by Boo Walker
Claire turned to him. “Five minutes ago, you were telling me you were done.”
“I know! But that was before the story fell into my lap. This is it. This is the lead I was waiting for . . . and thought would never come.” He lifted up the three composition books. “I can’t stop now. What if Orlando is truly in trouble? I mean, in real life.”
He was right. Claire’s mind was racing so quickly, she couldn’t process the next steps. “Where would we even start?”
The man beside her had suddenly come alive and was apparently thinking more clearly than he had in a decade. He said enthusiastically, “Probably by getting me out of this robe and into something more presentable.”
She looked him up and down. “I agree.”
Whitaker looked to the sky and back. “I don’t know about you, but I’m going to Sarasota. Orlando would be fourteen or so now. I’m going to find him. I’m not coming back until I know he’s okay. And I have the ending.” Whitaker turned fully toward her with bright eyes. “Are you with me?”
Claire felt blindsided by the idea but couldn’t imagine not going. She wanted answers as badly as he did. Was Orlando okay? How much of the story was actually true? And what was this secret life David had been living? “Yes, I’m with you.” She wanted this book finished more than he did!
“Come here,” Whitaker said, opening up his arms.
Their hug was awkward as they fumbled over the center console, but once their arms wrapped around each other, he pulled her in. “What a ride, Claire.”
And she found herself not wanting to let go of him. How much longer could she keep her feelings for him a secret?
They discussed the logistics as they returned to his house. Claire offered to drive to Sarasota. While she waited in Whitaker’s driveway for him to pack a bag, she asked a coworker to take care of Willy. Then Claire took a picture of David’s photo with her phone and sent it to his close friends and family members, asking if they knew anything about the boy. She was in touch with them enough that reaching out wasn’t a complete surprise.
The news settled in her mind, and she wondered how David could have had a relationship with a boy without her even knowing it. What else had he been doing of which she was unaware?
Tapping her fingers, she reminded herself that she had always trusted David implicitly. Why was she jumping to conclusions? It’s not like he had a wife and family down in Sarasota. This wasn’t a picture of his son. Right? David could have gone down one time to a game and met this kid, something as simple as that. To that end, she texted the picture to a couple of David’s old friends too.
As Claire pulled away with Whitaker riding shotgun, she drove with great anticipation. They were closing in on answers. Though she was terrified of learning the whole truth, she knew that they were onto something amazing. She had a feeling that Whitaker was right. The end of the story was waiting with Orlando, and those two cutting across town in her convertible right this moment was meant to be.
“How in the world are we going to find him? A picture and a first name. That’s all we have. Assuming Orlando is his real name. I don’t know what’s truth or fiction anymore.”
“Why don’t you reach out to the people you’ve been interviewing? I’m sure someone can lead you.”
“That’s actually a great idea.” He took out his phone and worked away for a while.
Driving over the bridge from Deadman Key to St. Pete Beach, Claire asked, “Are we getting ahead of ourselves? Assuming the boy in the picture is Orlando is a pretty large leap. It could be anybody.” The possibility felt too much like a fairy tale.
Whitaker was infectious with his recovered excitement. “If that is not Orlando, I will go to work for my father, and I’ll never write another word. The rest of my life. And I will never complain about it again.” He leaned in toward her. “I know with everything that I am that that boy is Orlando.”
Claire weaved past a slow Jeep. She had to agree with Whitaker and continued his argument. “Why else would he have the photo in his desk? The desk where he was writing the story.”
“Exactly.”
Whitaker followed her inside her bungalow. “This place is so you.”
“What does that mean?”
“I love it, quirky and artsy. Feels nice in here. And look who we have here.” Whitaker reached for Willy, who was rubbing his back on Whitaker’s leg. “You must be the infamous One-Eyed Willy.” He held him up and looked at his face. “Yep.”
Whitaker hung out with Willy on the couch while she packed. When she returned to the living room, he was dangling his fingers above, and Willy was trying to paw him. “He’s a good one, an old soul.”
