I woke up to evening sunlight from the window blasting me in the face just as a heavy roll of thunder shuddered around the house. I sat up, blinking my eyes and belatedly realizing that I’d neglected to set my alarm. Lightning pulsed outside, followed by another blast of thunder a few seconds later, the sun dimming only slightly. The devil’s beating his wife, I thought, hearing Loralee’s voice.
I searched for my phone, vaguely remembering dropping it on my bed before I’d passed out, finally finding it tucked under one of my legs. I was in the middle of a stretch when I looked at my screen and saw that it was after six o’clock, the realization dawning on me that I’d been asleep for almost five hours.
I leaped from the bed, then headed toward Owen’s bedroom, calling his name, wondering whether he was hungry and feeling bad, and if he hadn’t wanted to awaken me to let me know. Yes, he could probably make his own peanut butter and jelly sandwich, but he wasn’t supposed to. That’s what I was there for.
“Owen?” His door was cracked open, so I knocked and waited for a response. “Owen?” I tried again after a moment, pushing open the door slowly. His room looked like it belonged to a military cadet, with bedclothes tucked in at neat angles, all of his LEGOs in color-coded bins against the walls, his latest projects displayed on the bookshelf along with Cal’s.
“Owen?” I called again, louder this time, checking in his closet and under the bed just in case.
I ran down the stairs, calling his name, pausing only long enough to hear him reply. But I heard only silence. I looked into all the downstairs rooms before heading toward the kitchen and then into the garden, where all the blooms and leaves bowed their heads from the weight of the raindrops, seeming to me as if they were in mourning, too.
“Owen?” I called, hearing my own rising sense of panic.
I moved quickly through the house again, calling his name, then out the front door and to the side of the house. “Owen—please! Answer me!” I used the gate to cut through the garden, moving rapidly toward the basement door, feeling the emptiness of the room before I’d hit the last step. The suitcase and plane model seemed to mock me, using Cal’s voice: Coward. I backed up, then quickly retraced my steps.
I ran upstairs, checking in the attic and the bathroom this time, calling Owen’s name again and again. I felt the rising panic begin to bubble over into my reasoning, and I found myself questioning Loralee’s decision not to get Owen a phone yet because he was only ten.
I was about to run downstairs again when I backtracked to Loralee’s room. I hadn’t checked in there, knowing Owen’s reluctance to enter it was as strong as my own. I stood on the threshold. “Owen? Are you in here?”
I waited, hearing the sound of the rain against the window and the soft ticking of the pink alarm clock by the side of the bed. I was about to turn away when I noticed that the journal was missing. I entered the room and got down on my hands and knees to look behind the nightstand and under the bed and came up empty.
Where could he have gone? Wherever Owen was, I had to assume the journal was with him. In desperation I called Maris’s mother, although in my heart I knew she would never have brought Owen to her house without speaking with me first. The whole family had come to Loralee’s funeral, and I knew their offer to call them for anything had been sincere.
Tracy hadn’t seen or heard from Owen, and neither had Maris, but she promised to let me know if they did, and asked me to let her know if I needed her to go out and start driving around looking for him.
I thanked her, not ready for my thoughts to go in that direction yet, not wanting to think of a lost Owen wandering the streets of Beaufort in the rain, his mother’s journal tucked against his chest. I started to call Gibbes, but stopped, remembering that he wasn’t available, and suddenly felt completely helpless and alone.
I closed my eyes. Think. The cemetery. I’d check the cemetery first, and if I didn’t find him there, I was calling the police. He wasn’t a runaway. He wasn’t a troubled child. He was simply . . . gone.
I grabbed my purse and headed toward the detached garage with the sagging roof. It was big enough for my car and our new bikes, keeping them out of the heat of the sun and the elements. I slid into the driver’s side, my gaze scanning the walls of the garage, which were mostly coated with layers of cobwebs, except where Gibbes had cleared them off to make room for the two bikes and two hooks for our helmets. I stopped. Owen’s helmet and bike were gone. He was somewhere on his bike, in the rain.
Terrified now, I backed out of the garage and sped over gravel to the street and headed toward Saint Helena’s churchyard. I was looking for his bike now, which might make him easier to spot, and found myself saying prayers I hadn’t said since I was a little girl.