Lost and Found (Chapter Nine)

Sitting behind the wheel of the Gallant I read Dean's letter. I had to give it to him, he was pretty crafty when he wanted to be. Must run in the family.

The letter began, "You better get this before June, little brother. I need you to come to the address at the bottom of the page on June 12th. Dress well, that means suit and tie, I know you must've heard of them. If you need money to rent a tux, call the number below the address. You can call to talk too bro. You don't have to be such a stranger, ya know? How long has it been, 4 years? Look, I know you don't like going to the family reunions and you don't get out much, can't really, I guess.

Yeah, I think I can understand why you don't go to the things, can't stand to see them anymore. You see the family as gone. Gone with Momma. Gone with Jared. But if you had come even once

you could've met him.

I've been all caught up in the headlines, thinking you might be dead. They aren't front page news anymore, but everytime I search, the cops are still looking for the bodies. Come to think of it I feel really bizarre writing what could be a letter to a ghost.

Look, I can tell you why I ran off, where I went, and where I've been all these years. This family has a deep dark secret, in alot of ways it explains it all. But, little brother, I'm afraid I have to keep you in the dark about it for now.

I need some insurance that you'll show up.

And if that doesn't make you show, I've gotta say, there might be some money in it for you.

Take care Juli"

Below that was the address and phone number he had mentioned in the letter. I put the number in my phone's contacts list and stashed the letter in the glovebox.

That gave more questions than answers. And what does he know about our father? And still, there was the question that he had never answered: Where did he go after mom went to prison? Five years older than me, Dean was almost eleven when Mom left and yet he seemed to disappear almost immediately. Where had he stayed and where was he now? After all these years he had never told me and I had never thought to ask on any of the rare occasions I had seen him over the years. That was the secret that had kept us emotionally distant for all of these years.

That was what I thought about on the long drive to Foxton. I had never been to or from the prison in the time I lived there. All I could do was piece together what limited knowledge I had about the main roads of Colorado and hope I got there.

It was nightfall when I pulled up to the gates and keyed in the old code I remembered from nearly four months before. The gates opened and I drove to the the house I had long since abandoned. Pulling in next to Janice's Murano, I realized that I was safe and somewhat alone here. Danny was in prison and there were no cars parked on the side of the streets, where you would expect an unmarked vehicle to be.

I knocked on the door, new coat of paint, fresh window; same old door, same damned house.

Janice came into sight from the dining room. She greeted me with a wave and then gestured behind her as is she was trying to keep someone back. She came to the door and welcomed me in wordlessly. I removed my shoes out of habit and walked in through the low, cramping entryway.

The living room, by comparison, was massive and spacious. Ceilings were at least twenty feet high even though the ceilings in the rest of the house weren't more than nine. I had always wondered why the architects hadn't turned the excess headroom into an upper floor to give the large house even more square footage, but entering the room now, I understood why. All of the tension of my memories had been condensed in the comparatively claustrophobia inducing entryway had seemingly drifted upwards into the extra space, expanding to fit the large room. Entering it I felt the weight removed from my shoulders. Perfect for a housewife with a secret.

I tensed when my gaze found the stairs on the far side of the room. They lead to the house's other four rooms, two of which had belonged to Rosemary and I.

Looking around the room I tried to bring my attention off of that aspect of the house. I looked at the open kitchen under that second floor; I admired it's cavelike charm. I looked over the terra cotta walls, noticing where Janice had made a recent attempt to change the wall's color to a lighter beige.

"Josh, go to your room, Mommy needs to talk." The early teenage boy trotted off obediently with an annoyed look from her babying tone. When he had disappeared around a corner she began to speak, albeit quietly.

"I know. About him." Her voice was especially meek. I found my way to the couch, hoping she would sit and be more comfortable. Instead, she continued to stand.

"I left you everything it would take to figure it out."

"Oh, you did that?" She paused, speech growing louder with time. "I meant Josh, the same thing happened five years ago, didn't it? He, uh, Danny denies it, of course. But I know."

"I figured that was what happened; it seemed like too much of coincidence that he had changed on his eighth birthday too." I looked up at Janice. She nodded her head and sat in a chair that engulfed her body like a cloak of darkness in the poorly lit room. Between the hands that held her face tears poured.

