- Monday, February 1st, 2016 -

– 10 days after the disappearance –

I’ve been aimlessly sauntering around the past couple of days. It’s not every day you find out your best friend, might not have been a friend at all. Right now, Emma and I are watching from a distance while the police, along with the principal are opening Finnley’s locker. Who knows what they’ll find in there. I for one have a hunch the secrets I discovered Finnley was hiding, won’t be the last secrets to come up while he’s gone.

‘I’m losing my mind over this.’ Emma mutters. ‘How can you act so… collected?’

‘Believe me, there’s a big internal conflict going on inside of me right now.’ I simply respond.

‘How are his parents and all doing?’

‘Bad.’ I sigh deeply. ‘His mom won’t stop crying and his dad looks like he aged at least ten years in the past couple of weeks.’

‘Do they keep you updated on the investigation?’

‘A little.’ I shrug. ‘The cameras haven’t shown much. Finnley left the club on his own and after that? No sign.’ And that’s where I’m lost. How could Finnley disappear like that? Why isn’t there any freaking trace of him? His phone has been out of service ever since he disappeared and even though a lot of tips came in about his whereabouts, none of those tips lead to any specific location. According to the tips, he’s been seen all over town in the timespan of three hours. Some say alone, some say together with either a boy, a girl, or a group of people. But every tip they’ve checked out, it turned out to be someone else.

His parents even promised a reward for any tips leading to finding Finnley. They’re desperate to find him back.

And here I am, wondering if Finnley is even alive. I know I should have some faith, but who turns out missing and is alive after ten days?

Police even went to search for him in the forest, with dogs and all. Even they consider the possibility of Finnley turning up dead.

I feel my eyes burn with the sensation of tears, blinking rapidly, not wanting to break down at school.

Emma nudges me, waking me up from my thoughts at the sight of the police who opened the locker by now, going through its contents, searching for any clue that might tell them anything useful. They take the contents with them in a big cardboard box, after pilling everything neatly, leaving behind an empty locker like Finnley isn’t even in this school anymore.

‘Wanna go outside?’ Emma whispers. ‘I feel like the walls are coming in on me.’

‘Right, let’s go outside.’ I agree, following her with a slow but steady pace; reminding myself to put one foot in front of the other instead of curling down on the floor, crying like a baby.

- Wednesday, February 3rd, 2016 -

‘Happy birthday Cris.’ My mom looks at me with a careful smile. ‘I made you pancakes for breakfast.’

‘I’m not hungry.’ I mutter, slumping down in my seat, looking at the pancakes she made. ‘And it’s not a happybirthday.’

‘I know you’re worried, even scared,’ – She sits down in front of me, her hands tight together in front of her – ‘but you have to eat something.’

‘I’m not hungry.’

‘You weren’t hungry yesterday either.’ Dad looks up from the newspaper, which he has been scanning each day for news about Finnley. ‘But I agree with your mother on this. You should eat.’

‘But I’m not…’

‘Eat.’ Mom deadpans, pointing to the pancakes. ‘At least one. We don’t want you to starve yourself to death.’

I groan, grabbing myself a pancake, re-chewing every bite for over a minute while feeling annoyed over this. I wonder if Finnley is alive and well. I wonder if he has enough food, wherever the hell he is right now. It feels wrong and unfair to sit here, in the safety of my own home, eating pancakes, while he might be in a ditch somewhere.

‘Do you need me to pick you up after community service?’ Dad looks at me and when I look up I notice both of my parents staring at me. They have a look in their eyes that tell me they assume I’m going to break down any moment.

‘No, I’m fine.’ I shrug. ‘I’ll go by bike.’

‘Maybe I should pick you up.’ He clears his throat. ‘I don’t like the idea of you alone outside when it’s dark.’

I cock a brow, before realizing he’s worried I might disappear too. ‘I’ll be fine.’ I tell him calmly. ‘It’s not like anything is going to happen.’

‘You know.’ My mom starts to talk, but she seems to lack strength to continue.

‘Finnley isn’t the only boy your age that disappeared.’ My dad takes over. ‘The police are linking his case to a couple of other missing children.’

‘Wait, what?’ I feel shocked at this news, since its new to me. ‘There are more missing?’ I grab the paper, looking for an answer, my dad tries to stop me.

‘There’s two more missing right now, all disappeared after a night out.’ He tells me, still holding on to the paper.

‘You know whatever is in there that you’re trying to hide, I can find online if I want to.’ I tell him, making him let go of the paper with a dee sigh.

