Cory's POV:This night it is impossible for me to find rest. I toss and turn on the sofa in my mother's living room and stare holes in the darkness.
The clock is ticking loud and heavy and outside I hear a dog howling. My thoughts are caught in a spiral. Over and over again I go through the interrogation at the police station. For three whole days they talked to me again and again, trying to find a truth that wasn't there. But the talk I remember best is definitely the first one...
FLASHBACK
The light in the small room is loud. One of the neon tubes flickers and I blink and lower my view. Officer O'Conor sits on a plastic chair on the other side of the table. He leans over and folds his hands in front of him. He just sits there and stares at me with this...view.
The door opens and Officer Dial enters the room, a hot cup of...smells like coffee in his hand. He blinks his eyes, too, but he is not turning the light lower.
"Sorry I'm late. We can start now." This is the word for Officer O'Conor. He gets up and starts to walk around in the room. From the door to the small window and back. Again and again. Officer Dial leans against the wall behind the now empty chair.
"Mr Monteith, what do you know so far about today?", he approaches me.I check my watch. He is right, it is still today, it's five minutes to twelve. I should feel tired, I think. But I feel so awake.
After a deep breath to swallow my anger, I start to talk. "I left the house early this morning. Had some important appointments today..."
"Appointments?", Officer O'Conor interrupts me with a highly interested tone in his voice, but Officer Dial gives him a sign to be quiet. I think he doesn't want to tease me.
To his confirmation I nod in his direction and continue. "...like I said, I had some appointments today and I left around 6 in the morning. Lea spent the whole evening with Annie and Tyler and of course she was still sleeping. I didn't wake her, because I assumed she must be tired and she hates to be waken up in the middle of her sleep, though..."
I clear my throat and pull on a piece of skin on my left thumb. After a while I look up again with a provocative look in the face, at least I hope it is."After that I only know that you came into my house to pick me up like a criminal."
I spit out the last word. Then silence.
"So you want to tell me you don't know anything? You didn't have any contact to your wife today, hm?" Officer O'Conor stands behind me now, I feel his breathe on my hair.
"No, actually not."
"I don't believe you."
"I'm a very busy man, Officer.", I answer simply.
"Yeah", he mocks. "Some who organizes to kidnap an infant must be very busy."
"Greg.", Officer Dial says without turning his face to him.
Officer O'Conor snorts, but he doesn't say anything more. To be honest, I'm confused. Seems like O'Conor takes this very serious. That's interesting.
"So, I'm gonna tell you now for the record what happened today, as far as we know from witnesses and from Annie Rose. "Your wife, Lea Michele-Monteith, spent the day with Annie Rose. According to Ms Rose they met at around 1 pm for a walk to the city with Ms Rose three month old son Tyler Rose. They went shopping this afternoon. On the way back they decided to take the subway back home.
Because she wanted to buy tickets, Ms Rose left her son with Mrs Michele-Monteith.On her way back from the ticket machine, the platform was very full and the train already arrived. While Ms Rose tried to fight her way back to Mrs Michele-Monteith and her son, she heard screams in the front.
We interviewed her in the hospital and she said the last thing she remembers is the squealing of the train and a few men lifting up her son's empty buggy from the rails. Then she paniced and faded.
She is in the psychiatry now, because she had panic attacks in the hospital and she was in shock after she woke up.The subway driver called us and some other witnesses told us, that they saw out of the sudden how the buggy rolled down the platform on the rails and the train hit it.
First we assumed to find the infant dead under the train, but after they removed the train it came out that there was no body. Because everyone was busy with the buggy, no one saw or heard anything. We have no sign of Mrs Michele-Monteith, neither of the boy. So there are grounds for the assumption that your wife kidnapped the boy."
Finally someone told me the whole story of what happened. I don't know how to react. My head is dizzy from the information it tries to process. I still think about what to say as Officer O'Conor takes the word again.
