(A/N): This is the last chapter. I hope you guys liked this little story. Please comment and favorite. Thanks.

It had been a couple weeks since your confrontation with Justin. Andrew, Derek, and Tevin had taken your side, the four of you resuming your lives without Justin. One thing you did notice was Naomi's sudden disappearance from school, which held with the dealers' theory of her being a narc. You were sitting in the back of the physics class, talking to Derek about the upcoming year. You were going to take a gap year, but everyone else was planning on going to college in the fall. As you were describing the road trip you were planning, two uniformed officers came into the room. They spoke to your teacher, and your teacher soon pointed you out.

Everyone's attention turned to you as the officers walked to your desk. "Ashland Barnes?" one of them asked.

"Yeah?" You replied, turning your attention to the man.

"Please stand," he told you. "Ashland Barnes, you are under arrest for drug possession with the intention to sell." Derek looked shocked from beside you, and when you snuck a glance at Justin, all of the color had drained from his face. You stood and let the other officer place cuffs on you as she read you your rights, your face completely calm despite your pounding heart and racing thoughts. They led you out of the classroom, which had been shocked into silence. After all, you were always the quiet one, the least likely to get in trouble.

Instead of taking you out to a squad car, the officers led you to your locker. The janitor was removing the lock, revealing your clean locker. The male officer put on gloves and began rifling through your things, making a mess of your carefully organized locker. It took only a few minutes for the officer to find nothing, and he turned to you. "Where's your supply?" he demanded.

"I don't have one," you shrugged. "I'm not a dealer."

"Don't lie to us," the woman said, pulling on your cuffs slightly.

"I don't have a supply because I'm not a drug dealer," you replied. "And if you could not do that, I'd appreciate it." The woman responded by tugging on your cuffs again, making them dig into your wrists. You winced at the feeling, but chose not to say anything else. You looked down the hall, seeing various lockers thrown open with papers and books scattered on the floor in front of them. By the amount of people caught, you could tell Naomi wasn't the only undercover officer at work.

The officers took you to the main office, where you were met with about a dozen kids waiting. You scanned the faces, recognizing some from your four years at the school, but you didn't see your dealer. The officers called every person's parents, taking them to the squad cars after, and slowly the group began to dwindle. You were one of the last to leave, and you had to admit that you were getting really sick of your arresting officers.

After your interview with the nice guy that treated you like a human being, you were interrogated by detectives. The entire time they were yelling at you, talking about how you needed to give up the act. "We have evidence that you planned to sell those drugs," a male detective yelled.

"What evidence?" You challenged. Save for touch DNA, there was nothing to prove that you'd even talked to Naomi.

"Don't play dumb, we have every text," the man replied.

"What are you even talking about? I never talked to Naomi, I didn't like her," you replied, suddenly confused. "Touch DNA on the bag I'd get, but texts? It's hard to text someone you never talked to outside of class."

"I'm talking about the ones between your friend and her. So what, you use him as a proxy to take the money for duds while you slip the customer the actual drugs?" the detective speculated. "It's your word against hers, and who do you think we'll trust?"

He had you there. The police would protect their own, and despite the fact that you never really planned anything with Naomi, they would do whatever it took to take you down. You slumped down in your seat, taking the abuse from the detective until your court appointed attorney showed up.

You spent a week in a juvenile detention center waiting for indictment since you were still technically a minor. You had to admit that you didn't have it as bad as you could've, especially since you heard talk that some of the dealers got sent to actual prisons. You had consistent visitors in your week: your parents, Derek, Tevin, and Andrew showed up. When indictment came around, you took the plea deal for two years probation.

During the week you spent in juvie, you couldn't help but think about how you could've avoided all of this. You could've told Justin about your suspicions from the beginning, but it's not like he would've listened. You could've just given Justin the oregano and let him look like an idiot, but no, you just had to go and get actual weed for her. You mainly just wanted to talk to Naomi, see what she thought now that she had done all of this. You wanted to know why she had to come in and destroy everything you knew. You wondered if she still thought she did the right thing during those months.

A couple weeks after the plea deal was arranged, you got a phone call from a journalist reporting the entire thing. You thought his voice sounded familiar, but it didn't click until you walked into the interview room and saw the same man from the day you were arrested. "So you aren't a detective, huh?" You asked, putting your bag down on the table and taking a seat across from him.

"I never told you that I was, you just assumed," he replied with a smile. "So, Ashland, can you tell me what happened since we last talked?"

"Uh, well, I was sent to juvie since I'm not technically an adult yet," you replied. "I turn 18 next month, so luckily all of this happened when I was still a minor. I took a plea for two years probation, so I can't really do anything. If I try to go to college, I gotta say that I have a felony charge, and I won't qualify for any federal financial aid, so it's not like I can afford it anyways. Naomi messed up my future big time."

"Have you talked to her since all of this happened?" He asked.

"Nope, but I never really talked to her in the first place, so it's not a loss," you said with a shrug.

"How about Justin?"

"He visited me when I was in juvie, we made up. He's still depressed about Naomi though," you told him. "That's a conversation he'd love to have if he ever saw her again."

