Jake goes for help Chapter Three - Back to work

The next morning, after Alison left, Jake decided he needed to do something during the day, and phoned his boss at work.

He worked for the Department of Justice, but the job sounded much more romantic than it was - he was a legal aide, helping the Crown Prosecutors prepare for cases, and unlike most of his fellow workers, he had no dreams of going in front of a judge and jury himself.

He had been very happy to just be a small cog in the wheels of justice, at least prior to ... the incident.

Now he was just trying to figure out where his life went from here.

But he now had to cut off his wandering mind, because his boss had picked up the phone at last.

“Jake, is this you? I wasnt expecting to hear from you for a week.”

“I know Ralph, but well, ... I’m getting a little squirly just sitting around, and I was wondering if I could come in?”

“Are... are you sure, Jake?”

“Yes. I need something to do. Work might just be the best thing I can do. Besides, I was supposed to come back next week anyway, right?”

There was a long pause, and then his boss said, “I guess so. But you know as well as anyone the kind of cases we get here.”

Jake did know it - as Crown prosecutors, they handled only the most serious cases - armed robbery, murder ....

And rape.

“I .... I would like to try. If you’ll let me.”

“All right, Jake. Come in, and let’s give it a try. But I expect and demand that if it gets too much, you dont try and be a tough guy. You let me know, right away.”

“Okay, Ralph.”

Jake hung up the phone, and went and had a shower. Once finished, he went into the main bedroom closet and found his suit and tie. Once outfitted, he went to his car, and began to drive to work.

It wasnt as busy as when he normally went, but he knew the route by heart, so he began to fiddle with his radio, trying to find something worth listening to. But at this time of day, the AM dial was dominated by blowhard talk show hosts, Religious leaders who spent more time talking about the money they needed to do their good work than actually doing it, and overloud sports commentators.

The FM side wasnt much better, being filled with immature disk jockeys who spent more time telling jokes that only a three year old would laugh at than they did actually playing music.

Eventually, he gave up, and turned the radio off, and finished the drive in silence.

He carefully navigated the one-way streets of the downtown core, until he got to City Square, which was a block-sized patch of green in the middle of the concrete and bustle, framed by most of the city, province and federal buildings, including the federal courthouse.

The courthouse actually consisted of two parts, the courthouse itself which sat on the west side of City Square, and behind that was the office tower where the majority of the people whose work affected the courthouse had their desks. This tower, modern and ten stories tall and looking quite strange attached to the back of the more classically designed courthouse, was where he was headed.

He went around to the far side of the building where there was an entrance to an underground parking garage for those who worked there. He drove up to the entrance and put in his staff parking pass, which opened the gate to let him in.

He navigated the careful turns of the parking lot, found an empty spot, and parked. He went to the elevator and pushed the button for the lobby.

Once out at the lobby, he went over to the reception desk, where he signed in under the watchful eye of both a large security officer and a pretty receptionist. He went to the elevators that would take him to his floor, and a few moments later he was standing outside the door of his section and took a deep breath.

“Here goes”