by Amber Garza
“She never said anything to me. I thought she was getting good grades,” Whitney said, this entire conversation leaving her dazed. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I assumed you knew. Amelia said you did.”
“I didn’t,” she mumbled. Her head spun. It didn’t make any sense.
“Well, she couldn’t keep it from you forever. You’d figure it out soon enough when she wasn’t competing in any of the meets.”
Whitney nodded, forgetting Dan couldn’t see her. She wondered when Amelia had planned to come clean. “Amelia loves swimming. What would make her quit the team?”
“Maybe she was telling the truth. Perhaps she is struggling in school and just didn’t want to tell you.”
“Maybe,” Whitney said aloud, but she didn’t think that was it. “But then, where has she been when she was supposed to be at practice?” She’d been so busy at work lately that she hadn’t tried to track her while at practice. Didn’t think there was a point, anyway. Now she wished she had.
“She did mention to me that she had a new group of friends.”
“Group? I only know of one new friend.”
“Oh.” Dan paused. “I thought she’d said ‘friends,’ plural, but maybe not.”
Natalie poked her head into the room, her eyebrows high, her eyes speaking to Whitney from across the room. She was familiar with that expression. Natalie had information.
“Look, Dan, I gotta go,” Whitney said, her gaze never leaving Natalie’s.
“Okay. Let me know when you find Amelia.”
“I will.” After hanging up, she tucked her phone into the back pocket of her jeans and stood.
“She’s not with Dan?” Natalie asked.
Whitney shook her head. “What’s going on?”
Natalie took a few steps forward, then held up her phone, the face turned toward Whitney. “Check this out. Kayla screenshotted this from Snapchat a few weeks ago.”
Whitney squinted, moved closer. When she couldn’t get a good look, she took the phone from Natalie, inspecting the photo on the screen. It was of a good-looking guy, late teens or early twenties—it was hard to tell. At first, Whitney couldn’t figure out what this had to do with anything. But then her gaze slid over the cute guy’s shoulder and she saw her. Amelia and a boy Whitney had never seen before. Sitting on a bench, heads close together, beers in their laps. Her stomach twisted.
“Where was this taken?”
Natalie shrugged. “Kayla doesn’t know. One of her other friends posted it and Kayla screenshotted it because she thought the guy in the front of the picture was hot. Wanted to find out who he was.” Natalie smirked. “Anyway, I called her a few minutes ago and told her what was going on. And she sent me this.”
Whitney slid her thumb and forefinger apart on the screen to zoom in. “Does Kayla know who that guy is that Amelia’s with?”
“No, I was hoping you’d know him. Do you think maybe that’s why she stayed out late? ’Cause she’s hanging out with this boy?”
“Maybe. I have no idea who he is.”
“Okay. I’ll text Kayla and have her ask around. See if she can get any information on this boy.”
Something about the photo nagged at Whitney. Like a word on the tip of her tongue. There was a clue in here, but she couldn’t pinpoint it.
“Thanks.” She handed the phone back to Natalie so she could send Kayla the text. “I wonder if Amelia has any other pictures of this guy. Or maybe she follows him on social media.”
Hurrying out of the room, she made her way to the computer, and wiggled the mouse. The screen lit up, roaring to life. Whitney opened up Facebook and went to Amelia’s page. It had been months since she posted anything.
Facebook’s for old people, Amelia repeatedly said.
Still, Whitney clicked on her friends list and typed “Lauren” in the search bar. No one came up. Her stomach sank. If only she knew a last name. Next, she tried “Phil,” and then “Lopez.” No luck there either.
She scrolled through Amelia’s page, looking at all the comments, hoping to see Lauren’s face. A couple of the comments turned her stomach. Rude, on the cusp of vulgar. Why did kids talk like that? Didn’t they know their parents, employers, teachers, could see what they posted?
“You know you can block people,” Amelia once told Whitney when a guy she’d gone out on one date with wouldn’t leave her alone.