“He’s my little buddy. Pretty much saved my life.”
“I believe it.” He changed the subject. “You know, I’ve driven by this house so many times. It’s funny how two people are meant to cross paths, and it’s inevitable, but they might only be feet away from each other for years before the uniting. How crazy is it that I used to write in your café and now we are here together solving what could turn out to be a real mystery?”
Claire looked around to make sure she hadn’t forgotten anything. “It was your book that brought us together.”
Whitaker nodded. “And then David not wanting to read it.”
Claire smiled at the memory. “David was never someone to like pop culture.”
“Pop culture?” Whitaker said dramatically, standing from the chair. “Napalm Trees is a literary behemoth. There was nothing pop about it.”
“Pop means popular. Your book and your movie were popular.”
“Taylor Swift is popular. John Grisham is popular. What I wrote is a Tom Waits album of literature. And believe me, not everyone loved it. I’ve read every review ever written, and some people don’t agree on its merits.”
“I stand corrected, Mr. Waits. What I was trying to say was that David didn’t like to be a follower. To read your book was to follow everyone else.”
“Anyway . . . before I cower into the fetal position at the thought of writing pop, are you ready? It looks like you packed for several months. Are we going on a cruise around the world?”
Claire looked down at her bag. “I wanted to be prepared.”
While driving toward the bottom of the peninsula, Claire called one of her managers, making sure things would run well at the café in her absence. The more she and Whitaker talked, the more she believed in their mission. She needed to know who this boy was, how he and David knew each other, and how much of the story was true. Had the man she’d married and grown to trust actually been living a second life? Once again, she found herself angry at him, but this time she had just cause. And what else was there? What else had David been hiding?
Claire turned up the reggae as they left St. Pete and crossed the vast stretch of Tampa Bay on I-275, which separated St. Pete and Bradenton. The wind picked up immediately, but it was too beautiful a day to put the top up. Slivers of thick jungle dotted with oak trees and several varieties of palms bordered the highway, and, beyond that, the sparkling blue of Tampa Bay on both sides.
Rising high over the water on the new cable-stayed bridge, Claire looked at the gangly mangroves of the Terra Ceia Aquatic Preserve and then the northern finger of Anna Maria poking out into the blue. How many times had David crossed this bridge?
After their descent, she looked over and noticed Whitaker reddening from the sun. “Do I need to put the top up? You’re looking like a steamed crab.”
Whitaker smiled. “I’ve been hiding in my dungeon for months.”
“I can see that!”
“So before you called my book pop culture, we were discussing how often our paths have crossed. Think about every step that has led us to this drive. At some point, you decided to open up a café on Pass-a-Grille.”
Claire turned down a Raging Fyah tune. “That was about ten years ago.”
“Ten years ago,” he emphasized. “Think about that. You opened the café about the sam
e time I published my book.”
“That’s right,” Claire agreed. “Books were my escape from all the stress of starting a new business.” As the words left her mouth, she realized how much of her life had been a giant escape. Opening Leo’s South had been an escape from the sad reality of living a parentless life. David had been making plenty of money, but what the heck else was she going to do with her time? How else accept the death of her potential motherhood?
“I remember you coming up to me that day at the café. I thought you were just another girl hitting on me.”
“You’re such a dirtbag.” She hit him on the leg. “I most certainly wasn’t hitting on you. I was happily married.”
“I got that. It didn’t take you long to bring up David and flash your ring in my face. It’s just funny to think about. How lives intertwine.” He added, “I wish I’d been more open to your request to finish his book from the beginning. I can’t believe I lied to you and kept trying to back out. I’m so sorry.”
She was touched by his sincerity. “Well, now that you’re out of your cave, think about this. Everything you and I have both been through was meant to be. I might never have found that picture if I hadn’t given you the desk.”
