by Dahlia Adler
“Do you want me to get him?” he offers, and the nice gesture snaps me out of my weirdness.
I’m about to tell him not to bother, but I’m not exactly dying to walk through that house, let alone revisit the exact scene of…everything. “That’d be great, if you wouldn’t mind.”
He smiles briefly and heads up, and a couple of uncomfortable minutes later, Trevor’s familiar form trudges downstairs. “Just that attached to this house, huh?” He’s trying to sound like an asshole, but the rest of his face hasn’t caught up; there’s a trace of concern there, and it’s…weird.
“Why are you out there defending me?” I ask plainly, because I’m not interested in getting caught up in Trevor’s cutesy bullshit. If he’s setting me up for another fall, I need to know. There are too many people at stake in everything that happens to me now.
He exhales a sigh. “Because you were right,” he says, scratching the back of his neck. “I was a dick and you deserved better than that. You happy now?”
“I’m…shocked, actually. I mean, you’re right, but—”
“Don’t push it,” he snaps, but there’s no fire behind it. His shoulders even slump a little, a pose I have never, ever seen on Trevor Matlin. “Look,” he says, softer now. “I really am sorry. I didn’t know what to do that night. Everything went fucking crazy, and Sophie was going nuts, and you were…I didn’t know how to get in touch with you after that.”
“You lost my number?” I ask wryly.
“Not…I don’t mean literally. We weren’t exactly friends, Lizzie. Our texts weren’t the ‘come weep on my shoulder’ type.”
I can’t really argue with that. The truth is, Trevor was an asshole, but so was I. I like to think I’d have been a better person if the situations were reversed, but I honestly have no clue. I only know that I’d be better now, because someone was better to me, and I see how much it matters. “Well, I appreciate it now, anyway,” I say finally. “I don’t know if it’s doing anything, but it was nice to see.”
He nods, and it’s obvious we’re both pretty uncomfortable with and embarrassed by this conversation. I feel about two minutes past my welcome. So I’m surprised when he speaks up again. “I don’t know what’s gonna happen, but if you need me as an alibi for whatever Sophie says…I owe you one.”
“Actually….” I take a deep breath. “I might need more from you than that.”
He crosses his arms. “Such as?”
I can’t believe how many times I’m being forced to have this conversation. The mere fact that this recording existed without my knowledge for almost two months feels so violating I want to hurl. “I need you to get Sophie out of her house, now, and then I need you to destroy something on her computer. A video.”
Trev quirks an eyebrow. “A video. Of you fucking this professor guy? Seriously?”
I choose not to correct the finer points. “I swear it’s the last thing I’ll ever ask of you, Trevor. And like you said—you owe me. You fucked up my car, for Christ’s sake.”
“That’s wasn’t—” He sighs. “I can’t make any promises, okay? I’ll try.”
“Thank you,” I say, because it’s really all I can. “You know I wouldn’t ask if I weren’t desperate. She’s threatening to send it to my social worker and my professor and….” I am definitely sharing too much information with someone I trust very little. “Please, Trev.”
He nods, once, and I’m relieved to see that somewhere in there is the Trevor Matlin I actually used to have fun with on occasion. I rise up on my toes and give him a peck on the cheek.
When I walk out, I don’t look back.
Well, that was a tremendous fucking failure of a day. I suppose I should be grateful I kept my dress on that night. Having my tits on the internet really would be the icing on top of today’s shit cake.
At least there’s no yelling or crying coming from the other side of my apartment’s door. I desperately need to study for my Stats final, and if the boys are actually chill tonight, I should still have a good few hours for that, even if I make dinner. Which I probably should, given I left them alone all day without even cash for pizza.
Christ, I’m a terrible parent.
The quiet that greets me when I walk inside is welcome, but only for a minute.
Then I realize it’s unnatural.
“Ty?” I call out, glancing into their room. Empty. “Max?”
