I’ll start this account with first thing this morning.
I wake up to someone banging on my back door. I open my eyes. The pale light of early morning is drifting through my small basement window.
Of course, I think it’s you at the door and I got to admit, I’m kind of pissed. I don’t know why you’d knock when you have a key, but it can’t be anyone else. I tug on my jean shorts and put on a bra under the tangerine T-shirt you bought me to match my hair. I wore it to bed. Yes, I admit—I was missing you, just a little bit.
More knocking. “For god’s sake, I’m coming.”
I open my bedroom door, step into the hall, and bump into a stack of magazines, which tips over, blocking the hallway. I climb over them. Seriously, if the big West Coast earthquake ever happens, I’ll be buried alive under a pile of US and People magazines.
“Jessie?” My mom is making her way down the stairs in her old pink bathrobe, gripping the railing like her knees hurt. “What’s going on?” She sounds groggy. Probably because of the sleeping pills. She looks worse than normal. Greasy hair. Dark circles under her eyes. Her tired, sagging face. I’m worried about her at the moment, not you.
“It’s okay, Mom,” I say. “Go back to sleep. I got it.”
“Okay,” she mumbles, and heads back up the stairs.
I navigate around the piles of laundry and random towers of my mom’s stuff, and finally arrive at the back door, which I swing open. Nobody’s there.
I stand with the door wide open. Really? Did you really wake me up and leave? I dig out the corners of my eyes for what you call “sleep surprises” and think about how we both get the same sick pleasure from morning crusties. You told me you love the feeling when you dig them out and they scrape against the corner of your eye, and right away, I realized that’s what I like too.
This break is really stupid. In so many ways, we’re perfect for each other. Anyway, it’s a week before graduation and we should be together. I decide to stop being so stubborn and go make up. Give you a big old wet kiss. And forget about needing some “perspective.”
I slide into my flip-flops, step out into the yard, and walk to the side gate. There’s a strong pulp-mill smell in the air, like a stew of farts, rotten eggs, and used athletic socks…and yes, plus a little sugar.
The gate squeals as I throw it open. I expect to see you walking up the incline along our house to the front lawn, but nobody’s there.
I listen for your truck. All I hear are the neighbor’s dogs going crazy, barking inside her house. Are you in your truck already? Are you going to leave, again? I take off, running up the path, my flip-flops slapping against the gravel. I catapult myself around the corner of the house, ready to throw myself at you. Only you’re not there.
Instead, I see Josh, pushing his bike past the giant tire in the middle of our lawn. The back of his white T-shirt is soaked with sweat.
What is he doing at my house at this time in the morning? Were you running with him? Did you fall? Are you hurt?
“Josh?”
He turns. Sweat is dripping down his face. His blue eyes are rimmed with red, like he’s been crying.
He pulls off his helmet. His curly blond hair is so drenched, it falls down like an air mattress without air. He runs a hand through it and swallows. “You hear from Chris yet?”
I say something like why or what.
“He’s missing,” he says, as if he’s reminding me, like that’s something I’d forget.
“Missing?” The word missing echoes inside me, reverberates against the internal walls of my body, like an empty chamber. A guy like you doesn’t go missing. You’re responsible, smart, athletic, sexy, funny, sensitive, kind—you are hundreds of words, but you are not missing.
“Didn’t Chris’s mom call?” he asks.
I shake my head.
“Chris went for a run last night around nine, and he hasn’t come home yet. His mom said she called you.”
The phone rang in the middle of the night, vibrated on my nightstand. I was still mad about how you acted at the mall, so I grabbed it and mumbled something like, “Chris, I said a week.” Then I turned it off.
I slide my phone out of my back pocket. There are two texts from Josh. And a drunken text from Steph about winning some money at poker. No text from you, but there are two calls from your home phone. Why didn’t I see that? You never would have called from your home phone at two in the morning.
I listen to the voicemail. It’s your mom. “Hi, Jessie. We’re trying to locate Chris.” Her voice is calm, not angry. “Can you call me?” She pauses, as if she’s going to say more, but then simply adds, “Thanks. Bye.”
“His mom called,” I tell Josh. “I didn’t know it was her.”
He looks away. He’s pissed. And I can’t blame him.
I call your number, but it goes straight to voicemail: “Hey. This is Chris. You know what to do.” There’s a beep.
I can count on one hand the number of times that I’ve heard that message. And that beep. You always answer. My heart flips around in my chest. My arms buzz. I feel electric, like I’m guarding at the pool, and I’m about to jump in the water for a rescue.
“Hey, Chris, can you call me? I’m worried. Josh is here, and he’s worried too. Please let us know you’re okay.” I pause. “I miss you.” I don’t say I love you because Josh is standing right there and I don’t know why, it’s dumb.
Then I send you a text: Call me!! XOXO
Josh is looking at his phone, like he just got a text.
“Who is it?” I ask.
“Tim and them. They’re out looking too.”
I wonder who “them” is. “Didn’t you have a big meet in Seattle this weekend?”
“Yeah.” He shakes his head like it doesn’t matter. “I ran the two hundred yesterday. I came home in the middle of the night, soon as I heard. I’ve been riding the trails looking for him since I got back.”
I cannot believe I’ve been sleeping this whole miserable night. “You check Matheson trail?”
“Yeah, we go there all the time.”
“How about the Pitt?” Of course, I’m thinking about how those guys from the Heights beat you up there.
“I looked everywhere, Jessie. Been riding down every friggin trail, calling his name.” He bends over and wipes his sweaty face on the bottom of his T-shirt. “There’s nothing. No sign of him anywhere.”
I have more questions, but I don’t know how much Josh knows. Did he search the ground? Was there blood? Did he look for broken branches?
“That route is only twelve miles,” I say. “He should have been home in just over an hour.”
Josh frowns. “I headed out when it was dark, but the light on my bike’s not great, maybe I missed something.”
Down the street, a truck roars. We spin around to look. We’re both hoping it’s you, but it’s not.