21 The Missing Headmaster Zhang

 

My mother named me Wu Meng, hoping that she wouldn’t have any more nightmares. I personally didn’t mind nightmares because I could converse with the other version of myself in them. According to the doctors, that was a symptom of schizophrenia. So I supposed… to be an actual officer, I would gladly give up the ability to dream.

The next morning, someone called the police. Yu Cai High School’s Headmaster Zhang had disappeared. It was the staff at the school who called the police because Headmaster Zhang had not been to work for 3 days already. We got the headmaster’s home address from the school staff and we all went along to see if he was home. We called his phone and knocked on the door but there was no answer. The police decided to break down the door. The officers and teachers poured into the house to search for the missing headmaster.

When one of the teachers opened the cupboard inside the headmaster’s bedroom, she screamed because out tumbled Headmaster Zhang’s dirty little secret. When you realized the people beside you were not at all whom you thought they were, you’d start to question the world. That was happening with most of the staff from Yu Cai High School.

“Well, our headmaster sure has quite a bit of collection.” I shook my head with a mirthless laugh.

“I never thought Headmaster Chang had such a nasty habit.” Wu Jiajia said, “He normally looks so presentable and scholarly. This is disgusting!”

“This shows that you’ll never really know a person.” Someone commented.

There was nothing inside Headmaster Zhang’s cupboard that belonged to him, the cupboard was stuffed with female undergarments. In fact, when the doors opened, the room was instantly infused with the sour odour of sweat and human hormones. That told us that Headmaster Zhang was an avid collector of unwashed female undergarments. Wu Jiajia pointed at a few of the panties and gasped, “Wait, those are my missing panties! So the stalker is Headmaster Zhang?!

“I did suspect that the stalker might be someone I know because he has returned to stalk me not long after I moved to a new apartment. I took rides with different people from work, and only the staff at the school would know about my new address…” Wu Jiajia was stunned with disbelief.

As the head admin at the school, it was not unusual for Headmaster Zhang to know about his staff members’ address but Wu Jiajia never once thought to suspect this respected member of staff.

But staring at the pile of female undergarments, it was impossible that all of them came from Wu Jiajia. In other words, Headmaster Zhang might be stalking some other victims.

“I need all the male teachers to vacate the room. We need to conduct a quick questioning.” I told the room. Gao Rui gave me a look before he led the male teachers out. Naturally Guan Zhenglin and Gu Chen stayed. Out of concern for their beloved headmaster, all the staff members were helping the police find him. They definitely were surprised to find this hidden side to their headmaster instead.

“Do any of you see your undergarment here?” I asked openly. Other than Wu Jiajia, the rest shook their heads. This was quite unusual. Was Headmaster Zhang stealing just from one person? But that did not explain the amount of undergarment inside the cupboard. I stressed again that it was important to be honest to help the police solve the case but still everyone shook their heads. I shared a look with Guan Zhenglin and Gu Chen. At that moment, Xiao Hui, who was also an intern teacher, raised her hand.

After some urging, she finally told us her story. She started her internship at the high school just slightly earlier than Wu Jiajia. When she got the notification that was accepted, she was overjoyed because she came from a normal university. She did not think her application would be accepted. When she first met Headmaster Zhang, her impression of him was good. She found him scholarly, humorous and intelligent. However, one month into her internship, her impression of him changed.

Headmaster Zhang would call her into his office to give him her internship report. Whenever she handed her report over to the headmaster, the latter would let his hands linger on her skin. Initially, Xiao Hui thought this was the old gentleman being careless but she was proven wrong when Headmaster Zhang became more brazen. When Xiao Hui read her report, Headmaster Zhang would move to sit beside her. His arms would always find their way to land on Xiao Hui’s calves. Because she did not want to lose this job, all Xiao Hui could do was to try to move herself away from the offending hands. She did not dare to tell the other staff about this.

However, during one of their sessions, Headmaster Zhang finally showed his claws. He pressed Xiao Hui under his body. The headmaster’s office was on the top floor and students were not allowed to go to that floor without the headmaster’s permission. Even the teachers had to make appointments before they could meet the headmaster. Therefore, Headmaster Zhang was not afraid of being discovered. Xiao Hui did struggle and scream but it was pointless, the headmaster’s office had incredibly good sound proofing. Xiao Hui thought that was it for her. In her mind, she told herself that maybe if she let Headmaster Zhang have his way with her, she might be able to become an official staff. That was the only consolation she could give herself.

However, right then there was a knock. Headmaster Zhang grunted with annoyance but Xiao Hui was saved. The intruder was none other than Wu Jiajia. Wu Jiajia was a new staff member and she lived outside the school hostel so she did not know about the rules and appointments.

“So no wonder that day…” Wu Jiajia said. Xiao Hui nodded. With the leading example from Xiao Hui, the other female teachers became more forthcoming with their stories. From their tales, we knew that this was not the first time Headmaster Zhang had used the power of his station to take advantage of the female staff. He mostly targeted teachers with more reserved personalities like Xiao Hui. In fact, there were 2 female teachers who had already fallen under his mix of threat and coercion. However, they thought he was just a sleazy old man with too much power, they had no idea he was so perverted that he’d go and steal used female undergarments.