"Where have you been yesterday between 5.30 pm and 6.30 pm, Mr Monteith?" His eyes are cold.
"I told you already, I had appointments. I worked all day long with my manager to talk about the concept of..."
"Of what?"
"I'm not supposed to tell yet, but I will, for your sake.", I say sarcastically. "I'm gonna be in a new movie, coming out next year. We talked about the concept of this movie. Around this time we met with the regisseur for dinner to get further details."
Officer Dials eyes dart from me to Officer O'Conor and back. Officer O'Conor gets up.
"I'm gonna check this." With a loud bang he shuts the door.
I stare in front of me on the table, showing no reaction to this at all.He will call my manager now and he thinks he will tell him that I am lying. The thing is...he won't, because I AM not lying.
"You think about doing a new movie?", Officer Dial breaks through my thoughts.
"Yeah, actually I do...after I thought that I'm....we are better now." With a lowered voice I add: "At least I thought so."
Officer Dial sits down on the table braces on his arms, staring to the door. "I am not supposed to say this, but this is the first case we don't have the same opinion."
"You mean, you and..."
"Me and Greg, yes." He gives me a wryly smile. "He is my partner for 4 years now, since I came from the police academy and this is the first time we don't agree. Don't be mad at him. He takes this very personal. I think you tell the truth and we have nothing against you. But he wanted to interview you so badly."
I don't know why he is telling me this. Probably he is not supposed to. But somehow I trust him. He seems to be for me.
"Can I ask...why?"
Officer Dial bites his lip, then he turns around to face me. "All I can tell is that a similar thing happened to his daughter. Her husband killed her and the neighbours child and made it look like she ran away. He was the one who brought him to prison. But I don't know any more details. This is just what they tell in the police office. I never asked him about this personally, he never talked about it.
Again, I don't know what to say.
"I never told you this." He surveys me with a piercing view.
"Of course not."
"Good."
I nod. The thoughts are rushing through my head like airplanes. Till Officer O'Conor comes back we just wait and don't say a word.
I have to do something. I just can't lie here and wait. My thoughts spin around and aournd and in the middle of it there is Lea. I didn't even talk to her on the day she left. She was still sleeping when I left the house, because she spent the evening at Annie's place. This thought comes always back to me and tortures me.
I only remember her sleeping face and her curly messy hair all around it. She wore her favourite sleeping shirt and she looked like an angel. She looked like she was okay. I really thought she was. But now I have to admit that I don't know her anymore. All these things she did...there is no way I could explain any of it. So far I wasn't able to order my thoughts about it. Maybe because a part of me never really wanted to believe it.
Now that I'm lying here all alone, all my suppressed feelings from the last days come up. They push me down and I feel so helpless. I never felt this way before. I had rough times in life, but over my drug addiction and the death of my father, I think this is even worse. My soulmate changed and left on the most mysterious way and it feels like a bad dream. Why...why...What is the matter with her? Where did she go? And why the heck did she take all our money?
We checked the bank account again and it's true. My wife who I used to know so well, my wife who I love... she took all our money we own together. As if it isn't bad enough that I just spent three days in prison, no, the bad news and the despair directly goes on and on.
She stole it, if you want it like this.
Wow, this thought is tough.
I'm trying to shake it off and stand up. Can't sleep anyway. I spotted a bottle of Jim Beam in the house bar.
A few minutes later I walk around in the living room with a glass full of the drink in my hands. The first sip burns in my throat and I cough. Still I empty the rest in a few gulps.Back to the point. She stole all our money.
Why?
Where is she now?
And why did she take the boy with her?
Questions over questions, spinning like a carousel in my tired mind.Suddenly I know what to do.
What I need is a plan. A strategy to find her. I need to investigate this case on my own. And I'm gonna start as soon as possible.The idea forms itself in my mind and it calms me down.
After a while I get back to rest again, in my mind the things I gonna do as soon as I wake up to find out more about the mysterious circumstances. And to find her.