Frank could not wait for Joe to finish his shower. There was just so much he wanted to talk to Joe about. So the moment Joe returned to the bedroom they shared, he pounced.

“Joe. Why did you say ‘sorry’? You didn’t run away. I mean, it should be us saying sorry for thinking you did it. And you were gone five months, what happened?” It all poured out of Frank in a rush.

Joe looked into Frank’s questioning yet concerned eyes, and replied simply, “I ran away from home.”

“You were kidnapped!” Frank snapped back. Then realizing he lost his temper, Frank looked contrite and continued in a softer tone, “You were kidnapped, Joe. But, what happened after that? What happened during those four months? Why didn’t you come home?”

“I missed you, Joe.” Frank added in a voice thick with emotions when his brother did not immediately respond.

Joe sat down on the edge of his bed, but kept his eyes on his toes. Then he started to talk in a soft voice.

“After everything was over, I took the public bus from New York City back to Bayport…I was so excited about coming home and telling you about everything. I wanted so much for you and Mom and Dad to be proud of me…”

There was a short painful silence before Joe continued.

“Then I stopped by the ice-cream parlor for a snack before heading home. You know the place where we always go for ice-cream for ‘The Talk’…You guys were there …and I was in the alcove right next door, and I overheard …and it hurts so much, so I left...”

There was another short tortured pause. Then Joe suddenly looked straight into his face and said in a rush, “But I came back, Frank, I’m ready, and I came back!”

Joe’s eyes held a pleading look. For what, Frank could not tell. For a moment, Frank’s mind drew a blank. Then he recalled that fateful day four months back, when he and his parents went to the ice-cream parlor for a family talk. His dad was telling him about his own runaway experience as a teen. It had been a rare but eye-opening experience hearing his father opening up his heart about lessons learnt and growing pains. And Frank had said ….

“… and I had said …I agreed we shouldn’t go searching for you and that you’ll have to learn and you’d come back when you were ready,” Frank choked out. He had not meant for his brother to go off on his own and sort through his demons by himself. No. Brothers were supposed to stand by each other, support each other and help each other through the hard times.

And Frank thought bleakly, ‘What sort of a brother am I?’

A gasp sounded from the doorway, and both brothers looked up to see their parents standing there with pain-filled eyes.

<O>

Much later, the four Hardys sat facing each other on the twin beds, drinking tea and chatting. It was the reunion of 24 hours ago all over again, except this time they were talking. Fenton had told Joe of his own painful childhood experience. Joe had given a quick run-down on his time as a captive, how he and the kids made their escape, and where he was in the last four months. There were plenty of bear hugs and tears too. And they all were dumbfounded by the fact that Joe had been staying just over two hours north of where they were, working part-time for a living, and at the same time facing down his personal demons.

‘We should have been there.’ Laura thought sadly to herself. ‘My baby should not have had to go through that alone…’

‘All on his own!’ Fenton thought as he eyed his youngest with newfound respect.

Frank looked at his family around him and smiled. Things were moving back to normal. Almost. Frank knew there were still issues to settle. About what happened during that one month of Joe’s captivity – Frank had not missed the fact that Joe was now just a little touchier about personal space. And Frank knew his little brother was still holding back on something. Frank sighed – it would take a bit more time for the family to regain Joe’s trust.

Then his dad started talking again and Frank returned his attention to the family discussion.

“Joe, about your schooling, we’ll sort out your missing classes and possibility for catching up with the education department later. But I think extra work will be inevitable.” Fenton started, but then hesitated. Finally he continued. “Son, we never meant that you must match Frank’s grades. We only meant that you put in the effort to do better than borderline passes. You are smart, and you are definitely capable of doing better than that.”

“How much better than borderline passes?” Joe asked instantly, and Fenton had to bite his tongue. Laura choked on her tea, and Frank had to hide a smile.

That was so textbook Joe, always looking for a sweeter deal! Fenton had thought.

Then he saw the steady look that Joe leveled at him and realized Joe was right. How much better was better enough? His youngest had far more depth and was sharper than he had given him credit for.

Then Joe surprised them all with his next words. “Don’t worry too much about that, Dad. I did attend a semester of classes. So I probably can get some credits from there…I think.”

Joe suddenly stopped and frowned a little. “It’s a different system, so there may be some issues on the conversion of credits…”

“Which school did you attend?” Frank asked, curious.

“Red Creek Towers.” Joe said nervously.

Both his parents were floored by that, while Frank was just confused by his parents’ reaction.

“Joe.” Laura said in a soft voice. “That’s an exclusive private boarding school. How did you get in there?”

“Of course, that’s the only school in Red Creek, not counting the one in Hampton Bay,” Fenton mumbled to himself, then added for Frank’s benefit, “Most of the kids there either had European parents working in diplomatic circles or are from well-to-do Asian or European families working as expatriates here in the States. Students there work towards either the Cambridge examinations or the International Baccalaureate.”

Then Fenton added with a wry smile, “Your mom and I certainly can’t afford to send even one of you there.”

All eyes turned on Joe as they waited rather impatiently for his answer. Knowing Joe, it would be some story.

But Joe never got the chance to answer.

A gunshot shattered the quiet of the night air.

Then the lights went out, leaving the four Hardys in almost total darkness.

