The days were finally cooling off and Harry and I enjoyed as much time as we could outdoors. He loved exploring nature and I often brought my phone out in the woods so we could search up the answers to any and all questions that he had about plants and trees and wildlife. I was doing rather well controlling my attraction to him but I found myself wanting to snuggle and cuddle with him all the damn time. I told myself it was because he hadn't gotten enough physical affection when he was growing up, and that was partly true. But I just loved being close to him. He was warm and comforting in a situation where everything else was so uncertain.

I found myself feeling safe with him, which was very strange since I was the one trying to protect him from so much. I knew he was crushing on me, which meant he cared deeply for me and would protect me if he ever had to. It was just such a bizarre situation, falling for this man who was merely a child yesterday and wasn't even truly a legal adult yet.

About a week after my last outing, I woke up one morning to find a folded note on the kitchen table, with my name on it. I wondered if Harry had left it but it didn't look like his handwriting. I opened it and read, He's leaving town tonight and will return tomorrow night. Tomorrow 5 AM.

Whoa!

Clive came through after all. I had a good bit of angst, hoping it wasn't a trap, that Theodore hadn't set out to expose me and then ship me back to the US without even a good-bye to Harry. Even so, I set my alarm for 4:45 and hardly slept, anxious for what I was about to do.

The alarm blasted me from the sleep that I'd finally found in the wee hours of the morning. I got dressed and grabbed my phone, switching only the most necessary lights on and hoping not to wake Harry. The main house was dark with only the tiniest slivers of light beginning to peek through the windows. I used the flashlight on my phone and checked the doors that led into the house; sure enough, they were unlocked.

I crept into the house silently, hoping nothing creaked and that no one else was awake. I was terrified of getting caught, but motivated even more by my love for Harry. I made my way to the office and the doors were closed, but thankfully unlocked as well. I tiptoed inside and pulled one almost closed but I wanted to hear if there was any noise from the hallway signaling that others might be waking up. That was when I realized I didn't even know how many other servants Theodore had. I remembered the man who had brought my suitcase to my suite when I first arrived and the woman who usually brought the medication refills. Still, it was kind of twisted that I didn't even have full knowledge of everyone else who worked in this house and I'd been here for close to four months already.

I hesitated to turn on a light, but I decided to flick on a small desk lamp to help me with my search. I found the keys easily but I needed to use my phone flashlight again as I began searching through one, then another, then another file drawer in the numerous cabinets that lined Theodore's office.

It was all business-related material, drawer after drawer of mergers and financial reports and personnel for Blake Enterprises. It never really occurred to me before, but I wondered if Theodore was the owner or CEO or what. He'd never shared much about his personal or business life, but he was obviously successful at what he did. It was also obvious, as he had previously stated, that he conducted business from this very office since these kinds of files weren't usually stored in someone's home.

I searched through one entire wall full of cabinets and stood up to stretch my aching back. I was growing frustrated but embarked upon another set of cabinets. I had to try several keys before getting the right one. I was shocked as I attempted to pull out the top "drawer" but all the drawers came out as one full panel, disguised as four drawers. I had to consciously put my hand over my mouth to hush the gasp that escaped when I noticed the cabinet was full of guns. And not just the standard hand guns that a homeowner might have to protect his family. There were pistols, shotguns, and even a fucking AK-47!

Why the hell would he need all these guns? If he was a collector, wouldn't he have them on display somewhere? I was suddenly more terrified of Theodore than I had ever been, but I had to stick to my original task. I closed the gun cabinet and moved to the next one. As I pulled out the top drawer, I heard a sound in the hallway and froze. I listened very intently, the silence burning my ears as I walked stealthily to the door and peeked out.

There stood Clive like a guard in front of a tomb.

"Shit!" I whispered when he turned abruptly towards me.

He put his fingers over his lips. "Shh. I sleep late when the boss is away. You never saw me."

"Gotcha," I whispered back and returned to my task. About halfway through the second wall of files, I found what I was looking for. The files were lying flat in the drawer which seemed shallower than the others; too shallow for hanging files. It was unexpected because the drawer didn't appear different from the outside. Harry's name appeared on many of the folders so I was hoping for the best when I came across a file simply named Medical.

"Yes!" I cheered in a loud whisper. Clive poked his head in and shushed me. I giggled silently, happy that he was keeping watch.

The first file I pulled out was a well-child visit from when Harry was three. The statistics and percentiles all showed that he was a perfectly normal three-year-old child. I was both surprised and not surprised. 

The well-child visits for ages four and five were both normal as well, from what I could tell. But when I came to his six-year-old visit, I scanned down the page and read, "Patient presents with symptoms of mild intellectual disability." Okay, so they suspected it when he was six, but that didn't seem right. ID was usually discovered when the child was very young. Harry would have already been in kindergarten by age six. I mean, maybe his parents really didn't notice until he started school, but it still didn't seem to make sense. The bottom of the form was signed by some a doctor with an Indian name that had far too many letters for me to memorize. I couldn't make a photocopy of anything since I didn't want to make any noise. Suddenly, I was very grateful for the flashlight on my phone because it gave me the idea to just snap a photo of it, which I did, and I took photos of the other ones as well.

