Chapter Thirty-Seven
Nathan
"Here ya go, folks. Two short stack platters. Be back in a second with a fresh pot of coffee." The waitress spun away and navigated the crowded diner with a quick step.
"These look great, is this what you had in mind?" I asked Bree.
She jumped at the question and her eyes came back from faraway and focused on the table. "Oh, our pancakes. These look great."
I handed her the tray of syrups. "How is it that something so simple can taste so good?"
Bree drizzled a little syrup on her pancakes, pressed her fork into the stack, and then froze.
The waitress swung over to our table and brandished a fresh pot of coffee. "Who wants some?"
Bree didn't move so I pointed to both our glasses. "Thanks."
Bree didn't move as the older waitress walked away. Then she put her fork back down and said, "She reminds me of Janice. I'm going to give her a call. She must be worried sick."
I caught Bree's hand before she could leave our table but I didn't have to say anything. The realization had already knocked Bree back in her seat.
"I can't call her. I'm dead," Bree whispered.
"Drink a little more coffee, it'll help." I spread out the stack of brochures we'd grabbed from the motel lobby. "And help me decide, is the world's biggest kite worth a ten-mile detour?"
Bree faked a smile and sipped at her coffee. "There's also the bust of Teddy Roosevelt carved completely out of butter. It's a few miles south of here."
I took a huge bite of my pancakes to buy a minute. Bree was in no state to discuss heading to El Paso. She refused to cry but I could see the extra shine of tears in her eyes. I needed to give her time to grieve over her old life.
"She'll recognize me, you know. Even if we don't get back to Topeka for another decade, Janice would still recognize me. She's got a thing about remembering faces," Bree said.
"Honey, I'm sorry," I said.
She faked a smile and picked up her fork with a resolute sigh. "How can you put strawberry syrup on pancakes? That's diner sacrilege."
We ate our pancakes and sifted through the stack of roadside attractions. If Bree noticed that I pulled out the ones that were south of us, she didn't say anything.
Then a headline from the TV over Bree's head drifted down to me. I had purposefully sat her where she couldn't see the screen. I didn't want her scouring the news and stressing out. That's why it was me, not her, who asked the passing waitress to turn up the volume.
"What is it?" Bree joined me on my side of the booth.
"Maybe nothing." The news show had just gone to commercial. "I just thought I heard something about Springer, New Mexico."
Bree pulled her plate over and refused to take her eyes off the TV screen. The show came back on and led viewers through an easy new recipe before they got back to the headlines.
"A young girl is still missing in Springer, New Mexico. Authorities are asking anyone to please call in if they have seen this girl."
Bree's fork rattled to the table. "Is that…?"
I glanced up from my pancakes but missed the photograph. The reporter spoke about the scant details of the case and the heavy grief of the family. Then they showed the little girl's photograph again.
"That's Maggie Wheeler," I said.
Bree said something but I couldn't hear over the buzzing in my head. Flashes darted across my vision, followed by dark shadows. Then there were other images, a roadside, the barrel of a gun.
I put my head in my trembling hands. The images darted by so fast, but I tried to focus on each one. Maybe my memory was trying to come back.
"Darling? Are you okay?" Bree was panicked but did not call out my real name. "Just take a few deep breaths."
There was the girl, Maggie, but I couldn't tell if she was real or a photograph. There was the squeal of car tires and a dizzying flash of a dark sky.
Bree wrapped an arm around me and whispered in my ear. "You're all right, Nathan. Everything's fine."
I blinked hard and shook my head. The shadows retreated slowly and then my vision came back. We were in the diner, our pancakes were almost gone, and the news show had moved on to a segment on pet safety tips.
"What happened?" Bree asked. No one else in the diner had noticed anything, but her eyes were wide with concern.
"Nothing. Just flashes. God, I wish my memory would come back." I put my fist down on the table too forcefully.
Bree turned around to the table of young kids behind us. "Hey, can I borrow your cell phone? I just need to look up something quick."
"You don't have a phone?" The two girls at the table giggled.
"It's in the car." Bree turned farther around and pinned all her attention on the boy closest to her. He seemed to melt in front of her smile, and he was nodding before he could answer.
"You can't go get it?" the snotty girl asked.
"Come on, do me a favor?" Bree asked again.
The teenage boy dug into his pocket, fumbled the phone, then caught it and gave it to Bree with an awed smile. "Sure. Here."