No response, and they’re not in my room, either. The bathroom door is wide open; no one inside. An icy vine of fear starts to creep its way up my spine, but I realize I’m being ridiculous. There are way too many possible explanations behind their absence for me to start freaking out right now.
I give myself five minutes to look for a note, check my texts and emails, and listen to voicemails. I call Tyler’s cell, but it just rings. I leave him as calm a message as I can, asking him to call me back, and leave a text asking the same.
Twenty minutes of no response later, though, I’m starting to panic.
Deep breaths. They’re both gone, which means they’re probably somewhere they’re both welcome, rather than at just one of their friends. Not that I know any of their friends, anyway. Max does know where Connor lives from that one time he played video games there after therapy, but there’s no chance he would’ve taken them in without calling me. I look up the numbers for all the restaurants we go to near our apartment and call, but no one’s seen them.
Then it hits me: they must’ve gone to a movie.
I laugh at myself for my overreaction when the answer was so obvious, and push aside the niggling little feeling that I still don’t know for sure. I can’t stress about made-up scenarios right now. I have too many very real, very shitty ones to deal with. And I know I should tell Connor how badly I fucked up, but I just can’t right now. It’s too much.
I settle myself down at the dining table instead, Stats book wide open, highlighter in hand, cell at my side. For an hour, I force myself to focus on problem sets and graphs, one eye on the little screen of my phone that never lights up.
Finally, I call Lauren—with the snow coming down, the boys would probably have asked for a ride rather than walking anywhere, right? When she greets me, I hear boys in the background, and my breath hitches in my throat at the hope that maybe I’ve found them after all. “How are you?” she tacks on to her hello.
Lauren always asks this. I’m tempted to answer with the truth—that I’m a complete and total mess—but we’re not friends. No one wants that truth, except for maybe Cait and Frankie.
“I’m good, thanks. I was just wondering—did Max call you, by any chance?”
She laughs. “Nope, don’t remember chatting with any seven-year-olds today, other than my own. Why?”
“No reason.” It definitely won’t do me any favors for her to realize what a shitty parent I am, especially if I want to keep up our carpool situation. “Thanks, Lauren.” I hang up before she can say anything.
I’m officially starting to worry again.
I leave another message for Ty, then grab my coat. Only as I’m sliding it on do I realize something I didn’t when I first came home and hung it up.
The coat closet is noticeably emptier than usual.
I double back to the boys’ room and throw on the light, and suddenly it’s glaring—Max’s favorite stuffed dinosaur, Ty’s little collection of Yankee caps…they’re all gone.
The boys didn’t leave for a movie.
They left. Period.
I run out to my car like a bat out of hell, clutching my phone like a lifeline, and jump into the driver’s seat. The snow is coming down harder now, and I have no idea where they could’ve gone. I try to remember if Ty’s bike was still on the patio when I left, and curse myself for being too stupid to check.
Once I’m on the road, I realize I don’t even know where I’m going. I check the movie theater, but no one recognizes the pictures I hold up on my phone. I don’t know any of their friends, and they’re obviously not at Lauren’
s. I go to every place I can think of, but other than the college bars, clubs, and restaurants they’d never go to, it’s pretty dead around Radleigh.
I have no idea what else to do.
“What the fuck, Tyler?” I scream to the inside of my car as I frantically dial him one more time, to no avail. “I spend so much time trying to keep this stupid family together, and you just—”
I break off when I realize I was about to hurl my phone at the window, and drop it onto the passenger seat instead. My throat burns from all the screaming I still want to release, though, so I do—for a good, solid minute.
I scream for my brothers, for Sophie’s shit, for Trevor putting me on her shit list in the first place, for Connor’s job, for all the finals I should be studying for, and for my parents, my parents, my parents.
And then I stop, because my throat hurts, and screaming isn’t getting me anywhere, and my brothers are still out there somewhere.
What the hell would my mother do in this situation? Or my father? How did they handle all three of us? I can’t even handle two.