‘One of them turned up dead two months ago…’ Mom carefully tells me. My blood runs cold hearing her say that they’re linking Finnley’s case to that one. I remember a boy our age was found dead in the woods two months ago. I never assumed it would have anything to do with Finnley being gone.

‘Finnley is alive.’ I deadpan. ‘And they will find him.’ If only I could convince myself like that. I read through the article, stating facts about all four disappearances, comparing the similarities.

It’s scary to think there’s someone out there, abducting boys my age. It’s even scarier to think he got to Finnley.

* * * * *

They found medication in Finnley’s locker. I’ve been eavesdropping in on a conversation his parents had with mine. It isn’t the medication Finnley took for his depression. They already concluded he wasn’t taking those. They found Ritalin. But Finnley didn’t need them, never did. And his parents would have known since he’s underaged.

Finnley couldn’t deal with the studying so he probably went on and got himself Ritalin to focus. It does explain his stressful state of mind, him being tired a lot. He probably didn’t sleep a lot.

I told Emma and Julia about it, the latter not surprised. According to her, she knows more students who take it to focus while studying. I started asking around the students of which I know deal in all sorts of stuff, to try and figure out who could have given Finnley the medicine.

None of them have been helpful and Emma is even a bit pissed of I talked to students like that. Stating it could get me in trouble to hang out with the wrong people. I backfired her objections by telling her I was confined in community service with the wrong people for another couple of days.

Which gave me an idea. Who better knew about who is dealing what, then people who deal themselves?

It takes a lot of overthinking this, and a lot of time trying to convince myself none of them would kill me for talking to them. And since police came in to take me in for questioning once, they all treated me with a little more respect.

I clear my throat while picking up garbage in the park to gain the attention of Stan, a boy I knew got caught with drugs. Nothing serious, but enough to get him in trouble for dealing soft drugs.

‘Are you choking?’ He laughs at me after I cleared my throat a second time.

‘Can I ask you a question?’

‘You already did, mate.’ He chuckles, continuing with the work.

I roll my eyes, following him along the path. ‘Seriously though?’

‘What’s the question?’

‘If… you know…’ I shrug to make it seem less of a big deal to me. ‘I needed something to focus during studying…’ I drawl, feeling awkward. ‘What would you recommend?’

‘Didn’t I see you with one of those gymnasium nerds last week? Can’t you ask her?’

‘You know her?’

‘Nah, by looks.’ He shrugs. ‘The only thing I pay attention to in school, are girls.’ He winks and grins. ‘She’s hot, can’t blame me.’

‘Well, yeah…’ I mutter. ‘I just didn’t know you go to my school.’

‘I’m not present a lot.’ He lets out a laugh. ‘And I don’t spend time with other people than the people you presumably avoid.’

‘Right.’ I stand up straight to look at him. ‘So, any recommendations?’

‘I already know, you know what that friend of yours took.’ He tilts his head sideways a little and looks at me curiously.

I feel my face heat up a little at his statement. So, he knows Finnley is my friend?

‘Less chatting, more working.’ The guy in charge appears by my side. ‘You’re not here to have a nice get-together.’ He deadpans.

We both nod, heading on with the work for a while, remaining silent. I keep my eyes on the guy watching us, planning on going back to our conversation when he’s out of hearing range, but Stan beats me to it.

‘It was Ritalin, right?’ He whispers.

‘Yeah… I’m trying to figure out where he got it from.’

‘You don’t know?’

‘I have no clue.’ I chuckle. ‘Lie you said, I generally avoid the wrong people.’

‘But you know him.’

I pull up my eyebrows in question, feeling confused. ‘Do you mean Finnley was the one…?’

‘Don’t be dense.’ Stan chuckles again. ‘Nathan off course. I know he provides students with Ritalin. He isn’t a big shot at dealing, but he does make good money out of his little business.’

‘Nathan?’ I do not trust the guy. I really don’t.

‘Nathan Jacobs?’ Stan stands up and stretches his back. ‘He was with those girls last week. Assumed you know him.’

‘No, it was the first time we met.’ I admit. ‘So, he’s the one who got Finnley the Ritalin?’

‘Probably.’ Stan shrugs. ‘I don’t know any other guy who offers the stuff.’

‘Right.’ I take in a deep breath. ‘Guess I’ll have to ask him.’

‘You don’t seem to cheerful about that.’ Stan grins. ‘If he’s giving you trouble, I can fix it for you.’

