CHAPTER 7: Jane

I walk out of the classroom calling her worried. Worried?!! If that's the correct word to say.

I must say, I've never begged so much in my whole life, than I begged to god that this girl is the girl I'm looking for. The Jane I'm looking for.

Please, be her!

Please, be Jane!

I pray with all my heart, being tired of this case already.

I must confess, I'm not that much of a believer, but this time I bow my head at him, hoping he grants my wish into finding her for me. If this girl is her, I will start to go to church.

Please, be her!

Please, be Jane!

Please, be the Jane I'm looking for!

"Hey, are you ok?" I run after the girl who has the premises to be the Jane I'm looking for.

"Yeah! I...I'm fine!" The girl stutters, trying to avoid looking at me with her weeping eyes.

"Why are you crying then?" I ask her, analyzing every possible answer she'd give me as a reason.

"I...I just..." the girl laughs paradoxially and licks her lips, damping her small thin edges with her little tounge after she pressed the lips together trying to wipe the scene that just happened. "Never mind! It's nothing, really!" She tucks a bunch of her hair behind her ear and I notice her hand shaking very nervously. "I'm fine!" She says and covers her hand as she recognises I noticed it.

"Are you sure? Your hand is shaking like crazy!"

"Never mind! It doesn't matter!" She sighs and walks towards the front door to leave the building, distancing herself 20 steps away from me.

"Where are you going?" I ask, provoking her intently to explore and dive deep into her mind.

"Somewhere!" She answers in a sigh and walks through the exit as she's about to break free.

Well, that's not the answer I was expecting.

"Where?" This question escapes my mouth. As soon as she hears it, she turns her head and raises her eyebrow.

Shit!

I curse, afraid of what her answer will be.

"Out." She says after five minutes of thinking what to say. I imagine a thousand and one reasons of what she could have said and...none of them is a good and pleasent answer.

"Oh!" I gasp releaved she didn't offend me.

The young girl doesn't seem like mrs Johnson at all. The perfect wavy hair are replaced with unruly curls. The emerald foxy eyes can not be compared to the dark pitch brown almond eyes that seem a little lifted up at the end. They both have the same straight nose, only that the young woman's is a little more lifted at the base. Mrs Jonhson's lips are remarkable compared to the girl's. I can give her some points for the thick eyebrows, but not credit for the teeth. Mrs Johnson's teeth are as round as pearls, while the young girl's...The couple front teeth are bigger as a rabbit and the canine teeth are pointed and sharper than a niddle.

I bet, you can feel the teeth drilling in your flesh instead of the biggest niddle if she bites.

"Are you not going to follow the lecture?" I ask confused of what she's planning on doing next.

"You mean cut open a dead man's body?!" She fakes a smirk and raises her index finger delicately up and moves it left and right repeatedly, showing indifference. "What can someone learn from a chopped off body?" She adds a question, leaving a five minute time gap for me to answer.

"Anatomy?!" I ask unsure as she obliviously questions my plan. My answer. Everything.

"Of a murdered man?" She questions again, looking at me from head to toe. Usually people perform this look in aim to search for answers and at least when they do it, they do it hidingly. Meanwhile this girl has the audacity to do it in your face. She doesn't hide it at all. It looks like she's doing it on purpose, telling you to watch you steps and be carefully what you do...

"I'm pretty sure his cuts in the forehead are the cause of death. Don't you agree?" She adds, looking at me in the eye fearlessly.

...or say.

The way she holds her hand and moves her fingers full of elegance, distracts me from imagining her as mrs Johnson's daughter.

She can have extra points for elegance, a vertue mrs Johnson doesn't have access to.

"I...I don't know! That's why I'm here!" I answer. "To know more about it." I tame my insistence.

"Should you be in class for that?" She provokes me again, observing me carefully.

Am I the policeman or she is?

I start to question myself.

"Yeah, I should but I came out looking for you! I thought something wrong happened!" I say, but the girl has some other comebacks to spill.

