The next day passed as usual. She managed to get her 5 minutes of peace, even if she did have to be careful with her hand. Germ was waiting at the door and expressed his concern, but she assured him she was alright. She had to take the pain pill around mid-morning, but she immersed herself in her work and tried not to think about things too much.

The paint was delivered. She called the contractor and he picked it up. One of the big tubs of interior paint was in an orange hue that reminded her of Casey, and it made her cry a little, but not too much.

Just after noon Angus stopped by.

“Hi Bea. I saw the store was closed yesterday, and you weren’t on IM. You okay?”

She held up her bandaged hand.

“Oh! What happened?”

“Just cut myself on some glass. It’ll be okay. I’m good.”

“You got antibiotics?”

“Yup. One of Germ’s aunts patched me up. I’m fine.”

“Well that’s good! Have you seen Casey? His parents were looking for him.”

A cold chill ran down Bea’s spine and her eyes betrayed her concern. “No. I haven’t seen him since yesterday. He didn’t come home last night?”

“I guess not. Not the first time he hasn’t come home though. He’ll turn up.”

“I’m not so sure, Angus. We had a falling out yesterday,” Bea said, worried now in earnest. She proceeded to tell Angus of their relationship that had bloomed and so quickly died.

“Oh shit. Bea, you think he might have done something?”

“I don’t know, Angus. I was pretty hard on him. Maybe.”

“Bea, I think we need to talk to the police.”

She nodded, knowing it was the right thing to do. She didn’t hate the cops. She knew they were necessary. But she didn’t like to have to talk to them either.

“I’ll talk to them. I’ll call them now. You’d better get back to the Outpost.”

“Okay. Sorry Bea.”

Bea nodded and picked up the old phone. The dust had been cleaned off of it yesterday. She didn’t use it much.

The voice on the other end of the line wasn’t familiar to her, but it was professional. She explained the situation briefly.

“We’ll have someone come over. The Ol’ Pickaxe you say? No need for the address, we know where it is. Thanks for calling, Bea.”

It was, of course, Mae’s aunt that dropped by later that afternoon.

“Yeah, I’m her aunt. Just call me Molly. Is there somewhere we can talk privately?”

Bea led her back into the warehouse.

“Thanks for parking out back, Molly. People talk.”

“I know too well, Bea,” the policewoman said, taking out a notepad.

“Don’t you have detectives for this sort of thing?”

“Bea. This is Possum Springs. We’ve got like 5 people on the payroll. We have one detective, and he’s been busy as hell lately. Casey’s not the only person that’s been reported as missing recently.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. Really. Now, tell me about Casey.”

Bea proceeded to tell Molly everything. She briefly considered leaving out the part about the meth, but decided it was probably too important to lie about.

“No problem,” Molly assured her. “This isn’t a drug investigation. You’re fine. So you haven’t seen or heard from him since yesterday afternoon?”

“Yeah. About 2 pm I think.”

“Okay. Got it. Bea, I have one more question. Not for the record, just so I know. What do you think has happened to him?”

“I hope he did what he said he’d do. I hope he hopped on a train and got the hell out of town.”

Molly looked directly at her. “But…”

“I’m afraid he’s committed suicide - but mind you I don’t at all know that! He never talked about anything like that. But… I can’t help but be afraid of the possibility. I came down on him pretty hard. Besides that possibility, I think the most likely thing is that he’s holed up doing drugs somewhere.”

“Thanks Bea. We’ll send some people out to the railroad tracks to see if we can find anything. Bea, if the worst has happened… this isn’t your fault. You know that, right?”

Tears started to well up in her eyes again. She really thought there must be a limit, but apparently Tear Ducts Spring Eternal.

“Yeah. I do. Will you tell me what you find?”

“I’m not supposed to. But yes. I’ll let you know if we find anything. Doesn’t sound like the other cases though. Hopefully he just left.”

“Thanks,” Bea said, rising to show her out.

“I’ll go out the back way. I understand, Bea. And you were right to do what you did. If for some reason I’d have come here about the drugs and found them here… well, I wouldn’t be leaving by the back door.”

“Thanks Molly. I hope you find him.”

“Me too Bea. His parents have already called. They want us to file a Missing Persons alert for him, but it’s too soon for us to do that yet.”

“But… I heard he’s been gone overnight before.”

“Yes, but he left his skateboard. They say he NEVER leaves his skateboard.”

“And he has a drum kit in the Party Barn that’s still there. Angus told me that.”

“Is that Angus Delaney? Works at the Video Outpost?”

Bea suddenly got worried. Had she let something slip?

As if reading her mind, Molly spoke up.

“Bea, I’m just a person. Like you and everyone else. I just want to find out what happened to Casey. I’m not here to harass you or Angus. But he might have some knowledge that he doesn’t realize too. I’m just going to talk to him, like you.”

“Yeah. Angus Delaney. He’ll be there now.”

“Thanks Bea. And good luck with the hand.”

Bea nodded and showed the officer out. Then she called Angus to let him know what he was in for.

“No problem Bea. Really. You told her everything? Even…”

“Everything. I don’t need the law on me Angus.”

“Yeah. I know what you mean. Yeah, she just walked in. Talk to you later.”

Angus hung up the line and Bea set the handset down. In other towns they’d have cell phones. Not here. This was Possum Springs.

“What’s up?” Germ asked. “Something about Casey?”

“Yeah. He’s gone missing.”

“Oh shit. The copper’s got him.”

“No Germ. The coppers didn’t ‘get him’. They’re just trying to find him.”

“I bet he hopped a train.”

“I hope so, Germ. I really do. Still, I can’t see him leaving without his skateboard. I just hope he didn’t do anything stupid.”

“I guess we’ll find out eventually.”

“I guess so,” Bea said.

But she never saw Casey Hartley again. Posters were put up. People were questioned. But he was never seen again. Eventually minutes would go by when Bea didn’t think about Casey. Then hours. Then days. The posters blew away. His parents stopped being seen asking passerby if they’d seen him. The weather crept ever closer to winter.

Finally, one day, Gregg and Angus stopped by and asked her if she would mind programming the drum parts to their songs too. Bea thought it was silly. Soon everything would be on the computer and there’d be no reason to practice. But she already had the old songs’ parts programmed, and Angus was her friend. Plus Gregg was as excitable as ever and his enthusiasm was contagious. She took the old cassette tape home and spent a few evenings getting the drums right on the new stuff. And her song.

Then they practiced one Sunday night, and she felt hollow. Casey’s drum kit had been taken away. There was a hole where he used to be. The drums she’d programmed were perfect. Too perfect. They hit every beat exactly on time. The music sounded dead to her.

After that, she begged off of playing with the band anymore. She gave Angus the files so he could play them, but they stopped practicing too. It felt like everything was shutting down.

And then one day she got a call from Angus. Terse and urgent, he begged her to come by the Party Barn. Apparently Gregg had gone hyper and absolutely HAD to practice. Urgently.

“Hey Germ, can you hold down the fort? Apparently there’s an URGENT band meeting. Like, now.”

“No problem Bea. You gonna be back?”

“I really don’t know. If not, can you leave the key in the ‘special place’ for me?

“Sure.”

Bea walked over to the old Party Barn, her laptop in tow. Her hand had healed long ago - not that she needed it to press a key. When she looked through the window, she saw an unexpected face.

Mae had returned.