Dream Catch Me (Student/Teacher)

Dream Catch Me - Chapter Forty Eight (Joe's POV)

JOES POV

Sunday came and go with visits from policemen, detectives and hundreds of customers. It was hard to keep track of everyone who came and go in the rush of the weekend. After I had fell asleep on Jane's bed, I found myself waking up on Sunday afternoon with a blanket haphazardly covering my body. The smell of Jane filled my nose and I smiled as I felt the smell wrap me into a securing hug.

It was only when I was fully awake did I realise that Jane was gone. I flew out of her room after jumping from the bed. I went searching for Alex, but walked in on two policemen and Alex and Ellie gathered in the lounge with grim looks on their faces. When I stopped immediately, everyone looked towards me. A looked to Alex and noticed the pain behind the facade he was trying to hold up.

Everyone turned away from me and continued their conversation. "There's been no leads, or any tip offs since Friday night." The news was grim but I was determined to find her. "What about the car?" I cried, "GNG467! Can't you run it through the machine and tell who it belongs to?"

"We did Mr Hunter, but it came up empty. Whoever owns the car hasn't registered it, and we sent patrol cars to search for the car in a driveway but that too came back without luck." I sighed and put my chin in my hand, straining my brain to think of different solutions. The policemen continued to talk, but this time at Alex. "If we don't have any luck within the next few days, the longer it gets the likeliness lowers that we will find her."

The grim realisation had me shouting, "What!? You can't give up! She's probably out there scared and hurt, while you're here doing nothing to find her! You know what? I'll find her myself!" I stormed off, down the apartment stairs and out onto the street. My anger had me storming down the street in a ball of stress, fatigue and fear. I began to run all the way home, if the police weren't going to do anything to find her, then I would.

My house was exactly as I'd left it, in a mess from getting ready on Friday night. I had debated between different ties and what jacket to wear, and as I walked into my room I thought back to when I had carelessly thrown them around the room. A blue tie was strewn across the handle to my wardrobe, and I threw it to the side as I opened the door hard, making it slam against the wall with a loud thud. I dug around until I had come up with what I needed and took it to the study.

I tried to forget about the last time Jane was in here, needing to focus on finding her. I swept off the unimportant objects on my desk to the side on the floor and laid down the whiteboard I had found on the desk top. I sought the pens and started what I knew was the beginning of my search for Jane.

I drew mind maps and notes and possibilities until the large whiteboard was filled with scribbles and the sun was long gone. I had laid out what happened, what I saw and what I had to look for. After circling three important ideas, I had a clear target. 1. punch to the neck, 2. car's number plate and 3. a man.

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I had finally sent myself to bed, knowing I'd need a fresh mind if I were to find Jane. Especially after my scribbles on the whiteboard became unrecognisable. I had no choice but to go to work the next day, as while looking for Jane, I knew my other students would need me for their exams. I had to put on an act that would show that nothing was wrong, and if I heard anything about Jane, I'd act surprised.

I haphazardly threw on my shirt, the blue tie from my bedroom floor and some dress pants from my trashed wardrobe. I didn't bother with breakfast or packing myself a lunch, all I had to do was get through the day. I became robotic with my classes and I had them come in, sit down and work silently while my mind ran in circles around Jane. I wondered what she was doing.

Was Jane hurt in some creeps basement? Was she feeling hungry? Tired? When the bell rang I moved robotically to the staffroom where I'd hoped I could scrounge for a biscuit and a cup of coffee. Teachers were abuzz about Jane, insisting she hd run away and didn't get abducted. It angered me that as soon as something happened to her, every teacher was interested, but before they would've said, "Who?" and never thought twice about it. Yet it was all they could talk about now.

I sat down at one of the staff tables and sipped at my coffee, while trying to block out the conversation happening behind me. "Mind if I sit?" I looked up and saw Christopher with a fake grin on his face. I raised my eyebrows as a signal and he pulled out the chair and sat down. Like Saturday, he was walking stiffly like he had a pole up his arse. His back stayed straight as he unpacked a lunch.

He had his sleeve rolled up on his black dress shirt and I could see the tattoo of his gang poking out. It reminded me of the time I had spotted him in town smoking with young teenagers, and I had overheard their conversation. "Initiation," he started. "You do what you're meant to do, you'll get in. If not, you're out forever." Christopher had used a deep and threatening voice and the boys who were barely out of secondary school seemed to be shaking in their boots.

"Understood?" he demanded and each boy had nodded their head vigorously, eager to be a part of the gang. They had scattered in different directions and down small side streets until it was just Christopher and I standing outside the bar where he drew in a breath on his cigarette and blew the smoke my way.

"Hey Joe," he had called out casually. I held up my hand in a greeting and walked over to him. "What do they have to do for initiation?" I had come right out with the conversation, the question I had always been curious about. Christopher had simple chuckled a deep throaty laugh and flicked the ash from him cigarette onto the ground where it caught in the light breeze.

