I shrug.
“Let’s get you settled,” Marcus says. He seems a little less suspicious now and picks up some of the shopping bags, leading the way upstairs. Valencia grabs a bag and hands it to me, then takes the rest, and we follow Marcus up the stairs and to the left.
The second-floor hallway wraps around the entry like a U-shaped balcony. There’s a large window looking out to the front yard and the roof of the portico. The door to the first room at thetop of the stairs is shut. The next, which is open, leads into a blue-tiled bathroom.
The third door toward the front of the house is also open and Marcus walks in. It’s clearly Nate’s bedroom. Only it looks as if it hasn’t been touched since he disappeared. The dresser is a dented, warm-colored wood. There’s a stegosaurus-shaped rug in the center of the wood floor and little dinosaurs hang from the metal pull chains attached to the ceiling fan. The shelves are filled with old books a six-year-old would read. One thing stands out from the rest: a full-sized bed made of dark wood and a gray fabric headboard.
“This was the nicest grown-up bed we could find last night,” Valencia says. “Your old one is down in the basement, but we know you wouldn’t be able to fit into a toddler bed anymore. We were planning on buying you a new bed before...” She chews at her cheek, then shakes herself out of whatever sad nostalgia zone she veered into and returns to the present with a smile. She points to the mismatched dresser. “We can get you matching furniture, too. We just wanted to be sure you liked the new bed first. We didn’t want to changeeverything,you know? But I was thinking it could use a fresh coat of paint! What do you think? Would you like to pick a color and—”
“Val.” Marcus makes it seem like the two of them have already decided what should and shouldn’t be spoken about, and maybe the lack of change to Nate’s room—when so much in the house apparently has been updated—was one of the things they didn’t want to discuss.
Valencia doesn’t acknowledge Marcus’s scolding and focuses onme. “We’ll give you some time to get settled. Maybe you want to take a shower?” She walks over to one of the closed doors on either side of the dresser and opens it to the blue Jack and Jill bathroom that connects to Easton’s bedroom on the other side.
I step in. It’s more dated than the other trendy parts of the house. The walls and floor are the same soft blue tile, and the built-in bathtub matches. The pedestal sink and toilet are both white porcelain, but at least the toilet looks a little more modern.
“This should look the way you remember it,” Valencia says. I can see Marcus give her an exasperated glance. “We were going to remodel when Easton went away to college, but things have been so busy we’ve been holding off.”
There’s a long, awkward few moments of silence before Marcus speaks.
“Come on, hon.” He puts a gentle hand on her lower back. “Let’s give the boy some space and let him get settled. I have some emails and calls to make and I’m sure you want to check in with the practice.”
She doesn’t look so sure she wants to do that but she nods. “We’ll be downstairs if you need anything.”
“Okay, thanks.” They walk out the bathroom door, and I listen to their footsteps, trying to figure out how the house sounds as they move through it.
In my old house, I could tell where anyone was at any time. The kitchen floor would creak between the oven and the fridge. The living room floor groaned when I walked in front of the coffee table. The bathroom door stuck so you had to slam it closed or pull hard to openit. The hinges of the front door squeaked, and the dining room chandelier rattled no matter who walked past.
So far, here, the hardwood floors all creak.
I shut the hallway bathroom door—it closes silently—then go over to Easton’s door and shut it as well. There’s a lock on the hallway door, but not on my or Easton’s bedroom doors.
A shower sounds amazing, so I turn on the water before realizing I don’t have a towel. The two towels hanging on the rack are hand towels and there are no hooks on the doors, so I go into Nate’s bedroom. The other door is an empty closet with two taped-up boxes on the floor and bare wire hangers.
I go out to the hallway and look past the entryway to Marcus and Valencia’s bedroom. There’s another, smaller door halfway down that side of the hall before a doorway with more stairs going up to the third floor.
“Honey!” Valencia calls up from downstairs. “There’s towels in the linen closet next to our bedroom.”
“Okay.”
I go over to the skinnier door and grab a towel, then head back to the bathroom to shower.
I stay under the warm water long after I’ve scrubbed off all the dirt and grime that’s accumulated on my body over the last God knows how many days—focusing on parts I might have missed in my paper towel baths in the Starbucks bathrooms.
I take the quiet time under the water to think about my next move. Obviously I need to get out of here before they find out I’m not their son. But the only thing that would get me in trouble is if they did arealblood test. Not one to check my blood type, but to check that I am Valencia and Marcus’s kid. Something Valencia was fighting hard against last night.
I stay under the showerhead until the hot water starts to cool, then get out to dry off.
I hang my new shirts in the closet, then fold my jeans and pants and put them in the third drawer down in the dresser. In the top drawer I put my new underwear and socks. The undershirts and a couple of the graphic tees Valencia said looked cute go in the second drawer.
I put on one of the tees and a pair of jeans, then take a second to look around the room. Clearly Nate was into dinosaurs when he was a kid.
So was I.
The bookshelf has copies of Magic Tree House and Captain Underpantsbooks as well as a few picture books.
I pull out one of the more well-worn Magic Tree House books.Dinosaurs Before Dark. I remember reading this one. I flip it open and on the title page is Nate’s name, written in pencil in his blocky, childlike handwriting. I sit down on the bed and flip through the pages.
When I saw Nate’s age-progressed picture and read about him, it felt like he was some nebulous being who didn’t really exist. But being in his room—seeing the things that used to be his, where he slept—has changed this whole thing for me. I thought it would be easy. That I could get here, steal some of the Beaumonts’ food and the clothes they bought me, and get out—though of course I need to figure outwherehereis. According to my phone, we’re in a town on the eastern shore of Maryland called Webber’s Landing.
