If You're Gone

  “With Lizard?”

  “Well, yes, and Jones. And there were a few other odd-named kids who came and went. As he got older he started racking up a list of misdemeanors… vandalism, burglary, disturbing the peace, those types of crimes. He must have a served over a hundred community service hours by the time it was all said and done.”

  “How is it possible I never heard about any of this when it happened?” I asked. It seems like the whole town knows within minutes when someone gets a bad haircut, let alone arrested.

  “There are certain laws that protect minors from being ex-ploited by the media, and Brad’s father’s friendship with Judge Hawthorn certainly helped. We’ve been working on getting his records expunged now that he is eighteen, so he can start college with a clean slate.”

  “So it all goes away?”

  She nodded. “In theory, yes. But certain crimes are really hanging over his head in this investigation. Although he pleaded not guilty, he was tried for drug possession and grand theft auto...”

  “Wait, he stole a car?” My jaw dropped as I pictured Brad huddled under a steering wheel, frantically trying to cross wires like something out of an action movie. I tried to shake the image away.

  “He claimed he was just in the car and was not the one who had stolen it, but who knows…” her voice trailed off.

  I wanted to ask about the troubled childhood she had mentioned but stopped myself. I was afraid it would only make me seem like I knew even less about the guy I was claiming to be in love with. Why didn’t he tell me all of this? What was he protecting me from? Or protecting himself from?

  “The police have a theory that Brad has stolen a car and that is what he used to leave town,” Janice continued as she dug her fingers into her forehead.

  “But if he wanted to leave, why wouldn’t he take his own truck that's parked in your driveway?”

  “They say that would have been too easy for them to trace. If he is in a stolen vehicle they have a tougher time narrowing down the search.”

  Suddenly my mind raced back to the night of graduation. We always took Brad’s truck when we went out, yet that night he had suggested I borrow my dad’s car.

  “I can give you another lesson on driving a stick shift,” he had said.

  He let me drive to the lake, keeping his hand on mine on top of the shift and helping me navigate the grooves between gears. But on the way home he took the keys and sat in the driver’s seat without a word otherwise. I had been far too wrapped up in the mood of the evening to notice or care at the time, but now it seemed strange. Why didn’t we just take the truck? What were you trying to tell me, Brad?

  “Do they have a record of cars in the area being stolen the night Brad… disappeared?” I asked anxiously.

  “From what I understand there were no vehicles reported missing on Friday night, but there were several in the weeks prior… which is furthering their theory that his disappearance was premeditated.”

  And I certainly didn’t disprove this theory when I dropped the ‘I love you’ bomb.

  “Mrs. Lee, uh, Janice, what do you think? Where do you think he is?” I looked deep into her eyes as I asked, unsure if I even wanted her answer.

  “I think…” she swallowed. “I think you and I both know a different side of Brad than what those police reports say.”

  I nodded. Good answer.

  “But I also think,” she continued. “That Brad has a lot of secrets.”

  I wished I could argue that she was wrong; that he never kept secrets from me. Up until the past few days, I always thought Brad had made me his world and confided his innermost thoughts to me. Yet suddenly complete strangers seemed to know things about him that I had never heard or imagined. I had painted a picture of his past in my mind based on the facts he had given me, but now there were holes in the canvas. All I knew was the fairy tale version of the story that he had fabricated.

  “Lillian, I just want you to know that despite everything that has come out about Brad, we will do everything we can to find him. There's nothing any police officer can say that will convince us to stop looking for him.”

  “Thank you.” I planted the palms of my hands onto Brad’s desk and pressed them onto the cold black metal. I wanted to feel him but instead, all I felt were my palms growing sticky against the desktop. I need answers.

