Vatsal Parekh (Victory Watson)

Action Crime Thriller

4  

Vatsal Parekh (Victory Watson)

Action Crime Thriller

Clocks Without Hands (Chapter-7)

Clocks Without Hands (Chapter-7)

22 mins
357


Light crept through the thin curtains. I yawned, stretching my sore muscles and feeling my bones crack. My shoulders and neck were extremely sore from all the swimming I had done the previous day, and my calf throbbed as if screaming for more time to heal. I peeled myself out from underneath the covers, and saw the television remote sitting on the nightstand. Out of curiosity, I pressed the red on button and was greeted by a news anchor.

“Maria Rodriguez’ body has been found washed up on the banks….” I gasped. I had been so out of the loop the past few days that I was totally unaware that another girl had gone missing. “Of the Sienna River.” I realized that this was the river that I had swam down the day before. “Police found her body while chasing a suspect in the case.” I felt my body go numb. This new development made me look even guiltier than ever before,and what did it mean that the police had now revealed where the body had been found? That information had been kept out of the media in all of the other girls’ cases out of respect for their families. I imagined the police were extremely desperate for a lead in their case, and right now their greatest lead was me. “Meanwhile, Summer Jenkins has gone missing, and many fear that it’s only a matter of time before she meets the same fate as the rest of the girls. The police are enforcing a town wide curfew at dark every evening from now on, and parents are urged to take careful watch over their teenage girls. If anyone had any information regarding the disappearance of Summer Jenkins, please contact the local police force.” A picture of Summer flashed onto the screen. My vision immediately went black, and a small light illuminated rough skinned hands. The clock without hands sat in the palms. The red haired man stepped forward, and I stared hard at his green eyes. He wasn’t going to get away with this anymore if I had anything to say about it. The light returned, and I switched off the television. The black duffel bag called to me from the desk, and I quickly dumped its’ contents onto the floor. I frowned hard at the picture of Justice and Tabitha, wondering why the picture would have been stuffed in the wall. Frustrated, I turned to the yearbook. The pages were still damp from the day before, but all of the words were still intact, though a little smudged. I scanned page after page, eagerly waiting for a vision to come to me. If any of these teens were destined to be murdered by the serial killer loose in our town, I was going to get to them first. I found myself nearing the end of the book, and no one’s picture had jumped out at me. The last page was marked as the staff directory, and I breathed a defeated sigh. I was pondering what my next step would be when a flash of red caught my eye. Those piercing green eyes were staring right at me, except this time I wasn’t having a vision. The man’s face sat framed in the middle of the Joseph P. Liles Preparatory Academy staff directory. My body was visibly shaking as the page sat before me. I squinted at the letters underneath the picture.


“Jim Gray,” I read to myself. The killer’s name was Jim Gray. I let that sink in. The entire town was searching for him without any clue of what he looked like or who he was. Underneath his name, it said that he was an English teacher. I looked at the digital clock on the nightstand. It read 7:30. All three schools in my town began at 8:30. An idea popped into my head. What if I said that I was a new student, and joined his class for the day? It would give me a chance to scope him out. A free bus ran from the hotel to the center of town, and I was on it in minutes. It stopped a few blocks from the academy, and soon I was in front of the school’s tall steps. The building not only looked more prestigious than the other two schools, but it even had a fancier air to it. I realized that all of the girls around me were dressed in uniforms. My plan hadn’t accounted for the school dress code. Students milled around the front doors, and many were giving me weird glances. My jeans and T-shirt stood out among the crowd, and I hurried inside to find the nearest restroom where I could hide in a stall before an administrator found me. The hallway I walked into was long, and there no signs to direct me where to go. I walked with my head down, trying my best to attract as little attention as possible.

“Hi, are you new?” I jumped at the sound of a girl’s voice, and quickly looked up. A teen appearing to be my age stood smiling at me. I nodded. “Cool! Did they not show you where you can get your uniform yet?”

“No.” I croaked. She frowned.

“Oh. You can follow me and I’ll show you if you want.” She began to walk down the long hallway, and I scurried to catch up with her. “I’m Hope. What’s your name?” I thought back to the name I had given Jacob’s mom.

“I’m Jessica.”

