Finding Jake (23 page)

One thing is certain. I have to get to the Martin-Klein house. I know for sure that’s where Jake went yesterday morning. I grab my spare keys and go out through the den into the garage. It is empty and I remember that the police have my car and Rachel has hers.

“Shit,” I growl, slamming my fist into the wall. I rush back into the house and throw on my running shoes. Their house is five miles away, less than one mile from the school. I burst from the front door and sprint through the renewed crowd. I feel a dark thrill as a few of them try to stay with me but fall behind like little yapping dogs chasing a car. The air rushes past my face and I feel alive. I am action now. I will not be stopped.

It is the fastest five miles of my life. My mind goes numb and my feet pound on the asphalt. I feel medieval as I push through the pain and the stares. I have one, and only one thought—getting to the Martin-Klein house.

When I reach their street, I stop, bending at the waist, hands on hips and panting as I take in the scene. Like our home, a ring of onlookers circles the property. This group, however, is different. The Martin-Klein house is not just dark, it appears long vacant. Although a few reporters stand on the fringe, within range of the streetlight half a block away, the rest skulk in the shadows. I instantly feel unsafe.

Pausing only for a moment, I walk down the driveway. These people will not stop me from finding Jake. I hear the threats as I pass among them, but no one touches me. I am through their midst and
find open space surrounding the house. It is as if they fear being too close. I wonder. Are they afraid of getting hurt or catching whatever it is that allows a human to act as Doug has?

I approach the front door. The windows look like black soulless eyes staring at me. I press the doorbell and hear it echo behind the closed door. Otherwise, the house remains silent. I hear only the ominous murmur behind me.

I cannot take no for an answer. I pound on the door. As I stand, shoulders wide, on the threshold, I see my shadow expand across the side of the house and realize a camera is recording. I think back to the moment at my house and feel I am pushing it.

At the same time, I feel like the atoms in my body are vibrating, like I might burst apart and scatter across the universe. My hand pounds the glass. It rattles but does not break. Behind me, the crowd moves closer, like a torch-carrying mob. I take a step away from the door, toward them. I am ready to fight every one of them. Then I’ll beat down the door and find out what Doug’s father knows. Another step and a young woman appears in front of me. She has the look of a reporter, but her eyes are not jaded. She is not looking at me like I am an animal in a zoo.

“We have a police scanner in the van. The police are coming. Someone called them. Get out of here before they do. It won’t look good.”

My head tilts. This moment makes no sense. The absurdity of a reporter telling me to get away before the best story of the night unfolds right before her camera is not plausible. This bubble of humanity strikes me to the core.

“Thank you,” I whisper. And I run home.

I return to an empty house. Worse, I have no car. I decide to call the detective. I will demand to know what they know. I will demand answers. Instead, I am put on hold.

Phone to my ear, I turn on the television. I do not know why I do this, other than it is a rote reaction to our generation’s need to know
more. Our children surf the Net to learn the news. For me, the golden box remains king.

Immediately, I realize something has gone wrong. A thick red band crosses the screen entitled
BREAKING NEWS
. I find myself reading the scroll at the bottom and not listening to the crisply dressed middle-aged man with the graying temples talk on screen. It reads: Shooting at Kansas school/Victims thought to include four children and one teacher/Police source names Jeff Jenkins primary suspect.

I listen to the anchor.

“Initial reports claim that Jeff Jenkins was obsessed with the Delaware school shooting earlier this week. On a Facebook page since taken down, we found this post: ‘13 is nothing. Wait until you see what’s next.’”

I change the channel, my finger slamming the remote button down as if I can erase what I am hearing. A cable news channel shows much the same, except the host is now a young woman in a low-ish cut silk shell and a uniquely angled business jacket. A man in a crisp black suit with perfectly combed hair and soft jowls sneers out through the screen. He speaks as if his words carry a wisdom that he’s decided the rest of us have forgotten.

