Torturous [Fillie]

Principal

"Thank you so much for agreeing to meet with me today, principal Harbor." Detective Ryder sat down in the chair across from the tall man with stubble on his chin and a mustache. Principal Harbor was indeed the principal of Hawkins high school. He became the principal three years ago. Before that he was the chief of police and he actually worked with Winona a few times, but not a lot due to the lack of serious cases involving children. The time that they did get to spend together was great according to chief Harbor.

He had developed some sort of crush on the older woman and even tried to ask her out on a date, but she refused. Winona was very serious about her work and wouldn't let a relationship distract her. Broken hearted, Harbor quit his job of chief and decided to become the principal of a high school thinking that he wouldn't have to see Ryder again. However, this is the third time they've met here.

Principal Harbor nods with a faint grin as Winona starts pulling a bunch of papers out of her satchel. "Anything for you, Noni." "Please call me Winona or detective Ryder when I'm working, Harbor." She politely stated before setting some stuff down on his desk. "Just call me David." "Harbor is fine." Winona scoot her chair closer to the desk and picked up her notepad to sit it in her lap while they speak. "So you wanted to talk to me about Noah Schnapp?" Principal Harbor moves on to the reason why she's here. The short older woman flipped her ebony hair over her shoulder and nodded. "Yes. I spoke with his mother Karina yesterday morning. She said that Noah came home Friday evening after school and went straight to his bedroom and nobody has seen him since."

David nods. "Did you see him at all that day or over hear him in the halls talking about maybe running away?" "Is that your theory? That he ran away?" Winona raised her eyebrows. She didn't wanna think about any other option. She liked to think that maybe Noah disappeared willingly and isn't with a stranger or dead. The thought gave her subtle anxiety, but she was pretty good at hiding it during these cases. "I have more questions for you." She stated after putting a question mark on her note pad and a line beneath Noah's name. "Shoot, kid." "Do you know if you have a student by the name of Finn Wolfhard?"

Principal Harbor took a big inhale as he turned his chair a little towards his computer. "Let me check," He searches for anything about a student named Finn Wolfhard. No results were found. "No, I don't believe there is a student named Finn Wolfhard here." Winona was starting to get a little creeped out by this situation. Karina Schnapp told her that Finn and Noah met at school, they were friends for a couple of weeks until they got into an argument, Noah goes missing only three days ago, and she found out last night that Finn is a murderer. She was not liking how all of this looked. Was Finn only posing as a student to lure in another victim? Did he kill Noah because of their argument? How many other students did Finn attack?

"Noni." David spoke a little below a shout to get her attention after she was put into a weird trance. She looks at the man with worry, thinking back to that last question she had asked herself. Did Finn target more than one person? "Can you give me the names of all of your students who are absent today?" Principal Harbor scrunched up his face, but then relaxed and turned to his computer to list off the names of students who weren't at school today. "Ashley Adams, Millie Brown, Liam Gallagher, Jessica Gallagher, Samantha Hawthorn, Gaten Matarazzo, Caleb McLaughlin, Fawn Patterson, Noah Schnapp, and Sadie Sink."

Winona had written down those ten names and then asked for their parents contact information, apart from Millie's. "How is she?" The small frail woman asked. Principal Harbor only nodded. "She's a straight A student. I did see her last Friday, the anniversary. Caleb McLaughlin and two other students were picking on her." It hurt Winona to hear about that. She was so angry that kids would be so cruel to her on a day like that. "You know today is actually her birthday." Winona stated. David smiles a little and nods. "I know." There was a bit of silence in the room, but it wasn't an awkward silence. The fact that it wasn't awkward made Noni curse herself for getting distracted. "Tell me the addresses, please." David frowned a bit and looked at his computer.

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The three teens that remained all sat there with nothing to do or talk about. Suddenly the door opened and Jaeden came in with handcuffs and a shock collar. Everyone was on edge now, wondering who was next and where Finn was. The boy approached Millie, undoing the leather straps around her wrists and ankles. The other two hostages were curious as to what was going on. Millie was as confused as them. "Are you letting me go?" She questioned, to which the boy shook his head as he put the handcuffs around her wrists and then the collar. "Finn wants to see you." Is all he said before guiding her out of the room and up the stairs to the first floor.

It was decorated with balloons and streamers and a banner that said happy birthday. She couldn't believe what she had seen. And Finn stood there in the kitchen with a big pink birthday cake right in front of him. Two candles sat on top of that cake, a one and an eight. Jaeden led the special birthday girl to the high counter to sit down. Finn lit the candles before him and Jaeden started to sing to her. "Happy birthday to you. Happy birthday to you. Happy birthday dear Millie. Happy birthday to you." The brunette couldn't help but smile a little bit and even tear up. She couldn't figure out why she was so emotional, but it was either because she was relieved that they liked her or that she was upset because this wasn't exactly how she expected her eighteenth birthday to go. She was happy anyway and even blew out her candles.

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I'm starting to like this story but it's not really a long one so...💉