"If you were that opressed to have the knowledge of what you're looking for, you wouldn't be here with me in the hallway."

I spoke too early!

She says and smiles, offending me even more than I was with myself.

She's smart!

Fuck!

I curse myself for planning the stupidest plan in the world. She knows I'm not there for the lecture, but for something else. She knows I was watching the students for some obvious reaction caused by a dead body.

What if she knows I'm here for her?

This question wonders in my mind rent free.

"Look, I..." As I am about to speak a word, the young girl points at the closed door with her delicate hand movement, daring me to go inside.

"You should go inside, in case you don't want to lose any important information about the lecture." She emphasises and smiles at me again, this time the sarcasm is more obvious than the previous one.

No! She's literally her mother's daughter!

I think as her offensive attitude jumped in for the second time.

She raises her eyebrow, waiting for my next move.

Should I go in or not? This is the case now! If I go in, I bow my head to her. If I don't , my new identity as a model citizen will be ruined, destroying my now idiotic plan.

I smirk, swallowing the humiliation and choose the easiest path. The path of embarrasment, saving my plan for the second time. Without saying a word, I open the door and walk towards the class where the re-autopsie is taking place.

I can feel the shame running from my chest to my cheeks. It feels like a hot source burning me from inside-out. It speads through the skin like a virus, till it reaches my head. I can feel my cheeks reddening up.

I have a need for cold. For something to cool me up. For something to cheer me up.

Something like...

As the door closes, I lay my back at the door, hoping I'd hear something if the Jane says something. Anything.

The classroom isn't as crowded as it was in the beginning. Most of the students have left from the moment Jack exposed the body. The ones that are not emotionally attacked by it, are watching the cut scalp that one of the professors is showing and explaining. Jack is keeping the students very interested at the procedure, also giving me time to find who the girl really is.

I can do this! I can do this!

I encourage myself, feeling kinda down after she offended me.

Just listen! Listen carefully!

"They're here!" She mutters, talking on the phone. "Lisa, they're fucking here!"

Isn't Lisa the name of mrs Johnson's eldest daughter?

I wonder, getting excited that I just found a little clue.

"Don't tell me to calm down! I just saw him! They have brought his body in the building. They're trying to find the killer!"

Bingo!

I smile at myself for completing the first step of the plan.

I found you, little girl! I finally found you!

***

Jack shrieks in a laugh, making me feel like an idiot.

"She showed you the door?!!" Derek continues laughing and I instantly regret telling him. "Quote her again!"

"Jack!"

"Derek, quote her again!" Jack demands, embarrasing me even more than I already was.

"If you were that opressed to have the knowledge of what you're looking for, you wouldn't be here with me in the hallway." I quote her. "And then she showed me the classroom door with a hand movement and said that I should go inside, in case I don't want to lose information." I add indirectly.

"Quote the last sentence!" Jack whistles, demanding my full humiliation.

"Jack!"

"This is what you get for not listening to the elders boy! The only thing that you can do now is quote her till I get bored of it!" Jack spits and then adds. "Which I probably won't."

"Come on, man!"

Jack gives me an evil eye, defining an angry stare forever. The only way to enroot that furious face is to complete his wish in the best way possible, entertaining him.

"You should go inside, in case you don't want to lose any important information about the lecture." I try to imitate her, making Jack laugh out loud.

"I like this woman!" Jack cheers. "She's my new spirit animal!"

"Jack, stop joking around!"

"I'm not joking! I'm just stating the facts with reality. Your reality! That girl realised you weren't ordinary! You left an impression and she..." Jack starts giggling. "Pushed you away!" He can't stop giggling.

"Enough, man!"

"Don't tell me to stop now! I asked you 10 times if you needed help and you told me you handled it. This is how you fucking handle it? Playing hide-and-seek with a young adult who is a suspect for killing someone." Derek yells again, dropping all the laughs and games.

