AN: This chapter mirrors itself in a way that I think is really fun, so I hope you guys don't find it redundant. Hope you enjoy, and please leave a review!
An awkward hush fell over the lobby as Walter stepped through the door. It was his first day back at work since his sons had gone missing, and clearly not only did everyone already know, but no one knew how to act around him about it. His boss had told him that he could take off as much time as he wanted, but the police had told Walter that there simply wasn't anything he himself could do at that point. With nothing else to do, it was easier for Walter to paste on a fake smile for the cameras and go to work than sit around worrying.
Walter ignored the silence and headed down the hallway to the elevator. Other people weren't even supposed to know, but clearly his boss had blabbed about it, and Walter just was not in the mood to deal with that breach in privacy. Walter was pissed, and for once in his life, he was actually going to give his boss a piece of his mind.
Walter let the anger stay on his face as he stepped off the elevator and headed straight towards Mr. Galloway's office. The man had been taking advantage of Walter and his family for far too long - and he wasn't ever going to forget the disgusting things that his gross wife had said about Drake when his step-son was only fifteen; joking or not, it hadn't been funny, and Walter couldn't believe that his boss would even tell him about what his wife had said as if it had been hilarious - and Walter was sick and tired of it.
He knocked on Galloway's door much harder than was strictly necessary, but Walter couldn't bring himself to care. Upon hearing a faint "come in", Walter quickly opened the door and took long, purposeful strides into the office. Galloway was already cringing at the sight of Walter, but Walter didn't give him a chance to say anything.
"Why would you tell everyone?" he immediately asked. "I told you that in confidence because you are my boss, so you should understand why my job performance may be affected, but for you to take what I told you and tell the whole damn building? Are my sons really just another news story to you?"
"I understand you're upset, but it wasn't me who told, I swear," Galloway replied, his hands up in surrender. He wisely refrained from chastising his employee for borderline insubordination. "Somebody with contacts in the sheriff's department caught wind of it. I didn't know you were here yet, otherwise I would have called you up here, because that's not all."
Walter just stared at him expectantly. If it wasn't Galloway who spread it around that the boys were missing, fine, but that didn't mean that he was suddenly in the mood to be chummy with him.
"You know our team reporting on the San Diego Snatcher? Well they got a tip that a photo of your boys was seen on the desk of one of the detectives handling the case, with pictures of all the other victims," Galloway carefully said.
Walter's jaw dropped more slowly than his heart. The police were investigating his sons' disappearance as a connection with the serial killer? The deputy that he and Audrey had spoken to had said nothing about that.
"We're going live with it in about fifteen minutes-."
"What?!"
"I just thought you should know," Galloway continued, unbothered by Walter's outburst.
"How the hell can you do that? How can you publicize a story about my family without asking me? Who the hell does that?"
"A failing network that wants to make money does that," Galloway responded with a shrug. "Channel 12 is outperforming us in every way. It's nothing personal, Walter, it's just what's best for Channel 7. Besides, won't this just mean more eyes out looking for your boys anyway?"
Walter shook his head. He shouldn't have been surprised, and yet, for some reason, he was. He was just a weatherman, but so many of his coworkers were becoming absolute vultures and turning the news media into something that Walter didn't even recognize anymore. He hated to think of what the media would look like in ten to twenty years if it continued on the current path.
"All due respect," Walter said with a sneer. "Fuck you." He shook his head in derision and turned around, storming back out of the room without looking back or closing the door. Galloway didn't call after him.
Walter made his way down a few floors to the news desk. He had to try to stop the story from getting out, and if he couldn't, he damn well was going to force the anchors to look him in the eye while they spoke about his sons.
He swung open the door to the sound stage with the news desk with as much force as he'd opened the door to Galloway's office, earning him the glares of cameramen and stage workers alike. They were currently on air, but Walter couldn't bring himself to care. He stormed over to the side of the stage, just off camera, glaring at his coworkers, who in turn did not offer him a single glance, and instead kept their gazes trained on the cameras.
"And when we come back, a surprising new development from the San Diego County Sheriff's Office in the hunt for the San Diego Snatcher," Jessica Liu, the morning's lead anchor said, that artificial smile on her face until the moment the cameras cut to commercial.