“You can?”
“Of course,” she said. “You can also hide your posts from certain people if you don’t want to completely unfriend them.”
Amelia wouldn’t hide her posts from her, would she? Whitney bit her lip, thinking about how distant her daughter had been lately. She wished she could get into Amelia’s account, rather than only seeing it from hers. Sitting up straighter, she logged out of her account.
Using Amelia’s email address as the username, she brainstormed several passcodes. In the past, Amelia always used her own name, the first letter of her last name and the number one: AmeliaC1. When that didn’t work, she tried it with a lower case c. Still locked out, she attempted to use Amelia’s birth date. But that wasn’t it either. She only had one more chance. Tenting her fingers, she thought harder. Years ago, she’d helped Amelia set up an email for school. What had her password been back then?
Ah, yes.
Swimmergirl123
Great. Now she was locked out.
Blowing out a frustrated breath, Whitney signed back into her own account. That’s when she saw Becca’s picture, and felt a modicum of hope.
With a shaky hand, she pulled out her phone and clicked on Becca’s contact information. It rang a few times before the familiar voice came on the line.
“Hello?”
“Becca, hi. It’s Whitney...uh...Amelia’s mom.”
“Oh...hi.” She paused. Whitney heard sounds in the background she couldn’t decipher—chatter, shuffling, dishes clanging, maybe. “What’s up?”
“Amelia’s not with you, is she?” Whitney held her breath, willing her to say yes.
“No,” she said. “Why?”
Whitney’s heart dipped. She glanced at Natalie, who watched intently, gnawing on her nails, brows furrowed. “She went to Lauren’s last night and hasn’t come home. She’s not answering her phone or texts.” A thought struck. “Hey, you wouldn’t happen to know Lauren’s phone number, would you?”
“Lauren who?”
“Lauren...um...” God, did she really not know Lauren’s last name? Why hadn’t she ever asked for that information?
“I promise to always keep you safe.” The baby’s large eyes stared up at her, unblinking.
Swallowing hard, she said, “I...um...I don’t know her last name. But Amelia’s been hanging out with her a lot. She’s in your grade, I think. Wait...no, probably not. She’s seventeen, so maybe one grade up. Dark hair, pale skin.”
God, that wasn’t very descriptive. A dark haired, seventeen-year-old girl described a lot of people. Probably half their school. She knew that anything extra she could add would be helpful. “Um...she wears glasses, has a few freckles on her face. She doesn’t wear very much makeup. Just sometimes a little mascara and lip gloss. Always wears her hair down.”
“I don’t know any Lauren like that at our school,” Becca said.
“Well, surely, you’ve seen Amelia with her.”
“No, I’m sorry. I haven’t.”
“Do you not see Amelia at school anymore? I mean...I know you don’t hang out as much, but surely you see each other.”
“Oh, yeah. I see her. I just haven’t seen her with anyone like that.”
“Don’t you still follow her on Instagram and Snapchat?”
She hesitated a second before answering, and when she did it sounded like a question. “Yes?”
Whitney was most familiar with Facebook, but rec
ently she’d been learning more about Instagram marketing for the business. She’d upped her postings for Nat’s Fancy Finds account, and consequently, she’d seen the photos Amelia had been sharing lately. Most of them had been with Lauren.
“Then you’ve seen the pictures of her with Lauren, right?” Switching Becca to speakerphone, Whitney went into her Instagram app and searched for Amelia’s account.
“I mean, I guess I’ve seen the pictures of her and some friend, but I didn’t know who she was.” There was a hint of bitterness and maybe jealousy in Becca’s tone.
Amelia’s page appeared, her pictures populating the screen. When they all finished loading, Whitney gasped. Every photo Amelia had posted with Lauren was gone. The last picture was of a smoothie Whitney had bought Amelia over two months ago.
“Becca, can you go into Amelia’s Instagram account?”
“Sure. I can’t get into her Finsta account, though.”
“Her what?”
