If You're Gone

  “Hey! Is that what it feels like?”

  I shrugged. “Close enough.”

  “You know, there’s something I’ve been meaning to tell you,” he said after a moment.

  “Oh yeah?”

  “I saw you sing at church a few weeks ago. In the Sunday night service.”

  “You did?” I asked. “I don’t remember seeing you there.”

  “I was. And you were incredible.”

  “Incredible?” I grinned. “That’s a pretty big word.”

  “Not big enough,” he said, taking my breath away as his gaze met mine.

  We laughed and reminisced for what seemed like hours. When the fire grew dim we inched nearer to each other, trying to keep warm as the wind whipped outside the window. Every time our eyes met it felt as though it was impossible for them to be torn away. There was something about him I couldn’t believe I hadn’t noticed before.

  Before I knew it, our eyes were locked, my heart was racing, and I was short of breath. He leaned towards me and I could see the orange glow of the flames flickering in his baby blue eyes as they closed. His lips met mine so suddenly that I felt paralyzed. I closed my eyes tight and let it all soak in. I was kissing Brad Lee.

  On the Permanent Record

  I was awake when the sun crept through the window and onto the foot of my wrought iron bed. I lay still for a moment, staring into the light that illuminated the blanket covering my toes. Deep breath in, deep breath out. It had now been twenty-four hours since Brad was discovered missing. Particles of dust swam through the stream of light and I considered counting them, hoping it might take long enough and Brad would be found before I even got out of bed. Deep breath in. Twisting my body towards the bedside table, I leaned forward to check the clock. 6:24 am. Deep breath out. I tried to count the hours of sleep I had gotten that night, but couldn’t. All I could remember was lying awake trying not to dream.

  From where I lay in my bed, I saw frozen faces staring back at me. Taped to the mirror above my chest of drawers were faded photographs from the past three years of high school, with a scattered few of Anna and me in middle school-capturing my glimmering braces and greasy hair. I had once spent hours printing my favorite pictures off of my social media pages, but now I snarled at the smiling faces. What could any of us have possibly been so happy about?

  The photo of me and Brad at my junior prom was displayed in the center with heart stickers as adhesive. My waved hair was combed to one side and pinned back with a silver linen flower. The purple dress I wore that night hugged my body, accentuating my tall, thin frame and had made me feel more beautiful than ever. And then there was Brad; his blue eyes the most prominent feature of the picture. From the bottom of his black tuxedo to the tips of his shaggy blond hair, he was flawless.

  I understood why they chose the photo for his Have You Seen This Man poster; it captured the essence of Brad perfectly. But what people didn’t see when they looked at that poster was that that essence was captured when he was standing next to me. A single snip of the scissors had cut me out of that photo, just like a single moment had somehow cut Brad out of my life; out of everyone’s lives.

  My mind wandered back to the night before when we had returned from hanging posters to find Brad’s parents at odds with a uniformed officer on my front lawn. The search parties came back empty handed, thousands of posters had been given out and plastered all over the town, and we were no closer to finding Brad. I sat on the front porch and listened to the man, later identified as Detective Padron, as he stood under the lamppost in our driveway and explained his take on the situation to Mr. and Mrs. Lee.

  It was hard to make out every word he had said, but the general gist of the conversation was quite clear. Brad was eighteen, which meant he was legally considered an adult and had every right to disappear if he wanted to. There were no signs of foul play so the police department wasn't very inclined to offer much energy towards the case. The detective would put out a BOLO (meaning ‘be on the lookout’ I learned when I immediately looked it up) and question Brad’s friends and classmates as necessary, but they wouldn’t be calling the FBI or Nancy Grace.

  Give it a few days, chances are he will just come back on his own. These had been Detective Padron's parting words as he climbed into his squad car. He backed out of our driveway with the blue lights atop his car illuminated but the siren remained off. No emergency here, he must have been saying to himself as he drove into the night. Brad, who meant the world to me, our friends, and his family, seemed to be nothing more than an inconvenience to Detective Padron. Still, Mrs. Lee promised that she had insisted he talk with me the following day and he would be returning to my house to do so. I had to wonder, though, if he was coming to question me as Brad’s girlfriend, or as the last known person to have seen him.

