It turned out Shapiro had been right; neither Andre Harris or Beck Oliver had come to school that day and, from a quick call to the officer stationed at the hospital (standard procedure still applied. Jade wasn't handcuffed anymore, but she had still confessed to murder, even though it was looking more and more like self-defence with every moment that passed. Until all the information had been collected, she was still technically a killer) they found out that yes, the two of them were at the hospital, with one freaking out and flipping between anger, depression and restlessness, the other trying to keep him steady, whilst still seething with anger. Neither had been allowed to see Jade as of yet, which was obviously not helping their tempers – although they knew Jade's dad was speaking with them periodically to keep them updated.

"So what do you think? Should we go to the hospital and speak with them? Maybe even get a shot at speaking with West?" Fowler asked, tapping his pen to his lower lip in thought.

"You think her dad will let us anywhere near her?" Diaz asked with raised eyebrows.

"I mean...he knows we have to speak with her. The longer she's quiet, the more complicated this gets and the longer it's going to drag on. I say we go, speak with Harris and Oliver and then try to get to West."

Diaz let out a sigh and nodded, tossing her hair back over her shoulder and looking like she was about to grab her jacket off the back of her chair when there was a knock at the door to the small meeting room they'd taken over. After Diaz called out 'Come in', the door opened and Lane poked his head in.

"I have a teacher who'd like to speak with you. He mentioned that he may have...witnessed an incident. He's probably also the closest teacher to Jade." Lane stepped back a little and a rather...strange looking man almost tumbled into the room.

He was balding, with the hair he had left sticking out in multiple directions, along with a pair of loose hippy-type pants and no shoes. "Erwin Sikowitz!" He introduced himself with a warm smile, and despite the weirdness of the man, both detectives knew he was probably a lot of students favourite teacher – they didn't know why, but it was just a feeling both got.

"Good morning." Fowler nodded motioning to the chair across the table from him. "Please, take a seat. I'm Detective Fowler and this is my partner, Detective Diaz."

"A pleasure!" He slipped into the seat offered, draping himself dramatically onto it in a position that couldn't possibly be comfortable. "I'm one of Jade's acting teachers. Cat and Robbie were using my room to speak privately and I was hiding behind the curtains. So I heard there were some...awful things afoot. And I hope to be of help."

Diaz and Fowler blinked a little at the oddness of the man – hiding behind curtains in his own class room? Using the word 'afoot'?

"Any help is appreciated, Mr uh, Sikowitz." Fowler replied with a nod, flipping open his notepad. "We're currently looking into any incidents between Jade West and Ryder Daniels. Have you witnessed anything of the sort?"

"Unfortunately, yes. One night, not too long ago, perhaps three months ago, I heard an... altercation outside my humble home. I didn't think much of it, but then I recognised one of the voices..."


Sikowitz peered out of the curtain in his living room, looking down onto the street. And he was quite thankful he had – there had been some shouting and noises of frustration slowly getting louder outside, as the two (well, at least, he had only heard two voices) speakers came down the street, getting closer to his house. He couldn't hear it clearly at first, but when he heard a familiar female voice practically shout 'Just leave me alone!' it caught his attention, which led him to peering out of his living room.

And the reason he was so thankful was because he knew the female voice – recognised it easily, to be honest, after all he'd heard it in various different moods over the last four years; happy, angry, sad, annoyed, shocked, fearful. And what really made him worried was the fact that under the anger and annoyance, he could hear the fear in her voice. And it wasn't easy to make Jade West afraid.

His first thought was that it was just Jade and Beck, on their way back from a party where they'd had an argument that had spilled into their walk home. But he realised quickly that the male with Jade was very much not Beck Oliver. That much he could see from the shadowy profile caused by the street lamps. Skin too pale, a little too tall and nowhere near enough hair. He did recognise him a little though.

"C'mon Jade, just let me take you home!" The male figure reached out and grabbed Jade's forearm, something that raised the hairs on the back of Sikowitz's neck. Even he, as a teacher, knew that touching Jade was a huge 'no-no'. Once he'd patted her shoulder in congratulations of a scene well done and she grabbed his fingers and twisted without even realising. He was pretty sure she'd almost broke them.

"Don't touch me Ryder!" Jade practically screeched, tugging on her arm to try and break the grasp. "I'm going to Beck's, not even home so fuck off!" Seeing that the male – Ryder? As in Ryder Daniels? It would make sense, as that would be why Sikowitz recognised him – not let go as requested, Sikowitz made the decision to move away from the window and exit his house, padding down his driveway to get a better look.

"Why the fuck are you going there?! We talked about this!"

"He's my boyfriend Ryder! Now let go!"