The moment the bell rang, Walter was marching onto the stage, much to the chagrin of Jessica and her cohost, Adam Groff.
"It's wrong to talk about my sons and you know it," he snapped at them.
"Look, man, we're just doing our jobs," Adam replied with a slight shrug, clearly unbothered.
"Your job is to report the news, not to spout off unproven theories that my sons have been kidnapped by a serial killer," he seethed, fists clenching as the need to hit something - or someone - grew.
"Sixty seconds!" a producer called out.
"It's too late," Jessica agreed with a shrug of her own, not displacing a single meticulously curled lock of black hair. "We're going live with it and I think you'll see it's a pretty good theory. Sorry." Jessica didn't seem sorry in the slightest.
"Walter, get off the stage!" that same producer shouted.
"How you live with yourselves I'll never understand," Walter muttered before doing as requested and going back to the side of the stage, just off camera. It took more willpower than he wanted to admit to not punch Adam in the face. He quickly pulled out his cellphone and pushed the first number on his speed dial. Audrey needed to know, and Megan couldn't see.
"Hello?" Audrey immediately answered.
"Keep Megan away from the TV," he said in lieu of a greeting. "They're about to talk about the boys, I tried to stop them, but they won't."
"What? Megan insisted on going to school today, then she's gonna be with Janie to get her mind off things, it's just me at home. On Channel 7 they're talking about the boys?" Audrey confirmed, her voice cracking.
"Yes," Walter forced out before his backstabbing coworkers stole his attention once again.
"And we're back on Channel 7 news with an update on the San Diego County Sheriff's Office's investigation into the string of rapes and murders attributed to the so-called San Diego Snatcher," Adam introduced.
"Our anonymous source inside the sheriff's department has confirmed that there are two more victims of the killer who may yet still be alive," Jessica added. Walter could just barely make out the sound also coming from his phone, just barely delayed, as his wife watched the news at home.
"The children of Channel 7's own weatherman, Walter Nichols, were reported missing Sunday morning, and police now believe that both boys may have been taken by the San Diego Snatcher," Adam continued. The fury Walter felt grew more and more with every passing second, amplified by the sound of his wife's whimper.
"They're showing their pictures," Audrey cried over the phone.
"Josh Nichols, and his step-brother, Drake Parker, both seventeen, would be the youngest victims of the San Diego Snatcher so far, as none of the other known victims have been younger than nineteen. If they are in fact victims, there is hope that they are still alive. Our source has also confirmed that every victim found so far was alive for several days between being taken by the killer and ultimately being killed," Jessica went on, not an ounce of sympathy in her voice. Walter's blood continued to boil. He slid his phone back into his pocket, hanging up without a word.
"But of course, time is still of the essence," Adam interjected. "Not only are there mere days to find the boys before it's too late, but the Snatcher is not only a killer, he's a rapist too, and these boys are young and attractive, and-."
Before Walter could stop himself or even think a single thought, he was storming onto the stage, ignoring the shocked gasps of some of the crew, and decking Adam in the face. Adam fell to the floor immediately as Jessica gasped and stood.
"Don't you ever talk about my sons again!" Walter shouted. Two crew members ran up and grabbed him by the shoulders, but Walter easily shrugged them off. Adam groaned and glared at him from the ground, where he nursed what Walter hoped was a broken nose.
Walter stormed offstage and out the door just as he had stormed in. He ignored everyone calling his name and made his way out of the building without looking. He barely even breathed before sitting back in his car. Tears sprung to his eyes at the familiar sound of his ringtone - Drake's song, "Highway to Nowhere", Walter's favorite. It was Audrey calling.
"Hello," he answered, his voice monotone as he let his head rest against the back of the seat and closed his eyes, forcing the tears back. He didn't want to think about the possibility that he might never hear his son sing that song live ever again.
"Walter, what did you do?" Audrey asked. Walter could hear the tears in her voice.
