Boy, 9, Missing

by Nic Joseph

  With my eyes still fixed on the back of the car, I dragged my fingers along the wall in search of the light switch. My fingers bumped into something cold and metal, and I turned briefly to orient myself. As I did, my foot hit something hard. It was a large trunk, a storage container nearly the size of a twin bed, and I wondered what Younger had stored in it. The noise echoed around the quiet garage. A second later, I heard a soft scuffling noise on the far side of his car, and I froze in place, peering into the darkness.

  That confirmed it.

  Younger was definitely out here.

  “You hear that?” I asked. “The cops are on their way. You’re not going to get away with this. Tell us where he is.”

  Silence.

  I turned again and searched desperately for the switch, my eyes rapidly adjusting to the shapes that protruded from the wall.

  Just a little bit of light…

  I spotted it and flipped it on. As the room illuminated, I suddenly heard a loud noise, right behind me. I whipped around, and there he was, inches from my face, his arms raised, a large object high above his head.

  We locked eyes for one second, and I could see the anger as he swung.

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  I ducked as he brought the object down on top of my head—a shovel—and I cried out as it connected with the side of my face. The pain was so intense that my entire body buckled, and I crumpled to the floor, inhaling sharply as my wrist twisted beneath my body. Younger came crashing down on top of me, and we struggled, kicking, pushing, and using every ounce of strength we had to get the upper hand.

  “What’s wrong with you?” Younger yelled into my face, and his warm, foul breath suffocated me as his saliva sprayed on my cheeks. “They let that monster get away with it. How can you defend him? He killed your brother! I saw it in his eyes that night. I knew it. I couldn’t just let that go.”

  “But why—” I tried to lift myself up, but he pushed his palm into my face. “Why take Matthew—”

  He drew back and swung again, and I turned my head to the side. His blow landed on the point where my left cheekbone met my ear, and my eyes rolled back in my head as pain shot through my entire body.

  “You’re the worst kind, you know that?” he sneered, and as I peered up in his face, I could see his eyes were wild. “You should be thankful for what I’ve done. I finally figured out how to get to Sam Farr, how to get him back for what he did all those years ago. You should be grateful for what I did for you!”

  I yanked my right arm free and pushed my hand into his face, using my fingernails to scratch at his skin, and he cried out as I rolled him off me. My head was spinning, but I pulled myself toward him, and then I was punching, in every direction, hoping to connect with something. But he was stronger—much stronger—and in one quick motion, he flung me backward. I fell again, my head hitting the leg of a workbench.

  Something heavy fell from the bench and rolled onto the floor. I blinked as I breathed in and tried to pull myself up. Not a foot away from me, I caught sight of the hammer that had just fallen.

  Younger raised himself and crawled toward me, grabbing a long garden spade that had fallen as he did. Reaching back, he aimed it straight for my face. I struggled to breathe, and to think.

  Do something, Francis.

  As he swung, I quickly rolled to my left and out of the way, and his body weight carried him down. The spade connected with the floor where I’d been only a second before. My fingers curled around the base of the hammer. Without giving myself time to think, I spun back, and with a guttural roar that contained all of the fear, anger, and self-loathing that had been trapped inside of me for the past two days, I swung. Hard.

  And missed.

  The sound of the hammer hitting the concrete echoed through my head and body, and I slumped forward. I knew the miss would cost me. Suddenly, I was moving, and not on my own. Younger was dragging me along the cold concrete. He knocked into something, and then he was pushing me, lifting me, and tugging me, propelling my body into a small space I couldn’t quite identify—

  The trunk.

  When I realized what was about to happen, I lost every ounce of my ability to fight, and my instincts took over. I was kicking now, not smartly, but recklessly. The position was too awkward, my body too weak, my fear too strong. He kicked me one final time, and I fell backward, my body slumping farther into the trunk.

  Before I could push myself up again, I heard a loud noise, and then the heavy steel lid came crashing down on my head. The lock was engaged.

  Click.

  If I’d thought it was dark before, I’d been mistaken. I blinked a few times as the horror of what was happening washed over me, and everything faded away.

  • • •

  When I opened my eyes again, I was in a box.

  In those first few seconds, before I realized what was going on, I was relatively okay, and I lay there, my arm twisted miserably beneath my body, maybe broken, my knees scrunched up toward my chest. In those first few seconds, I was blissfully ignorant, unaware of the horror I was about to face.

  I moved only slightly and felt the wall of the trunk on one side of me, and I gasped, pulling in a deep and shuddering breath and knocking my head against the bottom of the trunk.

  The trunk.

  I was in a fucking trunk.

  The memories of the last few moments flooded back, and I yelled out loud, a vicious, terrified cry of shock and horror as the seemingly impossible manifested itself around me within seconds. The weight of it hit me all at once, and I felt as if my entire body would explode. My body began to shut down, and I could think of nothing besides the burning need to be free, and to take a full, exposed breath of fresh air.

  I began to kick and flail, even though I knew it was wrong, knew it was futile, knew it wasn’t going to help me. The box couldn’t have been more than five feet long. The pain suddenly kicked in in my trapped arm, and I cried out, desperate to discover what was wrong with it.