“Her Finsta,” she repeated. “Um...her fake Insta. It’s like where we post stuff we don’t want like...our parents and stuff to see. Anyway, she blocked me from it.”
Heat snaked up Whitney’s spine as she stared down at Amelia’s profile picture. “What kind of stuff do you guys post on these accounts?”
“I don’t know. Just like random stuff.”
“Random stuff you don’t want your parents to see?”
“Uh...yeah.”
“What’s Amelia’s other account called?”
“Um...I think it’s her full name with her middle initial.”
Whitney typed out Amelia L. Carter, and sure enough, there she was. Her daughter. She couldn’t see anything beyond her profile picture because Becca was right, the account was private. But knowing it existed gave her a bitter taste in her mouth. She swallowed hard.
“Oh, my God,” Becca said. “Her last, like, two months of photos are missing.”
“So, you’re not seeing them either, huh?” Whitney sighed.
“Why would she delete them?” Becca spoke under her breath. It was exactly what Whitney was wondering. She had this sudden image of the three of them in Monterey last summer. Natalie had rented an Airbnb for the week, but her family could only stay for four days, so she offered the place to Whitney for the remaining three. Rarely did she allow Amelia to bring friends on vacations, mostly because Whitney couldn’t afford it. But this time it was essentially free, so Whitney let Amelia bring Becca. She figured it would give Amelia someone to do stuff with when Whitney wanted to spend the day lying on the beach and reading. Amelia and Whitney had always differed that way. For Whitney, vacation was a chance to unwind, rest. For Amelia, vacation was theme parks, swimming in the ocean, running from activity to activity.
Whitney was content to let Becca try to keep up with her on the Monterey trip. Her only concern was that she would be alone most of the time. But, actually, she wasn’t. The girls ended up spending most of each day at the beach with Whitney, only going off on their own a few times. The house was near Lover’s Point, so most mornings they trekked it down to the sand, and set up their towels. They’d read, talk, dip in the cold water when they got too warm. Then they’d head up to the little hamburger stand, grab lunch. Later in the afternoon, they’d pack up. Head down the street for ice cream.
Whitney recalled that Amelia got a horrible sunburn on their last day there. It was on the cooler side that day, so Amelia had forgotten to reapply her sunscreen. Whitney’s skin wasn’t fair like Amelia’s, so sometimes she’d forget to remind her. And usually, she didn’t need to. Being on swim team and spending much of her time near a pool, Amelia was normally really responsible about it. Then again, it was a lot warmer in Sacramento. There was no way she wouldn’t feel the warmth of the sun as it seeped into her skin.
None of them noticed Amelia’s sunburn until they’d returned to the Airbnb in the evening. But that was how sunburns were. You didn’t know you had one until it was too late. And then there was nothing you could do to fix it.
In Whitney’s experience, relationships were the exact same way.
“What happened between the two of you?” she asked Becca now.
“You’d have to ask her.”
Frustration burned through Whitney. “If I could do that, I wouldn’t be calling you, would I?”
“Sorry,” Becca mumbled. “It’s just that I don’t really know what happened with us. She just kinda pulled away from me. From our whole group, actually.” It was hard to read her tone. Becca had always had a slight edge to her voice. But underneath that, she sounded sincere, truthful. It didn’t make Whitney feel any better. She wanted a reason, and she wanted it to be Becca’s fault.
“Surely something happened. Did you get in a fight or something?”
“I mean, I guess we argued sometimes, but nothing big.”
It didn’t make sense. What was Becca hiding?
Whitney thought about her teenage self. What had she and her best friend fought about back then?
Dark eyes.
Tousled hair.
Black jacket.
A wink. An outstretched hand. Lips curled upward on one side.
Whitney shivered, thinking back to the mysterious messages in Amelia’s phone. “Do you know Phil Lopez?”
A pause, and then, “Isn’t he, like, the lead singer of the Hard Knocks?”