"Glad you're alive." I've been getting that alot lately. "I guess that means I'm not as bad a judge of character as I thought," seemingly as an afterthought she added, "you have (Rosemary), right? Oh, is she ok?"

"It's hard to tell sometimes, how shes taking things. Shes so quiet. But, don't worry about it. All things considered I think shes doing better now than she was even before that night, interpersonally. Of course, I don't see her at school but, I'd like to think I'm doing a good job with her.

"But, I, uh, I was wondering what it was you wanted me over for?" She looked up at me, sort of awestruck looking.

"What? Oh, um, a few weeks ago I noticed a odd charge on the joint account."

"You had me come over for that?" I said angrily, feeling impatient.

"No, the charge was for a private eye, thought would be looking for you most likely and as messed up as it sounds, you can't let that happen. He hurt me and I don't care if he rots, but you have to stay ahead of this. Keep her safe." To which she added. "I guess that one detective was right, you did run off with her."

"One detective?" I remembered Mom making a reference to some cop holding an alternate theory.

"Yeah, it didn't seem like the other cops liked him very much, but he seemed to have some sort of authority over them. He was something special, something... I don't remember." She looked down in some sort of shame.

"It doesn't matter." I said, hoping to calm and appease her. But, actually, it did peak my curiosity. Some lone wolf cop with a good bit of pull was looking for me.

I stood, suddenly anxious. "Wait, he brought another guy in a few weeks ago. The new guy questioned me about that night too. I mean, there wasn't much I could remember before the alarm went off. I remember Danny was out of bed and the alarm was going off... Nothing I hadn't already told them." Great, Mr. Wolf has a buddy.

I began to make my way to the door. Behind me I could hear Janice rushing toward me. "Wait." She beaconed and I turned just as she crashed into me in a clamorous hug. I could feel her body shaking and as she held me I could feel the shaking subside.

"I really have to go." Her grasp on my body loosened. She looked up at me, holding me by the shoulders. Her eyeliner ran in streaks down her face. I couldn't help but think, she looks so pitiful.

"I'm sorry, I really didn't mean to put you through all this. It's all my fault. Tell (Rosemary) I'm sorry. Tell her it's all my fault." I backpedaled, trying to make my way to the door as fast as I could without offending the sobbing mother.

I was in the car and on the road fast, driving past the towns aging stripmalls on streetlight lit roads. Two police cars sat next to each other, facing opposite directions, in one parking lot. When seeing a scene like that, you have to wonder whats up. Are they bored during the night shift and exchanging small-talk and donuts through their car windows, or were they plotting my downfall. Had they seen me? Do they recognize me? The answer to both questions was most likely a "no", but I couldn't help but wonder.

To a person with a record and bad memories of the police, a person currently running from a charge, this kind of thing will always be ominous, where normal people could just drive right by without ever worrying about it. In my rearview, I could vaguely see one pulling off.

I got that almost scratchy tightened in my throat like I need a cigarette. I lit one up, at once being both glad and angry it wasn't a joint, and inhaled. As I exhaled, the wind caught the second hand smoke and pulled it out of my cracked window in a quick stream. My throat felt no less tight.

I kept smoking, hoping i would eventually relax. Halfway through, my breath was coming in punctuated gasps. I put out the cigarette. It was dumb of me to have thought it would help to begin with. Still, breaths came hard and I became deeply worried.

If I couldn't breathe, I would die, right? I had done all I could think to do and it hadn't helped. Trying to come to grips with the situation seemed to only be making things harder. I tried just looking at the road, trying to get all "peaced out" as Tripp would say.

I saw headlights break horizon behind me. The cop. How the f**k could I relax now? And if I didn't he'd pull me for sure. At this point it was nearly impossible to breathe, but I had to keep going. I was so close to the entrance to the highway that would get me out of here.