They had each other, the more rational part of my brain points out. Call Connor—he’ll help you.
He will; I know that. But I’m not ready to tell him how badly I screwed up today. I can’t bear to tell him I’ve probably gone ahead and gotten him fired, and then ask for his help on top of it.
I can lie, though.
“It went surprisingly well with Sophie,” I practice saying in the quiet of the car. “She promised not to send the video, and I promised not to tell the police how she illegally obtained it. So, not to worry—everything will be fine.”
Yeah, there’s no way I can pull that off.
I pull back out into the street and drive around, my headlights bright and eyes peeled for signs of two tweens in puffy parkas. An hour passes with no sign of them, and no return call. Meanwhile, I’ve gained zero ground, the snow is making it nearly impossible to see anything at all, and I know that if the boys have indeed been roaming around this whole time, there’s no way they’re okay.
The thought of something happening to one—or both—of them chills me to the bone, and I realize I’m such an idiot, I completely forgot to check the very first place I should have: the hospital.
I yank the wheel into a U-turn instinctively, then promptly regret it as my car skids, narrowly missing two others and the divider. My heart pounds as the drivers shake their fists and give me the finger, and I right the wheel and catch my breath. Do you want to die exactly how your parents did? my brain screams at me. What the fuck is wrong with you?
My knuckles tighten on the wheel as I speed up in the direction of the hospital, and I grit my teeth and glare at the road with unblinking eyes.
Because the truth is, the answer to the second question is Everything, and the answer to the first one suddenly feels a whole lot like Maybe.
• • •
It’s a mixed bag of feelings when it turns out they’re not at the hospital, either. Obviously I’m glad they’re not hurt, but that was my last best shot. I still have no texts from Tyler, no calls, and no clue how to proceed.
Finally, I suck it up and call Connor.
He picks up on the third ring, sounding every bit as weary as this morning. “Hey. I’m guessing it didn’t go well with Sophie.”
My stomach clenches. “What makes you say that?”
“E-mail from the head of the History department. He wants to talk to me personally about whether I have a future at a school where professors are receiving pictures of their TAs in flagrante. Apparently Ozgur isn’t pissed enough for his liking.”
I close my eyes and lean against the wall of the hospital lobby. Operation Trevor was my last hope, and apparently it was a huge failure. I don’t know if he couldn’t manage to get Sophie out of her room or if he never even tried, but I should’ve known the odds of Trevor Matlin saving the day were zero to none. “Fuck. I’m sorry, Connor. This is my fault.”
“It’s—is that a siren? Where are you?”
“I’m at the hospital. I—”
“You’re what? Are you okay?”
“Sort of.” I’m suddenly exhausted beyond belief. I’d do anything for a nap in one of the uncomfortable-looking beds being rolled around. “I’m not hurt or anything, but I came here looking for the boys. They’re gone.”
“What do you mean, the boys are gone?”
“I mean they took off—no note—with a bunch of their things, and disappeared. Tyler’s not answering his cell phone, and I’ve been looking for them for hours—”
“Why the hell didn’t you call me? Jesus, Elizabeth. Sit tight. I’m coming over there, and we’ll figure this out. We’ll find them. I promise.”
God, it’s nice to have someone on my team. Though it makes me feel extra guilty that I didn’t get to fully confess about today’s events. “No point in your coming here,” I tell him, already striding outside. “They’re not here, and staff has called the three closest hospitals; no sign of them anywhere. I don’t really know what I can do now.”
“Then go back home, in case they show up. I’ll meet you at your apartment.” I can hear the jangle of his keys, one of those cute French-Canadian swears as I’m guessing he stubs his toe in his rush to leave his room. He has so much to stress about right now, and he’s shoving it all aside to help me, which is such a Connor move I don’t even know what to do with myself except fall even harder for him.
“Thank you.”
“You don’t have to thank me. I’ll see you in ten minutes.” He hangs up, and his voice lingering in my ear is the night’s first bright spot.
