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They followed her into the kitchen, which wasn’t what Auggie had expected. The linoleum was a speckled brown that had to be almost as old as the house, and the wallpaper—pink rose of Sharon—had yellowed. The smell of boiled starches and ground beef met them, and the air was almost as hot as outside.
She gestured to a Formica table and two yellow plastic chairs. “Go ahead. I’ve been sitting all day.”
Auggie opened his mouth to offer her his seat, but Theo gave a tiny shake of his head, and Auggie settled into the seat next to him. Elise took up position leaning against an ancient Whirlpool refrigerator. She wasn’t a big woman, but the fridge rocked under her weight, and the motor’s pitch changed slightly.
“He doesn’t live here anymore,” Elise said abruptly, chafing her arms in spite of the heat. “He moved out. So, if he’s in trouble, you need to look for him somewhere else.”
“No, it’s not like that,” Theo said. “I’m not sure if he’s in trouble, actually. Leon doesn’t live here anymore?”
She shook her head.
“When did he leave?”
“A few months ago.”
“Do you remember when?”
A tiny shrug that might have meant anything.
“Mrs. Purdue,” Auggie tried, “maybe you could help us understand what happened with Leon.”
She shrugged again. She was wearing a polyester polo with the 7-Eleven logo and polyester slacks, and she looked like all that polyester might be giving her a heat rash; she scratched at her neck and immediately folded her arms again.
“Mrs. Purdue—”
“He’s not here, like I said. So, if you want to know what happened, you can ask him yourself.” Her eyes came up—not to meet theirs, but settling on the yellow Formica. “He dropped out of school, that’s what he told me. In case you didn’t hear, he’s emancipated. So, if there’s some kind of problem, you’ve got to talk to him about it.”
Auggie studied her, the way she hugged herself, the way she made herself smaller. Then he said, “Mrs. Purdue, we need your help. Actually, a girl needs your help. Will you do that? Will you help us?”
She squirmed, tightening her arms across her chest. But she finally said, “I don’t know.”
“A girl from school is missing,” Theo said. “Shaniyah Johnson. We heard that she’d been looking into Leon’s disappearance.”
For the first time, life sparked in Elise Purdue. She gave a weird, wheezing noise that might have been a laugh and shook her head. “Disappearance. I told her—she came here, and I told her he wasn’t gone. He just moved out. That didn’t matter to her; she would have talked all day if I let her.” Her gaze drifted to the Formica again—not quite to their faces, but daringly close. “Leon said you’re gay.”
“That’s right,” Theo said.
She nodded. Something changed in her body. She was silent for a moment, and then she scratched her side, and the only sound was her nails rasping against polyester.
“Is Leon gay?” Auggie asked.
She nodded.
“Is that why he left?”
“He left because his dad and I got a divorce.”
“Was that in the spring?”
She shook her head.
“When did that happen?” Auggie asked.
“Last year.”
In the silence that came after, he could imagine some of it—what must have happened, in the months following the divorce, so that a judge would emancipate Leon.
“Do you know where Leon is living?”
