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FIRST SNOW
BRANT, AGE 18
“June’s gone.”
Theo and I both jolt from our places in front of the television, our Final Fantasy marathon forgotten. Yoshi scrambles off the bed, nails clicking against the hardwood floor while he darts from the bedroom as if he’s equally daunted.
“What?” I blurt out.
I heard her the first time. Maybe I just didn’t want to hear her.
Samantha Bailey pulls a blue ink pen out of her hair and begins clicking the end of it over and over, as if that might tell her where June went. “She wanted to go to the mall to meet up with her friends, but I told her no because of the snowstorm, and—”
“I’ll head to the mall.” I’m already pulling a wool sweater over my head and beelining toward the doorway. It’s the first snow of the season and it’s coming down fast and hard—but I’ll drive all over this town until I find her, shitty tires be damned.
Theo is right on my heels. “Who was she meeting there?” he calls over his shoulder to his mother. “I’ll see if she left her phone behind.”
“She’s a preteen,” I remind him. “She didn’t leave her phone behind.”
Samantha trails behind us with panicked breaths. “Lord help me… I’ll call Celeste’s mother again. I already tried twice and it went to voicemail.”
I pop my snow boots on one by one, nearly tipping over in the foyer. Theo tosses me my car keys, and I catch them easily as I say to him, “She could have walked down to Celeste’s. It’s not far. And if she’s not there, we can split up. Cover more ground.”
“Aye-aye, Luigi.”
“I’ll stay here in case she comes home. If she’s not back within the hour, I’m calling the police,” Samantha says worriedly as we zip up our puffy coats. She places a hand over her heart, gripping the fabric of her cardigan with glossy eyes. “Please, be careful.”
Nodding, I signal at Theo and we both make our way out into the December blizzard. Big fat flurries tumble down from a pearl-gray sky almost as fast as my heart is jackhammering inside my chest. I stomp through the several inches of freshly fallen snow, and we both hop into my Corolla, hoping the squealing belt I need to replace doesn’t snap and get us killed.
Where the hell are you, Junebug?
She’s growing up fast.
God…she’s growing up too fast. She’ll be a teenager in six months, and we’ve already been getting a taste of what’s to come—the hormones, the sass, the emotions.
The boys.
Jesus—the boys are going to kill me. She has a crush on a kid named Marty, and I don’t even know Marty but I already want to sit Marty down and interrogate the crap out of him in regard to his intentions with June.
I realize he’s twelve.
Of course, he will only have twelve-year-old intentions, like going to the junior high dance, or eating pretzel bites and ice cream cones at the mall food court. Possibly ice-skating down at the rink.
But hell, you never know, and sociopaths can be identified early these days.
What if he’s a miniature Ted Bundy in the making?
What if he’s a Dexter enthusiast?
What if he’s…
What if he’s just like my father?
“You’re thinking about her, huh?”
I flip on my wiper blades and ruffle the snowflakes out of my hair, trying to reverse out of the unshoveled driveway. The car reeks of Wendy’s Newport cigarettes. “Aren’t you?” I counter, craning my neck to look out the rear window.
“Of course I am. Peach is taking the whole princess-in-peril thing to a very realistic level.” He throws a slushy boot up on my dashboard, shaking his head of sandy-brown hair before slinging it back against the headrest. “She’s too smart for her own good, you know.”
