When I clock out, I’m starving. All I’ve had to eat today is that scone at Starbucks, as well as some unsalable produce, which I ate over the prep sink. Half an apple with a wormhole in the other half. A chunk of watermelon too mangled to wrap in plastic. A carrot that looked like two legs and a torso. All the imperfect things no one wants to buy, as if everything has to be free of bruises and blemishes or it’s worthless.
There’s a McDonald’s just down the street. When I walk in, my mom’s old best friend, Heather, is sitting at a table for four. Her eyes slide over me, like she’s waiting for someone and I’m nothing but a vague disappointment. With a sigh, she looks back down at her phone and picks up a limp french fry from one of two half-eaten Happy Meals on the other side of the table.
After I get my order, I take the next table over so that I’m sitting with my back to her. I get out my phone and pretend to be engrossed in it, tilting my head to let my hair obscure my face.
Jason hurries in. Heather’s ex-husband. My dad’s best friend. My mom’s old crush? And just maybe a serial killer.
“You’re late,” Heather says in a flat voice.
“You can’t blame it on me, Heather. For once.” Jason slides into a seat across from her so that we’re sitting back-to-back. “I would have been here on time except I had to swing the rig wide to make a right turn, and then some idiot tried to pass me on the left. I had to cut back over so I wouldn’t hit her, and then I couldn’t make the turn. It took me forever to get through. No one would move.”
“And that made you nearly an hour late?” She bites off each word.
“Don’t you get on my case, too. The company already did. All they care about is moving freight. They’re always watching me. I know the dispatcher talks about me behind my back. Between how little they pay me and how much I have to give you, I’m basically a homeless guy living in a truck.” He pauses. “Where are the kids, anyway?”
“In the play structure. They got bored waiting for you.”
Through our connected seats, I can feel him continually shifting. “Have the cops talked to you yet?”
“I talked to Stephen two days ago, but I didn’t have anything new to tell him.”
Jason lowers his voice. “Did he ask about me?”
“He asked about everyone. But who can remember exactly what everyone was doing fourteen years ago?”
“So you didn’t tell him anything?”
“No, Jason!” Heather’s tone changes, becomes more uncertain. “What is there to tell?”
“Nothing. Forget I said anything.” He grunts. “About the only thing we know for sure is it wasn’t Terry. It could have been any of us, couldn’t it?”
“What do you mean?”
“Terry and Naomi might have taken someone with them. Some friend of theirs. Which means it would be a friend of ours.”
“Jason.” She heaves an exasperated sigh. “Can you stop being so paranoid? It wasn’t one of us. Naomi and Terry—they must have just run into some bad guy. Some crazy psycho killer out in the woods.”
“Why would a stranger kill them?” Jason asks.
“Why does a psycho kill anyone? Because that’s what they do. All I know is that no one I know would be capable of doing”—she hesitates—“that.”
“What about Rich?”
Heather lets out a surprised bark of laughter. “What would Richard have to do with it?”
“Right after Terry and Naomi went missing, I noticed Rich’s knuckles were bruised. Like he’d been fighting. And remember how he always used to wear thrift store clothes and scrounge for meals? Now he’s just like his name—rich. Everything started to change for him around the time Terry and Naomi died. You have to ask yourself why.”
“But that doesn’t make any sense. Those two didn’t have any money.”
“That’s not true,” Jason retorts. “I’ve been thinking back about what was happening then. Terry had been pulling a lot of double shifts so he could catch up on child support. I wouldn’t be surprised if he was carrying a couple of thousand that day.”
Is Jason right? Could money have been a motive after all? Or is Jason just trying to make sure no one looks too closely at him?