Let me take care of you

Horror's of after-school (PT.2)

Nick could not find a bathroom sadly, but he looked in one of the open rooms and finally spotted Mr. Ajayi, fortunately. He walked up to Mr. Ajayi,
"Oh! Mr. Ajayi! Me and Charlie have been looking for you forever!" Nick said, exaggerating the forever. Mr. Ajayi smiled at Nick,
"Oh? What did you need me for?" He asked, placing down the scissors he was holding to cut out some sort of poster.
"I think Charlie has some homework to hand in to you. He's over in the centre of the art block." Nick pointed to where he had come from a couple of minutes ago, he was right at the very end of the hallway. Mr. Ajayi nodded,
"Of course, his last minute homework. Let me go get it then." He said, standing up from his chair and following Charlie to the center of the art block.

Nick walked at a quick pace to tell Charlie happily that he had found Mr. Ajayi. Mr. Ajayi followed along at a slower pace, putting his hand in his pockets. Nick walked out into the center of the art block,
"Charlie! I couldn't find a bathroom but I did find-" Nick stopped speaking, his arms dropped, and he looked around in confusion. Mr. Ajayi raised an eyebrow, he caught up with Nick looking around at the room, there was no one one there but them.
"Charlie?" Nick asked, expecting some sort of response, but was only met with more silence.

"Nick?" Mr. Ajayi asked, placing a hand on his shoulder. Nick looked confused and had a glint of worry in his eyes,
"I swear he was here before, I just left him for a couple of minutes. That's odd... He wouldn't go anywhere alone after-school, he's paranoid about that stuff." Nick said, walking over to where Charlie had been sitting,
"Now I'm sure he just went off after you, and you missed him in one of the rooms we walked pasted." Mr. Ajayi tried to say convincingly, but knew himself that it was very unlikely. Nick shook his head and sat down,
"He was literally sitting right here, I said that I would be right back and..." Nick's voice trailed off. His eyes were pointing down at something, squinting. Mr. Ajayi cocked his head to the side.

Nick crouched down and picked something up off the tile floor. He held it up to his face, it was a phone. Nick's eyes widened,
"Is that..?" Mr. Ajayi began, walking to where Nick was sitting and looking at the phone. The screen had a small crack in its corner, but it was still on, it was on Instagram. There was a photo of Tao and Elle smiling, he had liked it.
"This is Charlie's phone..." Nick said, in a hushed voice. Mr. Ajayi heard Nick's breathing get quicker,
"He's probably gone to..." Mr. Ajayi tried to think of something convincing, but couldn't think of any reason why Charlie would go off and leave his phone on the floor, and still turned on. Something has happened, something has happened to Charlie Spring.

Mr. Ajayi then realised, Nick only left Charlie for a few minutes, that's what he said. That meant that whatever was happening or was going to happen to Charlie, it had not left school grounds. Instantly thinking the worst, he suspected there were some messed up students who had some seemingly flawless plan. He really didn't want to make the instant jump, but in these situations, as Mr. Ajayi had learned before, you needed to assume the worst to make sure that the worst doesn't possibly happen.

"We need to start looking for him." Mr. Ajayi simply said. Nick looked up, Mr. Ajayi hadn't realised that Nick had been spiraling into panic next to him, his head in his hands. Nick took a deep breath, as if he hadn't breathed in a while, and nodded. Both men quickly walked out of the art block, Nick calling Charlie like a lost dog, almost a plead in his voice. They quickly determined that Charlie had left the art block, or better wording would be that he was no longer in the art block.

"Where do you think Charlie could be." Mr. Ajayi asked seriously as they walked out towards the school campus. Nick shrugged,
"What do you want me to say sir? He's not here." Nick snapped at him, before quickly looking away after realising what he said with guilt. Mr. Ajayi knew this wasn't a normal thing for Nick to do, he never snapped at teachers before.
"I get it, your upset. But who do you think would have it out enough for Charlie to do anything this horrible to him?" As soon as he asked the question Nick's eyes widened, he stopped walking, he fell to his knees and put his hands to his head, grabbing onto his hair,
"No no no no no.... I- I said... I said... He'd be safe with me..." Mr. Ajayi quickly crouched down beside Nick, he put an arm around Nick, he had worry plastered all over his face,
"Nick, what's going on? Who are you keeping him safe from?" Mr Ajayi asked, they needed answers, before anything to bad happened.

Nick sniffed, Mr. Ajayi realised he was crying, tears slowly rolled down his cheeks,
"It's... Them, the rugby lads who used to be my mates. They... They threatened him, said they'd do bad things to him, hurt him... I told him it wasn't true, that... That I would protect him..."  Nick breathed in and out, he said he would, he said he would be there. And where is he now, desperately trying to look for him? He should've been there with him, he should've stayed with him. What was going to happen now?

Mr. Ajayi spoke,
"Where do you think they could've taken him?" Mr. Ajayi asked, he didn't know if he should try to find another adult, or call someone? This was a really serious thing, something really bad could happen to him, and they needed to stop that from happening,
"We should start in the changing room, or areas near PE, they would always joke about this stuff, where they would do it. It was messed up, but I guess helpful now..." Nick said, sniffing again and standing up. Mr. Ajayi nodded,
"We need to get to him quickly." He said, more to himself. Nick nodded, wiping his tears away,
"We need to make sure he's okay." He replied, and both men ran over to the changing rooms at the back of the school in hopes that they would find the younger boy.

Sadly, that was not where they were going to find him, it was still quite far from it actually. Hopefully, they could find him before things got bad.

But something told them that no one was going to go out of this perfectly okay.