I have to assume all this was installed after Nate was abducted; Valencia would have been terrified someone was coming back for herother son. I’ll have to figure out how to escape the house without setting off any alerts to the family. The last thing I need is to break a leg trying to leave through one of the unmonitored windows on the second floor.
Valencia showed me how to set the alarm and asked that I keep it on while she’s gone.
But I have to figure out how to test the system. See what gets a reaction from them and whether they’ll notice me leaving the house while they’re at work. So ten minutes after she leaves, I turn it off and go out the back door.
Two alerts pop up moments apart. The first saying the alarm has been turned off. The second that the back door has been opened.
I wait for another notification. Marcus or Valencia asking if that was me.
Of course Valencia is first.
Is that you going outside?
I respond with a picture of the backyard and the Chesapeake, telling her it’s too nice a day to stay inside and that I promise not to go any farther than the backyard. Though I’m sure that does nothing to make her feel better, since that’s where Nate was when he disappeared.
Okay, she responds. I don’t know how, but I can tell that’s a nervous “okay”—like she is very much not okay. Guilt mixes with the food in my stomach. The longer I spend with Valencia, the more I realize how much Nate’s disappearance messed her up. When I’m with her, I don’t feel the same anxiety and fear I get when Marcus is around.
Valencia is genuinely thrilled to have her “son” home. Marcus, on the other hand, is suspicious and guarded.
I put the phone away and take in the fresh air. It’s a warm May day, and the sun feels amazing on my skin. The Beaumonts have a little deck with a long table and grill on it.
A willow tree sits in the far right corner of the yard, growing high over the white waist-height iron fence that separates the Beaumonts’ yard from the neighbor next door. But just before it is a white boathouse and a dock that extends out into the bay.
I walk down to the edge of the backyard, looking out at the bay. I’m not sure if this is the Chesapeake or an inlet, but it’s beautiful. There’s a small island—maybe the size of a football field—thirty yards out.
The boathouse is about the same size as the two-car garage attached to the house. But it looks newer. The sides are painted white, the roof the same asphalt tiles of the house. There’s a navy double door and a few double-hung windows.
I step onto the dock. Water sloshes against the wood pilings, but the dock itself is a mix of metal and some composite material. I try opening the door a few times before giving up and peering into the windows. Inside I can see there’s a large door that takes up most of the far wall facing the bay. But there’s no boat.
Marcus mentioned wanting a boat, but I thought that was a joke. Why build a boathouse if you don’t have a boat? And how rich are these people that they could spend money on such a ridiculous thing?
I walk along the dock, looking in the windows of the boathouse. In the middle there’s what looks like a small workbench, almost like akitchen island, but with no tools or boat materials on it. On the floor by the far wall is a large kerosene heater—probably for working on a boat in the winter.
I start walking back to the house. There are mulched plant beds along the deck that wrap around the house.
A dog barks and I turn, trying to find where it’s coming from.
“Hi!”
There’s a boy about my age in the yard next door. He has a friendly smile and curly strawberry-blond hair. He waves and starts walking across his backyard toward the fence. A white-haired golden retriever trots alongside him. I wave as I approach him.
“Hi, I’m Nate Beaumont.” Might as well get used to introducing myself like that.
His face changes a little bit, his brow furrowing as he looks me up and down, but then he nods. “Yeah, I heard on the LISTSERV you were back.” His dog plants its front feet on the top of the white fence and I put my hand out to it.
“LISTSERV?”
He chuckles and motions with his arm toward our houses. “The whole neighborhood has a Google group to gossip on. They used to use the town Facebook group but decided to make their own little side chats. Probably to talk shit about the Facebook group. My mom said Valencia sent out a blast last night telling everyone they found you.”
“Great.” Now the whole neighborhood can celebrate with Valencia that her missing son is back. I wonder what they’ll say when I’m gone. Maybe they’ll make a whole other offshoot of their Googlegroup. The “Not the Beaumonts” group, where they can talk shit about the family who got conned by a sixteen-year-old.
The neighbor shrugs. “It’s all everyone’s been talking about because nothing else exciting happens around here, especially since the group didn’t exist when you got kidnapped. Sorry, by the way. I probably shouldn’t be saying any of this to you.” But he doesn’t stop talking. In fact, his teasing tone is a little too flippant. It’s not offensive, though—maybe it would be if I were really Nate, but right now it feels like a refreshing change of pace compared to the awkwardness with Nate’s parents. “You’ve been through this trauma and now I’m here telling you you’re all over the neighborhood gossip group.”
“I think it might be more ridiculous that I didn’t realize I would be.” The dog, finished with my pets, hops down and starts circling the yard with her nose to the grass.
The neighbor waves a dismissive hand. “Don’t worry. As soon as summer hits it will go back to arguments between the lawn folks and the native-plant folks, and Mrs. Kenilworth body-shaming Mrs. Nowalk for sunbathing nude in her own fenced-in backyard. Also, it’s an election year, so there’s bound to be plenty of competing misinformation flying around.”
“Oh great, I hope someone says I’m a Russian spy.”
