I was busy with the things I thought mattered then, with Marco, too distracted to see what was happening in my own house. Literally alive, they say, because of this. Because I snuck out to Marco’s when everything turned upside down.
“So? So what if they weren’t getting along? Is that really a motive for killing her? For killing two people?”
He frowns. “You know how Elliot was taking one of Will’s classes?”
“Yeah, I know that already,” I snap.
“Well, he was failing the class.”
I shake my head. I keep shaking it as I back away, out of the room. It seems like the very stupidest thing to do, the worst reason to kill someone. Over a grade? An argument? Had he been fighting with my mother about that? Elliot is smart. I can’t imagine him bringing home anything lower than a B—but so what if he was failing? Was that really a reason? That, enraged, he would hear Will come inside, go into the linen closet, where my mom kept the gun hidden, and take it?
But what was I expecting? A good reason? I can’t think of a single one.
“He wouldn’t,” I say from the hall.
“Except, Kennedy…” Joe trails off, not needing to say the rest.
The gun, the residue, the blood, Elliot running from the scene. I am testifying as a witness. The police have no doubts about what happened next.
I snuck out that night because my mom was going to a department holiday party with Will. She wore a black dress and a red scarf. I saw her readjusting it in the hallway mirror while she looked out the window, hearing the sound of Will’s car.
If I’m not home until after you’re asleep, good night, she’d said, swooping down for a quick kiss on my cheek.
Goodbye, Elliot, she called over my head. Had he responded? Did she frown?
I can’t recall it clearly. Instead, I had been counting the moments until she was gone so I could leave.
I assumed they wouldn’t be home until after midnight. And then I was held up by the storm, and Marco. I didn’t notice how late it had gotten, and I was worried she’d notice I was gone.
But she didn’t.
It was horrific, the simplicity. The police knew what time they’d left the party. They figured she’d only been home for a handful of minutes before everything went wrong.
I didn’t know Elliot had a motive, albeit a terrible one.
This trial is not going to be what I thought—a chance for me to offer another explanation. They already have the details, the reason, and I’m just providing the proof.
Back at home, my parents and Agent Lowell are speaking in the kitchen quietly. I’ve had it with the ambushes, the looks, the hopes that will inevitably be shattered again. It’s just a photo, taken two years ago. Sent to Abby, not to us. What was she supposed to do with it?
I try to sneak by them up the stairs, but the second step squeaks, the traitor, and the voices in the kitchen abruptly halt.
Agent Lowell pokes his head out of the kitchen and announces, “Nolan. We’ve been waiting for you.”
“I have finals next week. Kinda busy.” When the investigators for your brother’s case are in your own home, it’s hard to justify avoiding them. But this is the point I’ve reached. Invoking the lie that studying is currently more important than finding out what happened to my brother. If only they knew about my own search.
“Sit down.” It’s my father, then, emerging from the kitchen, and his voice is rough and unfamiliar. My mother, I can tell, has been crying. Her eyes are red and the skin is swollen underneath. She doesn’t look at me as she stands beside my father.
My father gestures to a chair in the dining room, and I drop my bag and sit, as instructed. Something about his voice keeps me silent. Something about the way they’re standing twists my stomach.
My mother does not sit. No one else sits. And there’s nothing in front of me, no picture to look at, or clothing to confirm, just three adults standing over me. I start to feel sick, claustrophobic.
“We’ve traced the email with the photo,” Agent Lowell begins. Then he stops, as if expecting me to continue for him.
“Nolan,” my father prompts.
I hold my hands up, confused. What do they want from me?
“Your father tells me you work most weekend mornings at the Battleground County Library.”
I don’t answer, because that is what I tell my father. But it’s a lie. I have been there maybe three times in my entire life. Enough to know the name and location. Enough to use it as an excuse. I pass it every day on the way to Freedom Battleground State Park.
“The IP address,” Agent Lowell continues, “was from the library.”
“What?” I push back the chair abruptly, facing them all.
My father repeats it, in case I haven’t heard. “The email to Abby’s college account with that photo of Liam. It was sent from there.”
My mouth drops open, and I’m shaking my head, desperately trying to process. “I’m sorry, and you all think I did this?”
My mother still won’t look at me. One freaking suspicious testimony, and two years later, I still can’t escape it.
The problem with a missing-person investigation is this: Everyone is under suspicion. If they were taken, it’s most likely by someone they know. A disappearance could be reported in order to cover something up, something worse. Some of those children on the wall are probably dead. I know that. This is what I’ve learned after being at the center of this house for two years.
But this is different. Liam was there, and then he was gone, along with the dog. Like he slipped from this dimension, like something took him from us. It’s not the same thing.
“It wasn’t me,” I say. “I don’t really go there. I don’t use the computer. I swear. Check the cameras.”
Agent Lowell shakes his head. “They don’t have cameras, which I’m assuming you realized.”
I feel sick. The library. I pass it every day, and someone else was sitting there, sending this picture….
