Chapter 4 - The Boy in the Rain
Rain hit the street before Mark reached the driveway.
He did not bother with a coat.
"I'll take the car," Sarah shouted behind him.
"Check the park. I'll take the school."
Margaret called the neighbors. Lily came downstairs in socks, pale and frightened.
"Is he gone because of me?"
Sarah grabbed her shoulders.
"No. This is not your fault."
Mark heard the words from the porch.
They felt aimed at him.
He drove too fast.
The baseball field was empty.
So was the convenience store where Austin sometimes bought sports drinks after practice.
At the school, Mark jumped the curb and left the truck crooked near the gym.
The doors were locked.
"Austin!"
His voice echoed across the parking lot.
Nothing.
He called Coach Reynolds.
"Have you seen him?"
"Not tonight. What's wrong?"
"We had an argument."
There was a pause.
"What kind of argument?"
Mark looked through the rain at the dark field.
"The kind where I said something I can't take back."
Coach Reynolds did not ask for details.
"He goes to the old batting cages when he's upset. Behind the community center."
Mark hung up and drove.
The cages were locked, but a broken side gate leaned open.
He found Austin's backpack under the metal bench.
His heart stopped.
"Austin!"
He ran between the cages.
No one.
Inside the backpack were a water bottle, a hoodie, twenty-three dollars, and an old photograph.
Mark recognized it.
Austin at four years old, sitting on the shoulders of his biological father, Ben Carter.
Ben had died in a highway accident less than a year later.
Mark had met Sarah two years after that.
On the back of the photo, Sarah had written: YOUR DAD LOVED YOU BIGGER THAN THE SKY.
Mark stared at it until the rain blurred his vision.
His phone rang.
Sarah.
"Did you find him?"
"His bag. Not him."
She made a broken sound.
Then another call beeped in.
Unknown number.
Mark almost ignored it.
He answered.
"Hello?"
A man's voice said, "Are you Austin's stepfather?"
Mark gripped the phone.
"Who is this?"
"My name is Officer Daniels. Your boy is with me. He's safe."
Mark nearly dropped to his knees.
"Where?"
The officer gave him an address.
Mark knew it before Daniels finished.
Rosewood Cemetery.
May you like
Ben Carter's grave.
Then the officer added quietly, "You should know something before you get here. He keeps saying he doesn't want to go home with you."
