Tony
I didn’t know if I’d slept. I didn’t feel like it; my entire body ached. My head felt like it weighed a thousand pounds, boring into my pillow.
“Are you going to get up?”
Alice was standing in my doorway, dressed for school but barefoot, one small kid foot standing on top of the other. I rolled over to my side, forced a smile I hoped didn’t look uncomfortable, and pushed myself to standing.
“Yeah, of course.”
“There’s cereal for you.”
I scooped my little sister up and balanced her on my hip. “You poured cereal?”
She shook her head. “Mommy.”
“She’s home?”
We turned the corner into the kitchen, and my mom looked over her shoulder. “I’m home. Dad too.”
I put Alice down, and she scrambled to her seat, carefully pushing an overfull bowl of Cheerios toward me. I sat. “Thanks, but I should probably get ready for—”
My mom gestured at me with her coffee mug. “Sit. Eat.”
“But—”
“You’re not going to school today.”
Alice shoved a mammoth spoonful of cereal into her mouth. “Me neither,” she said, milk dribbling down her chin.
Mom immediately wiped her up. “Don’t talk with your mouth full.”
“Why are we not going to school?”
“You’re not going to school. Dad and I aren’t going to work. We’re staying in. Taking a personal family day.” Mom smiled, but there was no joy in it.
I turned around in my chair. “Where’s Dad?”
“He just went to run an errand. He should be back any time now.” A second forced smile, then my mom immediately tried to pour more cereal in my bowl. I covered it with my hands.
“Mom, no. You’ve poured me like, half a box.” I pushed the bowl away. “I’m not even hungry. And I really can’t miss school right now.” I tried to stand, but my mom put her hands on my shoulders, gently pushing me back down.
“Not today, Tony.”
I didn’t want to go to school, but I didn’t want to stay home either. I wanted everything to be normal, for it to be three days ago, for Hope to not be missing.
No such luck.
I heard the whirl of the cameras, the clicking, before I heard the voices. It sounded like hundreds of them, yelling, getting louder when the door cracked open and my father shimmied through. A man came in behind him.
“Mr. Bellingham.”
“Tony.” Bellingham crossed the living room and clapped a hand on my shoulder, immediately reaching out to shake my mother’s hand. “Lydia.” He turned his piercing eyes to Alice. “And you must be little Alice.”
Alice shrank back in her chair, plopped another giant spoonful of Cheerios in her mouth, and stared Bellingham down.
“She’s harmless, really,” I said by way of explanation.
“Alice, why don’t you go finish that up in the living room, honey? You can watch cartoons,” my mother said.
“I want to watch cartoons with Tony.”
My father poured a cup of coffee for Mr. Bellingham and pulled out a chair at the kitchen table for him.
“Honey, Mr. Bellingham is here to talk to Mommy and Daddy and Tony. Can you give us a few minutes?”
Alice pushed out her bottom lip, freckled with Cheerios bits. “Everyone comes to see Tony.”
Mr. Bellingham’s head snapped toward me. “Who else has come to see you, son?”
Alice slid off her chair, leaving a slosh of Cheerios and milk at her spot. “Hope came to see him last night,” she announced as she left the room.
My mother, father, and Bellingham all stared at me, three intent sets of eyes—confused, intrigued, interested.
“Hope was here?” Dad asked.
“Where is she now?” Mom pulled out a chair and sat close enough to brush my shoulder. “Oh, thank God. It’s over then, right? Hope’s home, she’s safe.” Then, to me: “She’s safe, right? She’s home now?”
A lump formed in my throat as I eyed my mom. There were frown lines around her mouth I hadn’t noticed before. A deep ridge down the center of her forehead. She just looked tired.
I pressed my lips together and shook my head. “No, Ma.”
Bellingham pulled his cell phone from his jacket pocket and slid it across the table. “If it were Hope, we would know it.”
I glanced down at the picture on Bellingham’s screen. It was Everly, from the side, standing at my kitchen window. I was there too, in profile, shadowed. The headline blared: JENSEN STILL MISSING, BOYFRIEND RECEIVES NIGHT VISITOR.
My father paled. My mother’s mouth hung open just the smallest bit.
“Tony, what is this about?” my mother asked.
“When… Who is she? Did she come here?” my father added.
Bellingham didn’t look the least bit affected. He was not sweating, not a hair was out of place. “I don’t know what’s happening in the picture, but I can tell you right now that it doesn’t really matter. You’ve heard the expression, ‘A picture is worth a thousand words?’”
“Nothing. No, nothing… She just… Her name is Everly, and she was a friend of Hope’s. I don’t even know why she came over last night.” I raked a hand through my hair and felt like it was all about to fall out. “She just wanted to talk.”
