A John Doe fanfiction by Booklovr
Disclaimer: The television show, John Doe, and all of the associated characters, ideas, and concepts are owned by Fox network, with which I am not affiliated, which will be obvious when this does NOT happen on the show in a few weeks…
This chapter dedicated to everyone who reviewed—because that's what keeps the chapters coming!
A/N: Ta-da! The long-awaited second chapter! To be exact, this is chapter 2a. I was going to make it a little longer, but it was taking forever to write. So, I'll finish it up and depending on how long the rest of it is, either repost or give you a really short chapter 3. Enjoy!
I had the dream again that night. Only…something was different.
I didn't wake up in a great mood. In fact, I was disoriented. I couldn't shake the feeling that there was something I should be remembering.
And something else unusual: I woke up, humming. My Funny Valentine, of course. Why? Was it just leftover from my wondering about it the night before? Or…had that been in my dream, too? Too many things to think about.
Where to start? I considered my options: try and find someone in town willing to talk, try and look in Theresa's apartment, try and see what the local police already had, try and take another look at the car…I didn't like the fact that all my ideas started with "try."
Well, I'd had some small success the day before with the car, but something about it still bothered me. So I headed back that way again.
Deputy Morse was still guarding the SUV, but he seemed at his limits. I wondered how long, exactly, he'd been on this duty. He sat in the cop car, staring straight ahead, and didn't notice when I snuck up behind. I waited as he began to nod. It takes the average human seven minutes to completely fall asleep, but I had to wait one hour eighteen minutes before Morse finally slumped forward across his steering wheel. Five more minutes, just to be sure, and the SUV was all mine.
What had I missed? Well, that was a hard question to answer; the Trooper had been gone over so well, not a thing remained inside but a layer of dust. So, forget the inside. There were other sides to a car.
The outside was consistently filthy: rain, snow, pollen, and the various animals that had visited it over the course of the last year had all left their signs, and there was no indication of what it might have looked like before. The tires, as mentioned, where flat, but appeared to have previously been in good condition. The spare tire was still in place, unused. The car was, except for the signs of a year of abandonment, in perfect condition. Perfect?
Any number of things can be wrong with an eleven-year-old car, from worn brake pads to severe electrical malfunctions. I checked under the hood and below the car, and once again found: nothing. Only this time I was beginning to notice something to the nothing.
What was wrong with the picture was that not a single thing was wrong with it.
Rust accumulation was correct for a year of exposure, no more. The break pads were even better than mine. Not a single malfunction to be found anywhere. Every connection, every piece of equipment, every detail had been, at the time, in show room condition. The oil had been changed, the tires replaced, even the windshield wiper fluid had been refilled.
Suddenly, it occurred to me what I had noticed the day before. How could I have been so stupid? The entire time I was searching, I was stirring up dust! If I was right…
I opened the back passenger side door of the car, and looked at the carpet. Since I hadn't looked as closely here, there were still patches where the dust was undisturbed. In fact, only in areas I hadn't looked closely, the dust was undisturbed. Looking closely, I could still trace my exact movements in the dust.
The police hadn't searched the car a week ago. No one had been in there for a year.
A quick look under the seats confirmed my guess: the dust was exactly as thick under there as anywhere else. The reason there had been nothing to find was that the car had been completely checked, refitted, repaired, and cleaned a year before. The lack of evidence inside was not because of a thorough police investigation, but a thorough vacuuming.
But why?
There is only one car garage in Southburg, owned by Carl Finnegan. Logically, an overhaul like what that car had received would have happened there.
Logically, at least.
"Look, buddy," Finnegan said, "I deal with a lot of cars here, I can't remember every single job off hand."
"You keep records, don't you?"
"I don't have time to look something like that up. See this car?" He gestured to a 1999 Ford Windstar with extensive damage to the front end. "Susan Morgan almost hit a deer last night. Wound up hitting a tree, instead. She's got four kids, lucky thing none of them were in the car at the time, and her husband drives a truck. Now, I promised I'd get this fixed up as soon as I can, because she just can't get around without it, and I'm not letting you take one more minute of my time." He turned back to his work on the front bumper.
"But if you remember what everyone in town drives, just like that, you ought to be able to remember this."
