I delete the words. But she still sends a message back:
♥
That little emoji heart is enough to bring me back to reality. I have to make sure I get away with this. At least long enough to run.
My curiosity gets the better of me, so I search Nathaniel Beaumont’s name. My stomach drops because not only are there news articles dating back to his disappearance almost ten years ago, but also newer podcasts and YouTube videos about it every few years—the most recent one was posted ten months ago.
One of the earlier news articles has footage of where he was allegedly last seen: on a blurry gas station security video, sitting in the back of a blue Honda Civic driven by a woman with brown hairwearing sunglasses. But several of the later videos talking about this footage say it’s not Nate. The gas station attendant had seen a kid who matched Nate’s description from the Amber Alert and called the police. They never caught up to the blue Honda, and the attendant didn’t catch her license plate.
I go back and start at the beginning with one of the earliest articles that isn’t hidden behind a paywall.
On the afternoon of July 7, Nate was in his yard playing with his older brother, Easton. Around one in the afternoon, Easton left to go over to his friend John’s house, where he stayed until four p.m. Upon returning home, he learned from Valencia that Nate hadn’t been in the yard when she woke from a nap. Marcus had been out grocery shopping and returned around two p.m., but Nate wasn’t there then either.
It wasn’t odd for both boys to go to a friend’s house or the nearby park together, so their parents weren’t alarmed to see neither boy in the yard. Easton said John asked him to come over and Nate didn’t want to go so he stayed behind.
The Beaumonts’ house sat on the eastern shore of the Chesapeake Bay. Search and rescue scouted the area for signs of him but found nothing.
That’s when the gas station tip came in. It was several hours later, from a rest stop in Pennsylvania. Since the police were treating the case as an abduction and it was now possible Nate had crossed state lines, the FBI got involved.
Agent Grant.
I put my phone down as a nurse comes in with food and more ofthat sugary drink they keep forcing on me. It’s supposed to help starving people, but honestly it’s so disgusting I kind of lose my appetite.
But the nurse sits there and watches me drink the whole thing before taking the cup and leaving again. I look at the hospital food—a dry, cheeseless burger, a fruit cup, juice, and the saddest-looking iceberg lettuce salad I’ve ever seen.
I’d prefer the Beefaroni.
My stomach does a little grumble, letting me know I’m going to eat it all eventually, but yeah, maybe we should pace ourselves after that disgusting drink. So I go back to reading about Nate. But all the articles are the same after that. No new leads. No sightings, no suspects—at least none that the police were willing to disclose to the press.
How does a kid go missing without a trace?
Seven
Marcus and Valencia show up a little after nine the next morning. Just them. There are no cops, and Valencia says Easton stayed home to finish up one of his final essays for school—which he left early when he heard they found me.
Even after they arrive, it takes almost two hours for the nurses to finally discharge me. The Beaumonts give me a new T-shirt, jeans, socks, and underwear to change into and then walk me out to an expensive-looking gray Mercedes.
From there, they take me to get my hair cleaned up and to shop for more new clothes. Valencia picks out shirt after shirt, asking if I like them while Marcus looks bored or answers emails on his phone. Several times Valencia scolds him when she thinks I’m out of earshot, and he tells her he still needs to be accessible for work.
After that we go to an awkward lunch where Valencia tries her best to update me on all the things I’ve missed in the ten years since I disappeared.
Mainly it’s about Easton. How smart Easton is, how he graduated fifth in his class before going to Columbia, how he plays baseball—one scary moment when he hit a fastball and the ball went right at the pitcher and knocked him out. But the pitcher was fine, just aconcussion. And all about Easton’s ex-girlfriend, Casey, who broke up with him before he left for college.
“But don’t ask about her,” she says. “I think he’s still a little bruised over it.”
Then we drive two hours from DC to a small town in Maryland—stopping off at a Walgreens to pick up a toothbrush and deodorant. Around three in the afternoon, we pull into the driveway of a massive three-story stone colonial.
The Beaumonts live in a sprawling suburban neighborhood where every house is surrounded by mature trees and a fence line marks the edge of each huge property. Behind every home on the Beaumonts’ side of the street is the dark blue of the Chesapeake Bay.
I get out of the car and look up at the house. It’s made of gray-brown stone and each of the windows has dark green decorative shutters. There’s a small white portico above the front door with roman-style columns.
Valencia puts her arm around my shoulders and looks up at the house with me. “Does it look how you remember?”
Out of the corner of my eye, I see Marcus turn to me. This question feels like a trap. What if it’s not even the house Nate grew up in? The articles I read didn’t have a picture of the house, just of six-year-old Nate. My eyes drift to the bay beyond the garage. It probably is the same house, but it might be easier to stick to the post-traumatic amnesia thing.
So I shake my head. “Sorry.”
Valencia still smiles. “It’s okay. We repainted the shutters last year. And five years ago we had to replace the roof. Such a shame we hadto get rid of the slate, but it was so damn expensive to maintain. And these asphalt tiles aren’t bad-looking.”
