Chapter six
His name is what
I have answered all the questions Officer Emilio had asked me. What the man did, where I was when it happened, what time it might have been, how far he got with me before the anonymous person saved me, how long I might have been wondering the woods after the incident, and information on Louis.
They want to question him as well. Find out how much of what happened he actually witnessed and why he seemed to be there around the same time of the assault. When the officer asked me if he could have been the one who saved me from the man as well as in the woods, it got me thinking, was he? Last night he had said that he was not, but it made me wonder if he was laying to me, and why he would be doing just that in the first place. Does he not want to be the hero?
I clarified how I only knew his first name and what kind of car he drove. I was shaken up to much last night to catch his license plate number. However, he seemed to know many things about me and me knowing nothing about him, though I did not tell him exactly that, I still hoped they do not find him. I do not want to get him into any sort of trouble. He had saved me last night and that is it. I was extremely grateful to him for that but here is no need for him to get involved, not in this.
Then it was time to see the sketch artist.
"Can you tell me, with as much detail as you can what the man might have looked like to you?" Paula Doux asks as she takes a seat next to me and places a sketchpad on her lap.
This woman is extremely tall. She has long curly brown hair and hazel eyes. When she first walked into the room, I was shocked. She has a scar on the left side of her face that runs from her eyebrow down to the side of her lip. She is wearing her hair down, reaching past her butt, wearing along sleeved pink t-shirt and jeans.
"He…um…his hair is black, his eyes are really dark; almost black like his hair, and his very large in size, very muscular." I start to explain as I sit in my seat. Seeing him in my head again frustrates me. I don't want to picture him anymore.
"How long is his hair exactly?" he wondered.
"Oh, um…very short, like a mushroom cut," I reply with a shutter.
"Do you think you can estimate his height for me?" she speculated.
"Hmmm…" I slouch in my chair as I try to remember. The more I try to focus the ore it hurts but I continue, knowing that it would be over soon. "Like 5' 6" or 5' 8"."
I bring my knees up to my chest, wrap my arms around my legs, and rest my check on my left knee, still facing Paula.
"And the shape of his face, was it more square, round, or oval?" she asks as she continues to scribble lines on the paper in front of her.
"Oval," I assure her.
"How's this?" she inquired as she lifts the picture up so I can take a look at it.
All the man's features are exact. I quiver in my seat as I stare at the image in front of me. It feels like his is staring back at me so I quickly look away. This is the first time I have seen his face, not in my head, since last night when I saw him in person.
"The…that's him," I whisper.
"Okay, thank you," she smiles innocently as she stands up. "One of the officers will be right in." she assures me as she steps out of the room, shutting the door behind her.
I stare out, into space while I wait. However, it is only seconds that pass before I suddenly hear my father screaming on the other side of this wall, "Aaron? Aaron did this to my daughter. I am going to kill that son of a bitch."
"Richard, calm down. This is good. We know who the suspect is now," I hear officer Emilio say. "All's we have to do now if find him. And please, Richard, let us do our job. Don't go out looking for him when you leave, we will take care of it ourselves. Please, don't do anything stupid."
Aaron is the man's name? Moreover, my father knows him? Every second that passes keeps getting weirder. First Louis knows everything about me but my dad doesn't know anything about him. The second, my father knows the one who attacked me and wants to go hunting for him himself. What's going too happened next?
Minutes pass, it is silent and irritating but finally an officer, whom I don't know his name walks in. he takes the seat nearest to me; the one Paula ha occupied earlier and smiles in my direction, with ought actually talking or making any sort of eye contact. I quickly look over at his badge to catch his name. Across it reads Officer Ben Forman.
As I take a closer look at the officer, I realize that this man is not as scary looking as Emilio. His hair is brown and slicked back. His muscles are not as large as Emilio's but there still big.
It stays silent as we sit here for many minutes. However, eventually he looks down at my face and speaks, "Don't worry, kid. We will find him."
I just stay staring down at the floor while I wait for my father to come back and get me.
"Honey, are you ready to go?" Richard asks when he finally enters the room, I don't even know how long after, it felt like forever.
I look up and find him leaning up against the doorframe. He has a frown painted across his face.
"Yes," I reply weakly.
Mechanically, I stand up and walk in his direction. When I'm finally by his side, he wraps an arm around my shoulders and leads us out to his car.
"Do you still want to go to school?" he asks, awkwardly, when we're finally seated in his car.
"Yes," I reply, though, my voice brakes, drat.
"Are you sure? I can see that you're having second thoughts about it now," he frowns but his tone stays serious. "If what happened in there was too much for you I can just take you home."
"No dad, really, I'm okay." I make my voice come out stronger this time so it wouldn't crack again, wanting to sound more convincing.
"All right," he agreed. "I'll take you to school but you contact me any time you feel the need to come home," he insists.
"I will dad," I force a smile. "I promise."
"You know, Mataya. I'm sorry it started out like this," a single tear falls from his eye. Wow, I never thought I would see the day that my father cried. It's a little weird to tell you the truth.
"Dad, it wasn't your fault," I assure him.
"But it is," he disagreed with me, his voice staying strong. "If I hadn't let you go walk in the woods by yourself this wouldn't have happened."
"Neither of us knew that what happened was going to occur at the time, dad. Please, don't blame yourself," I glower.
The rest of the car ride is quiet as he drives me towards the school. Occasionally he'd peek in my direction from the corner of his eyes, probably to check if I'm still holding myself together. I sigh, he worries too much. However, I guess that it is a good thing. I don't know what I would do if I didn't have worried parents who didn't care about what I did or where I was.
As we get off the high way, a large 'Forest Hills High School' sign catches my eyes. We turn into the large parking lot then and three large brick buildings appear in front of us. I cannot believe how big this school is considering the population around, Franklin county is only seven hundred and forty-five, well -forty-six- now, but there still can't be that many students here.
However, as we pull in closer I catch sight of not just high school students but middle scholars as well. They must be switching classes because students are everywhere.
"This isn't just a high school?" I ask as we pull up to the building that's labeled 'one' on the side.
"Nope, there are only two different schools down closer by here. This one which is for seventh though twelfth then the 'Forest Hills school' downs the street that holds the kindergarten through sixth grade," he explains. "There are not many people around here these days. People like," he gulps and frowns. "Aaron, are the reason why."
"Oh," is all I can manage to slip out of my chest.
"Well, get going, did," he laughs when I don't move.
"Oh, yeah," I laugh with him as I open the door and jump out.
"I love you, kid," he breaths softly then drives off as soon as I shut the door.