The group of girls crowded outside St Mary's Catholic School the next morning were fascinated when the large and rather loud motorcycle pulled to a stop outside the school gates. The young man who had brought the bike to a screeching halt looked like he could not be more than 18 or 19 at the most. He wore no helmet and his longish light brown hair was standing on end at awkward angles all over his head and his tie was crooked beneath his dust coated white collar. Standing at over six feet tall and very heavily built, he presented quite an imposing figure as he stepped off the bike. However it was the person he was now helping off the bike that drew more attention from the crowd of teenaged girls who had gathered round to stare. The girl who was sat on the back of the motorcycle was trying to remain as dignified as possible while having obvious difficulty with the calf length skirt that kept trying to trip her as she climbed off the bike. For all his efforts, the only thanks her companion received was having his hand batted roughly away every time he attempted to help her down.
"You ok now?" Doug asked impatiently when Hanson had finally succeeded on putting both feet down on the same side of his partner's bike.
"Fine!" Tom snapped.
"I was only trying to help." he replied sounding hurt with a wounded look on his face.
"Sorry" Tom said shortly. Being forced into the Chapel at 6 that morning so he could suffer through another session with Hoffs had not put him put him in the best of moods. He looked like a deer caught in headlights as his dark eyes swept over the campus and the crowd of girls now filing in.
"Hey" Doug said kindly, "Just relax, you'll be fine."
"Easy for you say. You know they hunt in packs?"
"What?!"
"Teenaged girls. Doug, you can't leave me here." he said desperately as he grabbed hold of the front of Penhalls jacket with both hands. "They can smell the fear, man! They pick out the weakest in seconds and then you're doomed."
"You're hardly the weakest babe" Doug said grinning.
"You know what I mean. They'll see through me in a minute man!"
"Don't worry, Judy's done an amazing job. Trust me!"
"Not everyone's as easily pleased as you Doug" Hanson said scornfully as he scooted behind his partner and began pulling at his clothes.
"Are you ok?" Doug asked, genuine concern beneath his laughter.
"No. You know there's a reason guy's don't wear pantyhose."
"You're not wearing panties under there as well are you?"
"What do you take me for?!" Tom almost yelled. "Of course I'm not. We couldn't find any that fit." he finished, his voice small and sheepish.
"You were right. They don't pay you enough for this" Doug said as he moved to helpfully push Tom in the direction of the entrance. "Now have a good day at school sweetheart."
"Yeah, yeah." Hanson said dismissively as he headed off.
"Hey!" came Doug's voice as he neared the building. Tom spun round at glared at his friend.
"What?" he snapped
"Don't I get a goodbye kiss?" he said smirking as he watched Tom walk back towards him. As he reached his partner Hanson plastered a smile on his face and leaned in close and spoke through gritted teeth so only Doug would be able to hear.
"There aren't words to describe how much I hate you right now!" he said before turning round and walking away.
"Don't worry beautiful" Doug called after him. "I'll be back to bust you out as soon as I can!" He chuckled to himself as he watched his friend walk away before turning and climbing back on his bike.
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"Excuse me". Sister Clarence, the school secretary looked up sharply at the sound of the lilting yet unusually deep voice. The young girl that stood before her didn't seem to fit with the voice, or the wide scared eyes that looked back at her.
"Can I help you?" She asked kindly. The girl coughed nervously before turning a thousand watt smile on elderly nun.
"My name's Tamara Heyward. Father MacKenzie said I was to collect my class schedule from you."
"Of course" she said smiling proudly as if she was doing this girl the biggest favour. "Your first class is English with Sister Margarite. Just down the hall, second door to the right."
"Thanks" 'Tamara' said smiling nervously as she took the sheet of paper from her hand.
To say that Tom Hanson had been shy as a teenager would be a gross understatement, and large groups of girls had always made him nervous. Things he couldn't understand had always made him feel uneasy. As a kid he had never understood girls and, if possible, as a supposed adult they were even more of a mystery. As he looked through the glass panel in the door he felt his stomach twist into a thousand knots as the face of every girl that had ridiculed him in his own high school days flashed before his eyes.
