the Missing open in front of him.
Three small pictures on the screen have the mottled blue backgrounds and strained smiles of school photos. They have “missing” dates and cities attached.
One day these kids were posing for a photographer, having greasy school lunch pizza, getting scraped knees on the playground. Now they’re gone.
How would we know where to find a girl from Greeley, Colorado?
And how would anyone else know how to find Dylan?
“Time to call the hotline,” Michael murmurs, and picks up his phone.
From my end of the conversation, it’s clear the person on the other end is well trained in reassurance and warmth. Michael repeats, “Yes, exactly,” and “We’re very worried,” and keeps pinching the bridge of his nose.
He lets go of his nose long enough to grab a narrow spiral notebook out of his desk drawer and starts writing in pencil. But he shoots me a look, shaking his head slowly. I walk around him to look at what he’s writing. There are things that we’ve already done, like break into his computer, search his room, call his friends. There are things the police already said they cannot do for us. We can’t use GPS to track down his cell, because he didn’t take it.
Michael has written, Missing poster—(like for lost cat?!).
Now Michael is nodding as if the other person can see him. He seems to be holding his breath.
He drops the pencil and crumples down to the desk, putting his head on his arms. He lets the phone receiver roll out of his hand.
I wrap my arms around him, feeling his body heave with the effort of holding everything in. This close I can hear the woman on the phone saying, “Hello? Mr. Turner? Are you there? Hello?”
Chapter 20
Michael
Casey doesn’t understand that her attempt at soothing me is making this worse. I don’t want soothing, I want answers. Action. Results.
I swallow hard, exhale, shake off Casey like a dog shaking off the rain and pick up the phone again, finishing up my conversation with the well-meaning woman on the other end who won’t stop expressing sympathy.
The phone rings again. It’s not a hopeful sound anymore.
“Hello.”
“Are you the father of Dylan Turner?”
“Yes.” I sit up straight at this, my ears pricked, my hand reaching by rote for the notebook.
“Your goddamn son has run off with my daughter. I’m pressing charges on him when they find that sonofabitch.”
“My son did not coerce your daughter anywhere. In fact, we have e-mails that show this whole stunt was her idea.”
“I’ll just bet. I know what horny boys are like. He just wanted to get her alone and vulnerable, away from her parents and their strong moral values!”
My hand grips the phone so hard I might break it.
“We need to help each other. Two families looking betters the odds. And last I heard they were in Cleveland. Are you in Cleveland?”
There’s a beat of silence. I can feel the anger wafting from him and I feel it, too, both of us hurt and furious.
“Yeah.”
“Then you can put up posters. Let me send you a picture of Dylan, and you can put your daughter on the poster, too.”
He huffs into the phone. “Fine. But this isn’t done. When we find them, it sure isn’t done.”
This guy is an asshole, but I appreciate that confident “when” in that sentence.
It takes me a moment to identify that rumbling in my gut as hunger. I haven’t eaten breakfast and only picked at last night’s pizza. Not that I feel like eating—can’t help but wonder, Is Dylan eating?—but it’s something to do, once I send the picture of Dylan to Tiffany’s father.
Angel comes down the stairs with her damp hair making dark circles on her purple T-shirt. The shirt’s neck scoops low, and her collarbone juts sharply from her upper chest. As she walks into the kitchen, I notice her grab a belt loop and hike up her pants.
“Angel, have you eaten today?”
“Yes.”
“What?”
“A bagel.” She scowls as she pours more coffee.
“We’re out of bagels.”
“I don’t know, whatever. I don’t remember.”
She’s not yet gaunt, but there’s less of her than I remember.
I grit my teeth, considering. I could let it go, today. But how many times in the last weeks have I wondered about Dylan—when his stammer showed up again, when he quit inviting Casey to hear him practice—but something else came up, swept me along in the tide of everyday busywork, and I never asked? And now he’s gone.
“You have to eat something.”
Angel sighs, tosses her head. “I’m