"I punched Adam in the face," he said. He didn't want to explain himself, he wanted his sons back. "I'm gonna go back and talk to that deputy again, see why the hell the news knew before we did that they think the boys-," he broke off. How could he say it out loud? The idea that his sons, his precious boys, had not only been kidnapped - for the second time no less, Walter could never forget getting back from his cruise that summer with Audrey to find out that his sons had been kidnapped and nearly murdered by a man on the FBI's top ten most wanted list - by a serial killer, but by a vicious rapist at that, brought tears to his eyes once again. Walter couldn't stomach the idea that at the very moment, his precious sons might have been getting violated in the worst possible way. "I'll talk to you when I get home," Walter rushed out before hanging up without another word.
He hated himself, but he didn't know how to talk to his wife. How was he supposed to comfort her when it was taking everything he had not to fall apart himself? Walter was a Nichols, and Nichols men had never been known for handling stress well. Usually, they completely freaked out and panicked, and often at the slightest provocation. But something like this had never happened to anyone in the Nichols family before. Even losing Josh's mother hadn't been like this, because then, he could push his own needs aside and be there for Josh, while Josh did the same for him. But he didn't have Josh to care for in that moment. When he got home, he would once again be able to push it all aside and take care of Audrey and Megan, but not until then.
His one solace was the hope that no matter what was going on, and no matter where the boys were, they were probably together. Walter refused to even consider the possibility that they weren't, because as long as they were together, they would protect each other. Josh was much the same as Walter when it came to freaking out, but when he was around Drake, it was different. The moment that Drake got stressed or even scared, Josh was calm and in control.
Josh's ability to calm Drake had already proven to be invaluable. After getting kidnapped in LA, Drake had been more stressed and anxious at home than he'd been since Walter had first moved in. Then a particularly bad day had led to a bad night, which led to a night terror unlike any Walter had ever seen before. Audrey sent him back to his old therapist immediately, but had confided in Walter that those night terrors had been common while Drake's father was around, and even after he left. That night, the only thing that calmed Drake down had been Josh.
Drake had been clinging to Josh, shaking, when Walter and Audrey had rushed into the room, Megan on their heels. He had stopped screaming, but he was hyperventilating, clinging to Josh as his step-brother sat next to him on the bunk and just kept on telling him to breathe, that he was safe and everything was okay. Walter remembered holding Audrey back slightly, despite knowing her need to make sure that her little boy was okay, because Josh had just looked at them and mouthed "it's okay, I've got him". It was the first time that Walter had ever seen Josh, his own little boy, as a man, a man who loved deeply and protected fiercely. Walter knew that Josh would in fact take care of Drake, because when something was wrong with Drake, all of Josh's insecurities and panics and nerves disappeared in his need to take care of him.
So that's what Walter kept telling himself, that everything was going to be okay because Josh was going to take care of Drake and Drake was going to take care of Josh. Neither one would ever let something happen to the other if they could help it. Knowing that his boys would give up anything and everything for each other, even their very lives, brought Walter both a comfort and a new terror: that in doing so, one of the brothers would sacrifice himself for the other.
Walter banished the thought as soon as he had it. Thinking like that wasn't going to do them any good. And besides, he didn't really know yet that they'd been kidnapped by the San Diego Snatcher at all. Freaking out wasn't going to help anyone, least of all his sons.
"Highway to Nowhere" stole Walter's attention once again as the ringtone played on his phone. Walter was about to throw his phone out the window when he saw the number. It was the sheriff's office. He flipped his phone open immediately and brought it to his ear.
"Hello?"
"Hello, this is Detective Villarreal from the San Diego County Sheriff's Office. Is this Walter Nichols?" an unfamiliar male voice asked. Walter remembered speaking with a Deputy Villarreal, but not a detective with that name.
"Yes, this is him," he answered.
"I've just been informed about what happened today, and I want to start by saying how sorry I am that this happened," Detective Villarreal said. "I can assure you that no uniformed officer leaked that information to the press, and there will be a serious investigation into who did. If you would like, you can come into the station and I can go over with you exactly-."
"I'm sorry, but just tell me now," Walter interrupted. "So I can get home and hold my wife, so I can just tell her whether or not she needs to be concerned that her sons are getting raped right now!" he shouted. Walter leaned back in the seat and seethed. He was not a man who yelled, especially not at the police. The emotional toll of the situation was weighing on him more than anything had since the passing of his first wife.
Walter heard Detective Villarreal sigh over the phone before answering.
