Leo

LEO

NOW

Dad took home videos of us when we were kids. Hours of them. Some nights, when he’s being especially pathetic, he makes me watch. The girl in those videos is giddy, silly. She smiles a lot. She’s always giggling. You, on the other hand, are dead serious. You look shook, scared. You’re nothing like that girl anymore. You’re someone new.

I’m at school when Dad gets the call from the police. He comes to get me. It’s fourth period honors algebra when he comes, which most people hate but I like because it comes easy to me. Apparently I’m good at math. Not that you care. The whole stupid class gets fired up when they call me down over the intercom because they think I’m in trouble. The truth? No one likes me. I’m the weird kid, the freak, the loser. I have you to thank for that. I don’t get in trouble, though. The only time I get in trouble is when the other kids tell lies about me.

Dad’s waiting in the office when I come down. His eyes are red and watery like he’s been crying, which is embarrassing as fuck: when kids at school see your dad cry. Todd Felding walks by and sees and I know I’m never going to live this one down.

Dad and I leave and, together, we go get you. They’ve got you in a room at the police station, and it’s just you and the lady cop. She has a name. It’s Detective Rowlings. I just don’t like calling her that. Dad calls her that sometimes, but mostly he calls her Carmen. I’m not entirely sure, but if I had to guess, I’d say Dad and the lady cop have hooked up before. She’s been there from the beginning and is, as Dad says, invested. Dad’s so blind that he can’t see she’s got the hots for him. He thinks it’s all about solving a cold case. Instead, it’s about trying to get into his pants, which I’m sure she has more than once.

Dad doesn’t know it but I’ve read the texts the lady cop sends him. They’re mushy, sloppy, sentimental. They make me want to vomit. She massages Dad’s ego, tells him she admires how brave he is, how gentle, how honest. I’ve been thinking about you,she sometimes texts. You and Leo are on my mind all the time.

Gag.

They’ve got a plate of food for you. You’re eating. Except that it’s like you forgot how to eat ’cause you’re doing it all wrong.

You’re thin. You’ve got pale skin. Your hands shake. Dad is so sure you’re you that he rushes right up to you and gives you a hug. You go stiff. It looks to me like you stop breathing. You try to pull back, but Dad won’t let you. He’s crying. He’s holding on for dear life. The lady cop has to lay a hand on his arm and tell Dad to give you some room. I’m embarrassed for him. I feel my own cheeks get hot because of the way he acts.

“You look just like your mom,” he says, cupping your face in his hand and, from the pictures I’ve seen, you do. You both have red hair, which is something because only about two percent of people have red hair.

I hang back, by the door. I don’t know you.

Dad and the lady cop talk a long time. They stand too close. A DNA test is pending, but that doesn’t matter because Dad already knows it’s you. The lady cop suggests you get checked out by a doctor. She wants to check for evidence that you’ve been sexually abused. Dad looks like he might be sick when she says those words. Sexually abused.

“Like a rape kit?” Dad asks.

I’ve heard of that before. The lady cop says yes. She touches his hand, her voice going soft. “It’s precautionary, Josh. We don’t know for sure that she’s been sexually abused. But if we can find the person who did this to her, it will help convict him.” She says that there might be DNA evidence on you that will aid in their investigation. I don’t like that she calls Dad Josh. I also don’t like that she touches his hand when she says it.

Dad’s torn. He wants to help the police, but he doesn’t want to traumatize you. The line between these things is thin. Eventually Dad says yes and we go to the hospital, where we sit in the lobby and wait. You go into the exam room with the nurse alone. Dad offers to go with you, to hold your hand, which is weird as fuck. The lady cop tells him no. She says it gentler than that. “I don’t think that would be a good idea, Josh.” You’re not six years old anymore, but try telling that to Dad. The lady cop sits with us during the whole entire exam. “You shouldn’t be alone,” she says to Dad, though he isn’t alone. He has me. I wish that she would leave.

It takes so long I think it will never be done.

They confiscate your clothes. They send you home with something else to wear.

There’s never any question of if you are who you say you are, though the DNA results won’t be back for another day. Child services could take you for the night. Child services is supposed to take you for the night. But after all that you’ve been through, the lady cop breaks the rules and lets Dad and me take you home.

She tells Dad what you told them about where you’ve been. Dad nearly goes through the roof. “It doesn’t make sense,” he says, and he’s right, seeing as how Mom was found dead of a self-inflicted knife wound with a note: You’ll never find her. Don’t even try.

The note went on to say that you were safe, that you were fine.

If what you say is true, you weren’t fine. You were far from fine. But maybe you’re lying. No one thinks about that but me.

We leave with promises to take you to a shrink and to our own doctor for a follow-up. They’re worried about malnutrition, muscle atrophy, physical abuse; they’re worried about your eyes. You have to wear special sunglasses because you haven’t seen daylight in eleven years. At home, we’re supposed to keep the blinds closed. They’re worried about your feet. They’re wrapped in bandages. If you had shoes, they took those, too.

They’re also worried about your mental state. It’s clear to see you’re not all there. You’re not right in the head. You’re scared as heck, wasted and emaciated. You should be seventeen but no one would ever think you’re seventeen. You could pass for ten. You’ve got no boobs. You’re about four and a half feet tall. You weigh maybe eighty pounds.

We drive home. You ride in the back seat. You say nothing.

It’s a media circus when we get home. That’s what Dad says as he steers the car through a crowd of reporters. A media circus. It makes me think of the reporters as clowns, as circus freaks, which they are. They step back so Dad doesn’t run them over. Still, they take pictures through the car window; they shout questions at you. Those farther back crane their necks for a measly look at you. There are a butt load of them. They fight each other for a square foot of our lawn, which Dad says they aren’t supposed to be on, anyway, because that’s trespassing. He lays on the horn and they step farther back from the car. At the sound of Dad’s horn, you spaz out, getting all twitchy. I feel sorry for you. But I don’t know what to say to make it better, so I say nothing.

I ask Dad how they know you’re here. Dad says some shyster at the station or the hospital probably leaked to the media that you were back. Otherwise how would they know? Your miraculous return is supposed to be kept on the down-low.

Dad’s angry about it because if what you told the lady cop is true, then there’s still someone out there looking for you. And if that’s the case, these reporters will lead them right to our door.