“Parents should have known. We could have seen this coming. From all accounts, Jeff Jenkins was strange. He kept to himself; no real friends. Just like we see in the Delaware case. Schools, and God help us
PARENTS
, need to identify these children before they harm others. Open your eyes, people. Look at your children. If you’re sitting there saying to yourself,
Wow, little Johnny is different
. But you’re convincing yourself that he’s just
special
, well, I say you are an accomplice to murder. There, it’s out there. I challenge anyone to prove me wrong.”

The host is visibly uncomfortable. “Okay, hold on there. I want to be sure that everyone understands that this is not a view held by this station.”

Rage burns under my skin, warming my body as Muzak plays in
my ear. I slam the channel button again, daring them to show me more of this filth.

“Of course introversion is a personality type. There have been many successful people who might fall under that categorization. They are people who look inward, not outward. They seek quiet as opposed to noise. Their ideal night is spent at home, not at a party,” a middle-aged professorial woman says.

The host nods along, smirking. When she speaks, righteous indignation seeps from her like a contagious illness.

“They kill, too, is that not right, Dr. Gregory?”

I turn off the television. Strangely, the anger abates. My mind latches on to a single comment I heard—
Just like we see in the Delaware case
. The woman referred to a child with no real friends. I will never forget the sound of Max sobbing on the phone. Never. It was the sound of a true friend suffering utter loss. The woman was wrong.

The hold music begins to grate. I look at the display. I have been on hold for over twenty minutes. I startle when someone knocks on the door. Hanging up the phone, I answer it. Jen stands before me, her eyes red rimmed and her face pallid.

“Can I come in?”

I nod.

As I back away from the door, I see flashbulbs pop. They are taking pictures of me letting this
other woman
into my house. Great.

I sit down without offering Jen a seat. She remains standing. When I look up, I see she is crying. Everyone is crying. My life has become a babbling creek of despair.

“There was another shooting.”

“I know,” she whispers. “I had to come over to make sure you’re okay.”

“They say the kid did it because of ours.” It seems strange for a second that I take ownership of this tragedy; but it is ours now. No one touched by these events will be free of them, ever. If we don’t own it, it will own us.

“They need to be able to explain it away. That’s what all this is about. If they can’t categorize what happened, put it in a nice, neat box, they can’t sleep at night. . . . I’ve done it before. Now I see how awful it can be, though. It’s like they want to pick at us until we are bare, exposed, just to make themselves feel better. They dissect our pain just so they can convince themselves they are immune to it. It is like someone suffering a horrible disease and finding someone who is worse off than they are and asking them,
Why?
Why are you worse off than me? How is your situation different from mine? Tell me, so I can go home feeling better as you stay here and die.”

Jen begins to cry as she speaks. I want to get up, wrap her in my arms, and hold her, but I have no comfort left to give. I am used up.

She continues. “You know, it’s been proven. If there is a suicide and the news reports it, particularly with their typical flare, the suicide rates actually go up in that area. This is proven. Kids can’t buy cigarettes because they die fifty years down the road. But they can watch the news even though it might kill them in three days.”

“Jen,” I say, reacting to the tension in her voice.

“No, I mean it. If that’s true for suicide, which it is, then why wouldn’t it be true with school shootings, too? There are kids out there on the edge. Shouldn’t we try
not
to push them over? Maybe that kid did copycat the Martin-Klein kid, but maybe it wouldn’t have happened if those vultures out there just kept quiet, stopped making these troubled souls into superstars.”

“It’s okay.” I feel impotent, unable to calm her. “Everything is going to be okay.” My words are empty.

“No it’s not,” she snaps, her hands shooting up and covering her face. “Oh God, I am so sorry.” She laughs, a sound totally lacking in mirth. “I came here to make
you
feel better.”

I cannot take it anymore. I stand up and hug Jen. As my arms wrap around her, I imagine the reporters outside sneaking up to my windows, craning and jockeying, and finally snapping picture after picture of my staged infidelity. I think of Laney and how that would
make her feel. My insides are a storm, a swirling tempest of neurons and guilt. Pulling away, I can’t look at her.

