got from Sebastian and I've been making calls to the girls on that list. Most of the ones that I've called have agreed to help and I have a meeting with two of them so that they can talk about it in person. And Noah had an awesome idea that we should make all of this into a video to show the school board or something. That way it's all there and it's tangible evidence."

He slides his jacket off and then hangs it on the coat rack before we both walk back over to the couch and I sit back down on the couch where I had been sitting and there's paper scattered all over the place with notes and findings on them, mostly from Noah because he understands this stuff much better than I do.

"I offered to help," Scott reminds me, giving me a weird look as he sits in the office chair beside the couch.

"Right, but you had that study group and Noah's dad is a lawyer so he knows a lot about this stuff," I explain, looking back down at the list of girls to see how many more calls I have to make. I think that I'm going to call two more tonight and then leave the other half for tomorrow because it's getting around dinner time and I don't want to interrupt anybody's dinner. As I'm going through my thought processes, I notice that Scott hadn't responded to me, so I flick some of my bangs out of my face and look up at him. "Is everything okay?"

"Yeah," He blinks at me, glancing over at Noah again. "Everything's fine. What can I do to help?"

"Okay, well I just have to make these two phone calls and then I think we can wrap it up and we can go to dinner or something, sound good?" I wonder. "And if you really want to keep busy while I make the calls, can you look over these and tell me if you find anything irregular."

"What do you mean by irregular?"

"Well, Noah noticed that not all of the girls stay for two years because that just doesn't add up- that would mean that he's been working here for sixty years and I don't think he's even sixty years old. So there might be a pattern in how they quit or get fired or something. I don't know, but any type of pattern or coincidence type of thing can help prove this thing. Career moves, promotions, anything," I say as I grab my cell phone and start making the calls.

The first one goes to voicemail and the second lady brushes me off extremely quickly once I mention Sebastian's name, so I assume that she won't want to help us. I put a question mark next to the first name and an X next to the second one.

Once I'm finished with that, all three of us pack everything back up into the folders and I put them in my room while grabbing a jacket due to the cold-ish weather outside.

"Okay, what are you guys in the mood for?" I wonder when I get back downstairs.

"Oh," Scott says. "I didn't realize that Noah was coming with us."

I give him a weird look, not really expecting that outburst. I didn't think that me hanging out with Noah was going to be a problem for Scott, especially considering we were sitting in a living room with legal papers surrounding us, sitting at least two feet apart the whole time on that couch. "Of course he is. He's been an incredible help these past two days with all of these files and everything, I'm not just going to blow him off, Scotty."

"You know, it's fine," Noah says, sensing some totally unexpected tension growing in the room. "I was just going to order pizza anyway, so I'll go. Just call me if you need any more help. Or not. I don't know. I'm gonna go."

"Alright," I mutter lamely, still not really understanding why Scott is being so weird. I mean, I know that Noah and I have some sort of history but that was forever ago and we're friends now. It's not a big deal so I'm not sure why Scott is all frowny right now. "Well, thanks so much for your help, and tell your dad that I say thank you to him too."

"Will do," He chuckles, offering Scott an awkward wave before he disappears out the front door. I shut it behind him and then turn to Scott.

"What was that all about?" I ask him.

"What was what all about?" He wonders back.

I stare at him, my mouth gaping open a little bit because I have no idea what's happening right now. "Are you okay?" I ask him apprehensively.

"I'm fine, Joey," He sighs, running his fingers through his hair. "I just didn't expect him to go to dinner with us is all."

"You didn't have to be so rude about it though," I mumble. "I didn't know that you had a problem with Noah."

"I don't have a problem with him, he's a cool guy," Scott assures me, trying to force a smile onto his beautiful face but I can tell how forced it is and that he's really perturbed about this.

"Then you just have a problem with him hanging out with me then?" I wonder with raised eyebrows.

He just shrugs, not denying it. "It is a little weird, Jo."

"It's not weird," I object. "Scott, what's going on?"

"Nothing," He insists. "I've just had a long day."

"Okay, well don't take it out on me," I say, feeling rather irritated that he's being all pouty that I'm talking to Noah. I'm especially surprised considering his past with Macy and how controlling she seemed to be. I never would have thought that Scott was the jealous type. "Do you want to talk about it?"

"No," He says, his voice quiet and seemingly stressed. I want to comfort him, to help him feel not so stressed but I can't get myself to step closer to him because I'm so annoyed at him for how he's acting about Noah. Bad mood or not, I don't think that it's necessary at all. "Let's just go eat, alright?"

"I'm not going anywhere with you right now," I say with a soft yet indignant voice. "You're kinda acting like a brat."

"I'm not acting like a brat," Scott rolls his eyes at me. "Like I said, I had a long day and I wanted to come over here and hang out with my girlfriend, not walk in the door and see you hanging out with your ex."

"We were working," I remind him, and I'm sure that we're about to have our first fight, which isn't good at all. I'm not ready to fight. I thought that we had a good few weeks left of our cupcake phase- you know, that phase at the beginning of the relationship where everything the other person does is perfect and being with them is perfect and there is absolutely no fighting?- but he's kind of being a turd and I'm not just going to let him treat me like trash just because he's stressed about something that probably has to do with school. I feel like he's just trying to pick this fight though and that doesn't make much sense to me at all.

"That doesn't mean that I have to be okay with it," Scott decides.

I slide my jacket off now because it's obvious that we aren't going anywhere tonight. And not for the good reasons. "Seriously, Scott, this can't just be about Noah. What's really wrong? Did something happen today?"

