Vanished by Carter Quinn

Author:Carter Quinn
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Published: 2014-09-17T04:00:00+00:00

I stared hard at the phone willing it to ring or chirp or vibrate off the table, anything to let me know CJ was safe. If I didn’t get an answer to my text soon, I was going to go stark raving mad. As if daring me to lose my sanity, the damn thing lay there completely dormant.

“Henry.” It was said gently, but it had the force of a shotgun blast against my raw nerves.

I looked up at Mary Beth sitting in the chair next to Shaun’s, her SFPD uniform still incongruous with my memory of a bubbly but ultimately innocent teenager. I tried to offer a smile but the effort was too much. Between my emotional and physical exhaustion, I was lucky to be coherent at all. And CJ not answering my text message wasn’t helping anything. “I’m sorry. I zoned out for a minute.”

Mary Beth’s smile even reached her eyes. I almost envied her that ability. “It’s okay, Henry. I know this is a difficult situation for you. I just want to make sure I have everything correct here. Do you mind if I repeat some of it back to you?”

I nodded and glanced at the phone again. Still nothing. Mary Beth had been here for almost twenty minutes and I’d messaged CJ at least fifteen minutes before that. I knew he was a typical college sophomore with plenty of friends and a very active social life, but shouldn’t he be studying on a Tuesday night? If he wasn’t, then he damn well should be and I’d be sure to tell him that. He was an incredibly talented and intelligent young man, but CalArts had chewed up and spit out more than one talented and gifted person in its long and distinguished history. As soon as I thought it, I realized his summer term had already ended, so he was either working or playing. Like his dad, he did both with equal determination.

Shaun's hand closed over the phone on the table and my gaze shot to his. “I’m going to take this out back and call CJ,” he said. “Relax and concentrate on verifying the information Mary Beth has, okay?” He didn’t wait for my approval; he simply scooped up the phone and headed through the kitchen and out into the back yard. I watched him go with rising anxiety. I needed to hear my son’s voice or at least see his words on the screen before I could feel sure he was safe.

When Shaun had disappeared from sight, I turned my attention back to Mary Beth. “I’m really sorry. This whole thing has me freaked out. I don’t understand what’s going on. This isn’t my life. People don’t just disappear, do they?”

Mary Beth grimaced. “Unfortunately, sometimes they do. But let’s not worry about anyone else. Let’s make sure we find Tom and return him home safely.” She turned back pages in her memo notebook and began to recite the information I’d given her earlier. Thomas Matthew MacKinnon

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