  Glancing back to the clock I grimaced, 6:36 am. I felt as though no amount of sleep would energize me. I wished I could fall into a coma, with a note pinned to my chest that read—Do not wake unless you are Brad Lee.

  Up until now, I had always found humor in the fact that Brad’s parents had given him a first name that, when coinciding with his last name, sounded like one word. Brad Lee? Or is it Bradley? I had heard teachers call for him, questionably. But it didn’t seem funny anymore; it felt ominous. That first-name last-name guy is missing. That might have been all he was to some people, Detective Padron being one of them, but he was so much more to me.

  I pinched my eyes closed and attempted to pray, something I had tried several times in over the last two days without success. Please keep him safe. Please bring him home. Please help me understand this. Please give me strength. Why did you let this happen? Please, please, please. There it was again. Every attempt at prayer started with pleading and turned into anger. This isn’t fair. What did I do to deserve this? Please just let him be okay. Please don’t make me suffer through this for another day. Prayer wasn't supposed to sound so much like lyrics to a country song.

  I started to force myself out of bed when I instead reached for my phone and dialed Brad’s number for the umpteenth time. It only rang once. My heart skipped a beat as a woman’s voice came on the line.

  “I’m sorry, the mailbox is full and cannot accept any messages at this time,” a computerized voice informed me before ending the call.

  I couldn’t see him, I couldn’t touch him, I couldn’t speak to him, and now I couldn’t even hear his voice. Is there anything left to take from me?

  I wondered who had contributed to filling up his voicemail. On an average day, his call log would have only shown ingoing and outgoing conversations with me, a message thread with Thomas containing sarcastic remarks and sports scores, and the occasional text from Mrs. Lee about what time dinner would be ready. Now, in his absence, was the whole town attempting to show compassion? I was so sick of questions. Please, Lord, give me some answers.

  ****

  I dozed in and out until Eliza tapped me on the shoulder; her tiny frame was barely tall enough to see over the bed.

  “Mom says you need to get ready for church.” Her slight lisp made the corners of my mouth turn up in my first attempt at a smile since the previous morning.

  “Okay. Tell her I’m up.”

  She nodded and rushed out of the room, likely under instructions not to bother me. As I kicked off the blanket and placed my feet on the rug, my eyes caught the window where I had watched Brad disappear into the night. He literally disappeared in front of me. I stood up and ambled across the floor to the window as I had that night. There was a small smudge on the pane I hadn’t noticed before. I reached up to wipe it from the glass, only to realize it was on the outside. It might have been a splatter of guts from a suicidal bug or pollen dried in a raindrop from the dreary night before, or it could have been from him. Maybe a smudged fingerprint is all I have left of our last moments together. That thought made it too painful to look at.

  ****

  Later that morning I sat beside my parents in our small s
anctuary with Anna and her family in the row behind us. I felt like I was attending a funeral, maybe even my own. I was supposed to be on stage with the choir, but instead I was huddled in the fifth row, wanting to disappear into the cushioned pew.

  It had been a struggle just to dress myself, as black seemed too hopeless but a summer dress was much too carefree. I was definitely not feeling carefree. The ankle jeans and green V-neck t-shirt I had settled on weren’t making much of a statement, but I didn’t care.

  In the front row sat Mr. and Mrs. Lee, with Brad’s ten-year-old sister, Montana, between them. Montana smiled and waved to me with the tips of her fingers. I wondered if she could even comprehend what was happening. Her parents stared straight ahead, still enough to be statues. I didn’t understand why we were all sitting around instead of beginning another search. It felt as though everyone had given up on finding Brad after just one night.

