Chapter 3: Skin

The courthouse steps felt like the edge of a cliff.

I stood between Cassie and our pro bono lawyer, shivering despite the spring heat. Behind us, protesters screamed—some chanting “Free them!” others bellowing “Shame!” News helicopters circled like vultures.

Ethan squeezed my hand. “Whatever happens today—?”

“I know,” I whispered back.

This was it. The case that would decide whether Cassie and I—and seventeen other ANF minors—could be legally forced to remain naked forever because of contracts we’d signed as children.

The Whistleblower

Inside the chamber, the judge’s voice cut like a scalpel. I barely heard the legal jargon. My focus snagged on details. Mom’s perfectly pressed blouse in the front row, her face serene. The bailiff averted his eyes every time I shifted on the plastic chair.

Cassie’s raw knees, rubbed bloody from months of sitting uncovered. Then came the bombshell—a woman in a lab coat burst forward. “Your Honor, I was the lead researcher on the Gomez case study. These parents conditioned these girls through forced exposure therapy, dietary manipulation, and psychological coercion—” My blood turned to ice. Case study?

I turned slowly. Mom’s face was drained of color. Dad lunged halfway out of his seat before his lawyer yanked him back down.

“This wasn’t voluntary. It was orchestrated.” Ethan’s grip on my hand turned crushing.

The Unraveling.

The courtroom erupted. Reporters sprinted for the doors. Cassie vomited into a trash can, and I just sat there, naked in every sense of the word, as the pieces clicked into place: The “iron booster” smoothies Mom packed every morning. The timed gynecological exams—always scheduled before media appearances.

The way our parents documented every reaction, every tear, every humiliation. We weren’t daughters. We were data. The Robe. The judge ordered an emergency injunction. For the first time in nine months, a bailiff handed me a robe. The fabric against my skin felt alien. Wrong.

Ethan helped me tie the belt; his fingers were gentle. “You’re shaking.” I was, but not for the reason he thought, because part of me—some sick, broken part—missed the nakedness. Missed the certainty of knowing exactly what was expected of me, no matter how horrific. Who was I without the ANF label?

The Emancipation

That night, we gathered at Lena’s—the only house without surveillance cameras or research notes hidden in the walls.

Mira traced her scars absently. “They were measuring our pain thresholds.”

Cassie stared at the robe in her lap like it might bite her. “I don’t know how to wear clothes anymore.”

Ethan’s phone buzzed nonstop—his mother demanding he “distance himself from that cult,” and me? I stood before Lena’s full-length mirror, watching the robe slip from my shoulders. The girl staring back was a stranger.

The Choice

The judge gave us two weeks to decide:

Return to our families under court supervision.

Enter state custody as emancipated minors.

Cassie chose option two immediately. I hadn’t decided yet because beneath the betrayal, beneath the rage, there was this terrifying truth: I didn’t know how to want things for myself anymore.

The After

One Year Later

Mira’s first art show featured a series called Skin Stories—my portrait sold for $5,000.

Lena got arrested at a reproductive rights protest (she framed the mugshot).

Cassie testified before Congress wearing a pantsuit and combat boots.

Ethan

He proposed on a Tuesday. Not with a ring, but with a question:

“Will you let me decide when you’re dressed or not in my arms?” I said yes—on one condition.

That he’d never let me forget I had a choice. Me? Some days I wear clothes. Some days I don’t. The difference is—now it’s our choice.

Final Lines

I wake up in Ethan’s arms, his breath warm against my bare shoulder.

“Today?” he murmurs, half-asleep.

I press closer. “Your call.” His laugh rumbles through me as he pulls the sheets over us both, and we begin.