CHAPTER 2

  The next afternoon, Alderwood High had already begun the slow, familiar process of emptying out.

  The loud, suffocating chaos of the structured school day had long since faded. In its place, the campus settled into a rhythm of scattered, isolated sounds. The rhythmic thud of basketballs echoing from the distant outdoor courts. The metallic slam of a locker shutting somewhere far down the deserted main hallway. The slow, rhythmic squeak of a janitor’s heavy cart rolling across the freshly waxed linoleum of the science wing.

  Block 2 sat almost entirely silent, steeped in the heavy, warm light of the late afternoon.

  At the very end of the oldest corridor, Room B-17 waited.

  The heavy brass handle turned with a dull click, and the wooden door swung open.

  She stepped inside first. She did not hesitate at the threshold today. She walked in with a sense of sudden ownership, dropping her woven canvas bag onto the surface of the nearest desk. She took a step back, planting her hands on her hips, and glanced around the room with a quiet, profound satisfaction.

  The tall windows were cranked open just slightly, letting the cool, early evening air drift in to chase away the lingering scent of old paper and dust. The student desks were no longer scattered. They were arranged perfectly, facing each other with deliberate purpose in the center of the room. The large whiteboard at the front still bore the words Investigation Society in her thick, confident black marker.

  And then there was the corkboard. It stood mounted on the far wall, immense and imposing.

  Empty.

  Waiting.

  Yesterday, this space had been nothing more than an abandoned, forgotten classroom where broken chairs went to collect cobwebs. Today, however, the air felt entirely different. It felt like a headquarters.

  A moment later, the old floorboards outside creaked under a steady set of footsteps. The door hinges whined in protest once again.

  He walked in casually. His hands were buried deep in the pockets of his dark jacket, his shoulders relaxed, and his dark hair was still slightly messy from the autumn wind outside. He paused in the doorway, letting his eyes adjust to the golden light filtering through the windowpanes.

  She looked up from the desk, a small, triumphant smile playing on her lips.

  "You came."

  He stepped fully into the room, letting the heavy door click shut behind him. "You say that like you fully expected me not to show up."

  "I kind of did," she admitted lightly, walking over to the teacher's desk to rummage for a pen. "You didn't exactly strike me as the reliable club member type. I figured Ms. Whitmore would have to drag you here by your ear."

  He let out a short, quiet breath of amusement and glanced around the room, taking in her meticulous handiwork.

  "Looks exactly the same as we left it," he noted.

  "We spent two hours cleaning it yesterday," she pointed out, tapping her pen against the wood.

  "Exactly." He walked over to the wheeled teacher's chair he had claimed the day before. He pulled it back, sat down heavily, and pushed himself away from the edge of the table so he could stretch his long legs out. He crossed his ankles and stared up at the acoustic ceiling tiles.

  For a long moment, neither of them spoke. The quiet of the room was comfortable, filled only by the distant sounds of the school winding down outside.

  Then, she leaned forward across the desk, resting her elbows on the surface.

  "So."

  He slowly lowered his gaze from the ceiling to look at her.

  "So?" he echoed.

  "What do detectives usually do now?" she asked, looking genuinely curious.

  He slowly pushed off the floor with his heel, making the chair spin one complete, lazy rotation before coming to a halt perfectly facing her.

  "They usually have cases," he answered dryly.

  She blinked, looking at the completely bare corkboard. "...Right."

  Silence settled over them again. The clock on the wall ticked loudly. Five seconds passed. Ten seconds.

  She let out a long, dramatic sigh and slumped her entire upper body forward, resting her forehead flat against the cool surface of the desk.

  "This is incredibly depressing," her voice came out muffled against the wood.

  "We have been official detectives for exactly twenty-four hours," he said, watching her theatrical display with mild entertainment. "I think the criminal underworld of Alderwood High needs a minute to realize we are open for business."

  She lifted her head, her eyes narrowing stubbornly. "Twenty-four hours is plenty of time for something interesting to happen. A missing exam paper. A stolen mascot costume. A blackmail ring in the drama department. Anything."

