Day 5: Untitled 2,076 Words

“I don’t think it’s very polite to interrupt someone when they’re talking,” Callie admonished. “They seem to be talking about something rather important.”

“Important? What could be more important than this?” Ace demanded. His temper really could flare when he didn’t get his way.

“Interrupting a police officer is not my idea of a good time. Besides, what are a few more moments going to hurt?” she asked. Ace scowled, as usual, but bit his tongue.

They were sitting on an old park bench next to the library on campus observing the crowd. College coeds milled around them, chatting about dates and classes to one another. A few hurried students entered the library as if their lives depended on it. Others looked as if they’d never stepped inside the library at all during their school tenure.

Callie watched the students while Ace zeroed in on the cop talking to Henry near a shade of trees. He wasn’t sure why Callie didn’t feel the same urgency he did, but he was used to this behavior from her by now. She was the laid back side of their duo, he the uptight taskmaster. It probably wouldn’t have worked out between them any other way.

“They do seem to be taking an awful long time,” she finally told Ace. “I wonder what they could be talking about?”

“You could go have a cigarette by that tree over there, you know, pretend to be a college student just having a smoke between classes.”

“I suppose I could pass as a college student,” Callie reasoned, “seeing as how I am a college student.” She gave Ace a look of annoyance.

“Good point.”

“You stay here,” she ordered. “I don’t need you looking over my shoulder. That might raise suspicion.”

“Aye aye, Captain. I’ll stay here at my post,” Ace agreed. “Just hurry.”

Callie stood and hoisted the backpack she’d brought with her on her shoulder. She gave Ace one last look, then meandered over to the tree, careful to avoid the notice of the two men in question.

When she was safely in position, she looked over at Ace, who gave her a thumbs-up sign. As she lit up her cigarette, she let their hushed-tone conversation drift into her consciousness.

“How many times do I have to tell you, detective? I don’t know!” Henry was saying. He looked frustrated, gesturing wildly with his hands to make his point. “I’ve told you all I know.”

“There must be someone out there who knows where she is,” Detective Jin pushed, invading Henry’s personal space a bit more each time he spoke. “I can’t believe that you of all people don’t know. You are her boyfriend, Henry. You’ve already told me she confided everything to you. ‘Thick as thieves’ you said when we first interviewed you.”

“We were,” Henry replied, “are. We are. I don’t know where she is or who she’s with. It’s not like Addie to just disappear. I’m worried sick just like everyone else.”

“No, Henry. It’s her parents who are worried sick. You have no idea what this is like for them.” Detective Jin’s tone of voice grew more heated.

“I can’t imagine how they are feeling, Detective. I’d never presume to guess, but that doesn’t mean I don’t have my own emotions. Addie is everything to me and I’ll do anything to find her.”
A silence fell over the conversation. The two men were at a standstill. Callie nonchalantly puffed her cigarette, pretending to be oblivious.

Finally, Detective Jin spoke up. “I need to get back to the station. This conversation is over, for now. Remember, I reserve the right to strike it back up at anytime.”

“I know, sir,” Henry replied. “I’m all too aware.”

Detective Jin had been harassing Henry with questions every single day during the 22 days Addison McNamara had been missing. Both men knew this would continue until Addie resurfaced.

Jin tipped his officer’s hat at Henry in closing. “Good day.” With that he headed down the brick path away from the library towards his police car.

Seizing this opportunity, Callie dropped the remaining length of her cigarette on the brick and ground it out underneath her tennis shoe.

Now was her chance to speak to Henry. She signaled for Ace to join her as she made her approach.

“Um, excuse me?” she said. Henry swung around, planting his dark eyes on her face.

“Yes?”

“Can I um, talk to you for a minute? I have something I need to . . .” He cut her off before she had a chance to finish her sentence.

“Leave me alone. I don’t know where Addie is. How many of you idiots are going to keep asking me that. You don’t know her. You don’t care about her. It’s none of your business.” He turned on his heel and started walking away.

Ace gestured manically for Callie to follow him. She let out a big sigh, then relented, chasing Henry down the path.
“But I’m not being nosy. I swear I’m not,” she told Henry. “I really just need to tell you something.”

“What could you possibly have to tell me?” he asked, but he stopped walking all the same. He turned to face her. Callie could see the sadness in his eyes masked by the anger in his voice.

“I, well, you see, my friend has something that he says might be important to you.” Callie looked at Ace for backup. He nodded his head for her to go on.

“See, my friend says that he has a message for you, from Addie.”

Henry’s jaw dropped. “What? What?” Anger infiltrated his whole body. “What kind of sick joke are you playing here?”

“It’s no joke,” she said, taking a slight step back from the angry guy.

“So, your friend knows where Addie is? Is he the one who took her, huh?” He grabbed Callie by the shoulders and started shaking her. “You know where she is? Tell me! Tell me!”