The headlights were getting closer. My face flushed. I looked down at the speedometer. I had to maintain exactly 35, above or below that mark was an excuse for him to pull me at this time of night. The on-ramp was coming up on my right. I began to lose my grip on the steering wheel. My hands felt numb. Using my arm to move it, I pulled my left hand from the wheel. My fingers wouldn't move. Using the club my hand had been reduced to I pushed the stick up, giving a left turn signal. I was maybe a quarter mile from the on ramp still. Too soon? The headlights from the car behind me shone into my eyes from the reflection in the left side mirror. He was close. This was a bad time to lose speed, but I did.

My legs felt numb and only tremendous willpower kept them from turning into jelly and slipping off the pedals. Still, there wasn't enough power left in my body to keep them pressed hard enough to keep the speed at 35. I watched as my speed dropped to 30. F**k.

The car was right in my blind spot and it took all the power I had left in my arms to drift lazily into the turn lane. But I made it, and the car passed, a dark colored Impala. Possibly an undercover car but who cares now. It's gone. I'm free. All I had to do now was drive straight and I was gone for good.

I pressed down with my whole legs as hard as I could and the engine burst into life carrying me up to 50. And then, my legs too weak to hold the pedals down, my speed dropped back down to 40. It took two miles like this to get up to 65, but I did it and luckily I was alone on the road til then.

I pulled in at the first rest stop and tried to relax a little and slowly feeling returned to my body. I have never been so exhausted in my life.

I woke to the chirping of birds and bright light coming in through the windshield. Damn, I'd slept the whole night away and now I would be even later than I had intended. And I had another date with Felicity this afternoon.

The birds were getting on my nerved and the over-bright light of the morning sun bearing down on me was causing a peculiar pain just behind my eyes. I pulled down the sunvisor to shield my eyes and started the car and pulled it into reverse from neutral (why the hell had I parked the car in neutral anyway?). I set up straight and felt the wet tee shirt pull from my back. Come to think of it I felt the tingling dry heat that was oh so much like the desert. Of course, the temperature in the car could easily be something like 150. None of the windows had been rolled down in the slightest while I slept and I guess the morning sun had nearly baked me as I slept. I rolled down the windows knowing the A/C wouldn't be able to work nearly as fast as I needed it to.

While finding a pleasing radio station I let off the brakes and pulled out of my parking space in the now abandoned rest stop. I took a deep, painful breath. My mouth and throat were dry and sore. Actually, judging from the headache and faintness, I was at least dehydrated. I pulled into a parking space nearer to the main complex and went looking for the vending machines. I found them, bought a bottle of water and downed it. My parched throat screamed in pain as I drank but I savored the pain as I knew it would lead to relief.

Next mission, find a water fountain and repeat until the light-headedness at the very least went away. Found one, filled my bottle and headed outside in search of fresh air. I was greeted by the damned sun and made my way to the distant tree line to seek refuge in the shade.

The air below the canopy of the trees was both crisp and mellow. It's amazing how the air is just a bit fresher under the cover of trees. I took a seat below a large tree and rested my back against it. Most of my body was sore from sleeping in the Galant's bucket seats. At least I had had the foresight to recline the seat at some point in the night. Of course when that was I couldn't entirely say.

But, I thought, back sliding down the trunk of the tree, making myself more comfortable, why did it matter? Even pinpointing the exact moment in time wouldn't change the way my back hurt. The past doesn't effect my future nearly as much as the present could. Sitting pensive wondering how the past could screw me now meant nothing, and even less if it took time away from actually fixing things in the present. By now my head was the only part of my body touching the tree, other than my shoulders which were spread against the roots at the thick base of the tree.

The past is not reality. The past is simply a memory. The present was for living. My breaths now were deep and slow, forcing my throat and lungs to expand and face their own pain. I finished my bottle of water. Standing, my head no longer felt light but clear. Perhaps clearer than it had been in forever.

The absolute truth was that, here I was, in the woods at the edge of the property of a rest stop. At this exact moment that was all I was. Still, in the same moment, I had a car nearby and a date later today. What had happened, my successes and failures, did not define me. To think that they did was to make excuses for myself and was all in all just another way to rest on my laurels.

Still, I was in desperate need of a shower and I intended to smell and look my best for Miss Felicity Preston. However, I was still in Colorado and I had a long drive ahead of me.

So, I drove.