  He nodded slowly toward the vast expanse of the empty corkboard. "Apparently not."

  She ignored his pessimism. She pushed herself up from the desk, grabbed a blue dry-erase marker, and marched purposefully toward the whiteboard.

  At the very top left corner, she wrote in large, bold, meticulously underlined letters:

  CASE FILES

  She capped the marker with a sharp snap and stepped back, crossing her arms proudly. "There."

  He stared at the two words. "You are actively preparing for something that currently does not exist."

  "It will exist," she declared, her chin tilted upward in defiance. "You have to manifest these things. If you build it, the mysteries will come."

  "You are very optimistic."

  "And you are very boring."

  He opened his mouth to deliver a sarcastic retort, but the words never left his throat.

  Knock. Knock.

  Both of them froze. They turned their heads toward the heavy wooden door simultaneously. The brass handle turned slowly, almost hesitantly, before the door pushed inward.

  A boy stood in the doorway. He was tall, wearing a blue and gold Alderwood basketball jersey over a white t-shirt. He clutched the straps of his backpack tightly with both hands, his knuckles turning slightly white. He looked incredibly nervous, his eyes darting from the girl to the boy, then to the imposing blank corkboard on the wall.

  "Uh... hi," the boy mumbled, shifting his weight from one sneaker to the other.

  They simply looked at him expectantly. She stood frozen by the whiteboard, the marker still clutched in her hand. He remained leaning back in his wheeled chair.

  "Is this the... investigation club thing?" the boy asked, his voice cracking slightly on the final word. "The notice board downstairs said Room B-17."

  Her eyes lit up instantly. The boredom vanished from her face, replaced by a sudden, electric surge of pure adrenaline.

  "Yes," she answered, her voice dropping into a tone that was remarkably professional and calm. "Yes, it is."

  The boy let out a breath and stepped cautiously inside the room. "I think I need some help."

  She immediately straightened her posture. She walked back to her desk and sat down, folding her hands neatly on top of the wood like a seasoned precinct captain preparing for an interrogation.

  "Please, have a seat," she offered, gesturing to the empty student desk next to his. "What exactly seems to be the problem?"

  The boy didn't sit. He stayed standing near the door, looking embarrassed. "My phone is missing."

  He, sitting in the wheeled chair, finally sat up slightly. He uncrossed his ankles and placed his feet flat on the floor.

  "When did you last see it?" he asked, his voice calm and level.

  The boy looked relieved that someone was taking him seriously. "During basketball practice. Just a little while ago."

  "What is your name?" she asked, simultaneously pulling a fresh spiral notebook and a black pen from her canvas bag.

  "Ryan," the boy replied. "I'm a sophomore."

  She clicked her pen open, the sound sharp in the quiet room. "Alright, Ryan. Walk us through absolutely everything. Do not leave out any details, no matter how small they might seem."

  Ryan took a deep breath and began to explain.

  Basketball practice had started sharply at four in the afternoon. He remembered distinctly because he had checked the time on his phone right before he locked it away. He had placed the device on the top shelf inside his assigned locker, directly next to his wallet.

  Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

  The locker room had been mostly empty at that exact moment. There were only four people present in the back aisle where his locker was located. Ryan himself. Two of his sophomore teammates who were busy arguing about a video game. And the team captain, a senior named Marcus, who was taping his ankles at the end of the bench.

  Practice ran for two grueling hours. When the coach finally blew the whistle to dismiss them, Ryan was the first one back to the locker room. He opened his metal locker, reached for the top shelf, and found empty space. The phone was entirely gone. His wallet was still there. His clothes were untouched. Only the phone was missing.

  She wrote everything down with frantic speed, her pen flying across the lined paper. She created a small diagram of the locker room, marking the positions of the four individuals Ryan had mentioned.

  When Ryan finally finished his story, he looked at them with desperate eyes.

  She tapped her pen against the notebook once, her eyes scanning her notes. Then, she looked up and turned her head slightly to the left.