I really hope it isn’t its last.
• • •
He really must’ve left his room the minute I called, because he’s sitting on my living room couch when I return. I have to bite my tongue not to comment about the fact that he’s wearing an extremely un-Connor-in-public-like outfit of a hoodie and sweatpants, his appearance as disguised as humanly possible. He’s radiating paranoia, as if there are security cameras inside my apartment, too. As if there’s really any more damage they can do beyond what they’ve already done.
“Sorry, I let myself in with the extra key,” is the first thing he says. “Just seemed like a bad idea to stand outside.”
“Yeah, it’s also fucking freezing out.” I accept the quick kiss on the forehead he offers, but anxiety is radiating off both of us in waves. “They must be miserable out there. If they’re even out there.” I nibble on a thumbnail and walk over to the French doors that open to the patio.
I don’t even know how to feel about the fact that Tyler’s bike is still here.
“Where could they possibly go?” he asks, pacing the room. We run down everywhere I’ve been, and then Connor suggests calling Lauren again, asking her if she has any ideas. The thought of admitting to her that I’ve lost my own brothers makes me wanna puke, but the thought of actually losing them makes me wanna puke more.
I pull out my phone to make the call, but a knock sounds at the door, startling me into dropping it. I don’t even care. I’m so happy to hear that knock I think my heart is gonna explode. “They’re back. Oh thank fuck, they’re back.” I dash to the door and grab the knob, yanking it open. “Boys, I am gonna—”
The words die on my lips.
It isn’t the boys who are standing behind the door.
It’s the social worker.
“Hi, Elizabeth. It’s nice to see you again.”
I nod dumbly as Karen cranes her neck to look past me into the apartment, no doubt taking in an eyeful of Connor. At least we’re fully clothed. Not that it really matters at this point.
“Can I come in?”
I step back to let her in, glancing at Connor, who looks completely confused. “Connor, this is Karen, our social worker.” His eyes widen, and I narrow mine so he’ll take the hint. “Karen, this is…” There’s really no good way to introduce him. “Connor.”
“Your Teaching Assistant, corre
ct?” She raises an eyebrow and opens the folder I hadn’t realized she was holding. “Yes, I’ve been…made aware.”
Sophie. Of fucking course. Instinctively, I step away from Connor, which is such a joke. This whole thing is such a fucking joke. My brothers are missing, wandering out in the freezing-ass cold on their own, and the social worker is here for a fucking sex tape between two consenting adults that shouldn’t even exist in the first place. “Karen—”
“Where are the boys?” she asks stiffly, pasting a smile on her face that could cut glass.
“They’re with friends.” The lie is instinctive, and I pray it’s actually the truth…somehow. “We weren’t expecting a visit,” I add with a weak smile.
“I’d imagine not.” She glances at Connor. “I’d really like to speak with the boys, Elizabeth. Could you bring them home? It’s important. I’d like to talk to the three of you as a family.”
The implication that Connor is not welcome here hangs heavy in the apartment, which suddenly feels impossibly small for three adults. “Karen, maybe we could talk first. You’ve obviously heard things. And maybe…seen things?”
Her expression betrays nothing, but there’s no denial, either.
“I realize how it looks, but I assure you, it’s…not how it looks. We’re….” I sneak a look back at Connor. “The university knows. My professor knows.”
“That’s all well and good, Elizabeth, but there’s still the matter of having tween boys living in an environment where pornography is being made.”
Connor sucks in a sharp breath. “Miss…Karen. There is no one making pornography here. Yes, we got carried away somewhere we shouldn’t have, and I apologize for that, but the boys were nowhere in sight.”
“And that tape was obtained illegally,” I add. “I mean, does it look like we were filming ourselves? Someone with a vendetta against me impersonated me and then bribed a security guard for the tape. It’s not like that’s a thing we do.”
“So the boys are in an environment where someone has enough of a vendetta against you to do those things?”