Fear Awakened [Jonathan Crane / Scarecrow]

012

Ideally, the pair would have sorted their issues and reached some sort of a rational conclusion by the time the sun rose on the next morning.

Unfortunately, that was not to be the case.

After finishing his tea, Jonathan was no longer in the mood to entertain even the most basic attempt at conversation. Afraid to push after the trauma he'd been through, Jane did not force the issue.

In keeping with her sweet, longsuffering disposition, she merely elected to bring him blankets and offer him the couch as a makeshift bed.

She spent the rest of the night tossing and turning in the room above him, her mind too full to allow her any sleep.

The story he had crafted about taking a blow to the head - she couldn't believe it no matter how much she tried or how many times she turned it over in her mind. The seething voice which had rumbled from deep in his chest had been too real to be simply the product of even a serious concussion.

Something was rotten at the very heart of the story, though she was too frightened to imagine what it might be.

Eventually, she found some rest that night and woke with a renewed determination to find out exactly what was going on; she was going to march down the steps and ask him point blank about his lie, get to the bottom of the situation whether he wanted to or not.

That plan came crashing down when she found the living room completely empty. He was gone.

In his wake, he had left only a stack of neatly folded blankets. Even His teacup had been relocated to the kitchen, washed and put away in the cupboard - it was like he'd never been there at all.

So much for getting answers, Jane thought to herself, surveying the empty room.

That sinking feeling did not leave her for quite some time, worsening as the days passed.

Beginning that Monday, Jonathan was conspicuously absent from school and she saw no sign of him or his grandmother when she walked past his house each day. It was as though he had disappeared entirely.

Normally, this would not have rattled Jane - she had never been a particularly needy creature - but she had grown quite accustomed to the company of the only friendly face in all of East Gotham. His disappearance was sudden and swift, a shock.

By the third day, she was beginning to consider sneaking by his house just to reassure herself. It sounded a bit off color even to her own ears, but she genuinely wasn't making an attempt at stalking him; she was worried.

Still, she did not put the idea into action. She knew what would happen to him if she was caught sneaking about, and the risk outweighed the reward.

Just when she had begun to think she had few other options, he was simply standing there in the middle of the sidewalk as she made her way home. She had to blink to reassure herself she wasn't imagining him there.

She tried to play it cool, keep herself collected, but as her mouth opened, she found the task difficult.

"Where have you been?" she asked worriedly, her tone more cross than she'd meant it to be.

"We need to talk," he spoke evenly. His facial expression remained neutral, bordering on cold.

He seemed aloof to the fact that she'd spent days on end worrying about whether or not he was alright, what his grandmother might have done to him.

"Jonathan, what is going on? You've basically disappeared for the last three days," she reminded him, eyebrows furrowing at his blasé tone.

"Come sit with me," he instructed, walking a few short paces to a bench at a city bus stop.