  "Well, Agent J?" she asked, her tone entirely serious. "What are your initial thoughts?"

  He slowly raised an eyebrow, staring at her in genuine confusion.

  "...Agent what?"

  She rolled her eyes and gestured toward him with her pen as if she were explaining gravity to a toddler. "You are Agent J. Obviously."

  He stared at her blankly. "And you are?"

  "Also Agent J," she replied without a hint of irony.

  He pinched the bridge of his nose, feeling a headache forming. "...That sounds incredibly confusing. How are we supposed to know who is talking to who?"

  "Context clues," she dismissed his concern with a wave of her hand. "Focus on the case, Agent."

  Ryan looked between the two of them, his brow furrowed in deep confusion. He looked like he severely regretted walking into Room B-17.

  She didn't give Ryan time to reconsider. She stood up abruptly, slapping her notebook closed.

  "Alright," she announced, her voice filled with newfound authority. "Agent J and I will handle this investigation immediately. Lead the way to the scene of the crime, Ryan."

  He let out a long, heavy sigh that echoed in the quiet room, but he stood up anyway. He wasn't entirely sure why he was playing along, but the look of absolute determination on her face made it impossible to refuse.

  "Let’s go," he muttered, following her out the door.

  The boys' locker room smelled exactly the way one would expect. A suffocating mixture of cheap body spray, harsh industrial floor detergent, and stale sweat hung heavily in the air. The fluorescent lights overhead buzzed with an irritating, relentless electrical hum.

  Rows of dented, navy blue metal lockers lined the cinderblock walls, and heavy canvas gym bags were scattered haphazardly across the long wooden benches running down the center of the aisles. The showers in the back were still dripping loudly, echoing against the ceramic tiles.

  Ryan stood near the entrance of his aisle, shifting his weight nervously. He pointed a trembling finger toward an open door midway down the row.

  "My locker was right here," Ryan explained softly. "Number forty-two."

  She did not waste a single second. She moved into the space like a professional crime scene investigator. She walked straight to locker forty-two and immediately started examining the area with terrifying intensity.

  She opened the locker door fully, inspecting the hinges. She checked the top shelf where the phone had supposedly been placed. She dropped to her knees, looking closely under the wooden benches. She checked behind the heavy gym bags left behind by other players. She even inspected the air vent near the ceiling.

  Ryan watched her frantically, his anxiety visibly spiking with every passing second.

  Meanwhile, he simply walked to the end of the aisle and leaned his shoulder against the cool cinderblock wall. He folded his arms across his chest and watched her tear the locker room apart.

  She popped her head up from behind a pile of towels. "You are actively not helping."

  "I am observing the scene," he replied calmly, not moving a single muscle.

  "You are just leaning against a wall."

  "I am leaning strategically," he countered. "A good detective needs to see the whole board. You are handling the micro details. I am handling the macro environment."

  Ryan looked entirely lost, staring at the two of them as if they were speaking a foreign language.

  She rolled her eyes, offering a dismissive huff of breath, and crouched back down near the wooden bench situated directly in front of Ryan's locker. She went completely still, her eyes locked onto the scuffed floor tiles.

  "Four people in the aisle," she murmured quietly to herself, her voice barely carrying over the sound of the dripping showers. "Locker left open for a split second. Practice starting. Everyone rushing out the door."

  Then, she stopped moving entirely.

  Her brows slowly furrowed together. The playful, theatrical energy that had possessed her back in the club room completely disappeared. The shift in her demeanor was sudden and absolute.

  Now, she looked remarkably different. She looked focused. Dangerous, almost.

  Her dark eyes moved with calculated precision from the open locker door down to the edge of the wooden bench, and finally settling on the dull gray floor tiles beneath it. She tracked the space as if she were watching invisible lines connecting in thin air, building a geometric web of cause and effect.

  He noticed the change instantly.

  At first, he had been dutifully scanning the room, checking the exits, looking for security cameras that didn't exist, playing the part of the observant partner. But now, his eyes were locked entirely on her.

