W: "Five young women were found dead in Massachusetts in the past two months. Each victim suffered similar traumas. All were bruised on the arms and had been raped. Semen was found in all of them. Only the first victim had dead skin cells underneath her nails. All had traces of rohyphonal and alcohol in their systems. The cause of death on all victims was severe head trauma. No leads."
I received the message with great disgust. Quiet rage bubbled up inside me and my body grew cold. That was how I knew which cases I took; if I literally felt the need to bring the person responsible to justice. I needed to win…because justice must prevail. I immediately contacted Watari to go to New England. It would take Watari at least 8 hours to fly over there and find the MSP headquarters. He could probably get an escort if he contacted the MSP immediately. Before I could tell Watari to do this, he sent me a message, informing me that he already had some state troopers waiting for his arrival. Sometimes, it was truly strange how much he understood my logic. My flight was in 3 hours.
I had no access to the details of the cases, and was about to hack into the MSP…until Jenny decided to waltz in with a plate of French toast. Was it already morning? I looked at the clock on my computer. 7:00 A.M.
I closed the files on my computer and turned to face her on my chair. "Can I help you?"
"Uh, well…It's morning so I ordered you some food." She said, trying to not look at me. I figured that she found me repulsive, and every gesture she made provided more evidence for my assumption. Her hair was damp and wavy, and her face was much paler than it appeared yesterday or on her license. I found her more pleasing to the eye with her hair and face bare.
"Yes, I see that." I said. She shuddered a little before leading me to the kitchen table. I stalked behind her, seeing the flush creep up her shoulders. It was unfortunate that I could only make attractive women blush or shudder with disgust, but it was entertaining anyway. We sat down across from each other and she piled powdered sugar on the French toast before handing it to me. I took a bite and found myself enjoying it. Although French toast was not exactly something I found myself desiring (because it was not particularly sweet), Ms. Davis found an effective way to incorporate 10 grams of protein into my food intake for the day without removing the taste or any of the many calories I needed to burn. Impressive.
"Did you stay up all night?" She asked, looking at her plate.
I studied her lips before speaking. "Yes, why?"
Ms. Davis frowned and poured me a glass of sugary tang. She was providing me Vitamin C without sacrificing any sugar. I liked the way she thought. "I was told to make sure that you would not become too stressed, and I know depriving yourself of sleep is not exactly the way to go." She said.
"Why do you not look me in the face? I'm sure my father told you that I suffer from social anxiety, yet when I make attempts to be socially interactive with you, you close me off. Like last night, I only thought we were innocently passing time, but you pulled away from my massage. You then told me to call you a nickname. That is a sign of friendliness. Now you refuse to look at me. I want to know why." I replied, studying her face as I waited for an answer.
She seemed to be shocked by the question. The silence was eventually broken by her response. "To be honest with you, Hideki, I am also socially anxious. I do not like being with men alone, so I get extremely tense. I apologize for making you uncomfortable. I told you to call me Jenny because I knew you were trying to be friends and I did not want you to think of me as a cold person. I will try to look you in the face more often, and hopefully we will both break through our shells and become friends."
It was all so brilliant. This girl was not just a random choice of Watari's. He somehow understood that she was socially inept but also capable enough to undertake responsibility. Watari told me that she was very polite while they ate at a restaurant. She can pick up social cues in public, but when alone, she freezes up. All angles were accounted for. Because Jenny does not know how to act around men, she does not interfere or question anything I do when we are alone. This ensures that my work is safe. She can act normally when we are in public, so she does not raise suspicion. If a man were to threaten her for information, she would freeze up and not reveal anything crucial. She was also fully capable of contacting Watari if I could not. Does she act the same towards women? How did Watari know all of this about her if she never received mental evaluations? I planned on asking Watari those questions next time we were alone.
"Thank you for being so honest with me." I replied, taking a large bite of French toast before continuing. "I am planning on going to New England in a few hours. Do you like Boston?"
She smiled and looked into my eyes. My heart almost stopped. "No, I have never even left England. I'm excited to go with you. Maybe we can talk more when we take our flight."
I had mixed feelings about her statement. I wanted to get started on the case, but at the same time I wanted to learn about this new presence in my life. I studied every feature of her face, which lights up in a magical way when she smiles. The plane that we were going to use did not allow lap top usage, so I would be forced to wait anyway. I nodded softly in response to her statement and left the room to pack.
I was rather nervous on the plane. Hideki's father made sure we had first class seats, and the stewardesses were very polite, but I was still shaking. I looked at Hideki during the unpleasant take off. He was completely entranced in his own thoughts, completely oblivious to my discomfort. I couldn't believe I felt the urge to grab his hand for comfort. He probably would hold my hand in a delicate way and study it with his endless-but-empty eyes until he could understand what I was grabbing him for. I shushed my mean thoughts and closed my eyes. Should I say something? I regretted every nasty or judgmental thought I had about Hideki in the few hours since we met. He was just a socially awkward person, so who was I, out of all people, to judge him?
"Is something wrong?" Hideki said, breaking my thoughts.
"Oh, no." I said, trying to look into his face. I realized that if he brushed his hair every once in a while, Hideki would be a decently attractive young man. Uh oh, my face was getting hot. His thumb went to his mouth. I had to divert his attention away from my face. "What is your favorite hobby?"
He stared at me even more intently as he answered. "I don't know. Probably internet surfing. I don't do all that much outside of that. You?"
I wanted to answer him, but I knew my face was blushing. I turned to look out to the clouds and shrugged. I waited for my skin to cool down before I turned to face him again, only for his face to be mere inches away from mine. The heat returned rapidly.
"You said that you would try to look in my face more often" he said, his breath touching my lips.
"I-I'm sorry. My favorite hobby is reading. I like being able to go into another world, even just for a little while" I replied quickly, noticing that he was starting to blush as well. How painful was our relationship going to be? I didn't know what to do. There were only two other people in the first class compartment. We were trapped by our shells.
Hideki pulled away from me and I gasped a little for breath—I didn't realize that I was not breathing while he was close to me. He called the stewardess over for some sweets. She came over and asked us what we wanted. I soon found myself with some champagne and a sudden lack of inhibition.
It took jenny four glasses of champagne before she started to act differently. Every sentence she tried to speak overflowed with bubbly giggling. I found her laughter kind of cute. She tried to speak coherently but could only burst at the end of each few words with laughing. During one of her fits, she hit me with her shoulder. She stopped giggling and looked at me, slightly dazed.
"I'm tired" Jenny whispered. She rested her head on the shoulder that she accidentally hit. Why was she acting like this? Did alcohol really go to her head?
"Jenny, did you know my father before he hired you?" I asked, hoping for an answer.
"No, I only met him a few days agooo" She replied, her voice wavering in coherence.
Before I could continue, she started snoring slightly. I could not ask her for anything. I couldn't work on anything. I found my head resting on hers. My thoughts become incoherent and I attempted to sleep.