"I said I'm busy."
"Please, just try and remember. 1992 Isuzu Trooper, large box-like car, there's only one registered in this town—"
"How'd you know that?" He demanded.
"I just—never mind, the point is, it should stick out in your memory, a car like that getting a complete check up."
Finnegan sighed. "Alright. I remember Theresa Small needed to get her whole car checked over a year ago. It was in good condition to begin with; she must have kept it good. I fixed what I could find, cleaned it up, and that was it."
"Really? Did she say why she needed it looked at for?"
"No. I didn't ask. She probably knew she was leaving on a long trip, and wanted to make sure it was fit for that kind of work. That's it. Now, if you'll excuse me?" Again, he turned away.
So, she had bought the car in good condition, rarely drove it, and got the finishing touches put on it, right before abandoning it on the side of the road? Not likely. Keeping a car in good condition was one thing; this one was immaculate. What had it been like when she got it? Several ways to find out…
"Three dollars?" I demanded.
"That's right. A dollar fifty a minute, no refunds, pay in advance," Roger informed me, keeping his hand on the telephone receiver.
"But no telephone company in the nation charges anything near that rate! And with independent services, you can make calls for even less—"
"What, dial ten-ten-three-two-one and get all calls up to twenty minutes for only ninety-nine cents? What's next, dial one-eight-hundred-collect and save a buck or two? You watch too much TV. That's the rate for calling from this Inn, no exceptions. Understand?"
Since I had been unable to find a single pay phone in all of Southburg, I had no choice but to hand over three dollars to make a two minute call. And not even private; Roger stood there the whole time, listening.
I dialed Frank's office number and got his voice mail. "Frank, it's me. I need another favor—can you find anything on…" I glanced at Roger, who still made no sign of moving. "…On that car in the report? All the information should be there. I need to know who it was registered to, when they bought it, anything you can find. Don't call me, I'll call you." I hung up.
"By the way," I added on my way out of the room, "that was twelve point three seconds, which works out to thirty point seven five cents."
"No refunds."
Not that three dollars was a huge strain on my budget, but it was somewhat annoying.
It was two thirty-seven in the afternoon. What I really wanted was to search Theresa's apartment, which I technically should not have been doing without a warrant. Which meant that I just couldn't be caught at it.
Easier said than done. There was no way of entering the duplex without passing by Veronica's windows. Well, not directly, anyway. Staircase was to the right of the apartments, so that the only windows looking out over the street were on the left half of the building; I would need to somehow get around the building unseen and approach from the opposite direction. Since Oak Street was a dead end, walking casually past the front of the house was not going to work. Judging from what I had seen of the floor plan, only the bedroom and bathroom windows would look out the back, and the odds of Veronica looking out from that direction were slim, but not negligible. So passing behind the house was the better idea, but still not the best. The edge of the forest was approximately three hundred fifty yards behind the duplex, so by traveling fifty more yards within the woods, I could circumvent the entire neighborhood, start on the far end of the street, approach from the right, enter as quietly as possible, go up the stairs, pick the lock to Theresa's door, and take a look around. If I left by the same route, I could go unnoticed.
If that sounds like an overly complex way to sneak past one elderly woman, I can assure you that it isn't. In fact, it wasn't complex enough.
"Hello? Is someone out there?" Veronica opened her door and looked into the hallway before I was even halfway to the staircase.
"John," she remarked with some surprise. "I didn't expect to see you again. So soon, I mean. Come in; come in, how goes the investigation? Any luck?"
I had no choice but to pretend I had come to talk to her. "Veronica," I smiled as pleasantly as possible. "No…not much luck at all. I'm afraid no one is willing to talk to me."
"Well, that's understandable, isn't it? Most people around here don't trust strangers much. Been a while since we've seen a new face, you know."
"Four years ago, correct? Isn't that when Russell came up here? From what I can tell, everyone gets on with him just fine."
"Well, that's a little different. He had family up here, an aunt if I remember correctly. Can't quite recall…I was always so bad with names."
"Really? Given the approximate birth and death rates of this region, there couldn't have been more than two hundred twelve different people in this town[i] over the course of your life. I wouldn't think that it would be hard—"
"Clearly you know nothing about memory troubles," she said sharply.