  “Let me out!” I finally screamed, finding a voice I knew was both wasted and useless.

  Take a deep breath.

  I needed to stop kicking. I was exerting too much energy and using up the little air I had in the trunk. And suddenly, I could visualize them, every single molecule of air, and I knew I was using them up with every breath.

  Stop it.

  I allowed myself one deep, calming breath and tried to think as rationally as I could. Kicking wasn’t going to get me out of the box. Nothing would. This was it. I was going to die here in this lunatic’s garage while Matthew could be—

  Stop, Francis. Think.

  I visualized my entire body, imagining every single button and zipper on my clothing—anything that might be helpful in my escape. My shirt was cotton; my shoelaces, useless; my—

  The photos.

  I gasped as it hit me, the small stack of wallet-size photos I’d taken from home that morning. The ones of Sam and Matthew Farr that my father had hidden in his cabin. It wasn’t the pictures themselves that made me pause.

  It was the paper clip holding them together.

  The paper clip.

  With my free arm, I twisted and reached toward the pants pocket where I’d stuck the photos. I cried out at the pain that surged through the arm tucked beneath me, and I feared I would have to stop because it was so intense. But stopping wasn’t an option. I used the very tips of my fingers to slide the paper-clipped photos out of my pocket. Holding on to the clip only, I shook the stack of photos, letting them fall free, until only the thin piece of metal remained in my hand.

  I used my fingers to unbend it and ran my thumb across the pointy tip of the paper clip. This was my only chance, and it wasn’t a great one. The problem was, the hand that held the paper clip was nowhere near the front of the trunk. If I wanted to reach it, I was going to have to find a way to flip almost 18
0 degrees so my left arm was aligned with the front of it—where I thought the latch must be. Or, I could toss the paper clip to the front of the trunk and hope I’d find it with my other hand.

  Too risky.

  I decided to roll onto my face and let my arm swing over to reach it. As I did, searing pain roared through my body, and my arm began to shake violently. I pushed on, turning myself until my left arm was lined up with the opening to the trunk. Groaning loudly, I reached up with the open paper clip and felt around in the darkness. There had to be an opening somewhere.

  I dragged the paper clip from one side of the box to the other, waiting for it to slip in an opening. It did, quickly, and I almost cried out, but it took only a second for me to realize it was simply a corner of the box. The paper clip hooked on to something I couldn’t see, and I yanked, but it wouldn’t budge.

  Damn.

  I pulled again, and this time, it clattered from my fingers into the bottom of the trunk.

  My heart sank, and I clawed blindly for the paper clip, but my fingers connected with nothing but dust. I took a deep breath. I needed to find it; it was my only chance. I needed to calm down. More than that, I needed to count.

  One.

  Two.

  Three.

  But it wasn’t working, and the painful absurdity of it brought tears to my eyes, which in turn shifted to something else. Something like—

  Laughter. The first laugh escaped my body, and I knew instantly that I was losing it, going crazy, getting hysterical, but I couldn’t hold it back. I really was going to die in the box. Alone, crazy, and laughing. Many times, in my nightmares, I’d imagined such a death, but now that it was here…

  Another laugh escaped, and I didn’t try to stop it as it rolled out of me. I let the giggles and the tears flow from my body and pushed on, using my hand to scrape the bottom of the trunk. I was piling the dust into the corners, and it only took about three swipes for my fingers to snag on something sharp.

  The paper clip!

  Fumbling to pick it up, I moved my hand toward the front of the trunk. I held the clip tightly in my fingers, feeling the small piece of sharp metal as it cut into my skin. But I couldn’t afford to drop it again. I dragged it in a straight line across the front, waiting for an opening. Nothing.

  My mind was racing as I moved the paper clip in all directions, searching for the lock. For many years, I’d thought if I could just force myself to be put in a confined space for ten minutes—maybe even five—I would get over it and be cured for the rest of my life. But the fear had been so terrifying that I could never go through with it. Now, here I was in that very situation, and I was almost positive it was making things worse, not better.

  I ran the paper clip across the trunk again, and this time, it slid into a space that was different than the first one.

  This wasn’t a corner.

  The lock!

  I placed the thin metal into the hole and moved it around wildly at first, and then more carefully. I spun the paper clip in slow, deliberate circles to the left, using my finger to steady it. When it pressed against something firm, I knew it was the lock mechanism. I pushed with all my strength. The paper clip began to bend, and I groaned, trying to support it with my finger. I was pushing my finger through the lock as far as it would go, and the metal was cutting into my skin.

  The paper clip continued to bend, and I knew if it bent any farther, it would be completely useless. I just needed a bit more strength and—

  Click.

  I paused, not daring to get too hopeful, then pulled the paper clip out of the hole.

  Please.

  Taking a deep breath, I pushed hard against the lid of the trunk, and it lifted about two inches before falling back down on top of me.

  It was enough to give me hope.

  The trunk was unlocked.

  I pushed again and slipped my hand through the opening.