  “As we close, I’d like us to take a moment to pray for one of our young members, Brad Lee,” Pastor Allen spoke from behind the pulpit. “For reasons we do not yet know, he has not contacted his friends or family since Friday evening. If anyone comes in contact with Brad, please urge him to reach out to his family. We pray that this young man is not in any danger and that he will make smart decisions...”

  He kept talking, but I didn’t want to listen. It was becoming bigger than posters, bigger than unorganized search parties wandering through the ditch in my front yard, bigger than a pre-occupied Detective Padron offering less-than-encouraging words. Our pastor was standing in front of the entire congregation and asking for their help. The members of our church who didn’t even recognize Brad when he passed them in the sanctuary would now know him as the Missing Guy. The first-name last-name missing guy. What would be next? Assemblies in the schools, candlelight vigils on the steps of city hall? Please Lord, wake me up from this dream-this nightmare.

  ****

  My father received a phone call as we were leaving the service and we rushed home to meet Detective Padron who was waiting to speak with me. His squad car was already parked in our driveway when we arrived, with the driver’s side door open. He stepped out of the car as soon as we drove past, notebook in hand. Hurry Dad, we don’t want to waste this man’s precious time.

  Within minutes, I was seated on the couch in the living room between my parents while the detective sat across from us in a chair he had yanked from our dining room table. He was middle-aged, taller than my dad and a little pudgy around the edges. His thick neck led up to a head of spiky salt and pepper hair, which matched his gray eyes. He sat tall and rested his elbows on the wooden armrests, flicking a pen between his pointer and middle fingers.

  “Now, uh, Miss White…” Detective Padron spoke my name as though he wasn’t sure what I was actually called, looking down at his notebook and then back up at me.

  “It’s Lillian,” I told him. “It’s okay if you call me that.”

  I hoped for a moment that being on a first name basis would lighten his mood; perhaps then I wouldn’t feel like a witness taking the stand against a criminal. But he nodded and continued his interrogation as if Brad was just some fugitive on the run.

  “Lillian,” he repeated. “I understand you were with Brad Lee on the evening of May sixteenth, is that correct?”

  “Yes.” Am I supposed to elaborate?

  “And can you tell me when you last saw Brad?”

  “He dropped me off at my front door at 9:59 pm.”

  The detective gave me a questioning glance.

  “I remember it was that exact time because my curfew was ten o’clock and I was making sure I wasn’t late.” Do I sound like I’m sucking up? Trying to come across like a goody-goody church girl who never misses a curfew?

  “So the last time you saw Brad he was leaving your front porch at approximately 10:00 pm?” He stressed approximately as though he wasn’t buying my curfew line.

  “Yes.”

  “And that is the last time you saw him before he was reported missing?”

  “Yes.” No. I was suddenly afraid to correct myself and tell him about Brad’s visit to my window. Even with my parents sitting on either side of me, I was overcome with a wave of panic. If I correct myself now he won’t believe anything I say. But if I don’t tell him, he will never know the difference… right?

  “Did Brad give you any indication of where he was going after he left your house?”

  “He was going home.”

  “Brad wasn’t going to any graduation parties or other festivities that night?”

  Stop using his name with that tone!

  “No, he was invited to a graduation party at Jason Hamilton’s house but he didn’t want to go.” I glanced to my left to look at my dad, my eyes felt droopy and desperate like a hound dog. He gave me a quick nod then looked back at the Detective. I was on my own.

  “Do you have any reason to think Brad would have wanted to harm himself?”

  “What? No,” I insisted, clearing my dry throat. “Not at all.”

  “To your knowledge, was Brad recently involved with any type of drugs or narcotics?” He held his pen to the paper, like it was his finger on the trigger of a gun, ready to fire.

  “No, sir.” I attempted to take a deep breath, but the air in our living room felt thick. “Brad is a good guy, he wasn’t doing anything like that...” I suddenly began rambling like a faucet of words turned on full blast. “And that’s why I just think something is really wrong. It’s not like him to not communicate with anyone, especially with me. If he was going anywhere besides home he would have told me, and he definitely wasn’t going to harm himself or to buy drugs or anything even remotely…”

  “Miss White,” Detective Padron interjected. “While I appreciate your desire to defend his character, his criminal record is telling us a different story.”