“She couldn’t call?” my father snapped.
“I don’t know, Dad—”
“She comes here in the middle of the night?” My mother’s voice was strained; she kept picking up her coffee cup and setting it down again without taking a sip. “Don’t you know how this looks?”
“It wasn’t supposed to look like anything! I didn’t invite her to come over! She just showed up!”
“Tony, you need to start being honest with us.”
I felt the frustration rising, squeezing the air out of my voice. My chest felt tight. My skin felt hot. “Mr. Bellingham, you have to believe me. She just showed up. She wanted to talk about Hope. She thinks Hope is staging this whole thing.” I took a deep breath and glanced from Bellingham to my parents, looking for some shred of evidence that they believed me, that they knew I was telling the truth. “You know me. I’m not… I wouldn’t. You know who I am.”
There was an impossibly long beat where no one talked but everyone eyed me—Mom, Dad, Bellingham. Blank stares, but something deep in all of them. I felt like I was backpedaling. I felt like I needed to explain myself, but there was nothing to say.
“Guys?”
Finally, my mother reached out. Squeezed my hand. Tears rolled over her cheeks, and her lips were pressed together hard. It ripped at my heart.
Bellingham cleared his throat. “Let me first say this: Everything is going to be okay. I’m going to get you through this. I brought the headline and the picture to your attention because, Tony, you’ve got to start being really careful right now.”
“But I have nothing to do with anything. I’m not even a suspect.”
“Not officially, no.”
“Well, that should be good enough.”
I opened my mouth again, but Bellingham held up a hand. “Regardless, you need to be careful. Don’t give them any fodder for their rags. You need to be clean, Tony, pristine clean. I don’t care if you have another girlfriend or night visitors, but the public does, and the media is going to run with every little mistake or misstep you make.”
I wanted to defend myself, but I thought better of it.
“So no more talking to anyone other than me and this family unless you run it by me first, clear?”
I nodded, numb.
“We’re going to cooperate with the police. We’re going to issue a statement.”
My stomach dropped into my shoes. “A statement of what? I haven’t done anything.”
“Mr. Bellingham…” my mother started, her voice strangely high. “Is Tony actually going to be arrested?”
It took forever for Bellingham to nod his head. “If he’s not now, he’s going to be any minute. We’re going to go down to the police station in a show of good faith. Tony will be able to tell his side of the story.”
“I don’t even have a side. And I told them, like, three times already. I was talking to Hope on the phone. I heard her scream…the tires squealing… That was all. That’s everything.”
Hope’s voice reverberated back to me, sounding hollow and tinny in my own mind. The screech of the tires cut through the gnat-buzzing hum in my head.
“It wasn’t me.”
“And that’s what we’re going to be sure to tell the police. You’re going to be helpful, Tony. It’s going to be scary. They’re going to want to search your car, your room, likely even your house, Mr. and Mrs. Gardner. Now, Tony…” Bellingham’s eyes went an intense, piercing blue. “Is there anything you need to tell me before this happens?”
I thought about the websites. I thought about Hope.
“Our love is a flower that blooms…”
The peals of hyena-like laughter.
The screech of the tires.
“If there is anything that you would like me to hold for safekeeping…”
Share Location? The throbbing cursor.
“Mr. Bellingham, sir, I don’t think I like what you’re implying. Our son has nothing to hide. If he says he didn’t have anything to do with Hope’s disappearance”—my mother gasped slightly, lost her words, then seemed to regain her composure—“he didn’t.”
I thought of my laptop sitting on my desk. I thought of my search history, of Hope’s phone. I thought of the message from RIDETHEWAVE.
Gotcha.
My stomach was in knots. I stood.
“Tony, honey, you don’t look so good.”
I sprinted to the bathroom and slammed the door, sinking onto the cool linoleum. My gut continued to churn, the sick feeling creeping up the back of my neck. I was sweating so much I could feel it dripping down my back and front, dampening the waistband of my sweatpants. I crawled to the toilet and tried to throw up, but nothing came out. The water just swirled in front of my eyes.
Come clean.
I have to just come clean, to tell them everything.
Then everything will be okay.
Mr. Bellingham…
Share Location?
She deserved it.
I gripped the sides of the toilet, and my stomach recoiled.
She deserved it.
Afterward, I filled a glass of water and swished the taste of vomit out of my mouth. My mother knocked on the door. “Tony, honey, are you okay?”
Sat back onto the floor. Rolled onto my side. Let the cool of the linoleum soak through my sweatshirt. I stared at the water in my water glass.
I wasn’t okay.