“Okay, you can all leave now. Also we need to investigate the headmaster’s office after this. Can someone please get us a copy? Thank you.” I told the female staff.

“Right, I believe Gao Rui has a copy to the headmaster’s office.” A 50-year-old teacher said before she left. “Gao Rui is heavily valued by Headmaster Zhang, he is always there to help Headmaster Zhang even with the smallest issue. But as the senior teacher at the school, how come I didn’t realize all these incidents of sexual harassment was happening under my eyes? Headmaster Zhang has never done anything improper towards me!”

I took in the teacher’s aged appearance and outdated sense of fashion, and I could only chuckle helplessly, “Perhaps he hasn’t gotten to you yet? And we’ll make sure that he doesn’t. Anyway, tell Gao Rui to prepare the key, thank you.”

Finally, only 3 of us were left in the room. Guan Zhenglin took in the different styles of female underwear inside the cupboard and sighed, “Now that the cat’s out of the bag, do we need to search his office? It’s clear that Headmaster Zhang is the crazy stalker, he mistook Zhang Mingliang for Wu Jiajia, he raped and killed her before using her head to write on the wall.” Gu Chen snapped his finger. “Also since Zhang Mingliang was stalking Gao Rui, she would have known that Headmaster Zhang was Gao Rui’s superior. Didn’t you say earlier that Zhang Mingliang might know Wu Jiajia’s stalker? Now everything makes sense!”

“No, there are still things that don’t make sense.” I walked forward and picked up a few random panties. “For example, we still don't know who the young person who fell for Ol’ Zhang’s trap is.”

“Perhaps that was really just a petty thief.” Gu Chen shrugged. “Someone completely unrelated to the case.”

I lifted the panties close to my nose and took a good sniff. “Things are not that simple.”

“The fuck!” Guan Zhenglin cursed loudly, “Wu Meng, have you gone crazy again? You pervert! Disgusting, you’re well on your way to become the second Headmaster Zhang.”

“The smell isn't right.” I confirmed.

“Do you think this is some kind of wine-tasting?” Guan Zhenglin scolded. “What smell?”

“I’ll tell you all about it later.” I walked out the room and said with a smile. “Now let us go inspect this headmaster’s office.”

Guan Zhenglin followed behind me and berated, “Don’t think that will change the fact that you’re a pervert!” I turned back to look and see Gu Chen hesitate beside the female undergarment. Guan Zhenglin noted my eyes going over her shoulders and she warned without turning around, “Gu Chen, don’t follow this pervert’s example!”

Half an hour later, with Gao Rui’s key, we entered the headmaster’s office. Mary handled the computer stuff remotely but now there was a locked safe that stood in our way.

“We should get someone from the technical department.” I suggested.

“It’ll be too late when they get here.” Gu Chen raised the safe and thus the long journey to trying to literally crack the safe began.

Mary did not find anything useful from the office computer. With raging breath, Gu Chen finally smashed the safe into smithereens. There was some cash and a USB drive inside the safe. The USB drive was choked full of photos taken secretly. They featured the school’s staff, but most of them were of Wu Jiajia.

“Well, there’s even more evidence now. Headmaster Zhang is definitely the creepy stalker.” Guan Zhenglin affirmed.

I looked at Wu Jiajia and Wu Jiajia looked at me.

Why was Headmaster Zhang so fixated on Wu Jiajia? None of the female staff lost their underwear, only Wu Jiajia. But Wu Jiajia was staying outside the school hostel while the other staff lived at the staff hostel. It would be too risky for Headmaster Zhang to sneak to the female staff hostel, that was a possibility.

“Did Headmaster Zhang ever make advances onto you?” I asked Wu Jiajia.

“No. He did nothing of that sort.” Wu Jiajia answered.

“You sure?” I pushed. Wu Jiajia’s eyes darted to the side before she repeated, “Yes.”

At that moment, Gu Chen rushed in. “Wu Meng, look at what I found.” It was a stack of school documents handwritten by Headmaster Zhang. Gu Chen used his fingers to point out a few specific characters. “Don’t” “Push” and “Me”.

Someone had written a red warning message on Wu Jiajia’s wall before. Gu Chen pulled out the picture and compared it with Headmaster Zhang’s handwriting on these documents, they matched perfectly. Looks like it was indeed Headmaster Zhang who was behind the painted warning. He was our stalker. But there were still questions that were unanswered, I felt like something was missing.

“Looks like you were right after all. Headmaster Zhang, the crazy stalker mistook Zhang Mingliang for Wu Jiajia and murdered her. Now, we only need to find Headmaster Zhang and the case will be closed. I wonder where this creep has disappeared to. Did he know we’re onto him?” Gu Chen tried to console me seeing how silent I was.

‘Is that really the case?’ I thought to myself. “In any case, we’ll indeed know more after we locate Headmaster Zhang.” I told them.