“Nice to meet you,” Hope smiled sweetly. Her brown hair matched well with her deep brown eyes. We arrived at a small shop by the cafeteria. Inside was textbooks, coffee, snacks, and uniforms. We certainly didn’t have anything like that at my school. Hope selected a dark blue polo shirt with light khaki pants and black dress shoes. “This should do nicely for your first day.” She walked it right up to the register, and I stared as the cashier rang it up.

“74.62 dollars, please.” Hope looked back at me.

“I’m sorry. I must have left my wallet at home,” I fibbed. Her sweet smile returned once again.

“I’ve got it,” she said, pulling a wad of cash out of her own wallet.

“Are you sure?”

“Yes. Don’t even worry about it.” She handed me the bag with my new clothes. “Go get changed. Wait. First, what’s your homeroom?” She scanned my hands for a blue schedule.

“What’s yours?” I asked nervously.

“Mr. Gray.”

“Me too.”

“No way! Come on, I’ll let you change, and then I’ll walk you to class.”


“You’re going to love Mr. Gray,” Hope assured me as we strode toward his door. With each step, I became even more wary of meeting the man that had been the center of my nightmares for weeks. “Everyone has him for english at some point during their four years here. He’s everyone’s favorite.” I tried my best to smile back at her.

“I can’t wait.” I hoped she couldn’t sense the insincerity in my voice. She stepped through the doorway, but I paused for a moment, trying to calm my nerves.

“You coming?”

“Yeah, totally.” I followed close on her heels this time.

“Mr. Gray! This is Jessica. She’s new today.” All of the air escaped me at once. He was the spitting image of the man in my visions. He looked up from his roster, and I thought I detected a slight frown on his lips.

“I never got an email about getting a new student.” I tried my best to maintain eye contact with him.

“There must have been some mistake then sir. I know that I was supposed to start today.”

“Hmmm. I’ll email administration tomorrow morning. In the meantime, why don’t you take a seat. What did you say your name was again?”

“Jessica.”

“Nice to meet you Jessica.” The class settled down around me, and I took a seat farthest from the front of the room. Even from the back, I could tell that each student looked at Mr. Gray with admiration. They seemed to be bent on soaking in every word he uttered.

“Can everyone get out Macbeth and flip to Act 1 Scene 4 and read lines 57-60? Hope, can you get Jessica a copy?” He looked hard at me. For some reason, I felt as if he could see right through me, and that he was aware of the real reason that I was there, but I knew that I was just being paranoid. The police had kept my identity completely out of the media, and few people actually knew about my visions. Even fewer people actually believed that they were real. I thought about what Jacob was doing right now. He was probably sitting in a classroom similar to this one, worried sick about me. The police would have figured out that it was me at his house by now, and he could even be heavily involved in the investigation now as a suspect. I hoped that I hadn’t gotten him into too much trouble or destroyed his relationship with his mom.

“Hey, are you okay?” Hope placed Macbeth on my desk.

“Yes.” I assured her. I quickly flipped open the play before any more attention was drawn to me. The words ran through my thoughts.


For in my way it lies. Stars, hide your fires;

Let not light see my black and deep desires.

The eye wink at the hand; yet let that be

Which the eye fears, when it is done, to see.

“Now, can anyone tell me what these lines mean?” Mr. Gray asked. I read them over and over again. The entire class remained still. No one was raising their hand. I was becoming more and more angry as my brain processed the words over again. I found my hand in the air. “Excellent. Jessica, go ahead.” The entire class turned to face me, eager to hear the new girl speak. I suddenly found myself at a loss for words. My mouth went dry and my hands felt clammy, but then I looked Mr. Gray in the face. I thought of all of the pain he had caused those girls and their families, and my anger returned.

“Macbeth wants his desires to be hidden from the light. In other words, he wishes to do the unspeakable, but has a golden reputation that will be ruined if he does so.”

“Very good.” He turned to the board.

“Wait.” I felt forty pairs of eyes meet mine once again. I gulped. “Don’t you think this is relatable to the serial killer loose in town. I mean, no one knows who he is, but he is probably a productive member of our society. He has us all fooled because his desires haven’t been brought to light and the stars are hiding his fire.” Those forty pairs of eyes were now accompanied by forty gaping mouths. Mr. Gray stared at me as if he didn’t know what to say. No one but me seemed to notice that his fists were balled at his side. “Do you agree with me Mr. Gray?”

