Fall Again (a Michael Jackson fanfiction)

38. Bad news

Hopes POV 🥀

I got a call from Juliette that evening, while I was with Autumn and Scottie in our lounge watching "Family guy".

I expected it to be about my aunt Annabel, who had recently been diagnosed with breast cancer, Juliette still lived with mom, and either her or mom often called me up to give me updates on Annabel.

Juliette's voice was muffled, and she sounded tearful, and my heart stopped. "Did , did auntie Bella die?"
Auntie Bella was our name for aunt Annabel.

"No..." Juliette sniffed, "She's fine."

Usually I would immediately assume something had happened to James, but he was safe in Clemmie Woods and if anything had happened there, I would be one of the first to know.

"Is it mom?" Mom was perfectly healthy but I couldn't imagine who else it would be about.

"Nothings happened to anyone .. Don't worry." Juliette had completely broken down now, her heart rending sobs echoing down the phone, filling me with both an urge to hold her, and a terrible fear.
Something bad had happened. I knew it.

If Juliette was having just a good cry, she wouldn't call me - she'd hide in her bed and sob quietly for hours.

"Juliette - what's happened?" I said urgently, "Please tell me."

"Jamie...." She started off then began to cry again, harder this time.

"Jul, James is safe in Clemmie Woods, if anything had happened they'd have called me!"
But I wasn't so sure anymore.

"No, no, it's his attacker.."

Alex Adlon, who was 22 at the time, was still in jail for James' assault and rape. "What about him, Juliette? You're safe! James is safe - Alex Adlon is locked away and hopefully won't get out for another 5 years."

"No, Hopey...." Sobbed Juliette, "He had a rich uncle, who just got him out ..."

"What?" Everything went cold. "Adlon is getting OUT of prison?"

"Yes! He's going to be living in a halfway house somewhere, they wouldn't tell me where, for obvious reasons. He's out - it's not fair, Hope, it's not fair..."

I felt fury rush through me like I'd never felt before, I was going to find Alex Adlon and kill him, stab him, burn him, whack his smug abuser face with a brick until he was unrecognisable and lifeless.

"Mom is in hysterics, she's driven off for a few hours somewhere - I don't know where she's gone promised she'd be back by 10." Juliette told me.

"They can't .. surely that's not allowed.." I muttered, "He raped and beat up a teenage boy, they can't just LET HIM OUT!!"

"They figured he's been in there for around 10 years now - that he's learnt his lesson."

"Rapists never learn their lesson. They're the lowest of the low - especially CHILD rapists! Jamie is lucky he didn't DIE that night! He could easily have bled to death!" I was getting close to hysterics myself. 

"He's getting out this weekend .... They refused to tell me anything else!" Juliette choked out.

"I'll hunt that fucker down! I'll do exactly to him what he did to James!"

"They haven't given anyone any information of where he's gone, so we have no hope of that." Juliette replied.

"Has he got a new name?" I asked.

" I don't know." Sighed Juliette.

I was determined to find out. I would avenge James, hurt the person who had hurt him the most, who had sent his mental health on a downward spiral.
Then the hidden anger inside me that I'd had all my life since the day James was attacked, would hopefully be eased.