"Oh, I…know a thing or two. But recent studies show that long term memory—"
"Well, for your information, I didn't come here until I married my husband George, and there was no one named Russell in town at the time. So his aunt was either maternal or married herself, and excuse me if I'm a bit rusty on everyone's maiden names. Besides, I haven't left this house much since George died six years ago, and I haven't been too up on gossip since. I never heard who Fredrick's aunt was, or if I did I wasn't paying much attention. Believe me now?"
"I'm sorry," I murmured, looking away guiltily. Shouldn't vent my frustrations on innocent women like that, I scolded myself.
She sighed. "No, I'm sorry, I'm a bit touchy these days. I can hardly even make it down to the store to buy my own groceries anymore. It was such a blessing having Theresa around; she used to go out for me. It's been a hard year."
"Are you suffering from…some kind of condition?" I wondered.
"Only old age. Don't suppose there's a cure for that?"
"But women sixty-five and under—"
Veronica chuckled. "Sixty-five, eh? Bit of advice, John, don't try guessing a woman's age; you men always get it wrong. I'm seventy-three, for your information."
"Really? You've…aged well."
"Only on the outside. On the inside, well…" she sighed again and began to rub her hands absently. "I do hope you find her. It gets lonely out here. The top apartment's never really been quality real estate, if you know what I mean. At least from what I remember, haven't been able to climb the stairs in years. She had to come down here to visit."
"Hmm. Why did Theresa live there, by the way?"
"Oh, the price. One good thing about poor real estate is that it's nice and cheap, you know. Theresa was always on a tight budget. Take that car she drove; piece of junk. Always told her it would get her in an accident, but she couldn't afford anything better."
"Oh, really? But, before she left, Theresa got the whole car checked over, and I think there was…a little work done on it, too."
"Hmm. You sure? I wouldn't have thought she would go for something like that. Carl's memory isn't so grand, either, maybe he remembered wrong?"
"Maybe," I said noncommittally.
"Well, if you want my advice, try getting to know the people in town, see if you can get them to trust you a little more."
"How would I do that?"
"Well, do you like bars?"
And that's how I found myself at Wood's Bar early that evening. There was a small collection of the locals at one end, me at the other, and the bartender, Mark Wood, somewhere in the middle. Social skills, still a work in progress.
Well, Mark was standing relatively close. Or was it just so he could reach that bottle of brandy?
"You know," I ventured, "back in Seattle, I work in a bar some nights."
"Really?"
"Yeah, I'm good friends with the bartender there. He and I—"
"Well, maybe you should go back there."
Yeah, it was the brandy bottle. Well, a simple "I'm busy here" would have been sufficient.
I considered the group at the other end of the bar. Three men, sitting near the pool table. They were all eyeing me over their beers. Maybe this wasn't such a great idea. I stood to leave.
"Hey," one of the men shouted suddenly. "We haven't seen you around before. What are you doing here?"
I shrugged. "Drinking."
"Aren't we all?" answered another.
The older two turned back to their drinks, but the youngest, about twenty-six, waved me over. "These guys aren't very interesting, but you might do. Play pool?"
"A little."
He grinned, seeming friendly enough. "Name's Jim."
"John," I said, skipping the rest of my usual introduction.
Playing pool is always an interesting experience for me. It actually takes more effort for me to lose than to win, and I tried to focus on not getting all the balls in right off.
"So, where you from?" asked Jim after a minute.
"Seattle," I said. "You?"
"Here. Where else? I've been in this town my whole life. Fascinating lifestyle, huh?"
"Oh, it seems…calmer out here," I offered.
"Calmer. Yeah. Boring's more like it."
"So why not leave?"
"Oh, I will." He grinned at me across the table, sinking the two and ten ball with one hit. "Not bad, eh? I'm just saving up money to get out of here. Work at the grocery store for now. Not much room for improvement there."
"At least you meet a lot of people that way," I commented, wondering how I could bring this conversation around to Theresa.
Turns out, I didn't even have to try. "Yeah, but not too many my age. Weren't that many to begin with, now they're all gone or working, you know. There was that girl, though, for a few years."
"Girl?"