Then there was a piercing scream that was abruptly silenced.

OHBHBHBHBO

3 months earlier:

Mr. Pan whistled a happy tune as he drove to work. He realized he had not been this happy for a long time, and the reason was the young lad sitting next to him. It was like having his grandson alive and with him again. And he found he liked it. So he gave Joe everything he would have given to his own grandson. He knew this would be a temporary thing, but for now he would enjoy what was given to him by the heavens above.

Joe Hardy sat in the passenger seat of the Land Rover dressed in a white shirt and burgundy pants. The embroidered burgundy school blazer lay neatly folded on his lap. He looked every inch the respectable student attending one of the most exclusive schools in the area. The necktie lay on top of the blazer. Joe refused to wear it until it was absolutely necessary – at the school gates.

Mr. Pan had to laugh as he recalled how hard he had to work to persuade the lad to attend school. It was like running a cross-country marathon with a broken leg. Joe had been adamantly against it. Then he had absolutely balked at the uniforms. Pan had asked, ordered, and cajoled with little effect. Finally, he made a bet with Joe, and won. So Joe agreed to attend classes.

So Mr. Pan approached the Headmaster of Red Creek Towers and asked for a favor. It certainly helped that he was a senior teacher at the school, and had the Headmaster as his personal friend. Then he enrolled Joe for Art (Free-form), English Literature, Chinese as a 2^nd Language, the compulsory General Paper, and finally Mathematics Syllabus ‘D’.

He had noted Joe’s rather unusually low self-esteem and low confidence in his academic capability, and had carefully steered Joe towards subjects that would utilize his strengths, when discussing subject choices. He saw Joe’s ability to draw, his natural flair for languages, and had enjoyed the boy’s rather interesting perspective on movies they watched and his interpretation of the nightly news.

With exception of mathematics – there were just some things in life one had to do even if it was not liked.

Mr. Pan smiled as he drove into the school’s car park. This was Joe’s third week here at Red Creek Towers, and the feedback from his teachers had been promising indeed.

<O>

“Good work, Monsieur Joseph,” Madame Lamont praised as she looked over Joe’s sketches. “Now, if you add a little more depth here, and here, and lighten it a little there…le beaucoup d’améliorer, Oui?”

Joe visualized the results of the improvements and agreed.

“Oui! Merci!” he responded, and quickly applied the changes.

Madame Lamont gave him a quick encouraging nod and moved on to the next student.

Joe himself was surprised by how much he was enjoying his classes. He could not remember when he last enjoyed school this much. But he knew once upon a time he did.

An image of himself as a little kid standing by the door and waiting impatiently for the school bus to take him to school popped up unexpectedly.

Joe smiled rather sadly. Yes, once he looked forward to school, to meeting friends, and to learning. And somewhere along the way, in the past few years of his life, he had lost that. It seemed that in the last few weeks, he found it again. Except, he did not really know what it was that he had lost.

His ponderings were interrupted by the ringing of the bell, signaling the end of the current class and the start of the next. Joe sighed as he realized his next class was mathematics. And today’s topic was calculus. His nemesis. He slowed his pace.

“Joe-san! Konichiwa! Come, let’s hurry, we don’t want to be late for Mr. Sanjay’s class. Ikimashio!”

“Konichiwa,” Joe returned the greeting. “Let’s go.”

Shinji had been one of the first friends he made in the school. Seeing that Joe struggled with calculus, he offered to help. Unfortunately, Shinji was not a good teacher. However, he did have a great sense of humor and they had both gotten along very well.

Once in the classroom, Joe forced himself to focus on the doodles on the board and prepared himself for another grueling mental session deciphering them. It was a while before he realized the doodles weren’t so alien anymore. In fact, they were comprehensible symbols! He sat up a little straighter. Mr. Pan was right. Calculus was edible!

Joe chuckled as he recalled Mr. Pan’s reaction when he realized Joe had failed to grasp even the most basic concepts for calculus after he tried explaining for two hours. Joe was ready to give up. Instead of telling him to stop daydreaming or try harder, Pan had asked Joe to bear with him a little longer. A good teacher must be creative, he said. He had returned with a dome-shaped chocolate coated cake which he called a panotte. Half an hour and half a panotte later, Joe got his homework on differentiation done, packed and ready to be handed in the next day.

Having grasped the basics, Joe found that he could keep up with the lectures. And that was good. At the end of the class, the calculus teacher returned the assignments. Joe looked at it. 71/100. He sighed. Then he turned over and saw Mr. Sanjay’s note.

This is a big improvement from your previous assignment, Joe. Keep up the good work!

His lips curled into a smile. Then Joe realized why he was enjoying his classes …The teachers had noted his efforts. And no one had expected him to get top grades.

Suddenly he found that he could not wait to get to his next class – English Literature. Here they had allowed the students to choose their own texts. True, it had to be from a list. But he got to choose, and he could not wait to start on Gulliver’s Travels.

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Disclaimer

The Hardy Boys belong to Simon and Schuster and the Stratemeyer Foundation. The Hardy Boys Fan Fiction authors of the Hardy Detective Agency have just borrowed them for an adventure or two. The authors promise to put the boys back when they are done with them. The authors do claim copyright to the original characters in this story. Please do not borrow original characters without express permission of the authors.