  Reaching as far as I could, I used my fingers to finish opening the latch and then braced myself before pushing up again. The lid to the trunk flew backward, landing with a clang against the garage wall.

  It took all of my strength, but I pulled myself over the side of the trunk, collapsing onto the filthy floor, drinking in gulps of the stale air as if it were fresh, pure mountain air. I lay there with my cheek on the cold floor, waiting for the nausea to subside and the room to stop spinning.

  I heard a noise above me, and I looked up quickly, my heart pounding again.

  In the dim garage light, I could see a figure sitting down about ten feet away from me.

  I squinted as I pulled myself up.

  Christine.

  Her arms were bound behind her body, and her mouth was covered with tape. I walked over to her, pulling the tape off her mouth.

  “Where is he?” I whispered.

  “I don’t know,” she said, gasping for breath. “I heard the police cars. I heard them come in. But I think they left!”

  “Damn it. He probably found a way to get rid of them,” I said. “That son of a bitch. How long ago was that?”

  “Just a few minutes,” she said. “That means—”

  “He’ll be back in a minute.”

  “What are we going to do?”

  I walked quickly over to the tools and picked up a pair of gardening scissors. I cut her free, but as she began to stand, I put my hand on her shoulder.

  “What?” she said.

  I wrapped the ropes loosely around her arms. “Stay here,” I said. “When he comes back, I want you to run on my signal, okay?”

  She blinked and then nodded. Placing the tape back over her mouth, I walked over to the trunk and closed it, locking it. I picked up the hammer from where I’d dropped it earlier and then stepped around the car and crouched, my heart pounding in my chest.

  And then, we waited.

  Five minutes passed, then ten. I heard scraping on the other side of the car as Christine got settled. She could get free if she needed to; I just hoped she could manage to stay still until he came back.

  Moments later, I heard her gasp as the sound of footsteps approached. They were loud and confident, and I wrapped my fingers around the handle of the hammer.

  Here we go.

  The garage door opened, and the footsteps approached.

  “They’re gone,” Younger said to Christine. “You stupid bitch. I don’t know what you thought you were doing.”

  I took a deep breath as he walked across the room, closer to the trunk.

  “Now what the hell am I going to do with you two?”

  I leaned around the car and watched as he bent toward the trunk, unlocking it in one swift motion.

  Now.

  As he flung open the lid, he staggered back, an expression of shock on his face. As he spun toward Christine, I charged.

  I knocked him back into the workbench, and we both went down. “Go!” I yelled at Christine, and she flung the ropes off her wrists and raced into the house, I hoped to find a phone.

  The hammer was still in my hand, but I couldn’t find the opportunity to swing. I kept my head low and pushed with my free hand, searching for my opportunity. I couldn’t miss again. He scrambled back, reaching behind him presumably to find a weapon, but I had the upper hand. When he turned to reach toward a long metal pipe, I took my chance.

  Swinging back, I let the hammer fly toward his head.

  This time, I hit my mark.

  The thud of the hammer hitting Younger was sickening. He let out a loud, anguished cry and then collapsed forward. I moved back, letting the hammer drop from my fingers.

  Fuck.

  He wasn’t moving.

  No, no, no.

  I pulled myself closer to him as the door to the garage opened and Christine rushed back in. “The police are on their way back,” she said. “Oh my God. Are you ok
ay?” She stared at Younger’s body. She reached along the wall for something. Suddenly, the garage was illuminated in light, and we squinted as Younger began to stir.

  He peered up at me. I grabbed the collar of his shirt, locking eyes with him. Blood trickled down the side of his head, and his gaze was glassy, unfocused.

  “Where is he?” I hissed. “You’d better tell me right now, or I will kill you, so help me God.” I could barely get the words out. “Where’s Matthew?”

  He didn’t say anything, his head wavering slightly back and forth.

  “Please,” I whispered, tightening my grip on his collar.

  We stayed like that for a few moments, and then he began to laugh, a low, menacing sound that made me freeze.

  “You’ll never find him,” he said, closing his eyes and leaning his head back against the concrete. “They don’t deserve him, and you’ll never find him.” He opened his eyes again and then stared at me meaningfully. “Especially you. If there’s one person who has no chance in hell of ever finding Matthew Farr, it’s you, Francis Scroll.”

  Chapter Forty

  I beat the shit out of him.

  Only a few seconds passed between the moment when the words left his lips and when Christine dragged me off him, but it was enough. Almost too much. By the time she reached me, I’d hooked the thumb of my right hand under his two front teeth, dug my fingertips into the soft recesses beneath his eyes, and begun to whip his skull repeatedly against the cold concrete floor.

  “Where is he?” I cried as Christine pulled at my waist. I dug in harder, unable to slow the tide of anger pouring out of me. “You better fucking tell me where he is right now, or I swear I’ll kill you.”

  “Francis!” Christine yelled, and she pulled me even harder this time, violently, and finally, I lost my grip. I sprawled back on the floor, sobs exploding from my body.

  • • •

  The search for nine-year-old Matthew Farr began a little after twelve thirty a.m.