Mind Games

Chapter One: Death of the Good

Jeremiah Whitley was born in the summer of 1986 to parents Olivia Whitley, a hardworking waitress at the local café, and Steven Whitley, a carpenter at his step-father's family business in his hometown of Cashmere, Washington.

Now, coming from a hardworking family, the Whitley boy knew the importance of where hard work could get you. He knew not to look gift horses in the mouth, to eat with his elbows off the table, and when courting a woman, to always be a gentleman.

Some of this knowledge fell on deaf ears. He thought he knew better.

But knowing of his past, ultimately means very little to the story. It doesn't help to know how he broke his first bone, or when he lost his virginity. It doesn't help to know that he was named after the football player Jeremiah Castille, playing for the NFL Buccaneers since 1983-1988. It doesn't help to know that Whitley himself was only a mediocre football player, that his final career as a teacher was only decided after the loss of his father.

Though perhaps his career choice is a little important. It lets us know that he settled down, began teaching at Washington University in Seattle's centre. It lets us know that his skills as a teacher were something to be admired, that they went a little beyond mediocre. His father would have been proud.

Prouder still, if Whitley hadn't been so callous.

If, maybe, he'd been more selective on where he chose to settle.

Because in the spring of 2020, Whitley's life came to an untimely end.

On the night of March 9th, Whitley had stayed at work late, his usual routine on a Monday - as penance for a late arrival every Monday morning - and he never left.

All of the other teachers had retired for the day, leaving Whitley alone in the school. Even the students had returned to their dorms, to the homes they lived in off campus. There were no late classes. No secret affairs carrying out in the darkness. It was locked up and abandoned.

All except for Whitley's room.

Where the lighting was dark. So much so that it held an eeriness. A sense of forbidden danger, something that raised goose-bumps on his skin. Of course, this was something that he was used to.

He was used to every sound that surrounded his classroom. He knew that the aircon rebooted every night at 11pm and wound down an hour later. He knew the racoon that lived in the school roof ran back and forth over his head every twenty minutes. He knew the drone of the wrought iron gates opening and closing was the school's headmaster leaving after a long day of his own.

What Whitley didn't know, was the electronic buzz of the security system being hacked. Or the sound of expensive Italian loafers as they walked almost in sync up the stairs and down the hall towards his classroom, with a determination that wouldn't be easily swayed. What he didn't know were the names that belonged to the faces of the three men who broke down his classroom door.

He didn't know the reason he took a hit to the back of his head with the butt of a gun. He didn't know the consequence of the rope tied around his wrists, or of the suspension of his arms tied above his head. Of his feet dangling above the floor. He didn't know the consequence of the blade that was dragged across his stomach.

He didn't know that no one would be there to save him in his final hours. Not even his killers would stay and watch. He didn't know that he would spend those final moments bleeding out slowly. Painfully. With his last sight before him a 'hang in there, kitty' poster hanging with dog-eared corners at the back of his classroom.

More importantly, what Jeremiah Whitley would never know was that his death could have been avoided if he had left the school an hour earlier.

He would never know that his death was the result of some bad people trying to send a message to an even worse person.