“And if I hadn’t stormed into my office, almost deleted everything I’d written, and—”
“Almost deleted the files?”
“I didn’t do it.” He wagged his finger. “Thought about it for a second but didn’t do it.”
Claire’s eyes widened. “Why in the world would you consider deleting months of work? You’re such a drama queen, a bona fide kook.”
Whitaker smiled and stuck out his fist for a fist bump. “Here’s to two kooks looking for answers in a world full of question marks.”
“The long-stemmed variety of question marks, no doubt.”
“Bouquets of them.” Claire gave him a bump and then took his hand. “Thanks for doing this with me. Thanks for caring.”
Whitaker blushed. “Thanks for resuscitating me.” With that he unbuckled his seat belt and nearly stood as he raised his head above the windshield. With his curly hair blowing in the wind, he yelled a call of freedom and happiness.
When he looked back to her, Claire was smiling so hard she could have kissed him again. She looked back to the steering wheel and to her rings. She’d promised herself she wouldn’t kiss him again until she’d taken the rings off for good.
The time had come.
Out of nowhere, several pink flamingos crossed over the highway. “Look!”
Whitaker turned toward the sky. “If that’s not a sign we’re onto something, I don’t know what is.” He plopped back down and buckled his seat belt. “In terms of symbolism, an encounter with pink flamingos is a sign of good fortune, especially on a journey.”
“Really?” Claire lit up.
“No,” Whitaker admitted. “But it sounds possible.”
Claire shook her head. “You’re ridiculous.”
“Do you know what a flock of flamingos is called, though? It’s not a flock.”
She took her eyes off the road for a second and glanced at him. “What is it?”
“A flamboyance of flamingos.”
“Oh, c’mon.”
“And a group of manatees is actually an aggregation of manatees.”
“Really?” Claire studied his poker face. “No, I’m not falling for your distorted lies.”
Whitaker’s voice raised an octave. “Distorted lies? I am bathing you in the glory of the English language. Oh, and by the way, I wonder if they have a Clarion Inn in Sarasota. Only seems right for Claire to stay at the Clarion.”
Smirking, Claire shook her head. “Does your mind ever stop?”
“All I know is that if we stay at the Clarion, they better serve éclairs. Because you know what I want? To eat éclairs with Claire at the Clarion.”
Claire couldn’t suppress a laugh for a moment longer, and though she didn’t tell him (and maybe should have), she marveled at how much richer her life was with this man in it—absurdity and all.
Chapter 29
SAVING SARASOTA
Whitaker and Claire stopped for grouper bites and peel-and-eat shrimp at Woody’s River Roo in Ellenton before continuing down to Sarasota. A guitarist worked his way through a set list of acoustic classics as they discussed possibilities and strategy. Still coming to grips with the discovery of the photo, their conversation ping-ponged without focus like they were two severe sufferers of ADD. “I can’t believe this is happening.”
“Me either. I wonder what . . .”
“But how could he have . . . ?”
Shrugging shoulders. “What are the chances he’s still . . . ?”
Whitaker was having a ball, chasing down a lead that could be life changing. It was almost impossible to believe that Orlando was a living and breathing boy, but at the same time he was willing to bet his entire writing career that it was true.
Back on the highway, he looked at Claire in her gold-rimmed prescription sunglasses, driving her convertible with the top down, singing with the reggae that seemed to ooze from deep within her, and he wondered where he’d be without her. Probably halfway through a miserable first draft of I Hear Thunder, figuring out how the character was faring in his attempt to break free from the Mafia. I’m serious, Matteo. I’m done.
Every time Claire’s phone dinged, Whitaker would check to see if she’d gotten lucky fishing around the photo to friends and family. And one by one, they responded that they had never seen the boy in their lives.
The burning question that kept returning to their conversations was, How do you find a boy in foster care with a first name and a picture? They’d jumped the gun by hopping in the car to drive down to Sarasota, but what else were they going to do? Whitaker certainly wasn’t going to sit around his house and wait for answers.