“Interesting logic indeed. You make a valid point, but let’s move on. Can anyone tell me what the main theme of this play is?” A small girl raised her hand.

“It’s about what happens when ambition goes unchecked by moral constraints.”

“Precisely. After the murder of Duncan, Macbeth lets the power go to his head, totally disregarding what is morally correct.” I rolled my eyes.

“Or you could say that once one uses violence for their own personal gain, it is difficult to stop. I mean, maybe the serial killer in our town hadn’t set out to be a serial killer, but got addicted to the feeling of power violence gave him,” I interrupted. The class gave a collective sigh.

“Jessica, I am sure that the killer will be caught soon, and then we can all go on to have productive class discussions. Ok?”

“Ahhhhh, but you cannot tell which grain will grow and which will not,” I said, quoting the play. “The truth is you have no idea what the future holds.” He looked as if he was about to argue with me, but the bell rang.

“Come see me after class,” he grunted. The rest of the student filed out one by one, glancing in my direction as they walked. Mr. Gray waited until the last student had left the classroom to close the door. His fists were once again balled at his sides. “Come to my desk.” I knew that I should have felt fear in that moment because only I was aware of what he was capable of, but the intense desire for justice and revenge propelled me to the front of the room.

“Do you really think you can speak to me that way in my classroom?” he scolded, shaking his beefy finger in my face.

“Like what?” I asked innocently. “I was just giving my opinion on the subject.” His face was now the same color as his hair.

“That was totally inappropriate and you know it,” he practically yelled.

“I’m terribly sorry. It won’t happen again.” I backed up. He watched me leave. I knew I had gone too far upon hearing his next words.

“Watch your back.”


Hope waved to me in the hallway, but I made a mad dash in the opposite direction. Confusion clouded her face, but I wasn’t about to try to explain myself to her. A sign up ahead told me I was close to the library, and I scurried into the quiet room. There were numerous computers in the corner of the room, and I selected the one farthest away from any foot traffic. Thankfully, I was able to unlock the device without a password and straight to google. I typed the name Jim Gray into the search bar. Hundreds of Jim Grays blotted the screen. I frowned, adding Joseph P. Liles Preparatory School to the end of the search. A picture of him holding a handful of awards immediately popped up. He was fairly new to the school, but had already received Teacher of the Year along with several Outstanding English awards granted to him by the district. Several comments sat underneath the picture, each containing quotes from students claiming to have never of enjoyed english as much as when Mr. Gray taught it. I moved onto the next link which provided me with even more praising comments to read through. He was set to receive an Exemplary Leader Award in the next week. I laughed to myself, knowing that all of these awards would be evoked in the blink of an eye if the administration found out that he had threatened me, let alone knew about all of the awful crimes he had committed.

“He certainly has Macbeth’s golden reputation,” I muttered. “But every leader has their downfall.” Besides his teaching awards in the last year or so, the character Jim Gray didn’t even exist. There was nothing on the web from his old school, his childhood, or on his family. This stuck out to me as suspicious. I thought hard about this, but I couldn’t quite figure out how he could have avoided the Internet for basically his entire life.

“Can I help you?” the librarian peered down at me through her purple glasses. I quickly exited out of all of my tabs.

“Nope. I was just leaving.” I was out the door before I could even hear her reply. It was necessary for me to find out more information on Mr. Gray, but I wasn’t sure how. I didn’t have his home address and even if I did, getting caught trespassing again wouldn’t look too good for me. So what could I do? His school was the one place that I had access to. I could search his desk and room after hours, but I would need the master key, and I imagined that I wouldn’t be lucky enough to just stumble upon it like I had been in the hotel. Stealing one from the office was my only option. I strode toward what I thought was the front of the school, and eventually stood in front of the office doors. I felt a pair of eyes on me, and turned to see Mr. Gray staring right at me. His eyes were wide in concern, and I realized he thought that I was actually going to the office to talk to the principal. His alarm brought me a small amount of satisfaction, and I watched him with a smug look on my face. He noticed that I was looking at him, and quickly turned on his heels and hurried back toward his classroom. It was almost lunchtime, and so the hallway was becoming even more crowded. One boy jostled into me while wrestling with his friends, and didn’t even turn around to apologize. I rubbed my shoulder, then walked through the office doors and right up to the secretary’s desk.