“I think I need to be alone,” I say.

Jen shudders, but nods. She backs to the door.

“He didn’t do it,” she blurts out. “He’s a great kid. The best. Don’t let them make you think he did. Don’t let that happen. Promise me!”

I stare at her.

“Promise me, Simon! I mean it,” she cries out. Her entire body shakes. “Don’t let them do that to him.”

She’s too late. I have already returned to my senses. Jake could never have done anything like this. I knew
that
all along.

“Don’t leave,” I say.

“What?”

“I need your help.”

Jen looks confused. “Okay.”

“I need to take your car.”

DAY TWO

I am already sitting in Jen’s car when Rachel calls.

“I see you have a visitor,” she says after picking up.

“What?”

“Jen.”

I am confused, thinking for a second that Rachel has the house under surveillance, which makes no sense at all. Then I remember the TV crews outside.

“I called Max.”

There is a pause before Rachel speaks. Her tone is cool, protected. “What did he say?”

“That Jake couldn’t have hurt anyone.”

“I know that. What else?”

“He said that Jake was afraid of Doug. He was really upset.”

“And Jen?” she asks.

“I don’t know. Nothing. Look, we have to find Jake.”

She laughs. “What do you think I’m doing?”

I pause this time. Strangely, I have no idea what Rachel thinks.
Our communication since this all started has been disjointed at best. At worst, we have split, a chasm opening (or opening wider) between us.

“I don’t know,” I say.

“I’ve called the police and threatened a suit if they don’t find Jake soon. They’re treating him like a suspect, not like a victim, so they don’t care about the possibility that he is hurt somewhere.”

My mouth forms words before I think it through. “You thought he was dead before.”

“They can’t just leave him out there somewhere . . . alone. No matter what.”

I feel dizzy. I want to yell at her, tell her she knows nothing. Yet I realize I know nothing. Some part of me believes Jake is alive, maybe hurt, but alive. The rest of me is numb, thoughtless.

I go back to the one truth we share. We have to find our son.

“I think this all ties back to whatever was going on with Alex Raines. Can you check with the police, see if there were any complaints? I tried to call his father again but he won’t answer.”

“I’ll try,” Rachel said. “I’m heading to the station now. They might not release that kind of information, but I’ll try.”

“I’m going to look for him.”

“You don’t have a car,” she says.

“I have Jen’s.”

“Good.”

Rachel hangs up and I look out the window at the throng of people surrounding me. I can’t take it anymore. I no longer care what anyone thinks. My back straight and my chest out, I get out of the car. About a dozen reporters see me and converge like turkey vultures on a roadside carcass. This carcass, however, still has teeth.

Microphones thrust at my face as questions cut through the air, more damaging than any bullet.

“What would you say to the families of the victims?”

“How did you not see your son’s violent side?”

“What do you say to the people who think you should be held accountable?”

I let the questions peter out without a response. When the opening presents itself, I strike.

“Let me ask you all a question,” I say, hoping my voice sounds as confident as I feel. “Why haven’t the police found my son?”

Incredibly, silence answers my plea, so much so that I can hear the rumble of the news vans’ engines in the background. One cable reporter (according to his microphone) pushes forward. He is a man with a clear opinion behind his squinted eyes and red-cheeked face.

“He’s on the run. We hope they find him soon before more children are hurt,” the reporter says.

“Where would a seventeen-year-old run to? Has there ever been a mass shooting where the shooter got away? The answer is no. The reason the police haven’t found my son is that they are looking for the suspect, not the boy.”

At least half of the reporters appear to understand what they have, a new angle, something unexpected to report. I see the hunger in their eyes and know they will let me speak.

“When children go missing, there are community searches, there are hotlines . . . and empathy. Why hasn’t anyone asked about Jake? Asked if he was okay? No, he has been condemned, and with what evidence?”

My phone rings from deep in my front pocket. It might be Rachel, but I have an idea it is Jonathan. If my comments are playing live, he is likely having an aneurism. I do not answer.