"No," He insists with a long sigh but I don't believe him because I don't think that he'd act so crappy about Noah without another reason behind his crappy mood. I step toward him and put my hands on his shoulders. "Just some family stuff but that doesn't really have anything to do with this."

"It does because you're completely overreacting," I tell him. "Look, if you don't want to talk about what's bothering you, let's at least just take a breather. Let's just sit down and watch a movie or something and you can cool down and relax and then we can talk, alright?"

"Jeez, this isn't about my mood, Jo," Scott tells me, ignoring all of my pleas to pacify this argument.

"I don't want to fight," I say to him at a last attempt to stop this from happening. I really don't want to fight with Scott and especially over something so ridiculous.

"Me neither," He sighs, but it's an aggravated sigh. I do us both a favor and ignore that though and sit back down on the couch so that I can start a movie or something. "But that doesn't mean that it's okay."

"What's not okay?" I give up on my peaceful tactics. There's not going to be a movie. There's not going to be any making up right now. There's just going to be a war.

"You and Noah. And stop giving me that look, there's nothing wrong with me not wanting you to hang out with Noah. Considering your history with him and everything," He explains as I stand back up.

"Are you kidding me?" I ask, genuinely asking him because that sounds so ridiculous that it just has to be a joke.

"I'm really not," He says back, his eyes narrowing at me a little bit. "I mean, how am I supposed to feel when I walk in and you're giggling with Noah on the couch?"

"You're supposed to trust me," I say with a sharp glare. "And I was not giggling. We're friends. Am I not allowed to laugh with my friend, who is majorly helping me out right now with the Sebastian stuff, by the way?"

"I do trust you."

"Obviously you don't if you're throwing some stupid hissy fit over the fact that Noah was over here. It wasn't a big deal at all, he was just helping out. Completely honest, Scott, do you honestly think that I'd do anything with Noah? While I'm dating you, do you honestly think that I'd do that to you?" I ask him with a terrified frown because I don't want to know the answer to that question.

A while back, I remember Scott coming into my apartment the morning after I'd hooked up with Noah the first time and I thought that he thought that I was a slut and I was terrified because I didn't want him to think of me like that. I don't care about what anybody else in this world thinks about my sex life or about my private decisions. There are seven billion people in this world but Scott is the single person that I don't want to dissapoint.

That's how I feel right now, so small and pathetic, praying that he says no. That he knows that I'm not like that. He knows that I'm better than that. He knows. I pray that he knows.

But then my heart sinks into my diaphragm as he just shrugs and shakes his head. "I really don't know right now."

My hands start shaking so I fold them over my chest and look down at my shoes, willing myself not to cry. It's like back in the ice cream shop and I'd cried because I don't want to disappoint him. I've never wanted to disappoint him. But then he'd hugged me and assured me that I never could. "Well, you know where the door is then," I mutter in a restrained voice, glancing up at him briefly before I make my way toward the stairs.

"Jo," He calls my name and I turn around to face him. "You can't just run away!"

He lifts his arm to motion toward the stairs that I'm heading to but he does it so quickly that it looks like he's raising his hand to hit me. I know that he's not going to hit me, he's just trying to make a point with hand gestures. And yet, I flinch anyway, feeling my heart skip a beat when I do so. I try to play it off as if I didn't just flinch at his hand but by the look on his face, I'd say that he noticed. And he looks absolutely heart broken.

I want to tell him that it's no big deal, that I flinch whenever a guy angrily raises his hand like that. I've flinched at Jasper, Penn, Niles. I guess that's one thing that's haunted me since I was little, my reflex to flinch when a guy raises his hand like that near me even though I know he's not about to hit me or anything.

But I don't tell Scott that. I just want this to be over. I know that this fight is ridiculous and I know that I'm crying now because of what he said about not knowing if I'd mess with Noah behind his back or not. And now Scott looks broken too because I flinched away from him.

I put a hand on his strong shoulder and I sniffle but I don't wipe the tears from my face. "I know that something's going on with you that you don't want to talk about. This isn't you, Scott. So I'm going to go upstairs and look through these files again and you're going to go home. And when you want to talk with a clear head on your shoulders, you give me a call. And bring flowers because I'm so pissed at you."

"Joey, I didn't mean to-" Scott starts to speak up as I turn toward the stairs to escape whatever dagger-like words he has left for me.

"Just get out of here, Scott," I say in a trembling voice, wiping a tear from the corner of my eye even though there's already a stream of them running down my face. "We'll be okay, we just have to talk later. Not right now. You're being such a jerk. We'll talk later and it'll be okay."

I start to walk up the stairs but I can tell that he's not moving, still watching me ascend the stairs.

I stop and turn around to look at him again but I don't go back down the stairs, I just stay there and I sniffle again. "I love you," I find myself saying. "Like, more than anything. I thought that you knew that."

And then I finally go upstairs.

No, I'd never actually told him that I loved him, but I do. And I thought that I acted like it a lot. I thought that he could tell that I loved him, that I was just afraid of telling him that in fear of it being too soon or something. I didn't want to rush things and I didn't mean to blurt it out like that just then but I couldn't help it. I don't know what had come over me but I pretend to be unaffected by my ill-timed admission and hurry up the stairs.

A few moments later, I hear the front door open and then shut and then I'm alone.

We've broken each other. We are the casualties of our own war.

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Song: Jealous by Nick Jonas
Picture: fan cover by winternase