He had reached out via text to a couple of his contacts, including a case manager in St. Pete and a woman named Carissa at the local child-placing agency, but he hadn’t heard back yet. He and Claire had agreed to drive straight to the placing agency’s office.
Inside a one-story office building close to downtown, the young man—possibly an intern—at the front desk wasn’t nearly as impressed with Whitaker’s local celebrity as much as he was with Claire’s brief story. He did warm up once Whitaker mentioned Carissa, though. “She’s out of the office today, but let me ask Sophie if she has a minute to help you.” A few minutes later, Sophie came around the corner wearing a pink suit jacket. After introductions, she led them to an empty meeting room with a large chalkboard covering most of one wall. The words THINK WITH YOUR HEART, NOT WITH YOUR HEAD were written in large block letters in the center.
Once they were situated in the chairs around the long conference table, the woman in pink looked at Claire incredulously. “So you’re trying to find a young man who may have known your deceased husband?”
“Yes, exactly.” Claire handed her the photograph. “We think my husband, David, was possibly helping him, perhaps acting as a mentor. Honestly, I’m not sure. I just know that this boy has some answers I’ve been looking for.”
“And you’ve heard, I’m assuming, how much effort the state puts into attempting to protect the children. I’m not saying you two have any ill intentions, but there are many parents we’d like to prevent from discovering their child’s location.”
“Yes, I totally get that.”
Sophie looked at the picture. “What’s his name?”
“Orlando.”
“You don’t know his last name?”
Claire shook her head. “All we have is the picture and his first name—or what we think is his first name.”
Sophie blew out a slow breath and shook her head as if they’d just asked her to find a sunken ship in the Gulf.
“And his age,” Whitaker chimed in. “We think he’s about fourteen.”
“If my husband was mentoring him, you know, spending time with him, wouldn’t he have had to register
in some way? Wouldn’t there be paperwork?”
Sophie nodded. “He would have had to do a background check, get fingerprinted.”
“Which would be in the boy’s file?”
“Yes, but not something you could access.”
Claire was scrambling. “Is there a way to reach out to every case manager in the area via email with the photo?”
The woman stifled a grin. “Not that I’m aware of.”
Claire sighed. “What do we do then?”
“There are a few websites where children that are up for adoption are listed . . . with pictures. I’d start there.” She named four sites as Claire typed them into her phone. “These are only children up for adoption, not everyone in the system. And they’re not exhaustive lists by any means, but at least it’s worth looking through.” She tapped her pen in thought. “DCF won’t help you without a court order.”
“DCF?” Claire asked.
Whitaker knew the answer. “Florida Department of Children and Families.”
Claire removed her glasses. “What else do we do? What would you do?”
Sophie pondered the question. “It’s a tough one. You could perhaps convince someone to share the list of licensing agents, the ones who license all the homes. They know their kids. But I don’t know that they’d help you. We’re all working to protect the children.”
“Could you help us get the list?” Claire asked.
“I don’t have it.” She looked at Whitaker. “Maybe Carissa can help you. I’d try Google. I’m really sorry, but they take this seriously. Honestly, you’re going to run into a lot of brick walls. Please don’t tell anyone I told you this, but I’d say the best thing you can do is try to get lucky on social media. You can find a lot of Facebook groups with foster parents in the area. Maybe they can help you.”
Whitaker had joined a few local groups involved with the foster care system as part of his research, but he’d never posted before. It wasn’t a bad idea. He’d do anything to find Orlando, even if that meant using his celebrity and getting the media involved.
Back in the convertible, Claire drove them into town. Sarasota came off cleaner and wealthier than St. Pete—perhaps more populated by semiretired snowbirds with disposable income. Whitaker had always loved the vibrancy of Sarasota and appreciated the juxtaposition between it and St. Pete. If they were colors, St. Pete would be orange and purple. Sarasota was bleached white and light blue.