"Do you know what he'd say to her?" The man seemed even more invested in the story than he initially was, but you chalked it down to it being major headline news. If this was his first major piece, then there was undoubtedly a promotion in his future if this story gained as much attention as he seemed to think it would.

"We actually talked about this. He said that he'd ask what the heck did she do to him. He honestly really liked her, and it was only because it was her that he did all of this. If it had been the dude UC that I heard about, he would've turned him away, told him to back off, but it was all because it was her," you spilled, finally putting everything you'd been thinking about in juvie out there.

You had been in Juvie four days when he showed up, his face blotchy and swollen. You swallowed nervously as he awkwardly stared at you.

"I'm sorry Ash. I didn't know, I really didn't. I should have just listened to you. I liked her so much, you know. Maybe it's because she reminded me of you. I had a crush on you in junior year, you know. But you always avoided that kinda subject so I just thought you were like out of my league or something. I never meant for all this crap to happen." He let the words tumble out.

You blinked back tears. It hurt to see him a wreck. "It's okay. I wasn't planning on college anyway. And...I had no idea you had...you know. Are we like...cool now?"

He nodded softly. "Yeah...and we could be even more than...cool...if you want."

"Yeah." You said putting a hand on his shaking one.

He gave you a watery smile. "Cool."

Letting your thoughts slip back to the present you see he's still attentively listening to your views. "She just got him so infatuated with her." You started up again . "I'm not sure if we could sue for entrapment, but that entire situation definitely felt like entrapment. The court appointed attorney I got isn't trash so he's still talking with us, seeing about getting an appeal to overturn the plea."

"That would be a difficult case to win," the man commented. "But I wish you the best with that. Is there anything else you'd like to talk about? I know it's sort of off topic, but the last time we talked, you mentioned that you told Justin that you liked him. Did anything come from that?"

"Aw, you're a romantic," you teased. "Well, when I was in juvie, we actually talked it through and we've been together for a couple weeks now. As soon as I was out, he took me on our first date. Honestly, I can say that's the one good thing that came out of all this." The man looked overjoyed at the news, and you could tell he was fighting to keep in his enthusiasm. "You can react more than that, you know."

"I'm just really glad that worked out for you," he gushed, a wide smile on his face. "And you got me, I'm definitely a sucker for a good love story." You laughed at his excitement, already knowing that you'd look out for him since he seemed like a good person.

"Yeah, to think all it took was for me to get a felony for him," you joked.

"There was obviously no easier way," the man joked right back. You liked him, he was quick witted.

"Well, that's all there really is to my story," you told him. "Thank you for listening and not judging."

"No problem, let me show you the way out," he told you, standing and waiting as you gathered your bag. The two of you made small talk as he led you to the lobby of the building, and just as you were about to leave, he surprised you by putting a hand in your shoulder. "Hey, Ashland."

You looked at his hand and then back at him.

"Sorry," he apologized, moving his hand, He dug into his pocket before speaking again. "When I was researching you I got to look at some of your pictures from school, and they're really good. If you're looking for a job, I can get you on the staff here as a photographer."

"Wait, really?" You asked incredulously as he handed you a business card.

"Yeah, just give me a call," he told you.

"Why are you doing this for me?" You questioned, despite your instincts telling you not to look a gift horse in the mouth.

"Because you deserve a second chance," he replied. "I'll be waiting for that call, Ashland." With that, he turned and walked away, heading back in the direction of his office. You shook the shock out of your system, pocketing the card before heading out. You smiled when you saw Justin waiting for you outside, sitting under a tree. Justin looked up, smiling brightly when he saw you.

"Hey, I thought I said I'd call you," you joked as Justin walked up to you. He took your hand in his and your heart fluttered just like it did the first time.

"I was okay with waiting." Justin replied, he still felt bad, you could tell.

"You waited a hour though." you laughed. The two of you walked hand in hand down the street, headed back to the same park you'd first confessed at.

"I know," Justin flushed. "So, what were they asking about?"

"Remember how I told you about that nice detective when I was getting questioned?" You paused, waiting for his nod. When he gave it to you, you continued. "Well, turns out he's a journalist and that's who I met with today. He just wanted a follow up on what happened."

"What'd you tell him?" Justin asked, his hand nervously twitching in yours as if he thought it odd still to be there.

"I told him about juvie, the plea, things like that," you replied. "But after we were done, he gave me his card and said he wanted to offer me a job as a photographer."

"Well, there you are, Ash. Maybe I didn't permanently mess up your life!" Justin said hopefully. You dropped his hand and turned to look at him. "It's not your fault you know."

"I guess." He muttered.

You pull him into a hug that he gently returns.

"C'mon, we should go celebrate," you tell him, letting go of his embrace. You head over to a coffee shop and order.

He sits with you in a booth and smiles.

While there were countless things you could've done differently, you had no way to know if it would've led to this moment right here. When you looked back, you were sure you didn't do the right thing at the time, but you knew that you did what you were meant to. Right here, in this moment, you knew in your heart that that was enough.