"Get a grip Hanson." he thought to himself. "You're 23 years old. You're a fully trained, highly skilled police officer. Wearing a plaid skirt. And pantyhose. Make up. And you have balled up socks shoved down your shirt. Oh god, someone shoot me right now!"
He took a deep breath and opened the door as slowly and quietly as he could so as not to draw attention to himself. However, while concentrating on how he was walking and where he was putting his feet he somehow managed to trip and stumble slightly. The only time he had felt more uncomfortable was when at 5 years old he had rushed unannounced into his parent's room after a particularly bad dream. The sight that met him as he opened the door was one he decided right there and then was worse than any nightmare. That pretty much summed up how he felt as every eye in the room turned and focused on him. "Cos that's just the repressed memory you need resurfacing right now" he thought to himself as he gave a small uncomfortable smile as he regained his composure and hurried to take the nearest empty seat silently praying that Judy's makeover would hold up under the scrutinizing eyes sweeping him from every angle.
However, to his horror before he could reach the empty seat Sister Margarite decided he hadn't drawn enough attention to himself and shouted over the urgent whispers echoing round the room.
"You must be Miss Heyward. I'm Sister Margarite" she said shaking Tom's hand enthusiastically. "Everyone, this is Tamara, please do your best to make her feel welcome." Tom managed to shake off his nerves and offered a small smile and a single nervous wave.
"You can take the empty seat over there behind Helen, dear." she said kindly as she handed Tom a very old and tattered copy of 'A Tale of Two Cities'. "Oh good" Hanson thought "That again. Oh well, at least I get to sleep through one class."
"Hi" Helen said. The slim ginger haired girl offered Tom a wide smile as he sat down. "I'm Helen Cresswell. Nice to meet you. Hey was that you on the bike?"
"Aha" Hanson said warily.
"Wow. So that guy was..."
"Doug, my boyfriend, yeah" he replied trying to look proud on the outside, when on the inside he was imagining the many ways he could make Fuller suffer for dumping this case on him.
"He's a big guy isn't he? Well I supposed he'd need to be dating you." she said as she swept Hanson with her eyes from top to toe. "So let me introduce everyone. The girl behind you is Emily Carter and the one behind her is Louise Thompson but we don't talk to her because she was dating Chris Fletcher while he was still seeing..."
Resisting the urge to be violently sick in this girls face, Tom plastered a vacant smile on his face trying to block out Helen and her own special version of who's who. "Somebody kill me. Kill me now!" he began repeating over and over in his head as he remembered why he had always hated teenaged girls. So to save his sanity he stared straight at the petite girl with the constantly wagging mouth and retreated into his visions of torturing his commanding officer.
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"Mr Porter I assume!" the teacher snapped as Doug bounded his way through the door, wincing at the thought of being late on his first day. Oh, well at least it's in character he thought. "Nice to finally meet you"
"Pleasures all yours, sir, I'm sure" Doug said offering a sarcastic smile.
"Any explanation for your tardiness?"
"Er, not really. Had to drop my girl off at school."
"I see. Well maybe tomorrow you can worry more about getting yourself to class on time."
"Maybe. I'll think about it." Doug said. This was met by muffled laughter from the other students.
"Would you like to take your seat Douglas? We don't have enough books I'm afraid, so you'll have to share."
"Don't worry about it. I'll just sit at the back and catch up on my sleep."
"Not today Mr Porter. You can share with Sam. Mr Taylor, you don't mind sharing with our new friend do you?"
"No sir." replied the tall young man with scruffy blond hair sat beside the empty desk.
"Bingo! Quick interrogation and outta here!" Doug thought as he made his way to the empty seat. "Hey!" he said cheerfully "Doug Porter. Fellow inmate."
"Yeah, hi" Sam replied dismissively.
"How long you been here?"
"Long enough?"
"You like it?"
"It's ok."
"Real conversationalist aren't ya?" Doug said with a smile
"Not really. Do you mind er..."
"Doug"
"Doug, I have work to be doing."