"No-"

"Achem." Sikowitz called out, arms crossed. "Is there a problem here?"

"Sikowitz!" He didn't think he'd ever see Jade look...relieved to see him. Sure, he knew he was her favourite teacher, but she still didn't generally show that much emotion outside of a scene. It made him realise things were even more wrong than he thought.

Jade managed to finally wretch her arm away from Ryder and glared at him hard. "Go home Ryder. Before trouble starts."

"I think that would be best." Sikowitz added, his eyes focused on Ryder, who in turn was staring hard at Jade, before he seemed to deflate and snarled angrily, turning on his heel and storming off into the night.

Once he had left, Sikowitz turned to Jade with a raised eyebrow, his eyes flickering up and down her slender frame – she had obviously been at a party, that much was obvious from the skintight black dress and fishnet tights (her combat boots still on her feet, unsurprisingly), her hair curled with green streaks.

"Thanks Sikowitz." Jade gave him a nod, tossing her hair over her shoulders. "He was following me around that stupid party all night."

"Of course, dear Jude!" He totally ignored her sigh and correction of 'Jade.' "Now, what on Earth was going on?"

"I was at a party just a few blocks from here. Beck couldn't make it because he had a rehearsal. He was going to come over after, but the party was lame so I told him to just head home and I'd come by the RV-" She stopped herself, as if remembering exactly who she was talking too. "Just for 10 minutes to say hi then head home." She added on quickly, as if Sikowitz wasn't well aware that Beck and Jade had 'sleepovers' regularly. Admittedly, he liked to pretend he didn't know either.

"And Mr Daniels...?"

"Like I said. He'd been following me around the party the whole time, trying to talk to me and get me to dance with him. Then when I left, he followed me, trying to get me to get in his car so he could take me home. But like I would trust him when he's had a few drinks. He gets really..grabby." She rubbed the slowly darkening handprint shaped bruise on her forearm. Sikowitz knew she always bruised ridiculously easily – he'd found out in Freshman year, when he had thrown a ball at her mid-scene (to teach about 'distractions!') and hit her in the face. To her credit, she didn't break character, but by the end of the short scene he was horrified to see a bruise appear on her cheek. Since then, Jade had never been on the receiving end of one of his ball-throws. For her it was just increasingly loud noises shouted midway through her lines.

"Well, as it's quite late, how about you wait inside and have Beck come collect you? To take you home, obviously." He added, pretending to still be blissfully unaware of the more...private goings on of two of his favourite students.

Jade nodded and pulled out her phone, holding it upto her ear. "Hey babe...yeah uh...can you actually come pick me up from Sikowitz's house? Yeah, it's a long story but Ryder was at the party...ye- I'm fine Beck, he didn't try anything." She turned her back to Sikowitz in an effort to try to be a bit more subtle, but it didn't really help. "He followed me as I was walking and...no, I'm fine Beck. We ended up outside Sikowitz's and he came out to check on us...Ryder's fucked off, it's fine. OK. I'll see you soon. You too, baby."

Sikowitz hummed to himself as he considered what to do while they waited for Beck to arrive. It wasn't exactly a normal situation – being alone in his house with a female student. Jade, however, was looking at something on the wall.

Over the years, Sikowitz had framed picture of himself and the students who had become big names in Hollywood or across the world; some taken from when the former students got famous, some taken from high school photos. There was one though, that stood out; one picture with a student who didn't get famous or have a big break. Instead, it was a candid photo taken from a rehearsal of their play in Junior Year – The Taming of the Shrew. Tori had, for once, not had the title role – the role of Katherina was played by Jade, with Tori playing Bianca. But the photo was of Sikowitz and Tori on the stage, looking down at the script.

"Do you ever think why she did it?" Jade asked softly, touching the frame of the photo.

Sikowitz let out a low sigh. "I wonder all the time. So much raw talent and skill, and she threw it away."

"She was an idiot." Jade whispered, wiping her eyes with the back of her hands. "She should have just...spoken to us. Or to someone. If something was wrong with her...we would have helped." She shook her head. "A permanent solution to a temporary problem."

"I know." He rested a hand on her shoulder, then realised the issue with that when Jade took a very deliberate step away from him, although her eyes didn't leave the photo. "Jade, sometimes people hurt and feel like they can't say anything for...many reasons."

"She was an idiot." Jade repeated, shaking her head and turning away from the photograph as headlights flashed in the window, letting her know Beck had arrived. "Thanks for your help Sikowitz." She gave him a small smile before heading to the door, slipping out quietly. He moved to the windows, peering out as Beck nearly leapt out of the car and crushed her to him in a hug, whispering in her ear as she shook her head. His face darkened as he held her wrist gently and examined the bruise forming on her forearm. They spoke again for a few moments before Beck ushered her into the car, glancing up and seeing Sikowitz at the window, giving a brief wave and a nod of his head, before ducking into the car himself and pulling away.