“Hi, how can I help you?” she asked, still looking at her computer.

“Ummmm, I have an appointment. Is there a bathroom I can use while I wait?” She sighed and pointed to the hallway behind her. I was relieved that she didn’t even bother to ask me who I was supposed to see. The girls bathroom caught my eye ahead, but I was more interested in what sat on the wall next to the bathroom. A small red box labeled as a fire alarm called out to me. I stared at the white lever, then looked around to make sure I didn’t have any spectators. My fingers grasped the alarm, and I jerked the lever down hard. An ear splitting chirp consumed the air, and I saw several people run from their tiny offices to see the source of the commotion. I dove into the bathroom before any of them took notice of me. I looked up at the sprinkler system overhead, and for a split second, I worried that my actions would cause the school to become awashed with the water. Then I remembered that the sprinkler systems were only triggered by intense heat, and that the only harm I would cause was the interruption of lunch. Mr. Gray had certainly done far worse. I heard the pattering of footsteps outside the door, and pushed myself into a stall, out of sight from anyone who peeked inside. The hall became quiet, indicating that the office staff had evacuated the premises. The door slammed behind me as I exited the bathroom and stepped back into view of anyone who came around the corner. The alarm was still blaring loudly, and I knew that I didn’t have much time before the fire department arrived to check the area. I quickly found the principal’s office, thankful to see that he had left his door unlocked in his haste to safely evacuate his students. I slipped inside and peered at his long desk. Upon jimmying the drawers, I found each one to be locked up tight. The bobby pin in my hair poked into my scalp, and I got an idea. I took it out of my hair and pushed it into the keyhole. The drawer clicked open with ease. The contents were of no use to me. It contained files of the school’s finances. I tried a few drawers higher up before finally coming to a lanyard of keys. One of these was bound to open Mr. Gray’s door. Voices suddenly interrupted me.


“It appears that someone pulled this fire alarm. If we can get the tapes from the security cameras from the last twenty minutes we can figure out who it was and where they went.” I didn’t recognize his voice, but I figured it was a fireman.

“I’ll get right on it.” I felt a chill go down my spine. This time, it was Officer Juarez speaking, a rookie who had met me early on in the case. Pretty much every single officer on the force knew who I was, and I was certain that he would recognize me instantly with one look at the security footage. Their steps padded down the hallway, and I knew the time to take action was now. There was no way I could ever show my face in this school ever again without getting arrested immediately. I needed to search Mr. Gray’s room, and then make a quick escape. The hallway was clear now, much to my relief. The firm carpet mostly hid the echo of my steps, but I took off once I got to the hard tile outside the office. Time was of the essence, so I just prayed that no one was close enough to hear me. The officers and firemen were probably reviewing the footage at this exact second, and Officer Juarez would give his cry of recognition any second. I stopped in front of Mr. Gray’s door, and began desperately trying to unlock his room with each key. The jangling of the keys threatened to give me away, but no one came running down the halls just yet. On the sixth or seventh try, the click of the lock allowed for the door to swing wide open. I hurried toward Mr. Gray’s desk, placing my bobby pin back in my hand. Each drawer came open with only a few twists. The top drawer looked completely normal, containing solely things like pencils, erasers, stickers, and paper clips. The next two drawers included his lesson plans and files. I held up the answers to his classes’ upcoming Macbeth test and laughed to myself. I opened the last drawer to find two stacks of papers: one full of graded papers and the other full of ungraded papers. Defeated, I realized that his desk contained nothing out of the ordinary. He would appear to anyone else to be an exemplary teacher with a special bond among his students, but I knew better. The corner of a paper suddenly caught my eye, wedged between the crack of the final drawer. My fingernails could barely grasp it, but it came out with only a little bit of effort. I held it up to the light. It was a small business card. Jeff Green was the name typed across the top. Underneath the name, the card gave an address located in Massachusetts. A phone number sat at the very bottom of the card. In the center, the name of his business was written in flashy green font: Green’s Hardware. I wondered why Mr. Gray would have a random business card from Massachusetts. Maybe he had lived there before he came here? The banging of the door caused me to jump, hitting my head on the bottom of the open drawer above me. I shoved the card into my waistband, not visible to anyone else.