“Huh? No, well, I have no idea.” She didn’t even know who the Hard Knocks were. “Maybe. But I mean, is there a guy at your school with that name?”
“Not that I know of.”
“And you haven’t seen Amelia hanging out with a guy?”
It was a moment before Becca spoke again. “No. I’m sorry.”
“I have a picture of Amelia with some random guy drinking beers. If I text it to you, do you think you can let me know if he looks familiar?”
Another pause. “Sure.”
“Thanks,” Whitney said.
“Hey,” Becca said suddenly. “Now that I think about it, there is one thing that might be helpful.” Whitney sat forward, afraid to even breathe. “Right before Amelia and I stopped hanging out, she mentioned that she’d been talking to this older guy online.”
“Older guy? Like how much older?”
“She never said. I kinda thought maybe like in college or something, but I don’t know. They’d never met in real life, I don’t think. But I know some of their conversations were like...well, you know. I don’t wanna say they were sexting, but...” Whitney’s stomach rolled, moisture filling her mouth at the thought. Becca cleared her throat. “Anyway, I remember teasing her, saying she better hope she’s not being catfished or something.”
Whitney thought about the picture of Amelia with that boy. He didn’t look older, so she doubted it was the same person, but she supposed it was possible. “Do you happen to know the guy’s name or anything?”
“Um...I feel like maybe it was like initials or something,” she said, “but I’m not sure.”
“Okay, well, if you think of it, can you let me know? And let me know if you recognize the guy in the picture.”
“I will,” Becca said. “And um...can you let me know if she comes home?”
“Sure.”
“I hope you find her soon.”
“Me too.” While Whitney hung up, Natalie sat on the recliner, one eyebrow cocked. “Hey, can you send me that screenshot?” Whitney asked her. “I’m gonna shoot it off to Becca.”
Natalie did as instructed, then Whitney sent the text.
“Have you ever heard of a Finsta account?” she asked Natalie.
“Yeah, Kayla had one of those. I think most kids do.”
“Did she let you follow it?”
Natalie shook her head. “No, I think that would defeat the point of it.”
“And it didn’t bother you?”
“I mean, a little, I guess. But it is what it is.”
Whitney had no idea how Natalie could be so nonchalant about this kind of stuff. Holding up the screen of her phone, she displayed Amelia’s page. The one she was allowed to follow. “Check this out. All of her photos with Lauren are missing.”
Natalie’s eyebrows knit together. “That’s weird.”
“Really weird,” Whitney agreed.
“Have you checked her Snapchat?”
“Earlier.” Whitney went into it again. Still nothing new. “She hasn’t posted anything in the last twenty-four hours.” She paused. “At least, that I can see.” Whitney was no longer sure what Amelia was sharing with others behind Whitney’s back. “I don’t think Becca’s being honest. Says she’s never seen Amelia with Lauren in real life. I mean, they’ve been attached at the hip for weeks. She also said she’s never seen Amelia with a guy, but clearly, she’s been hanging out with one.”
Natalie’s shoulders bobbed up and down. “Well, you know kids. They have a code. No one wants to be known as a snitch.”
“True.” Whitney knew better than anyone how easy it was to lie. “But if I can’t trust Amelia’s friends, how am I gonna find her?”
“You won’t need to. I’m telling you. She’s going to walk in the door any minute.”
Whitney glanced at the front door, willing Natalie’s words to be true. “If that’s true, then why did she shut off her phone?”
“Maybe she forgot her charger.”
Whitney blinked. Amelia was forgetful. In first grade, she left her lunch at home so often that Whitney filled her account up with money and made her buy the rest of the year. And she almost flunked PE in middle school for neglecting to bring her uniform back to school after taking it home to be washed. The only thing she never forgot was her swim bag. Probably because swim team had always been a priority for her.
After going into her room, she did a quick scan of the floor, then eyed the outlets. Empty. Next, she went around to the side of the bed closest to the wall where she normally plugged in her phone. Not there either. Her heart pounded.