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“You’re taking the month off,” she’d said to me.
“The month?” I gulped, nearly choking on the bit of coffee still in my throat. “I don’t need a month. Really, I’m fine!” Not to mention I needed the money. A month off work was going to sink me.
Marci sat down opposite me, her eyes barely visible beneath the heaps of charcoal she put on. “Look, take the month off and if you want to come back, we can talk about it.”
“Why are you doing this?” I felt like crying.
“You’ve clearly got some stuff you need to work out, Grace. Don’t look at this as punishment. I like you. I want you to come back, if you want to come back.” She patted my hand and stood up.
I stared into the empty cup. Now I was homeless and without a job. It was at that moment I almost called Eli. I wanted his comfort so badly that I nearly gave in. I had the number dialed and was about to press the green call button, but I stopped. I switched and called Lennox instead.
“So we just added this room. This used to be part of the living room, but now it’s a spare bedroom. We still only have the one bathroom, though, but it beats sleeping on the couch. Trust me.”
I nodded, too overwhelmed to speak. I was very grateful for her hospitality, but the new room was the final straw on my hypothetical camel’s back. The bed was different than one I’d been sleeping on, firmer. The comforter was wine colored, whereas I’d been sleeping with a pale blue quilt. The differences were very small, but to me they seemed so huge. I put my head in my hands, feeling completely overwhelmed.
“What’s wrong?” Lennox asked. “Well, okay, that’s a stupid question. I know what’s wrong, but is there anything I can do to help?” I shook my head, still cradling it in my hands.
“No,” I said, voice muffled through my palms. “I just feel so helpless.” Slowly I removed my hands from my face and looked up at Lennox. Leaning against the doorframe, she eyed me with an emotion I couldn’t discern.
“I think I know who can help.”
It was my turn to eye her. “Who?”
“Vic.”
I made a noise somewhere between a laugh and a guffaw. “Vic?” What was he going to do, brood Vera out of her kidnapping? Lennox entered the room and took a seat next to me on the bed. I felt the bed sink in lightly with her weight and I listened to her breathing. We didn’t say anything for a few moments. Finally she spoke.
“Hear me out. There’s a lot you don’t know about your brother.” I shot Lennox a look. What a massive understatement. Just because Vic and I weren’t braiding each other’s hair (his was long enough to d
o that) didn’t mean he could save Vera.
“Look,” Lennox continued. “Vic was in the military and now he works for some scary dudes. There’s a lot of shit that goes with that…” Lennox stopped talking and I looked at her to see what happened. Her gaze was at the wall but it was obvious she was thinking of something else. She shook her head and continued. “There’s some good that comes out of it, though. Like when your best friend gets taken he can help find her.”
“Maybe,” I muttered, not entirely convinced.
“Let me talk to him.” Lennox placed her hand on mine. “What’s her name?”
“Vera,” I said numbly. Even saying her name hurt.
“What’s her last name?”
“I…” It was my turn to stare off. I didn’t know Vera’s last name. What kind of friend was I that in the months I’d lived with her I never got her last name? It just hadn’t seemed important. Vera was Vera. “I don’t know.”
Lennox hummed, apparently thinking. “Do you have a picture of her?” I was about to say no, feeling even more like the worst friend in the world, when I remembered.
“Yes!” I scrambled for my phone. When I’d gotten my cell phone, Vera had made us take a “selfie”. She said it was a rite of passage. To date, it was the only picture on my phone that wasn’t of a sunset or the ocean. I pulled it out and showed Lennox. Vera and I were smiling, the aqua wall in my old bedroom our backdrop. Sorrow tugged on my chest as I looked at Vera’s smiling face, frozen in the phone.
“This could work.” Lennox reached for my phone. “Do you mind? I’m going to send it to Vic.” I shook my head, handing her the phone. Lennox typed out Vic’s number and handed the phone back to me. In less than a second her own phone was buzzing.
“It’s Vic,” she said, glancing at her screen. “He says he’s going to look into it.”
The woman Vic had pulled up on the computer looked different than Vera. She had blonde hair, whereas Vera had black hair. The photo was poor quality, too, zoomed in so much that the woman was almost blurry. She wasn’t smiling and her eyes were sad. There was no denying it, though; it was Vera.
“Is this your friend?” Vic asked, spinning around in his chair to look at me.
“Yes,” I replied. “That’s Vera, only her hair is a different color.”
“This is Vera Araya,” Vic said, closing the picture and turning off the computer. “It’s an older photo, probably about three years. It’s all I could find. However, now that I have your confirmation that it’s her, I should be able to get more information.”