"There were so little information about her. I didn't even have a picture of her! How the hell was I supposed to play my cards when she wasn't even here?" I justify myself.

"That's why investigations are for, fucker!" Jack continues yelling. "To search and find more specific information about the suspect or the person you're looking for."

I sigh, regreting I asked this man for help.

"Look at me!!!" He yells. "I'm playing like I'm an actor in a teen film." He groans. "I don't know her face, but I have to find her! The moment I saw those moves, I knew she was mine. My lungs stopped functioning and my body shakes everytime I think about her. I can't handle being away from you...this distance...oughhhhh." Jack moans, supposedly imitating the most famous lines in teen movies. "I've never been so clueless in my life in any case!" He finally adds, dropping the sarcastic monologue.

"Is this supposed to be the classic history romance genre?" I play along, trying to calm the waters.

"This man is going to drive me crazy!!" Jack whines yelling.

"Ok, relax." I stop playing. "Focus!" I clap my hands, bringing him to reality. "Share some thoughts with me! Now that I found the girl, how can I approach her?"

"Your majesty is asking for my advice?!! I don't know what to say! Should I be excited? Should I be..."

Here we go, again!

"Ok, I got it!" I raise my voice, admitting the truth. "My plan is the stupidest in the world!"

"At least, you get it!"

"Can you give me some advice? I'd really appreciate it!"

"Make sure you have the same classes as her and sit next to her. Act like you don't understand the lectures. Do something stupid! You're good at it!"

I sigh desperate as Jack continues whining.

"Jack!"

"You heard me! How do you think you approach a girl? By romantising her from the beginning? You have to take it slow! Be her friend first, then other things come!" He says.

"I'm not asking for a relationship with her. I'm asking to get close to her." I specify, thinking Jack doesn't understand me.

"How the hell is she supposed to spill the beans to you? By being her friend?" He chacles ironically.

"What's wrong with being her friend?"

"Unless you want to act gay..."

"Relationship is fine!" I cut him off, hating his idea already.

"That's what I thought!"

"What should I do to get her attention?" I ask him again, hoping he'd change his advice into something like...

"Be in the same class as her. Sit next to her. Ask for help. Act dumb! And then ask her for a coffe..." Jack counts the steps.

...that.

"That's the problem! I don't want to look like a stalker!" I whine.

"You're a stalker already!" Jack chuckles.

"I'm serious!" I say. "I can't walk to her like that...especially from her answers." I murmur at the end, reminding Jack to laugh again.

"You should go inside, in case you don't want to lose any important information about the lecture." Jack quotes her again laughing. "I wish I was there to see the show."

"I bet you wish you were!" I sigh exhausted.

"Back to reality! Dude, you're a police officer and your job is to do everything you can to solve the case, no matter the concequences or the way you're handling the case."

"Jack..."

"Don't Jack me!!!" He turns at me angry, shutting me up. "Just do your job! Don't you think this case has gone too far?!! It should have ended months ago!" He adds the only thing I hate to admit.

I turn around to leave the classroom, hearing enough of what should I have done and what should I do.

"You probably know it too, Derek!" He says. "When does it happen that a simple case gets postponed and never figured out, especially by trying to get close to the suspect herself?"

"She's not the killer!" I cut him off.

"I never said she was!" He turns at me fast and adds:

"I think deep down you know she has something to do with the killing, that's why you're taking it slow."

"I can't hear this insanity!" I head myself to the door faster. "I've worked my ass to find the killer and getting an accusation like that is low."

"I'm not accusing you, Derek! I think you're a great cop! The only problem you have is your heart." He emphasises the word your heart.

He's right!

It should have ended months ago! I should have found her months ago! I should have questioned her months ago! Michael should have been buried months ago! The murderer should have been caught months ago! The murderer should have been in prison months ago! I should have been free months ago!

I sigh and an unexpected laugh escapes my mouth.

"I know." I mutter, while walking in the opposite side of the classroom, facing the door. "I know."