“Freeze!” Officer Juarez didn’t have a gun in his hand, but he was no less intimidating.


Several officers stood around him that I recognized, but I couldn’t bring their names to my mind. Two firemen stood off the side, watching me intently. “Tyler, I said freeze!”

“Ok, ok.” I threw my hands up in defeat. ’I’m not moving.” Officer Juarez came toward me, seizing my hands and placing them behind my back. The familiar clink of handcuffs sounded as he grabbed them out of his waistband and pulled me to my feet. I knew the time to act was now, because I couldn’t escape with the cuffs around my wrists. I let my legs go limp underneath me, and I fell to the floor. He let go of me in surprise. I rolled underneath the desk and out onto the other side. The other officers and firemen quickly reached for me, but I grabbed the closest thing to me: a chair. I waved it around my head, preventing them from coming any closer to me without getting whacked on the side of the head with the metal of the chair leg.


“Tyler, stop,” Officer Juarez pleaded, but I paid him no mind. With all of the force I could muster, I chucked the chair straight into the long window. The glass shattered into the grass outside. Collective gasps filled the room, but I was already climbing through the window to the outside. Officer Juarez’ hand tugged at my ankle, but I quickly kicked it off of me. Adrenaline coursed through my veins, and I was flying. The entire student body stood on the lawn, gaping at the scene laid out before them. Hope stood in front of them all, her mouth gaping wide open as she looked at me. I waved to her jokingly, but she just continued to stare. I glanced behind me and found no one had followed me through the graveyard of broken glass. It was only then that I noticed the red slashes covering my arms, dripping red onto the green grass. Sirens sounded in the distant, covering up the sounds of the fire trucks and indicating that the detectives and their army were in hot pursuit, no doubt completely livid about the mess that I was leaving behind. Looking around, I realized that I was surrounded by open land, and there was nowhere to hide. I needed immediate coverage from the streets, so I followed the outline of the building to the back where no one could see me from the road. An open pasture sat in front of me, but I knew I couldn’t run through it fast enough to avoid being caught. The dumpster by the edge of the building caught my attention. The stench was absolutely horrid, so much so that I was tempted to cover my nose, but it provided me perfect cover. I hurried to open the lid. The dumpster contained tons of old food, lunch trays, trash, and God knows what else. I dove right in, holding back nausea as I carefully shut the lid above me. The trash was plunged into complete darkness, but I wiggled myself downward until I felt my feet touch the hard bottom. Was it possible to suffocate in a bin of trash? I placed a protective hand around my mouth in an attempt to leave myself a tiny air bubble. After I touched the bottom, I covered myself with trash to the best of my ability. Once I felt completely submerged in utter filth, I laid in wait quietly. It wasn’t long before I heard voices.

“The camera only reaches to right there, so we know that she came this way. I imagine she probably ran into that pasture.”

“Wait just a minute.” It was Detective Howell. “Did anyone check the dumpster?” I felt my blood run cold.

“No, I don’t think so.” The lid of the dumpster swung open with a loud creak. Momentary relief flooded my lungs as an abundance of fresh air circled through the dirty can. My body was a statue as they peered into the trash, and I prayed that I had covered myself well enough.

“Hand me that stick,” Detective Howell ordered. I heard a slight rustling, and then felt the trash jostle slightly as the stick poked gently through the trash.

“Gosh, that reeks,” said the voice. Detective Howell didn’t answer him. The stick grazed my side, sending a shiver down my spine. I watched the stick move upward and then come down again, and I adjusted myself slightly so that the stick hit the bottom with a thud.

“Nothing to see here, I guess. Let’s move on.” I waited until their voices were long gone to breath a small sigh of relief. My body laid motionless for what felt like several hours. I tried to rest, but I was always startled by the motions of the other officers. The lid opened several more times as they hunted for me, but no one else poked through the trash with the stick. Once it seemed that the outside world had settled down, I finally allowed myself to take a short nap.



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