"Your sons' disappearance is only being investigated as part of the Snatcher case because of the victimology. Aside from their younger age, and there being two of them, they fall in line with all of the other victims in terms of general appearance and demeanor." The detective paused for a moment, but Walter didn't say anything. "Now this doesn't mean for sure that your sons were kidnapped, but we are looking into it. If they were, it's better we investigate the possibility of it being the Snatcher now, before it's too late."
"You mean before my sons have their throats slit and their naked bodies dumped in the desert for the buzzards?"
"Mr. Nichols…" Detective Villarreal sighed again.
"It's fine, just find my sons," Walter spat, then hung up the phone. Only moments later, his phone rang again. This time, it was a coworker he hadn't spoken to in months. Walter ignored it, and began to drive, and drive, and drive.
By the time he got home, hours later, he had ten more missed calls, every one of them from someone else in the media.
Mindy gazed longingly up at the poster as she stapled it to the board at the coffee shop. The image of her boyfriend stared back at her, smiling that slightly crooked smile that made her melt every time. Josh had been missing for two days now, as had Drake, without a single word or clue to where they had gone. Initially, Mindy had wanted to blame Drake for it. The idiot was always doing something stupid and dragging Josh into it, but going missing was a step beyond even the dumbest thing that Drake had ever done. Besides, as much as she didn't like Drake, he never actually did anything to get Josh into real trouble. Mindy could tell that Drake loved Josh more than anything, and as much as she was loath to admit it, Josh loved Drake more than anything too.
It had been a hard thing to accept, that she did not occupy the top space in Josh's heart, but she couldn't deny that it was true. It was a very different kind of love than the love that she hoped Josh held for her, even though they hadn't exactly had that conversation yet, but it was certainly a love that knew no bounds. As much as she hated competing with Drake for Josh's affection, that was just the way it was for now, and Mindy knew that if she didn't get with the program, she would lose Josh entirely. She didn't have to like Drake, but she knew she couldn't replace him either.
But right now it didn't matter, because both of them were missing, and Mindy knew they weren't just lost somewhere. Whatever had happened, it was something bad. Josh was too smart to get lost for this long, and it just wasn't in his character - or Drake's for that matter - to simply be out that long without contacting his parents. No, foul play was the only explanation. If the brothers weren't contacting their parents, it was because they were being prevented from doing so.
That meant that putting up missing posters was probably useless, but what else was Mindy supposed to do? It wasn't in her character to just sit around crying about it, or to even distract herself from the problem by doing extra schoolwork.. She had to do something about the issue, even if the only thing she could do was unlikely to produce the desired results. So, when Audrey Parker-Nichols had asked her if she wanted to help her put posters up around town, Mindy had jumped at the chance. Audrey had stated that she'd had an especially rough day and didn't want to be alone, so who was Mindy to say no anyway?
Mindy stapled the poster of Drake right next to the one of Josh, and offered a forlorn Audrey a sad smile before the two moved on to the next shop, a little bakery that was connected to the coffee shop. Mindy thought it would be much more efficient to completely combine the two, rather than simply have them be connected through an open door, but she wasn't in the mood to rehash that conversation with the manager again.
Mindy stopped in her tracks, staring at the table by the window where she and Josh had had their first official date. Her heart sank at the idea that she might never get to have another date with Josh again, and she had never even told him how she really felt. Why hadn't she told him that she loved him? Mindy thrust the posters into Audrey's hands.
"I'm sorry, I'll be right back," she said, before rushing into the bathroom. Mindy ducked into the first empty stall and locked the door. "Breathe, just breathe," she whispered to herself, closing her eyes and tilting her head back. Everything was fine. She wasn't going to cry. Mindy Crenshaw didn't fucking cry.
The door to the bathroom swung open.
"I cannot believe he did that on live TV." It sounded like Brittany, a girl that Mindy vaguely knew from school. She was pretty sure that Drake had dated her for a week or so the year before.
"I can't believe they said that in the first place," another girl said. Brittany's friend Tracy, maybe? Tracy was always a bit more reasonable than Brittany, but still one of the brain dead popular girls. "I mean, implying that they're getting raped right now? Who does that?"
Mindy's stomach dropped at Tracy's words, but she held her breath and listened closer.
