Avery.
The relief he felt at seeing her caught him off guard. He dropped the bottle. He wanted to rush to her, take her in his arms, inhale the chlorine and honeysuckle of her hair. He wanted to pretend he’d never told her he couldn’t be with her.
“You’re out?” She shook her head. “Obviously.” She stood. “I don’t understand. I should go.”
“Avery, wait.” He grabbed her by the arm and stood in front of her. “I didn’t kill John Norton. And I know what crazy theories are being thrown around, but I didn’t kill anyone.”
“But you can’t prove it.” She sounded equal parts sad and mad. Was there a word for that?
“Can’t prove that I’m a good person?” He looked around like the proof might be there, in his father’s writing on the walls. “No, but who can? Can you? I was wrong, Avery. You do know me.” He stepped closer, stood right up against her the way she had with him on the lanai, when it had been all he could do to pull his body away from hers, like she’d been magnetized.
“I don’t.” She backed away, clearly not feeling the same pull.
“You do.” Moving closer still, but then backing away, giving her space. “And I’m going to go through everything in here again and I’m not going to stop until I get to the truth and find Max.”
“You sound like your father,” she said, not in a kind way.
“Good!”
“Everyone thought he was crazy.”
“Maybe I am, too. It doesn’t matter.” This was wasting time. “You can help me or you can leave.”
He’d brought his father’s laptop out here and now sat down at the desk to get to work, going through every file in a folder marked “Videos.” He heard her leave and had to stop himself from going after her. But then the door clicked open again and the floor creaked under her as she sat beside him. He took her hand, squeezed, then released.
They sifted through pages and pages of notes while playing videos of anniversary vigils and more. Most of the notes had been transferred to the whiteboards, and many of the news reports were repetitive, nothing actually new in the news. No connection to the shooting that they could directly see.
They went backward chronologically, working their way through the clips, one after the other, occasionally pausing to study a face—“Cham bers was so young,” Lucas said; “My mother loses it during this one,” Avery said—then moving on.
Finally, they were back to the night of the day it had happened, the first national report. Watching it, Lucas felt panic, like he was back there, reliving the whole thing as a kid but not as one of the missing kids. What must it have felt like for Ryan? And for Avery. Not having any idea what was going on. Being shoved away from TVs and pushed out of rooms while her parents spent hours on the phone and crying.
And his father? What had gone through his head before he’d picked up a chisel and stone and committed himself to someday uncovering the truth?
“Chambers and the memory specialist are working this theory that what happened to us has to do with the shooting. Like trying to erase the memory of that.”
“That’s why they were asking if Max was there?”
“Yes.”
The next clip played. A woman holding a girl toddler. The toddler holding a stuffed dog. She wore pajamas; she looked cold.
“That’s me,” Avery said.
And the whole scene came into focus alongside Lucas’s feelings for Avery.
“I could only ever bring myself to watch this one once,” she said. “Years ago.”
“I’m sorry.” Lucas paused it. “We can stop.”
“No.” She leaned closer, to study her own image. “It’s okay.”
He slid his arm around the back of her chair.
“It’s so weird.” She shook her head. “I can’t believe that was ever . . . me. That I was ever that small. And just, like, clinging to my mother like that. And Woof-Woof—the dog—it’s just so . . . different, I guess. It all went away that night.”
“We really don’t have to watch.” He started to navigate away.
“Play it.” She nodded, and leaned back into her chair, into his arm. He felt the connection like a lifeline.
A reporter shouts out, “Has the school made an official statement? Has the bus been traced?”
Another man steps up to the mike. “We’re doing everything we can to help with the investigation. We have every expectation that the children will be returned safely.”
“Everyone looks so naive,” Lucas said. “They had no idea what was actually happening.”
Avery’s whole body stiffened, cold like a corpse, and he couldn’t think of what he’d said wrong. “Avery, are you—”
“‘It was only supposed to be for a few hours,’” she said, like reciting a line, in a trance.
“What?” He paused the video.
Again: “‘It was only supposed to be for a few hours.’”
“What does that mean?” He felt irritation at not understanding.