Ilia Amitola is color coded for your convenience (amitola) wrote in valarlogs, @ 2019-10-02 13:08:00 |
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Entry tags: | !complete, ilia amitola |
Who: Ilia Amitola
What: Dealing with the fallout of her testimony
When: October 2nd 2019, afternoon
Where: Courthouse
Warnings: Low
Status: Narrative | Complete
Ilia had known that it was going to be tough when she spoke at the trial. She had known that going in yet she had still decided that no matter what, she was going to have her say. She would speak for her parents who never got the chance to see her grow up. Speak for everyone who signed an NDA who lost loved ones in collapse after collapse.
That had been the plan, but what was it they said about the best laid plans of mice and men? The first creep she had noticed could have been just that. A random creep. And it wasn't like it was always the same guy. But as the week or so went on, it definitely had felt like she was being followed. Always just enough to put her on edge but never enough for her to do anything. Not that she could when she had to be on her best behavior and not give the defense any reason to question her. There was plenty of that to go around with the fact Jacques had managed to manipulate her entire time in the foster system so that she never had a stable environment, as if he knew this was a possibility. No stability. Always being seen as an 'issue' and 'unreliable'. Just because Rita Skeeter wrote trash articles didn't mean she'd been wrong when she said that was the strategy that would be used. That it would dredge up all of those old issues.
It certainly didn't help that Logan's friend, the one who'd also had finches with her and everything from the Red Room, showed up early that morning because the woman who had been looking after Chloe apparently went batshit crazy. Ilia didn't know the details, she'd already been on edge and struggling to get some sort of rest. What did one more disruption matter? Even if it did bring up those issues as well.
God this day was a complete mess.
Somehow she had managed to get on the stand and present her case, her history. The first part had been as she ad expected between talking with the lawyer, as well as Marguerite's brother who was in law school. And she had known the defense wouldn't play fair. Yet somehow every single one of her buttons had managed to be pushed and any sense of calm she might have presented faltered and failed, even with friends there to support her. Honestly it was a miracle she had managed to keep from changing colors on the stand in front of all those people. That had to say something. Right?
Finally though it was over and she had somehow gotten through the testimony. She couldn't look at the smug bastard though. Couldn't break in front of people. Like hell. It was only after she was alone in the bathroom that she started to feel the panic rise, the inability to breathe, the fact that her skin and hair were alternating colors as she ran the gamut of emotions.
On instinct she grabbed her phone to call Chloe only to remember that, oh right. They had broken up right before the start of the trial. And she knew why. She knew that neither had been in a place to help the other and that Chloe had her own shit to deal with, to work through. So even if they had said the other could always call if needed.... she couldn't. Ilia couldn't put this on her ex when she was finally trying to work through her issues. Somehow managing not to scream, she closed out of the call option and locked herself in a stall where she finally let herself break down.
Break down from the pain of everything she had to dredge up while testifying.
The memories of her time in the system.
The pain of the Red Room.
The fact that men like Jacques Schnee never paid their dues and that this had been a futile event and why had she bothered.
The urge to just run away was strong and Ilia clutched at the fabric of her blouse and leaned against the stall door. She honestly had no idea if she could get through this. What was the point? Justice didn't exist. Not for people like her. So why think it was going to change now just because she had spoken out?