He frowned at me for a long moment. Then something in his face seemed to close off.
“Maya isn’t here. She’s living with her grandparents for a while.” He started to close the door, then paused. “I’ll ask her if she knows anything, okay?”
I stood there, unsure what to say, some instinct telling me to push harder — but I didn’t know how.
Then he closed the door.
Something in his face seemed to close off.
***
The weeks that followed were the worst of my life.
We put up flyers and posted on every local Facebook group and community board we could find.
The police searched too, but as the months went by, the search slowed down. Eventually, everyone started calling Daniel a runaway.
I knew my son. Daniel wasn’t the kind of boy who just vanished without a word.
And I would never stop looking for him, no matter how long it took.
Everyone started calling Daniel a runaway.
***
Almost a year later, I was in another city for a business meeting. I’d eventually forced myself back into some facsimile of normal life — work, grocery shopping, phone calls with my sister on Sunday evenings.
After my meeting wrapped up, I stopped at a small café. I ordered a coffee and waited at the counter.
Suddenly, the door opened behind me, and I turned around. An elderly man had walked in. He was moving slowly, counting coins in his palm, bundled up against the cold. He looked like he might be homeless.
And he was wearing my son’s jacket.
Almost a year later, I was in another city for a business meeting.
Not like my son’s jacket, but the exact jacket he’d taken before leaving for school that day.
I knew it wasn’t just a similar coat because of the guitar-shaped patch over the torn sleeve. I’d sewn that on myself, by hand. I also recognized the paint stain on the back when the man turned toward the counter and asked for tea.
I pointed at him. “Add that man’s tea and a bun to my order.”
The barista glanced at him, then nodded.
The old man turned. “Thank you, ma’am, you’re so—”
“Where did you get that jacket?”
“Add that man’s tea and a bun to my order.”
The man glanced down at it. “A boy gave it to me.”
“Brown hair? About 16?”
The man nodded.
The barista held out his order. A man in a suit and a woman wearing a pencil skirt stepped between the old man and me. I stepped sideways to get around them, but the old man was gone.
I scanned the café. There he was, stepping out onto the sidewalk.
“Wait, please!” I went after him.
“A boy gave it to me.”
I tried to catch up to him, but the sidewalks were crowded. People parted for him, but not me.
After two blocks, I realized something: the old man hadn’t paused once to ask people for spare change. He hadn’t stopped to eat the bun or drink the tea either. He was moving with purpose.
My gut instinct told me to stop trying to catch up to him, to follow him instead.
So that’s what I did.
I followed him all the way to the edge of the city.
He was moving with purpose.
He stopped outside an old, abandoned house. It was surrounded by an unkempt garden choked with weeds that merged seamlessly with the woods at the back. It looked like nobody had cared about it in a long time.
The old man knocked quietly on the door.
I moved closer. The old man turned at one point, but I ducked behind a tree before he spotted me.
I heard the door open.
“You said I should tell you if someone ever asked about the jacket…” the old man said.
He stopped outside an old, abandoned house.
I peeked around the tree.
When I saw who was standing in the doorway of that decrepit old house, I thought I might faint.
“Daniel!” I stumbled toward the door.
My son looked up. His eyes widened with fear.
A shadow moved behind Daniel. He glanced over his shoulder, back at me, then did the last thing I ever would’ve expected. He ran.
“Daniel, wait!” I picked up speed, sprinting past the old man and into the house.
A shadow moved behind Daniel.
A door slammed. I raced down the hall and skidded into the kitchen. I tugged the back door open just in time to watch Daniel and a girl race into the woods.
I raced after them, screaming his name, but they were too fast.
I lost them.
***
I drove straight to the nearest police station and told the desk officer everything.
“Why would he run from you?” he asked.
I lost them.
“I don’t know,” I said. “But I need you to help me find him before he disappears again.”
“I’ll send out an alert, ma’am.”
I took a seat. Every time the door opened, my whole body went rigid.
I kept asking myself the same questions on a loop: What if he’s already on a bus? What if he’s gone? What if that was my only chance?
Close to midnight, the officer walked over to me.
“I need you to help me find him before he disappears again.”