"Sure. Sorry" Doug said as he turned his attention to the rest of the class. "Piece of cake. Riiight!" he thought to himself.
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By the time morning classes were over Helen Cresswell had officially adopted Tamara Heyward.She seemed to be making it her own personal responsibility to help the new girl fit in and insisted that she ate lunch with her and her friends.
Tom sat pretending to listen to their incessant chatter while he chewed on what the school claimed was food as his watchful dark eyes scanned the cafeteria. He spied a girl sat by herself in the corner of the room and stopped Helen in the middle of whatever it was she was saying.
"Who's that?" he asked pointing out the solitary figure.
"Oh, that's Kelly Morris."
"How come she's sat by herself?"
"She's been pretty quiet recently. Her best friend was Nikki Stokely, that girl who died a few days ago."
"I heard about that. What was she like?"
"Nikki? She was the best. You know, always smiling, never a bad word for anyone. Pretty much everyone liked her. She came to a few of our prayer meetings."
"Prayer meetings. Really?" 'Tamara' said dismissively as 'her' eyes remained focused on Kelly Morris.
"Yeah. Hey, you should come along" she suggested lightly.
"Yeah sure. Look I'll catch you later I've gotta go do ...things" Hanson said distantly as he stood and made his getaway.
"Hello." Kelly Morris looked up on hearing the soft low voice over her shoulder to see the tall darkhaired girl stood looking down at her.
"Hi." she answered quietly. Kelly Morris was no more than 5 feet tall, with a very slight frame and long dark wavy hair. Looking down at this tiny girl Hanson thought "Great. This is who I'm supposed to stick close to. She's tiny! I'll stick out like a sore thumb stood next to her"
"You're Kelly aren't you?" he asked kindly.
"Last time I checked".
"I'm Tamara" he said offering her a friendly smile.
"Of course you are" she said sarcastically looking him up and down.
"I heard about your friend. I'm sorry."
"What did you hear?"
"That she died." Kelly let out a scornful laugh at hearing this.
"That's what they tell us." she said, "They don't want to admit that someone from round here could be a murder victim."
"She was murdered?" he asked kindly.
"Listen, I don't really want to talk about this and it's none of your business, so can you just leave."
"Sorry I bothered you." Hanson said softly as he walked away.
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When the end of the day finally came Hanson couldn't get out quick enough. He was used to spending all day listening to teenaged angst and gossip and was used to missing adult conversation. He was however unaccustomed to finding himself missing male conversation, made much worse by the fact that he still had not been able to shake Helen Creswell and her runaway tongue. She was just in the middle of a wonderfully interesting tale of one of her classmates and an ex-teacher when Tom heard the roar of Penhalls motorcycle. A small smile spread across his face as he turned to Helen and said "I gotta go, See you tomorrow" and bounded down the stairs. At least now it was only adult conversation he was lacking.
As Penhall stepped off his bike and was in the process of securing it by the curb he was nearly knocked forward as a rather large object landed on his back.
"Nice to see you too sweetheart" he said with a smile.
"Don't talk, just get me outta here" Tom said as Doug began to walk back towards the bike with his smaller partner still firmly attached to his back as whistles and catcalls came echoing from the school campus.
"Bad first day honey?" he said laughter evident in his voice.
"Let's just say I'll never understand teenaged girls. If I ever have a daughter, she's going from 12 straight to 21."
"Maybe Judy can get you a potion for that. You know these witchy kids can do anything." then still noting the noise coming from the girls gathered outside he smiled at Tom and said, "Hey, Hanson, you wanna give them something to really talk about?"
"What are you.."
He didn't have time to finish his sentence as Doug swept him from his back round into a tight hug and dipping him to the floor, before leaning in close.
"Convincing enough?" he whispered close to Tom's ear, hiding their faces from the watching crowd.
"Let me up you mook!" he snapped trying to hide a smile at his partner's antics.
"You never appreciate me" Doug said, pretending hurt.
"Just shut up and get me outta here"
They hopped on the bike and sped away under the observing eyes of the other students and one very angry looking young woman who was just getting into her car on the other side of the road.