Clive popped his head in again and whispered, "Hurry up, people will be waking up soon!"

I rushed through about twenty pages of what appeared to be random doctor visits, snapping shots as quickly and clearly as I could while trying to keep the pages neat and in order. In a panic, picked up the pile of files and just about missed the tiny key hole at the very bottom center of the drawer. I frantically searched through the keys and found one tiny enough to fit into the slot. The bottom of the door popped open and I lifted it up to find a large manila envelope stuffed full.

"Jules, Simpson is awake!" Clive hissed. In a panic, I grabbed the whole envelope, closed the hidden compartment and raced for the door. But I froze when I heard Clive speaking to someone else.

"Up early, aren't you Barrows?" Another man's voice rumbled.

"Yes, well, I had insomnia," he answered smoothly.

"I thought Theodore was out of town," the other man said. "Why is his office light on?"

Clive replied instantly, not even having to come up with an excuse, God bless him. "He texted me last night and asked me to pull a file for him. The insomnia helped me to get it done at the crack of dawn, I guess." He inserted a believable laugh. "I was just scanning it over when I heard you in the hallway." Clive set one foot into the room to show that he was returning to finish his job. He glanced over to make sure I was hidden from the other man's sight.

"All right, well, I'm off to get some coffee," the other man said and I heard him walk away.

Clive came in and turned off the light and mouthed, "Get out." I nodded and continued on my way out but he stopped me by grabbing my arm, noting the large envelope in my hand. "What are you doing?"

"I'll put it back," I said. "But I need answers."

"No," he said. "I can't let  you do this. It's too dangerous. If Theodore finds out you were in here, he'll kill you."

I didn't want to ask if he meant that figuratively or literally, but after seeing the guns, I was too afraid to find out. He held out his hand and I gave him the envelope and sighed in defeat. "I'll put it back," he said. "Just go back to your suite before anyone sees  you."

"Thank you," I whispered, both disappointed that I had to give back that chunk of information but elated that I'd found out as much as I had, and that I'd had Clive's help. I would never give him up, but I hoped there was no way for Theodore to find out that he had helped me. I'd hate for him to lose his job over this, but even more important, it was good to know I had an ally.

Back in the safety of my room, I read through the medical records on my phone until Harry woke up. I had been somewhat hasty about snapping photos so I didn't have the clinic names and doctor names clearly on every shot, but I saw enough that at around age six, Harry started seeing a new doctor and he was the one who started this idea of Harry having some kind of disability. Nothing else in his history pointed to it until that time. From then on, it looked like several tests were ordered and listed, and some of the records showed different medications that were prescribed and tried with varying degrees of "success." But there wasn't much listed in terms of what kinds of behavior or symptoms Harry was displaying at home so I had no idea if Theodore had been making these things up, even back then.

"Hey Jules," Harry's groggy morning voice startled me out of my investigation. I put my hand over my heart as it had just been jump-started into racing mode. "Oh, sorry," he said, noticing my alarm. 

"No, it's all good, Harry," I said. "Good morning." I turned off my phone and stood to hug him tightly. We lingered like that for a long time; it had been our morning ritual for a while now, an extended cuddle or hug just to greet each other for the day.

As always, we ate breakfast and embarked on our day of learning and exploring. I had to admit that, although I needed a break once in a while and I really had to plan to get out of this house more often, it was nice to have most days like this, when we could set our own pace and do whatever we wanted and it was all a learning experience. One good thing about Harry's isolation and limited experience with technology and the internet and social media was that he wasn't obsessed with electronic toys. Fun, to him, was learning something new all the time, and I took advantage of that desire to its fullest extent.

After another busy day, Harry had fallen asleep and I laid in bed, carefully examining every photo I'd taken of the medical records. I wished I'd had more time to capture them all, and to see what was in that manila envelope. But at least I had a few new pieces of information for now. I was studying Harry's six-year-old well-child sheet again and I noticed something that hadn't caught my attention before. I felt pretty stupid for not noticing before, and not really even looking, but now I was completely confused.

"What the hell?" I zoomed in on the date of the six-year-old check up and it was in March of 2003. But Harry would have only been three then. Unless...I panned all around the document and finally found it. DOB: 2-1-1997.

What the fuck was going on? I checked every other page and looked for the date of birth and every single one read February 1, 1997.

Holy shit! Harry wasn't really seventeen.

* * * * *

DUN DUN DUN! Some of you guessed it! Be prepared for a bit of a ride because it's gonna get bumpy ;)

And YES, I know that Harry's REAL BIRTHDAY in REAL LIFE is February 1, 1994, but just play along, please. It's fanfiction after all, lol ;)