Frerard - Yes Sir!

Chapter 26

Mikey Way was on a mission. He was determined to find out everything he could about the fucking witch that had caused his brother and Frank all this heartache.

He was currently sat at his laptop typing her name into Instagram and scrolling through the many possibilities of which one could be her. He didn't have clue what she looked like though, so logged out and made another coffee while he tried to rethink his options.

Later in the day he found himself on the school's website clicking on the 'Teaching Staff' tab.

His eyes wandered down the list of names with smiling photographs and little write-ups next to them. He passed each department and smiled as he noticed Gerard and Frank's pictures. Frank looked effortlessly cool as he grinned into the lens; his write up stating:

'Mr Iero – Musical genius and much loved by students and teachers alike. Beating heart of our school community who achieves great results from his passionate students.'

Mikey nodded as if to agree. Even though he knew nothing of Frank as a teacher, he could tell how likeable he was and knew that the kids would all love him.

He continued down the list, spotting Gerard a mile off with his unique style.

'Mr Way – newest member of our teaching team. Mr Way is newly qualified and brings with him excellent qualifications. His passion as a new teacher shines through.'

Mikey grinned back at his brother. He hadn't seen that lopsided smile for a while, and he missed it. His brother meant the world to him, and he was a genuinely nice person – he deserved to be happy.

Carrying on down the list he found Drama. Looking back at him was Miss Ballato. He studied her face, grimacing at her as he did. He took an instant dislike to her. Her smile looked false, and she had a hardness to her.

'Miss Ballato' it read. 'Enthusiastic and encouraging with a wealth of experience from her various teaching post prior to joining us.'

'Various teaching posts?' Mikey questioned. She was still young so why would she have had so many jobs before?

Now he had a visual image of her, he could continue with his quest to find out everything about her via her online profile.

He quickly found her Instagram and Facebook page and luckily for Mikey she was dumb enough to have left it without any privacy settings enabled.

He scanned through her vast array of selfies. Jesus – there were fucking hundreds.

"Vain Bitch" he found himself muttering.

Her posts were mainly of her out in bars or restaurants, a few with friends and family, the obligatory photos of plates of food and cocktails. He began to click on each one and scanned through the comments. Most were from her friends calling her 'gorgeous' or 'stunning'.

"Whatever" he grumbled.

There was nothing at all really to go on, so he looked at her 'about' info.

He noted her school, college, current town etc. etc. All the usual stuff that told him nothing really about her. Gender, Date of Birth, blah, blah, blah. Relationship Status: 'single but always on the hunt' she had 'wittily' wrote.

It was 'family members' and 'work history' that he took note of.

It seemed a little strange to him that none of her family members shared the same surname. Yes there were complex families nowadays, but for not one to have the name Ballato struck him as odd. He made a mental note to log onto their pages later.

Looking through her work history, it appeared that she had been employed at four other schools in her short career. He wrote down the names of each one and returned to her photos, getting quite frankly sick of the sight of her face.

Mikey sat and ate his sandwich, pondering what he could do next. He text Gerard and got an instant reply, telling him that his brother was once again sat alone in his classroom eating his lunch. He huffed at the thought. Gerard had been loving his job until all this shit. Now he just seemed to go through the motions and didn't make any effort to socialise with any of his colleagues.

Before he realised what he was doing, he was driving along the highway with the list of schools that Lindsey had worked at on his lap. He had no idea what the hell he was going to do when he got there, but he was going all the same.

He didn't get any answers whatsoever from the first school he tried. Some snotty lady on Reception who clearly thought she was in charge of the entire establishment and 'would not under any circumstances divulge confidential information' to him. He got it. Of course he did. Some fucking weirdo rocking up asking about past teachers, but still, she didn't need to be such a cow.

He tried a different tactic at the next school.

"Hello" he smiled cutely at the much younger receptionist.

She smiled brightly back at him and asked how she could help.

He leaned slightly towards her. "I'm arranging a birthday party for a teacher at our school. Well, I've been landed with organising it" he rolled his eyes in pretend annoyance. "No. I'm joking, she's actually really cool so I don't mind. Anyway, I know she worked here and was hoping that some of her former teacher friends would be able to come along."

"Oh that's so sweet" Miss Flirty Receptionist cooed. "Who is it?"

"Lindsey" Mikey replied. "Lindsey Ballato?"

"Oh. I'm sorry I don't know that name."

Mikey fished out his phone and pulled up Lindsey's photo, placing it on the desk.

"Oh!" the young woman flushed. "You mean Lindsey Foster" she said the name in a hushed tone and looked around to see if anyone else was in earshot.

"Foster?" Mikey asked. "Not Ballato?"

"No" she replied. "That's Lindsey Foster. And I don't really think anyone here would want to go to her party to be honest."

"What?" Mikey quizzed, interest well and truly piqued. "Why not?"

She looked around again checking her colleagues were busy. "Let's just say she left here under a bit of a black cloud. No one wants to see her again."

Mikey could tell he was going to get no more information from her so thanked her anyway and turned to leave.

As he walked away, the receptionist spoke up again. "Excuse me!" she called out, causing Mikey to turn around.

"Yes?"

"I know you said she's your friend, but just be careful around her!" she said sincerely.

Mikey nodded and left the building.

He felt like he was back at square one now, with a new name to research. He knew there must be something shifty going on though, so ploughed on with his task.

He sat and stared at his computer screen, then randomly typed the name Lindsey Foster into Google. There were professors and lawyers of the same name, but after a little more looking down the pages, he saw her face along with a local newspaper article.

Clicking on it, he sat stunned as he read the headline:

'Lindsey Foster guilty after false accusation of rape.'