"Yeah, Theresa was her name. Real cute one, you know. Now there's someone who had some stories, eh?"
"You…talked a lot with her?"
"Oh, yeah. Well, okay, so not that much, but she'd come up every two or three weeks, so sometimes we'd get to talking."
"What about?"
"Well, you know, she wasn't from around here at all. Used to try and get her to talk about where she came from."
"Where was that?"
"Boise, I think. And someplace else before that. A bit of a traveler, she was. Between you and me, I think that's why she left. Got bored here. Not that I can blame her, you know." He grinned again. "Pity she went without warning; I woulda gone with her, if she wanted company, you know what I mean?" He winked and lined up his shot. "Eight ball, side pocket."
I was somewhat surprised; I hadn't lost a game of pool in a long time. "That's…impressive."
"You wouldn't be holding back, would you? Or are you just easily distracted by stories of pretty girls?"
"Maybe a little of both."
"Well, you try a little harder next time, and I'll see if I can remember any more stories, eh?"
"You're on." This time, I grinned back.
In the end, I didn't learn too much more about Theresa, but I did feel a little better that night. So much better, in fact, that I went right to sleep without really thinking that much more about the case. And the next morning, I slept in until late in the morning. I dreamt…something new, something different. I was starting to dislike the whole idea of dreams. According to Freudian dream interpretations, the most common dreams are actually based on anxieties that were not correctly dealt with during the day. I think I have my fair share of those.
I thought about what I'd heard from Jim the night before. Little things, which my mind clung to almost desperately. She liked boats, and often talked about learning to sail. She was a dog person. They used to argue over whether she was more of a country girl or a city girl—Theresa insisted she liked fields and quiet, but Jim said he knew she got lonely without enough people around. She had said that she'd only seen the ocean a few times in her life, and wanted to see it again. Jim said he thought she'd gone west, or maybe north. He also thought that she had left on her own, not been kidnapped like the police said, and she'd left her car to "make a clean start. She came into town with nothing more than what she was carrying, and that's all she wanted to leave with. A real wandering type, you know? Personally, I think all this fuss about it is a little much. She managed to make a clean break, and I don't want to see nothing bring her back, you know?"
I suspected that his opinion was somewhat colored by his own desire to leave, but perhaps he was on to something. What if she had been trying to make a "clean break"? I filed that away to think about later. I still needed more.
I had resolved to spend the day talking to different people in the town, see if anyone could tell me anything. I guess my success with Jim gave me new confidence; somehow I thought I'd have more success. I only needed to know where to start.
Where to start, that was a good question. I decided right there was as good a place as any. Beginning with the Harpers, I planned to systematically visit every house in town until I found someone who had answers.
In theory, a good plan. In theory.
"Hello, my name is John Doe and—"
"Whatever you're selling, we already have one."
"Excuse me, my name is John, do you have a minute?"
"No, I'm not interested."
"Hi, my name's John and—"
"Here's five dollars towards whatever you're collecting for."
"I'm not asking for money!"
"What do you mean? Everyone's asking for money."
For a while, I even tried just handing a business card right over, instead of introducing myself. But that seemed to create an even more hostile reaction, so I switched back to failed introductions.
All day, I walked back and forth across the town, hoping for anyone who would be willing to talk. I hardly ever managed to get a word in about Theresa, and whenever I did, the reaction was always the same.
"Theresa? I don't know, she lived here for a few years. Never saw much of her. I don't know where she is now."
In fact, it was almost exactly the same every time. Apparently, no one knew anything. Almost as if they had never noticed she was there in the first place, and never noticed when she left. Or something.
I was ready to give up. Two days straight, and not one thing that could be considered a clue. I was no closer to finding out what happened to Theresa than I was to convincing the townspeople to trust me. In fact, I was sure that I was making progress in the opposite direction.
"My name is—"
"I've heard about you. Get lost, buddy!"
It was starting to get dark when the last door in town slammed in my face. It would appear that somehow I had made the entire town mad at me, though I didn't have the faintest idea how.
I needed to clear my head, and that I did have an idea about.