Callie felt tears slip down her cheeks. She also felt real fear. This was the first time someone she was trying to help had actually manhandled her. She looked to Ace for help, but she knew there was nothing he could do. She was on her own. This was her part of the job; she knew that. Ace gathered the information and she was the bearer of bad news.

“I don’t know where she is!” she shouted. By now, a few people passing by were giving them odd looks.

“Then how do you have a message from her for me? Huh?” Henry released her and turned away, physically blowing off some of his steam. His head was spinning. He no longer knew up from down. Everything that happened since Addie went missing was a confusion to him.

“My friend, Ace, he, well, he knows things.”

“He knows things. What, like he’s psychic or something?” A bemused smile took hold of Henry’s mouth.

“Something like that,” she responded. If she told him the real truth of the matter, he would never believe her. No one ever had before; she wasn’t about to start trying now.

“A psychic has a message for me from Addie?”

“Yes.”

“Well,” he said shoving his hands in her jeans pockets, “let’s hear it. What does Addie have to say?”

“First, she says that wishes she had her bubble gum ring with her where she is.”

Henry seemed lost in a daze. “How did you know about that?”

“She told my friend. Does it mean something to you?” Callie watched as his anger turned to thought.

“A few months ago, Addie and I were in the grocery store picking up a few items. On the way out, there were a bunch of gumball machines. One of them had plastic jewelry in it. Addie joked that if she and I were meant to be together forever, a fake diamond ring would fall out of it if she put a quarter in. I gave her a quarter, and surprisingly, one came out.”

“Wow,” Callie said.

“Addie joked that it probably gave everyone a fake diamond ring, but I told her it was a sign. She was to be my wife one day.” Henry’s eyes were looking far off into the distance as if he was right there in that store with Addie.

After a moment, he continued with his story. “It was too small for her to actually wear, so she kept it in her jewelry box in her dorm. No one else knew about it. She said her friends would think the story was corny, so she didn’t tell anyone about it. Now, here you are, talking about it.” At last, his eyes focused on her.

“I told you, my friend got a message from her. She wanted you to know that wherever she is, she’s missing her ring. She’s missing you.”

Ace nodded his head, relaying to Callie that she was getting the message across, that she was telling Henry the right details.

“Is that all he has to say?” Henry asked, not quite buying the story, but realizing he could do nothing but believe what Callie had to say. No one else knew about the ring besides Detective Jin.

“Well, there’s one more thing,” Callie paused. Ace moved closer to her to provide support.

“What is it?” Henry’s voice was soft now. Quiet. Waiting.

“She told him where you can find her ring.”

Henry looked visibly shaken. When the police had searched Addie’s dorm room, the ring wasn’t in her jewelry box where she always kept it. Detective Jin had brought Henry in to the scene, asking him if there was anything missing. That’s when he’d told Jin about the ring.

“Where is it?”

Callie gulped, summoning all her strength. “It’s down by the river, near her special place, the one with the shallow cave and the rock she likes to sit on to think. She said only you and one other person know about it.”

“And her ring is there?”

“Yes,” Callie reiterated. “She wants you to go fetch it. She says that once you find the ring, you’ll find the answer.”

Henry took off running, not saying a word to Callie, leaving her and Ace far behind. He ran straight to Addie’s special spot without ceasing. He’d been there a dozen times already, sitting on that rock, talking to her, asking her where she was. Perhaps now she was telling him, by some weird twist of fate, through mouth of a stranger.

When he reached the rock, he looked around quickly, growing impatient when he found nothing, just as he had so many times before.

“Where can it be, Addie?” he asked aloud. “Show me where it is.”

As if in answer, he found himself wandering further along the lake, past the shallow cave, over a few rotted logs until he saw something up ahead. It was black and shiny. A piece of it was blowing in the wind. At closer inspection, he saw that it was a trash bag. A big trash bag. And lying next to it was Addie’s precious plastic ring.

The bag, the ring, Addie. All these thoughts were circling his head, threatening to come together, threatening to give come to a conclusion he wasn’t ready to make.

“Addie,” he cried out, bending before the trash bag. A faint smell of decay caught his nostrils. “Addie.”

Then, he knew. He knew.

Henry screamed and cried at the universe for taking his precious love. He did so for several minutes until he was cowering on the ground, spent and tearless.

He reached into his pocket and punched in a number on speed dial. As the number rang, Henry remembered something that girl had said.

“Only two people knew about Addie’s special spot.”

Henry was one of them. He immediately knew who the other person was. O my God. He knew who the killer was!

“Detective Jin,” came the greeting on the other end of the phone.

“Detective Jin, it’s me.” He was close to hyperventilating now.

“What’s wrong Henry?” Jin asked hearing the urgency in his voice.

“I found her. I found her,” he said over and over again. “And I know who did it. I know who you need to find.”

Meanwhile, back on campus, Callie, who had mildly recovered from her encounter with Henry, headed back to her car. Her spirit guide followed behind.