“Mom, Dad, I was lying, okay? I don’t tutor. I don’t go there—”
My father reaches out to grab my arm, and his grip is too tight. It’s not kind. He’s angry. “Where did you get this picture?” he says, his voice sounding hoarse and raw.
“I didn’t,” I say, yanking my arm back.
Even Agent Lowell looks alarmed by the change in my father’s behavior.
My mother looks from him to the agent to me. There are so many levels of worry going on right now. We were all together when Liam disappeared. They should vouch for me. They know. They know.
“It’s a mistake,” I tell them. “We were all together. During the search. We looked for Liam together.”
“Listen,” Agent Lowell says, “we’re not implying anyone did anything. Only that you might know more than you’ve let on. If you sent this picture to Abby to get our attention, Nolan, you have it. Even if you didn’t take the photo, did someone send it to you, after the fact?”
“No one sent this to me,” I say, practically yelling myself. “I’ve never seen it before.”
It’s then I hear the footsteps overhead. Two men come down the steps, carrying boxes in their outstretched arms. “What…” I stand, stepping closer, until I can see into the boxes as they pass: my computer, my bag, my things.
“Dad? Mom? What did you do?”
Agent Lowell steps into my path, preventing me from getting any closer. “They didn’t do anything, Liam. It’s our job to track down anything that might help us. We’re going through your computer and electronics right now, to see if there are other copies of the photo.”
I moan. What they will find on that computer is a mapping of the park where my brother disappeared. Articles about the Jones House. The documentation of my search for the unexplained in Freedom Battleground State Park, and more. It should clear me, but I worry
it will seem like something else. Like I’m looking for something instead.
“One more thing. We need your phone,” he says, holding out his hand.
“No,” I say.
“Nolan,” my dad says. “It’s not yours. It’s ours.”
* * *
—
I have no more connection to the outside world. The bathroom fills with steam from the shower, my image disappearing in the glass. I catch a glimpse in the fog, and it’s Liam instead.
I look down at the sink and imagine him that day.
Standing in the bathroom, the drop of blood in the sink. The hiss. The razor clattering.
The tension rises, like there’s static, like something’s going to burst through this room. I keep picturing it, over and over. Like Liam is there, showing me something.
I’m cold and shaking by the time I leave the bathroom, my hair nearly dry, like I’ve lost a gap of time.
I feel like a prisoner in my own home. My things are gone. My connections to the outside world are severed. No one here wants to believe me.
I need to talk to Kennedy.
* * *
—
I’d call her, but my phone is gone. I don’t know her number by heart. At least I have my car keys. The sky is dark, and I’m only half-concentrating, and by the time I park in front of their ranch house, it’s almost ten at night.
But I’m not of sound mind to stop myself. I ring the bell, and it’s Joe who answers.
“I need to see Kennedy,” I say, but he stands firmly in my path. “I know she’s grounded. I’m sorry. Please, I need to see her.” My voice cracks on the word please.
But she’s already there, pushing Joe aside. In pajamas, hair wet and braided down her back.
Joe steps aside, and her hand is on my elbow, pulling me in.
Nolan stands in my doorway, looking terrified. There’s no other way to describe it. His eyes have gone hollow, and his skin is pale, and his hands are trembling. There’s this desperate yearning in his eyes, and I think it struck Joe as well, because he doesn’t object. This is clearly an emergency.
“Are you okay?” That’s my first thought, over anything else, but then I feel ridiculous because he’s obviously not okay.
Nolan, now in the house, seems to calm slightly. “They took my phone. I would’ve called first but they took it. They took everything.”
Joe gives me this look over Nolan’s head like he’s worried about his behavior, or what he might do, so I sit him at the table. “You’re not making any sense, Nolan. Who took everything?”
He shudders, then finally seems to realize where he is, and who is listening. “The email with the picture came from the library,” he says, lowering his voice. “The library they think I work at. They think I sent it from there.” His words are fine as razors. His eyes wide and pleading. “They took all my electronics, to check.”
“Oh.” I open the fridge to get Nolan a drink, then look at Joe, still standing in the foyer, watching us, and give him this eye signal like, he needs to leave us.
Are you sure? he mouths, and I nod. We need to trust each other, and he is. He’s trying.
“I’ll just be in my room, if you need me,” he says loudly, like he’s speaking to make sure Nolan hears.
I wait until Joe disappears down the hall, but he leaves his bedroom door wide open.
“Tell me what happened,” I say.
“They think it was me,” he whispers, and my hand shakes as I pour the can of soda into a glass in front of him. I tighten my grip so he doesn’t notice. Nolan’s on edge, coming apart. Marco’s words briefly echo in my head: Be careful. I remember him telling me about Nolan and his brother’s girlfriend. A motive. A quick zing of unease passes through me, but I shake it off.
Marco doesn’t know him. None of them do.
“They think I sent it. That I know where Liam is. What happened to him. But I don’t.”