  ****

  The Lees and I planned informal search parties for the coming days, knowing that police involvement would be minimal, and sought out news coverage. But Brad’s face only ran once on the four o’clock news-with a thirty-second spot requesting if anyone had seen him to call the local police department. They received several calls, mostly mistaken identity or pranks, but there was minimal follow-up. If he had been a young child or a beautiful girl he would have undoubtedly been more important to the media. But to them, he was just another eighteen-year-old runaway with a dodgy past. It didn’t matter to the media who he really was, or what he was leaving behind.

  I spent the first two weeks of my summer vacation searching for Brad, in woods, ditches, creeks and along the side of the interstate. Our initial search parties were huge, with over one hundred people turning out to ‘help bring him home’. But as the days went on and we found nothing but broken bottles and crumpled fast food bags, the numbers grew less and less. I didn’t know what we were even looking for. I never expected to find Brad lying in a field or a drainage ditch, but it felt like we were supposed to check.

  The Lees poured over Brad’s cell phone records, only to discover there had been no calls made to mysterious numbers and no ‘pings’ on local towers from the night he disappeared because his battery had been dead. A call to the bank informed them that the debit card he carried in his wallet hadn’t been used since the day before graduation, and no large sums of money had been withdrawn. Another dead end. We were going through the motions, following all the suggestions you can find on the Internet for how to locate your missing loved one, but it seemed forced. And it became exhausting.

  Pastor Allen’s wife organized a prayer meeting one Tuesday morning and a few dozen people from town showed up to hold hands and share their prayers for Brad. I had trouble finding the words to say when the person next to me squeezed my fingers, signaling my turn to speak. I had prayed every day, or attempted to, but my words constantly turned to frustration and then into anger. How could you let this happen to him-to me? How many times will I pray this same prayer, asking for Brad to be found, without resolution? The weight on my chest became a barrier between my thoughts and my prayers; I was angry with God. As much as I wanted to believe that I would ask and receive, I was no longer convinced. I didn’t feel like He was listening, much like the rest of the town.

  The posters baked in the summer sun, causing the glimmer in Brad’s deep blue eyes to fade away. He was truly becoming just another face on a missing poster; one you glance at when you enter the grocery store or the post office but never bother to study the information or care who that person is, or was. The Lees created a social media page for Brad that was updated frequently in the beginning, notifying the town of upcoming searches and possible sightings. They posted a video they had made, along with young Montana, assuring him they loved him no matter what kind of trouble he may be in and that they just wanted him to come home. I was tempted to make my own video, hoping that if he saw my face and heard me saying how much I loved and missed him that somehow he would find his way back home. But I quickly realized that if he was somewhere he could search the web and watch viral videos, it meant his absence was likely intentional and nothing I said was going to matter.

  As the weeks without Brad went on, my energy and stamina continued to drain until I felt completely lost. The search parties dwindled to one search every few days, and the people around me began to resume life as usual. Anna and Thomas planned trips to the lake with our group of friends and I would hear them laughing and shouting as they drove by my house with the windows down, enjoying the summer breeze. I was alway
s invited, but after awhile it became more of a formality than an actual invitation. They knew I wouldn’t come. I couldn’t go on as though Brad had just never existed, and I wouldn't allow myself to spend an afternoon with our friends in the sun if he wasn’t there.

  Every time a smile tried to creep to the corners of my mouth I told myself I was betraying him. My heart hurt, like another brick was strapped to my chest for every day, or every hour, he was gone.

  I saw him everywhere. His face appeared on the body of any blond-haired boy or man I passed in the street. I was tempted to grab the shoulder of every male I walked behind and spin him around to examine his face; to search for any sign of Brad behind the eyes. Every time I fell asleep he was there in my dreams. Sometimes I was reliving our date at the lake and in other dreams I screamed as I watched his decomposing body being pulled from the water by a large crane. In one nightmare he was walking through the hallway at school and when I called his name he turned towards me and yelled, “Leave me alone, Lillian. I don’t love you.” All I wanted to do was lay in bed, yet I didn’t want to fall asleep. I was treading emotional water, exhausted but unable to relax for fear I would drown.

