The Stranger
Page 34

Ryan’s voice was a panicked whine. “I need my uniform, remember?”
“Did you check your drawer?”
“Yes!” The panicked whine had upgraded itself to a shout. “You asked me that yesterday! I checked the drawer and the laundry basket!”
“How about the washer and dryer?”
“I checked both of those too! I checked everywhere!”
“Okay,” Adam said, “calm down.”
“But I need my uniform! If you don’t have your uniform, Coach Jauss makes you run extra laps and miss a game.”
“No problem. Let’s look for it.”
“You never find anything! We need Mom! Why isn’t she answering my texts?”
“She’s out of range.”
“You don’t get it! You don’t—”
“No, Ryan, you don’t get it!”
Adam heard his voice boom through the house. Ryan stopped. Adam didn’t.
“You think your mother and I exist only to serve you? Is that what you think? Well, here’s something you should learn right now, pal. Your mom and I are human beings too. Big surprise, right? We have lives too. We get sad, just like you. We worry about our lives, just like you. We aren’t here just to serve you or do your bidding. Now do you get it?”
Tears filled his son’s eyes. Adam heard footsteps. He turned toward them. Thomas was at the top of the steps, staring down at his father in disbelief.
“I’m sorry, Ryan. I didn’t mean—”
Ryan sprinted up the stairs.
“Ryan!”
Ryan ran past his brother. Adam heard the bedroom door slam shut. Thomas stayed at the top of the stairs and looked at him.
“I lost my temper,” Adam said. “It happens.”
Thomas didn’t say anything for a long moment. Then he said, “Dad?”
“What?”
“Where’s Mom?”
He closed his eyes. “I told you. She’s away at a teachers’ thing.”
“She was just away at a teachers’ thing.”
“There’s another.”
“Where?”
“Atlantic City.”
Thomas shook his head. “No.”
“What do you mean, no?”
“I know where she is,” Thomas said. “And it’s nowhere near Atlantic City.”
Chapter 20
Come in here, please,” Adam said.
Thomas hesitated before heading down the stairs into the kitchen. Ryan was still in his room with the door closed. That was probably best. Give everyone a chance to cool down. But right now, Adam desperately needed to follow up on what Thomas had just told him.
“Do you know where your mother is?” he asked.
“Sort of.”
“What do you mean, sort of? Did she call you?”
“No.”
“Did she text or e-mail you?”
“No,” Thomas said. “Nothing like that.”
“But you know she isn’t anywhere near Atlantic City.”
He nodded.
“How do you know that?”
His son lowered his head. There were times when he would see Thomas move a certain way or make a gesture and realize that it was an echo of himself. He had no doubt that Thomas was his son. The similarities were too great. Did he have doubts about Ryan? He never had before, but in some secret, dark corner in the heart, all men have that misgiving. They never voice it. It rarely reaches their consciousness. But it’s there, sleeping in that dark corner, and now the stranger had poked the fear and dragged it into the light.
Did that explain Adam’s stupid outburst?
He had lost his temper with Ryan, and yes, under the circumstances, it was more than understandable, the way the boy was carrying on about his uniform.
But was there more to it than that?
“Thomas?”
“Mom will get mad.”
“No, she won’t.”
“I promised her I’d never do it,” Thomas said. “But, I mean, she always texts me back. I don’t get what’s going on. So I did something I shouldn’t have done.”
“It’s okay,” Adam said, trying to keep the desperation from his voice. “Just tell me what happened.”
He let out a deep breath and gathered himself. “Okay, you remember before you went out, I asked you where Mom was?”
“Yes.”
“And, I don’t know, you sounded . . . it was just weird, that’s all. First, you not saying where Mom is, then Mom’s not answering my texts . . .” He looked up. “Dad?”
“What?”
“When you said all that stuff about Mom being at a teachers’ conference, were you telling the truth?”
Adam thought about it, but not long. “No.”
“Do you know where Mom is?”
“No. We had a fight, I guess.”
His son nodded in too sagely a way. “So Mom, what, ran out on you?”
“I don’t know, Thomas. That’s what I’m trying to figure out.”
Thomas nodded some more. “So maybe Mom wouldn’t want me to tell you where she is.”
Adam sat back and rubbed his chin. “That’s a possibility,” he admitted.
Thomas put his hands on the table. He wore a silicone wristband, the kind people use to promote causes, though this one read CEDARFIELD LACROSSE. He started using his free hand to snap the band against his wrist.
“But here’s the problem,” Adam said. “I don’t know what happened here, okay? If your mom contacted you and told you not to tell me where she is, well, I would listen to her on that. But I don’t think she did. I don’t think she’d put you or Ryan in that position.”
“Mom didn’t,” Thomas said, still staring at the band on his arm.
“Okay.”
“But she did make me promise never to sign into this.”
“Sign into what?”
“This app.”
“Thomas?”
The boy looked up.
“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“See, we made a deal. Mom and me.”
“What kind of deal?”
“She would only use the app in emergencies, not to spy on me. But I was never allowed to use it.”
“What do you mean, emergencies?”
“Like if I’d gone missing or she really couldn’t reach me.”
Adam felt himself spinning again. He stopped and tried to center himself. “Maybe you should explain about this app.”