I nod. “I know.”
He looks up, his eyes meeting mine, our faces inches apart. “Do you believe me?” he asks, and it’s so open and pleading that I think I could ruin him with one word.
“Yes,” I say, without hesitation. It isn’t about evidence, or proof, or a balance of pros and cons. It’s simpler than that. It’s Nolan, and I believe him.
Most people see something, some evidence, and then they believe. But I think maybe it’s the other way around. Maybe you believe first, and then it changes you, so you can see what else is possible.
* * *
—
Nolan stays until midnight, talking at my kitchen table. He claims he’s rarely even been to the library. I used to go plenty, meeting up with study groups in the fall. Marco and Lydia used to head there after school sometimes, and I’d join them. College kids, home for the weekend, earbuds in to block out our noise. I don’t recall ever seeing Nolan there. The library is built into a slope and set up for privacy—books with reading areas on the main level, cubbies with computers, all arranged at angles around the downstairs.
It could’ve been anyone. They’re focusing on him because they were looking at him to begin with. But I also get a chill, realizing that someone nearby sent that picture. If not Nolan, then still someone.
I haven’t realized how much time has passed until Joe comes out of his room and says, “I think it’s time to go. As long as everything’s okay.” He looks at Nolan then. “Is everything okay?”
“Yes,” Nolan says, pushing back from the table. “Sorry. I’m sorry for intruding.”
“It’s all right. Get home safe.”
I walk him to the door and we linger in the doorway, like neither of us is sure what to do now, to break the moment. And also, Joe’s watching. So I just go with my gut and weave my arms around Nolan’s shoulders, pulling him close. I can feel the sigh that escapes when his arms circle me back.
“I can email you, when I get to school tomorrow,” he says.
“Okay.”
I watch him walk all the way to his car, and I watch until the car drives down to the end of the street, just to be sure of him.
* * *
—
When I close the door, I turn around, and Joe’s there, arms crossed over his chest.
“It was an emergency,” I say.
“I know, I could tell. But, Kennedy, I heard what he said—weren’t you both just at the library together?”
I look away, remembering the lie, and his face darkens.
“I need to know, Kennedy, how you know him. I need to know what’s going on. The trust has to work both ways here.”
I fidget with the braid running down my back. This isn’t how I was planning to explain this to him. But the panic is tightening something in my chest. Something’s happening, and we’re running out of time, and if I can’t trust Joe, then who do I really have left?
“We met because of something we both found,” I say.
“I’m not following.”
“There was a signal,” I say. “On Elliot’s satellite dish.”
Joe blinks slowly, trying to process. “What are you talking about?”
“The dish, pointing out at space. Here, wait.” I race to my room and fish through my backpack for the flash drive. It’s in my hand, extended toward Joe, as I walk toward him. He hasn’t moved from his spot in the hall. “Here. It’s all here. Last weekend, I pulled a signal. Only it’s coming through where no signal should be. I’ve been trying to see if I can replicate it.”
He stares at the flash drive in my hand but doesn’t take it. “Back up a second. You’ve been by the house?”
I push the flash drive at his chest again. “Joe, you’re not listening. There’s a signal. And Nolan’s been receiving it, too.”
He doesn’t answer. I wonder if he’s debating something. If he believes me. I hold the flash
drive in my open palm, begging him to see.
“I know who he is, Kennedy.”
“What? Who?” My arm drops to my side.
“Nolan. Nolan Chandler. I know who he is, what happened to his family.”
“This has nothing to do with—”
“This has everything to do with this. Listen to yourself. Two people receiving a signal. Two people who—”
He stops talking, turning to face the window.
Quietly, I ask, “Two people who what, Joe?”
He fixes his eyes on me then, his jaw moving softly side to side. “Two people who have suffered a terrible loss, Kennedy. Two people who have endured something horrible, much younger than is fair. Two people who both want something desperately.”
My hand tightens on the flash drive, gripped in my closed fist. “What is it, exactly, that you think I want?”
He opens his mouth, then closes it again. “Well, for starters, you don’t want me to sell that house.”
I shake my head. “You think I’m lying? To keep you from selling the house?”
He runs his hand through his hair and winces. “I don’t know. I’m just saying. You don’t want to sell the house, and now there’s apparently a…” He searches for the word. “A signal? From space?” He says it like it’s impossible. Incredulous. And coming from him, it suddenly sounds that way. Like everything we’ve been doing is for nothing.
“What happened to trust, Joe?” Was it just a word, an empty promise, to keep me in line?
“It has to be earned. Look, Kennedy, I believe that you believe this, I do. But—”
“Elliot could tell us what this all means. That’s why I went to see him.”
“Kennedy!” he yells. I’ve pushed him to yelling.
“Please, Joe. Please, I know you can bring this to the college. I know there are people who can read it, who can figure out if there’s something there.”
“Kennedy, you don’t know what it’s like there, at the school right now….”
Come Find Me Page 16