"Still, hitting him on live TV? He's probably gonna get fired. Anyway, did you see that woman putting up posters? I think that's Drake's mom," Brittany continued. "I can't imagine being her right now, her sons out there getting raped by a serial killer while her husband punches news anchors on live TV." She scoffed.
Mindy put her hand to her mouth in shock. What on earth were they talking about? Walter had punched someone on TV? Drake and Josh were being assaulted by a serial killer?
"Well they don't know that," Tracy pointed out. "They just said it's a theory. All they said before Josh's dad punched him was that there was a picture of the brothers with pictures of all the other victims on a detective's desk, so they don't really know that for sure."
"Oh come on, that's totally what happened," Brittany went on. It sounded like she had a smile on her face. "Josh has the worst luck of anyone at school, and Drake? He's an idiot, and he's pretty. He's a serial killing rapist's dream. If that is what happened to them, there's no way that either one of them is getting out of it unscathed. I mean come on, if you had Drake Parker tied up somewhere, wouldn't you do whatever you wanted?"
"Ew, Brittany, stop," Tracy protested. "That's so gross, and illegal. And I really don't need to know what you guys got up to last year."
"Well duh it's illegal, that's why most people don't do it," Brittany said. Mindy heard the sink turn on. "Besides, we didn't get up to anything. Drake is all bark and no bite. He'll make out all day and all night, and he's really good at it, but he won't do anything more, no matter how much you want to. Anyway, I gotta admit, Josh has been looking pretty good too this year. I never would've thought I would ever be saying that a few years ago."
"Seriously, Brittany, stop," Tracy said, her voice firmer than Mindy had ever heard it before. "It's not funny. No matter what's going on, they're still missing, and they could be in danger. The idea of them getting raped and murdered isn't funny. Just finish fixing your eyeshadow so we can leave."
"Oh I didn't even say anything about them getting murdered, but maybe it would be for the best," Brittany said around a laugh. Mindy's face slowly contorted into a disgusted sneer. "I mean, would you wanna make out with Drake after he's been fucked by the San Diego Snatcher? I certainly wouldn't. I don't wanna play with a broken toy. And I know Josh has been with Mindy, but she's pretty enough that she could do better than him anyway, to be honest."
"Why do I even hang out with you?" Tracy asked around a sigh.
Brittany laughed, a loud, obnoxious cackle that reminded Mindy of a witch in a children's Halloween movie. That was it. She wasn't just going to hide and listen to them any longer. Walter had the right idea.
Mindy burst through the bathroom stall and took two long steps up to a shocked Brittany, Tracy standing to the side with wide eyes. With hate surely in her eyes, Mindy reared back and slapped Brittany across the face before any of the girls could say anything.
"You're a disgusting bitch. Go to hell," she seethed, then turned and walked out without another word. She spotted Audrey immediately. She was standing outside the bakery, passing out posters to passersby. Mindy stopped before stepping outside. Did Audrey know? Was that why she'd had an especially hard day? Mindy took a breath, then pushed the door open, the handle making her palm burn just a little bit more.
"Audrey?" she asked as she stepped out. Drake's mom turned to look at her, still looking just as depressed as she had all day - that wasn't exactly a surprise. "Was there something on the news today-," Mindy cut herself off before she even finished the question when Audrey closed her eyes against an onslaught of tears.
"How did you know?" she asked. "You were in school all day, you shouldn't have seen it." Mindy ignored the way her stomach sank once again. So it was true.
"I overheard some girls in the bathroom talking about it," was all she said. Audrey didn't need to know what exactly those girls had said.
"The police don't know for sure," Audrey continued with a nod, successfully holding back her tears. "But it's a possibility. Walter said he was going to the station to talk with them again, but I didn't want to just wait around the house anymore."
"Yeah, of course," Mindy said. She wasn't very good at dealing with emotional people, but she wanted to do everything she could. "I'm sure the police are doing everything they can, and so are we. The more people who know they're missing, the more eyes out looking for them, right? Maybe somebody knows something." Mindy inwardly cursed herself. How was that the best she could come up with?
"Yeah, maybe," Audrey replied. She gave a sad smile that didn't reach her eyes, and Mindy gave the same. Audrey handed a stack of posters back to Mindy, and they went back on their way down the block, and to the next, and the next.