  Both of my parents shot me looks. Mom threw her hands over her mouth to hide her gasp.

  “His criminal record?” My dad asked before I could speak. His eyes were turned towards the detective but I knew the question was meant for me.

  “Yeah, Brad was involved in some harmless, childish pranks… but he never told me anything about…” I trailed off, unsure how to end the sentence. My breath was leaving my body again. This can't be happening.

  Detective Padron flipped a few pages back in his notebook. “I’m not at liberty to go into detail, but his juvenile record includes many crimes for which he was tried and found guilty. The most recent being November of…”

  I didn’t have to hear him finish. His last offense had occurred only days before our encounter in the snow. All Brad's stories about raiding refrigerators must have been a G-rated version of the past. I remembered what he said in front of the lake on Friday night, ‘You saved my life.’ But what did I save him from? A dry lump settled in the back of my throat as I rubbed his class ring between my fingers.

  “That was a long time ago,” I managed to say. “He’s changed a lot since then.”

  “I certainly understand that, during adolescence, youth go through various stages of rebellion. But my point in asking this is to understand his current state of mind. Frankly, at this time we have no reason to assume that Brad has met with foul play or danger of any type, however, a possible drug relapse may have altered his state of mind and caused him to want to leave. There is just nothing leading us to believe he left involuntarily.” A drug relapse?

  “But I’m telling you,” I insisted. “Brad doesn't do drugs. And he wouldn’t have just left voluntarily. He had a job lined up for the summer, he’s enrolled in the state college for the fall. We had made plans for the next day…” I was trailing off. It didn’t matter what I said; the detective wasn’t listening. Not to my words anyway.

  “Miss White, I’m not sure you understand…”

  “You need to talk to Lizard,” I spit out, cutting him off. “Sorry.”

  “I’m sorry, did you say Lizard? Is this a classmate of Brad’s?” He put his pen back to the
paper, ready to write.

  “Yes, uh, well no. He dropped out of school early in the year, now he has some car repair shop in an old barn off Highway Forty-one. Michael Lizardo, that’s his real name, was a friend of Brad’s before we were together. I haven’t seen him since graduation, but he was upset with Brad on Friday night about missing Jason’s party. I'm sure if you just talk to him…”

  “Ah yes, Michael Lizardo,” he said with a nod. “I’ve already spoken with him. In fact, he called the station to report that you have been harassing him.”

  I flew out of my seat. “What?”

  “Have you been calling him repeatedly in an attempt to get information about Brad’s whereabouts?”

  “No!” I shrieked. “I mean, well yes, I called him a few times. But I called everyone I know!”

  He motioned for me to sit back down, and I sunk down into the cushion between my parents. “I’m going to ask that you refrain from contacting Mr. Lizardo again.”

  I started to speak, but my mom placed her hand on my knee and gave it a squeeze.

  “You need to let me do my job,” the detective continued. “If Michael has information about Brad, it needs to come through me. I’m sure you understand.” His inflection sounded like he was asking a question but the expression on his face indicated it was, in fact, a statement.

  “Yes, sir.” I nodded, squirming in my seat. Why is he making me feel like I’m guilty of something? So I called the guy a few times, it’s not a crime. And a far cry from harassment.

  “If you can give me a little more information about your relationship with Brad.” His left eyebrow rose as he spoke, his jawbone clenching in and out as he waited for my response.

  I peered out of the corner of my eye at my father who was staring at me. To my right my mother fiddled with her wedding band, her hands clasped as she held her gaze towards the detective. I didn’t know where to start. What is he asking me? Is he asking if we are sleeping together? That’s none of his business. Even if I tell him we aren’t, he probably wouldn’t believe me. If he is convinced Brad is nothing more than a common criminal, does he think that he has hurt me in some way? Brad would never hurt me. He would never want me to hurt the way I hurt right now…