"Thanks." Bree pulled up the news channel's website and found the story. She held it up so I could see. "They don't mention her name but it sure sounds like it could be Maggie."
The story told how the young girl went on vacation with her mother down to San Diego, California. There was no mention of the father. It was confirmed by multiple sources that the girl was last seen with her mother at the San Diego Zoo.
"Wait, look at that," I told Bree.
"What?" Bree asked. "Right now, it looks like it could have been any poor girl."
"It says there that the investigation placed the young girl in Tijuana a day later. Whoever took her, took her straight down across the border," I said.
"Why isn't there more information about that?" Bree wondered.
We read on and found that the news channel was asking the same questions. The investigative reporter pointed out that the girl had been missing for over a month, and the strongest lead had yet to be followed up.
"They couldn't send someone down to Tijuana? She's just a little girl, for Christ's sake. Someone had to go looking for her," I said.
"What about the mother?" Bree scrolled through the story again. "It sounds like she was so outspoken at the beginning. Why wasn't she the one on TV pleading for her daughter's return?"
"Why are these reporters the only ones pushing for answers." I leaned over Bree's shoulder as we read through the rest of the news story.
"Seems like local police don't have much to say. They just make vague statements and go on to other things," Bree pointed out.
"You're right. They don't have much to talk about, but in a normal case the police would be holding press conferences and making sure the public knew how hard they were working." I scratched my head and took another gulp of coffee.
Bree frowned. "And the mother has been completely cut off from the press. She hasn't spoken to anyone on her daughter's behalf in weeks."
"Wait, what's that?" I asked. I sloshed my coffee back onto the table and pointed to a small link at the bottom of the news story.
Bree tapped it and a video slowly loaded. She turned to give the teenage boy a flirty smile. "Sorry, we're almost done."
"No problem," he said with a goofy smile.
The video turned out to be an older news segment, recorded shortly after the little girl went missing. We played it with the sound down low but it was easy to know exactly what the mother was saying. She was heartbroken but hopeful and determined to do whatever it took to get her daughter home safe.
She mentioned how smart and capable her daughter was. Then she sent a message to her daughter to be strong. Mrs. Wheeler promised her that help was on the way.
It was hard to watch her send a message to her daughter when she didn't know if she would ever see her again.
I rubbed my chest where my heart ached.
"She looks like a completely different woman" Bree blinked back tears.
"I was just thinking that. This is the same woman we met in Springer, isn't it?" I asked.
Bree pointed out the same haircut, the same ring on her middle finger, and the same nervous tick of her lips. "That is Mrs. Wheeler."
"Except the woman we met was a mess. This woman's got spark. Look at her. She's fierce," I said. "She doesn't look like a woman who's going to give up. Looking at this video, can you imagine her holing up in her house and barely answering the door?"
"No," Bree said. "She looks determined. The Mrs. Wheeler we met was nothing like that."
"And why would she start avoiding the press? I would think that would be the opposite of what any parent would do," I said.
"Maybe Mrs. Wheeler lost hope?" Bree wondered. "Something like that would change you. But why would she call the police on us?"
I nodded. "You would think Mrs. Wheeler would be talking to anyone that could listen. We told her we just wanted to help. Why would she call the police on us for that?"
She closed out of the news story and gave it back to the love-struck teenager.
I shoved my plate of pancakes across the table. "I don't think I can do this."
"Eat pancakes?" she asked.
"Sit here and do nothing while Maggie is out there. No one is looking for her. Doesn't that bother you?" I asked.
"Of course, it bothers me. My heart is breaking for that little girl and her mother. But that doesn't mean it's your responsibility," Bree said.
I shook my head. "I had her picture. And a postcard from her. Why would I have those things if I wasn't connected somehow?"
Bree took my hand and held it in both of hers. "Maybe there's nothing that can be done."
"I can't live with that. I can't live like this." I brought Bree's hands up to my lips. "I don't want to make things worse for you but I can't leave things like this."
"I know," Bree said. A tear spilled down her cheek.
"What if I was the only one who knew where she was? What if I was trying to save her?" I asked. "I have to try."
Bree gave the diner one last glance, as if saying goodbye to Janice and her old life. Then she put a stack of cash under our bill and got up.
"Let's get out of here first. We shouldn't have stayed so long," she said.
"Yeah. I need to walk off those pancakes." And, I thought to myself, convince Bree to take one last detour with me.