As I previously mentioned, the town was mainly located within a clearing situated in the middle of a forest. Calculating the approximate distance from the center of town to the circumference of the clearing, I estimated the tree line to be fifteen point seventy-one miles full circle. I decided to walk it, and mentally catalogue all of the trees and plants easily visible from the edge. My usual walking rate is two point seven[ii] miles an hour, though I was going slightly slower at the time, so I estimated the walk would take just over five hours and forty-five minutes. Sunset was at eight o'clock, and the moonrise at eight fourteen, and since the exact full moon had been the night before (or, more accurately, that morning at twelve thirty-seven), I expected to have plenty of light, and to be able to finish around midnight.
I might have been able to, but I never finished. Around eight forty-five, just as I was noting the twelfth Fraxinus americana, or white ash tree, I became aware that someone was watching me. I turned to see a small girl, about nine years old, standing fifteen feet away, halfway between me and what was apparently her house.
"What are you doing?" she asked.
"Identifying the vegetation on the edge of this town," I explained.
"Ooooooooooooh," she commented. Then she smiled. "That one's an oak tree!" She said proudly. "And that's a birch. And over here," she ran to a tree near where I was standing, "is a white pine. You know, they have needles in groups of five! See? W-H-I-T-E. White."
"Yes, I know that." I smiled and squatted down to her level. "Where'd you learn it?"
"Girl scouts," she said, as if it was obvious. "Where'd you learn it? You aren't a girl scout!"
"Oh, I just…picked it up. Maybe from another girl scout."
It seemed that this explained my possession of what she considered secret knowledge. "Okay! So are you lookin' at all the trees in town? There's a lot!"
"I might."
She considered. "You need a better job."
"This isn't my job, I just do it for fun."
"So then what do you do?"
"Well…I play the piano…and sometimes I help the police."
"Ooooooooooooh." She thought about that. "Soooooooooooo…are you the man from Seattle looking for Miss Theresa?"
I was surprised, but tried not to show it. "Yes, I am."
"You will find her, right?"
"I hope so," I said. "Did you know her?"
"Uh-huh," she said, nodding emphatically. "We all did. And we're all really worried about her, but—" Suddenly, she stopped. "I'm not supposed to talk to you."
"What?" And I thought I'd been surprised before. "Why not?"
"Because—" She stopped again. "Just because. I hafta go now." She turned and ran back to her house.
"She's not allowed to talk to me?" I demanded out loud as I paced around the room that night. "Why not?" I ran through my mental catalogue of the houses. Her door had been answered by a woman, presumably her mother. I remembered handing her a card, and the door had been immediately slammed in my face. Which meant…
"What the hell is going on in this town?" I demanded. "Someone disappears for a year, and no one even cares? If everyone is worried, why don't they show it? Why will no one talk to me about it?" More pacing. "I knew something was wrong here, something is so wrong! I have to know what, I have to know…"
I stopped, pounding my fist on the desk. "They know something. I know it. They're all hiding something. But…what?"
I thought back to the one time I'd seen Theresa, standing on the ferry, calling to me. I will find you. Whatever it takes. I just couldn't believe I'd given up looking for her so soon after that. Well, it had seemed like the right idea at the time, but what if she was in trouble now, what if she had been in trouble then? If I'd had a chance to save her, and had failed…I didn't think I could ever forgive myself.
Relax, I told myself. I will find her. I haven't failed yet. And I won't start now. Then I made possibly the worst decision I could have made under the circumstances.
I decided to go to bed, and look at the problem in the morning.
A/N: All right! As I mentioned, I will post the rest of the chapter when it's done. That will bring us to the end of John's time in Southburg, and the part where, if this was an episode, the screen all goes black and everyone hopes that it's going to turn out to be a two-part-er. ;-) In other words, a change in gears, and the story will continue. Expect it in a week or two! And here's a thank you for everyone who reviewed last time: Thank you Peggo, Doefriday, ShaniaTwainrox74, LeafsFan2003 (seems you update much faster than me…) Kasia (all the chapters should be that long…this is the first time I've ever posted anything under ten pages!), Canadian Crow, ann(did I dawdle too long?), and Miyu, for all of your kind words. I do try! :-)
[i] I've mentioned I'm making the Southburg-related facts up, right?
[ii] This number based on how long it takes me to walk the length of my room, adjusted for approximate height and gait differences…basically, also made up.