  When it came time for our annual family vacation in Florida, I refused to take the trip. Mom was hurt, Dad was angry, and I was a mess. I had already skipped the Honors Choir retreat in the Blue Ridge Mountains, insisting I couldn’t bear the thought of leaving town in case he was found, and this time was no different. They let me stay with Anna after much debating and yelling back and forth, but soon after they left I realized I felt more alone than ever.

  Anna spent nights on the phone with Thomas, whispering once she thought I fell asleep. I let her talk me into going to a Fourth of July party at Mandy’s, desperate to appear normal again, but regretted the decision the moment I arrived. I could feel people watching me as I sat huddled on the front steps of Mandy’s house, clutching my phone and waiting for Anna to give me a ride. My classmates whispered about me between blasts from fireworks, thinking I couldn’t hear them but their voices carried through the night breeze.

  “What’s her deal?”

  “Wow, she looks terrible. Maybe Brad took one look at her and ran away.”

  “I don’t know what he ever saw in her, anyway. He was way too hot for her!”

  “That’s what she gets for dating a convict…”

  “Stop it, you guys,” a girl from my choir class hissed. “I feel so bad for her.”

  I didn’t want to cry in front of them, but my eyes that had been dry for weeks suddenly filled with tears. I dropped my face into my hands.

  “You okay?”

  Sniffling, I looked up to see a brown-haired boy standing a few feet away.

  “Sorry, dumb question,” he sat beside me on the step. “Clearly you’re not okay.”

  I quickly wiped the tears from under my eyes with the tips of my fingers. “I’m fine.”

  “Do you want to talk about it?”

  There was a sudden boom as fireworks lit up the yard. His eyes caught the flicker of light and my heart dropped. They were sad eyes, attempting to hide behind the dark strands of hair that fell in his face, but they were blue. Brad blue.

  “No,” I said over the crackle of the fireworks. “I really don’t. Sorry.”

  He stood up and brushed off the back of his ripped jeans with his hand. “No need to be sorry.”

  “Wait,” I said as he turned to leave. “I know you.”

  “You do?” He stopped in his tracks.

  “You were at my house… the night of the first search party. I saw you in my yard.”

  “Oh.” He nodded. “Right. I hope it's okay I was there. I just wanted to help.”

  The corners of my mouth turned up in a small smirk. “Seems to be your theme.”

  “At least I’m good for something,” he said as he smiled. His eyes lit up again and I had to look away. “I’ll see you around.”

  “Yeah.” I bit at my thumbnail. “See ya.”

  My face grew warm as he walked away and I batted my eyelashes through oncoming teardrops. There was always something that reminded me of Brad. As the tears streamed faster I realized I was no longer breaking down. I was officially broken.

  6. Bring Me Back to Life

  It had been three months and thirteen days, but it might as well have been years, or centuries even. Thousands of posters were distributed and just as many hours were spent searching to no avail. I had grown numb. The only thing I could feel was a constant, throbbing pain in my heart, intermixed with bouts of anger and denial.

  Despite what everyone said, no one understood what losing Brad was like. People can only understand things they have experienced, and sometimes not even then. A break-up, a divorce, even death; the pain of these events had been experienced by practically everyone around me. But no one understood the way it felt not knowing. I needed answers. I needed resolution. I needed closure. No matter what the truth was.

  I forced myself out of bed and planted my feet on the cool wood floor. I had been dreading this day for weeks. For my friends, senior year meant being one step closer to freedom. But for me, it meant walking the halls as ‘that girl who dated the missing guy’. That girl who completely let herself go. That girl who lied to the police. I couldn’t wait to see what superlative I received in the yearbook.

  I glanced at the stack of sheet music that sat in the corner of my room, collecting dust along with my untouched acoustic guitar. Singing had been one of my favorite past times since I was young, and I had become a strong vocalist over the past few years. Yet now, ever since the morning after graduation, the thought of opening my mouth in song made me cringe. Getting out of choir practice at church had been easy-I simply stopped showing up and no one asked questions. But avoiding music in school was going to be a different story. I didn’t know what would come out if I tried to sing again, and I was doomed to find out in third period Honors Choir.