"I didn't hear anything else regarding Mr Daniel's but I thought it might be...pertinent to your investigation."

And it was. It made it even more clear that Ryder Daniels was most likely the stalker; and now they had a witness to an actual interaction between the pair, unlike before with Valentine and Shapiro. And it didn't seem like it was a good interaction.

"Thank you Mr Sikowitz. It definitely gives us a clearer view of some things." Diaz nodded. "Lane said you were probably the closest teacher to Jade? Has anything been...off with her lately?"

Sikowitz hummed in thought. "Not really. Jade's...well, she's very talented but very closed off. Her own boyfriend once said she had an exoskeleton that's the lovechild of a porcupine and scorpion. But now you mention it, there was one odd thing..." He tilted his head to the side as if in thought, trying to remember a memory. "A few weeks ago, we started rehearsals for the Senior Play. Jade has the female lead, of course. But...she asked if I could make it closed rehearsals and, if Beck wasn't needed for the rehearsal either, so he wouldn't be there, if it could be finished before it got dark. Now, we do closed rehearsals occasionally, but Jade has never requested it. And Jade's often the one pushing for us to finish a little later, to get a scene perfect. So for her to ask, specifically if Beck wasn't there, for rehearsals to finish earlier was strange. And she was acting...skittish a lot for the past few months...when she was in character, she was perfect of course, but outside of acting she seemed almost...scared of everything. Which is very unlike Jade."

"Jade was being stalked." Fowler admitted, not needing to sugar coat it as much as he had with Valentine and Shapiro – after all, this was a grown adult. "Her wanting the rehearsals closed to others and not finishing too late if her boyfriend wasn't there...that's probably why. She didn't want the stalker to get access to the rehearsals or get to her after they finished. Same with her skittishness."

Sikowitz's eyes widened as he heard that, his mouth opening a little in shock. "Oh dear. Poor Jade." He shook his head. "I...I hope this is simply a coincidence but...Tori Vega? Before she..." Sikowitz took a hard swallow. "Before she..." He seemed like he couldn't get the words out, but both Diaz and Fowler knew what he was saying. "Before she killed herself..." It seemed the only way he managed to finally say the two words were by throwing himself at them hard, rushing them out of his mouth. "I think...I don't know for sure but...I believe Tori may have received some...intimidating phone calls as well. Shortly before she...did it, she had started to become withdrawn and quiet, jumping any time there was a sudden noise or her phone rang. As I said, it's just a thought but it was very unlike Tori. She was very often the life of the party." A sad smile flitted over his face. "That's why no one could figure out why she...why she would do such a thing."

Fowler and Diaz gave him sympathetic smiles, but didn't push; as sad as the loss of life of a teenage girl was, Tori Vega wasn't part of this case, despite her getting brought up often enough; tragedy begets tragedy, Diaz guessed.

"Thank you for your time Mr Sikowitz. If we have any other questions, we'll make sure to contact you. And of course, we do request that you keep this fairly quiet. We're trying to avoid as much media attention as possible."

The teacher nodded, pushing himself to his feet with a nimbleness that didn't seem to match his slightly aged and haggard appearance. "Of course. My lips are sealed."

Once the strange man had exited the room, Diaz rubbed her temples. "This is becoming more and more like a high school drama series."

"You're the one going on about teenage love triangles." Fowler replied, giving her a slight smile. "Come on. Let's go down to the hospital – see if we can speak with the boys and if we're lucky, Jade. Any word about the crime scene guys getting access to the Daniels and West houses?"

"They got a warrant for the Daniels residence, still waiting on West, but we might not need it if Mr West is happy to give us access. It'll clear his daughter after all."

"Then we'll swing by the Daniels place after the hospital. Give the forensics guys a chance to go through most of the house and tag anything important without us hovering over their shoulders."


A little bit more detail into Tori's suicide, along with more of Ryder being a first class creep to Jade. I just figured Sikowitz would be a good character to have as almost everyone else they'll be speaking to will be kids/teens, so some adult interviews would probably be needed too if possible.

Please continue to give me your theories and thoughts on this - I did mention this in a reply to a comment on the last chapter; I'm not telling who the stalker IS but I'll tell you who it's not :P How's that work for you? So the person stalking Jade (and Beck a little, by extention) is NOT: Sinjin, Andre, Shawn Becker, Sikowitz, Lane, Helen, Cat Valentine, any of the Vega family. Oh and they're not an OC! So...yes. Do with that what you will. (I mean...I think I'm being kind of obvious here tbh :P )