"You really wanna know? It's not nice." I pondered about it for a minute before I told him yes. Christopher had looked me dead in the eye and counted off the different tasks the boys had to do. "The two r's, Rob and Rape." I remember being absolutely appalled, yet trying to keep calm as he flicked more ash onto the ground and blew out a cloud of smoke. I had nodded slowly in understanding, while inside I was feeling disgusting and regretting asking.

"It's not for everyone." He commented and threw the butt of his cigarette on the ground and used his shoe to squash it into the pavement. I had put on a fake smile and made an excuse to move on in my evening walk. Christopher had given a small wave and walked off down the street.

Sitting across from him now in the staffroom of a high school, I felt myself shaking with anger as I wondered why the school had hired him, and why they hadn't done a background check, it couldn't be too hard to find. Each time I saw him, he seemed to have two different personalities, a dark one, and a not so dark personality. It was that night in town at the time of initiation into the gang when his eyes were especially black and his face had a shadow across his face.

But now, as he sat across from me eating his lunch I saw the lighter side of him. I shook off the memory, but kept it close to remind myself of the dangerous people. Any one of those boys he initiated into the gang could've got her. What if it was a part of the initiation? I lightly shook my head of these questions, refusing to be like one of the several other teachers in the room; talking about Jane.

Christopher looked up from over his cup of tea and started to speak to me, "Jane huh? She was the quiet one who was smart right?" he asked, sipping from his mug. I glanced up at him, holding back the glare I was wanting to release. "Yes," I forced out through my clenched teeth. "Nice girl." He commented and returned to his lunch.

I watched him curiously as he sat strangely. "Sore back?" I asked him. His eyes looked up at mine and I thought I saw a flash of panic in them before that familiar shadow seemed to pass over his eyes, but it was gone too quickly. "Yeah, well my neck really. I had a nasty knock from my new girlfriend. It was a mistake though. She didn't mean it." The shadow passed over again, but remained in his eyes as he sipped again from his mug.

Sore neck, I thought. That was strange, what are the chances. I brushed it off, giving him the benefit of the doubt and returned to my own mug. It steamed up my nose as I brought it to my mouth for another sip. "What's your new girlfriend like?" I unexpectedly threw out at him. Christopher glanced up in surprise but answered the question.

"In town. She was upset so I comforted her and it went from there I guess." It was a boring story and felt slightly made up. Firstly, there weren't many girls or women who hung around town that much, and if they did they already had boyfriends. I nodded slowly, letting him know I believed him. Christopher Lewis fit the part, a man with a sore neck and I had wondered what car he drove. I couldn't shake the feeling that something was wrong, that he had played a part somehow in Jane's disappearance.

By the end of the day I had concluded that it was nothing to go by. I had watched and inspected each male student as he either walked into my class or past the corridor, and it was at the end of the day when I had compiled a list of students too who fit the bill. James Darning had boasted about how his neck was sore after he had a 'rough night' with a girl, but refused to tell any of his friends who the girl was.

Kyle Sanders too. The more I watched him sitting in the back of my class the more I had convinced myself it was him. Kyle rubbed the back of his neck repeatedly through the whole lesson and look suspicious when asked why he hadn't done his homework.

I'll admit that my mind was not in the best place, struggling with fatigue and grief of the loss of Jane. And it was that grief and fatigue that messed with my mind, and convinced me to risk my job to find her. Students details were kept confidential, unless you had been given the right password into the system. Or if you had obtained it how I had.

I had a list, three names that didn't have addresses. Nothing but names with sore necks and suspicious lies. I needed a way of finding out if they had Jane or not, and the best way to do that was to find out their cars. My mind was bordering on delirious when I thought of the cunning plan that would see me stand in front of their houses and search for the GNG467 number plate that matched the one the tormented my brain.

I had snuck into the school's secretary's office after I saw her leave for the day That in itself was no easy feat, I had to hide behind the large flax plant in the corner while she left, her door closing slowly. When I was convinced she was out of my way I had run after the door, only just managing to slot my foot into the small gap before it closed. I sighed a breath of relief and checked to see if the coast was clear before I pushed the office open.

I didn't bother with anything else except the computer that sat in the middle of the room upon a dark wooden desk. Papers were neatly stacked on the table top and I made sure not to move anything other than the mouse on the computer. I wiggled the mouse to see the computer wake up and ask for a password. I typed in the generic password that each staff member had, and the computer unlocked.

I wasted no time and went about searching through the records that she had access to, finding the names of Kyle Sanders and James Darning and scribbling down their addresses onto the back of my hand. I had convinced myself I was right with a least one of the boys or Christopher, and that kept driving me to follow through on my ridiculous plan. I kept telling myself I was crazy, but the other part of my brain was urging to me to do it, do it for Jane.

After I had found the two boys' addresses, I searched the more accessible teacher's records and wrote down Christopher's address onto the small space left on my hand. I put the computer to sleep again and slipped out of the office, once again making sure no one saw me. It seemed everyone had gone home for the day and was waiting for the cleaners to come around and lock the doors. I sprinted back to my office and snatched my bag from where I had dumped it in the morning and headed quickly for my car.

I jumped in, and followed the addresses printed on my hand.

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I just uploaded a heap of chapters, I know some of them have mistakes but at the moment I don't have time to go ack, I will once I finished the story!