  He was watching the way her mind worked.

  A loose strand of dark hair had fallen across her face while she was crouched on the floor. She brushed it aside absentmindedly with the back of her wrist without ever breaking her intense visual focus on the floor tiles. Her eyes were sharp, calculating, parsing through the visual data of the messy room.

  She looked incredibly intense.

  He found himself staring at her, completely captivated by the quiet storm of intelligence brewing behind her eyes. He forgot about the missing phone. He forgot about Ryan nervously sweating near the door. He forgot about the terrible smell of the locker room. All of his attention funneled down to the girl crouching on the floor, decoding a mystery out of thin air.

  "Agent J," she said suddenly, her voice cutting through the quiet hum of the room.

  He gave no response. He was too caught up in watching the way the fluorescent light caught the edge of her jaw.

  "...Agent J?" she repeated, a hint of confusion in her tone.

  Still nothing. His mind had gone entirely blank, wiped clean by the simple act of looking at her.

  She finally turned around, resting her hands on her knees, and looked up at him.

  He was staring straight at her, his expression unguarded and unreadable.

  "What are you thinking about?" she asked, tilting her head slightly, her dark eyes searching his face for an answer.

  He blinked rapidly, the trance breaking as reality snapped back into place. He quickly shifted his weight, looking away from her to stare at a very uninteresting smudge on the locker next to him.

  "...Nothing," he muttered, his voice slightly rougher than usual.

  She studied his profile suspiciously for a long moment, clearly not believing him in the slightest.

  "Right," she said slowly, drawing the word out.

  She decided to let it go. She turned her attention back to the floor and pointed a slender finger at the tiles directly beneath the edge of the wooden bench.

  "Look right here."

  He pushed himself off the wall and walked over, crouching down right beside her. Their shoulders nearly brushed. He followed the direction of her finger.

  There, etched lightly into the wax of the gray floor tile, was a very faint scratch mark. It was incredibly subtle, barely visible unless the light hit it at the exact right angle. The thin, white line originated near the base of Ryan's locker and led straight under the dark shadow of the heavy wooden bench.

  "Someone didn't steal it to keep it," she whispered, a smile finally creeping back onto her face. "They stole it to panic him. A crime of opportunity. They grabbed it and kicked it under the bench when he wasn't looking."

  He didn't hesitate. He dropped down lower, pressing his cheek near the dirty floor, and reached his long arm deep into the shadows beneath the heavy wood. His fingers brushed against dust bunnies and discarded athletic tape before knocking against something smooth, hard, and distinctly rectangular.

  A moment later, he pulled his arm back out. Resting in the palm of his hand was a black smartphone with a cracked screen protector.

  Ryan gasped loudly, taking a massive step forward.

  "That’s mine!" the boy practically shouted, his eyes wide with disbelief.

  She stood up gracefully, dusting off her knees and folded her arms across her chest with immense satisfaction.

  "So, someone simply slid it under the bench to mess with you," she concluded smoothly. "Whoever it was had to be close by when you opened the locker."

  A visible wave of profound relief washed over Ryan's tense shoulders. He slumped against the lockers, burying his face in his hands for a second.

  "Probably the captain," Ryan groaned miserably, looking up at the ceiling. "Marcus does stuff like this to the sophomores all the time to quote unquote build character."

  He stood up, holding the phone out. He gave it a casual, underhanded toss. The device sailed through the air, and Ryan caught it clumsily against his chest.

  "Case solved," he stated flatly, stuffing his hands back into his jacket pockets.

  Ryan looked between the two of them, clutching his phone like a lifeline. The sheer gratitude radiating from the boy was almost overwhelming.

  "Thank you guys," Ryan said earnestly, stepping backward toward the exit. "Seriously. I thought I was dead. My parents would have killed me. Thank you."

  After Ryan practically sprinted out of the locker room, the hallway grew quiet once again.

  Back in Room B-17, the evening sun had turned into a deep, bruised orange, pouring through the windowpanes and casting long, dramatic shadows across the floorboards.