  As I brushed my teeth, I could smell Mom’s buttermilk pancakes sizzling on the griddle, accompanied by bacon being fried. As usual, I wasn’t hungry. Outside my door, Graham and Eliza tore down the hallway to the kitchen. I wondered how they always had so much energy in the morning. I couldn’t remember the last time I had that kind of childlike enthusiasm. I pulled on a pair of capris from off of the floor and thumbed through my closet for a top to wear, landing thoughtlessly on a flannel button-down. One arm at a time, one button at a time. Brad’s ring still hung on the chain around my neck, but I tucked it inside the collar of the shirt.

  I took a long look in the mirror. I had tan lines from days of searching in the noon sun, yet my skin had never been so dull and lifeless. I secretly hoped that people would see right through me, like a translucent being that no one bothered to notice. As I stared at my reflection, I tried to tell myself to shake the negativity. This was my senior year, focusing in on the event that my friends and I had been looking forward to since the first day of freshman orientation. Why can’t I just be excited? I had known I'd be entering this year alone as Brad would be at college. But the type of alone I was feeling was nothing that I could have prepared for.

  “Dear Lord,” I whispered, squeezing my eyelids shut. “Please find him. Help me. Save me. Anything…” I shook my head. It was useless.

  Crouched on the floor, I fished around with one hand under my bed for my book bag. I stretched my arm farther and the tips of my fingers brushed the wooden box I had stored beneath the bed frame months ago, attempting to forget it was there. Deep breath in, deep breath out. My fingers lingered for a moment, and before I could stop myself I was pulling the small treasure chest from its hiding place. It was perfectly made, carved from a log of driftwood Brad had smuggled back from our trip to Topsail Island over spring break. The letters ‘L&B’ were burned into the top of the box. I allowed my fingers to trace the indentions as I had many times since May seventeenth.

  With a deep breath, I lifted the corners of the lid and set it on the floor beside me. I stared at th
e folded love notes, candid photos and ticket stubs I had carefully preserved over the course of the six months I had spent with Brad. The dried corsage from my junior prom lay across the top and dozens of tiny dead buds were scattered amongst the contents. These once sentimental, romantic reminders now seemed like the Cliff Notes of our tainted relationship, housed in a small, dark, wooden coffin. Maybe I should bury it.

  “Lillian! Breakfast!” Mom’s call echoed through the hall.

  I shoved the box back to its hiding place and gathered my notebooks into my arms. As I rose to my feet I glanced out the window for any sign of Anna’s blue compact car coming to take me to school. I could easily predict how the morning’s conversation with my parents would play out; I knew I'd need a quick getaway.

  I crept down the hallway and slipped into the kitchen behind my mother who was bent over the sink, up to her elbow in soapsuds. But I wasn’t stealthy enough, and she quickly turned her head towards me.

  “Well good morning, Senior!” she said, wiping her hands on a towel that sat on the countertop beside her.

  “Good morning,” I groaned, hovering in the doorway.

  “Come on, have a seat. I’ve got a whole stack of pancakes waiting for you.” She pulled a chair away from the round table in the middle of the room and motioned towards it emphatically. Graham and Eliza sat across from each other, shoveling forkfuls of syrup-covered pancakes into their mouths.

  “Thanks, Mom. But I’m really not hungry,” I insisted.

  “Oh Lillian, sit down. You’ve got to eat something, you look terrible.”

  “Well, thanks,” I said flatly as I sunk into a chair.

  “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean it like that.” She dropped three pancakes onto my plate as she spoke and drizzled them in a honey colored syrup. “You just look so nice when you have some makeup on, and I love how you used to do your hair.”

  I grunted, thinking back to the time when I was thirteen and she made me wash off my mascara before I was allowed to leave the house. I wish I could be thirteen again.