Vagabonding.1 [COMPLETE]

22. Karma Chameleon

Standing in front of the city's small jail, I noted that it was set high with many steps in between me and the front door. When I reached the doors, a gust of wind blew my hair back and I gazed around.

Immediately, the invisibility I once felt became quite the opposite, the young man seated at the desk looked up at me instantly. His eyes never left my face as I awkwardly made it up to the table.

"Do you need help, miss?" The man asked nervously, sweat began to lightly form on his brow as he smiled just a little too enthusiastically.

I looked around and noted that it was truly only me and him. The two of us were oddly alone in such a spacious room that just wasn't large enough to keep our boundaries straight. I observed the walls and spotted portraits hung on the wall of stern looking men and women in uniform, their glares almost seemed to be enough to stir up guilt in me for a few seconds before I quickly focused my vision on the man behind the counter top.

He sat at a wide counter that held several televisions with live feed of the cells and the outside of the building. In one of the screens facing me, I saw a thin girl facing the man in front of me.

"I was wondering if you could help me," I began to say, my delicate voice becoming filtered with worry, "I am looking for someone who became lost."

The man quickly shuffled through his desk and pulled out a clipboard with a stack of papers and handed it to me. Latching on to it, I tried to take it from him but he kept a steady grip. He quickly yanked it back and offered to write down the questions for me.

"No need to write, I understand you must feel too stressed to probably even see straight! I am deeply saddened to hear of your loss, miss," He said as he kept his eyes on the paper, scrawling with his chicken scratch writing before his eyes trailed to my chest and quickly up to my face, "My name is Eric, by the way."

He smiled widely as I offered an awkward soft smile in exchange, "Nice to meet you, Eric. So about that lost person—"

"—What's your name, darling?" Eric interrupted suddenly, leaning over the desk slightly.

"My name?" I asked nervously as I scrambled to think of one. "Can't it remain anonymous?"

He paused for a moment before scooting his office chair closer to his desk, "Right, well, it can't be anonymous if you're the one looking for someone, right?"

"Jennifer Stone," I replied quickly. "Sorry, I just get so nervous around places like these."

"The police station?" Eric asked before snickering. "There's nothing to fear while I'm around, Miss Stone."

...This guy is totally hitting on me.

"I'm sure you're quite good at your job, sir," I replied before scratching the back of my neck and chuckled awkwardly. "So... Can we get back to the missing persons' report?"

"Right, sorry about that, Ms. Stone," Eric said with another annoying chuckle, he bent his head down to look at the paper, "Can you give me the details to the incident? Could you recall as to where they were last seen?"

I didn't plan ahead. Why didn't I plan ahead? I bit the inside of my cheek painfully hard enough to get tears to my eyes as I pulled away from the desk dramatically.

"I wish I knew," I said in between my crocodile tears, "it all happened so fast..!"

And like a trained puppy, Eric instantly felt the need to do something to balance out the situation. As he was trying to calm me down, I had barely enough time to put together a weak story.