  She walked straight to her desk, grabbed a crisp white sheet of lined paper from her notebook, and began writing something down with rapid, aggressive strokes of her pen.

  He walked over to his wheeled chair, sat down heavily, and watched her with deep suspicion.

  "What exactly are you doing?" he asked.

  She didn’t answer him. She finished writing, capped her pen with a final, satisfying click, and marched directly over to the massive corkboard. She grabbed a bright red push pin from the plastic container and pinned the piece of paper squarely in the dead center of the board with a theatrical flourish.

  She stepped aside, allowing him to read it.

  Written in thick, bold letters was:

  CASE FILE #001

  He stared at the piece of paper. He stared at her.

  "...Seriously?" he asked, his voice dripping with dry disbelief.

  "It is our very first case," she proclaimed proudly, gesturing to the paper like a museum curator revealing a masterpiece.

  "That wasn’t even a mystery," he argued, leaning forward in his chair. "A high school senior kicked a phone under a bench to prank a sophomore. Scooby-Doo wouldn't even get out of bed for that."

  She picked up the black dry-erase marker from the tray and pointed the felt tip directly at his chest.

  "Agent J," she commanded.

  He let out a long, exhausted sigh, dropping his head back against the chair.

  "What."

  "Come up here and write the official case summary," she ordered.

  "No."

  "Write it."

  "I am not writing a summary for a mildly misplaced piece of electronics."

  She crossed her arms, tapping her foot against the floorboards, her eyes narrowing into a glare that brooked absolutely no arguments.

  "Detective."

  He stared at her for a very long moment. He looked at the stubborn set of her jaw, the fiery determination in her dark eyes, and the way the fading sunlight caught the edge of her hair. He realized, with a strange sense of resignation, that he was never going to win an argument against her.

  He sighed heavily, pushed himself out of the chair, and walked over to the board. He snatched the black marker from her hand.

  Directly under her bold title, he wrote in lazy, slanted handwriting:

  Missing Phone. Resolved.

  She leaned in close to inspect the ink, her shoulder almost brushing his arm. She nodded once, a bright smile breaking across her face.

  "Good work," she praised.

  He walked back to his wheeled chair, sat down, and slowly spun himself around exactly one time, letting the quiet of the room settle over them again.

  She stood by the board, looking at the single piece of paper pinned to the vast expanse of cork. She looked incredibly proud.

  "Agent JJ strikes again," she whispered to herself.

  He stopped spinning his chair. He looked at her standing there in the fading light.

  "Agent JJ," he repeated softly, the words tasting strange but not unpleasant on his tongue.

  Outside the window, the sun finally dipped completely behind Alderwood’s tall, ancient oak trees, plunging the campus into the cool shadows of twilight.

  Inside the small, dusty room at the end of the hall, their very first case hung proudly on the board, a tiny white square against a sea of brown cork.

  Hours later, the world outside was completely dark.

  In a quiet, remarkably neat bedroom lit only by the concentrated beam of a small, brass desk lamp, a black leather notebook lay open on a polished wooden desk.

  He sat in the chair in front of it. The house around him was completely silent, a stark contrast to the chaotic energy of the girl he had spent his afternoon with. A heavy, silver pen rested loosely between his fingers.

  For a very long, quiet moment, he simply stared at the blank, lined page. His mind drifted back to the locker room. It drifted back to the moment she had crouched on the floor, her eyes calculating and sharp. It drifted back to the exact second she had turned to him and asked him what he was thinking about.

  He had told her he was thinking about nothing.

  It was a lie, but it was also the truth.

  He lowered the pen to the paper. The metal tip scratched softly against the grain. He wrote a single, deliberate line in the center of the blank page.

  He paused, lifting the pen. He read the words back to himself in the quiet of his room.

  Then, he closed the notebook, the leather cover shutting with a soft thud.

  But on the page, locked away in the dark, the words remained permanent and true.

  She was the nothing.

  Case File #001 solved.

  “She was the nothing.”

  And welcome to the beginning of Agent JJ.