‘No, no.’ I hold up a hand as in surrender. ‘No need for help. I just don’t like the guy.’

‘Nobody does.’ Stan tells me seriously. ‘He’s got beef with most of the people right here.’

‘Thanks for telling me that before I got too friendly with him.’

‘Don’t get yourself involved with him if you don’t want trouble with the wrong people.’ Stan warns me. ‘Most of these guys leave you alone after we found out your best friend is missing. Not because we feel sorry, but because Finnley was a nice guy.’

‘Is.’ I deadpan, before my jaw drops a little. ‘You knew Finnley?’

‘Honestly, for a best friend, you seem to know little about him, now do you?’

‘So it seems.’ I mutter annoyed. What the hell did Finnley have to do with these guys?

* * * * *

After community service ended, I ended up talking to Stan and one of his friends James for a while, before they drove me home. They did that the next two days too. Let’s say my parents aren’t too pleased I seem to be making friends with them since we met during community service. I’ve started talking to Stan two days ago and ever since, he told me a lot about Finnley and how much they met in the past couple of months. Finnley and Nathan have never been couple, what made me wonder why Nathan forgot to mention that to Julia.

Finnley came across Stan and James because he smoked pod.

By now I know five facts about Finnley, I didn’t know before he went missing.

He is gay, depressed, used a variety of intoxicating shit to get into a different state of mind; like Ritalin for studying and pod to relax. His grades had been slipping according to Charlie and by the looks of it, Finnley either couldn’t deal with the grades, or his grades suffered because he was in the wrong state of mind for months.

But why didn’t Finnley tell me? We always told each other everything. Hidden truth after hidden truth gets piled up in front of me making it very clear to me; Finnley was not who I thought he was. He didn’t exactly lie, but he kept the truth hidden.

But since he is my best friend and it’s more than obvious Finnley was struggling, I can’t help but becoming obsessed with revealing everything. I’m at Stan’s place and for some reason, he decided to help me uncover the things Finnley kept hidden for me, starting with Nathan and figuring out who exactly he was, and what their relationship had been. For all I know, they had been dating. For all Stan understood coming from Finn, Nathan had been his way of experimenting with his sexuality.

‘Can you find him?’ Stan asks beside me, scrolling through his list of contacts to see if he can come up with someone who might have better contacts with Nathan. The guy went off grid after we met, even Julia doesn’t know why he isn’t answering his phone calls, always sending it to voicemail and sending texts to tell her he’s busy.

‘No.’ I groan in frustration. ‘He isn’t on any Social Media.’ I mutter, scrolling through Facebook’s search results.

‘You said that Julia chick knew him because he was friends with her brother?’

‘Sister.’ I correct him. ‘They are in the same class I think.’

‘So, see if she has him in her contacts list. He might have hidden his profile.’

I do as he told me to, going to Julia’s Facebook to recover her sisters page, searching her friends list to find his name right there. The account, however, has been put to private and it isn’t helpful at all.

‘Wait.’ Stan hits himself in the face with a flat hand, dragging it down slowly. His eyes land on mine and he starts laughing. ‘Isn’t he supposed to be Finn’s boyfriend?’

‘Well, in secret, yeah…’ I look at him confused.

‘Aren’t they friends on Facebook or whatever?’

‘I don’t know.’ I shrug. ‘I never pay attention to that kind of stuff.’

‘You said you thought you knew everything about him.’

‘Yes. I thought. Thanks for reminding me I don’t.’

‘Do you know his passwords?’

‘I knew the password to his computer. But he changed it months ago. Why?’

‘Try and see if it’s the same. If it is, he might have access to Nathan’s page.’

I smirk at him and nod. ‘You’re way smarter than you give yourself credit for, you know?’

‘That’s what my mom always tells me.’ He waves his hand dismissively. ‘Can’t make the same money in school as I’m doing by dealing pod.’

‘Right.’ I sigh. ‘I can’t believe I spend time with a pod head.’

‘Hey!’ He nudges me in the ribs. ‘I’m trying to help you, don’t be rude.’

‘You’re still a pod head.’ I chuckle. ‘But a fairly nice one.’

‘Thanks…’ His sentence dies when my attempt to login on Finnley’s Facebook page succeeds, giving me access to his page. Stan takes over the controls, heading back to Nathan’s page instantly. They are friends and it provides a little more information about the guy. But by the looks of it, Nathan liked his privacy.

‘He doesn’t post much.’ Stan mutters. ‘But he gets tagged a lot.’ We watch the pictures he’s tagged in, most of them in an all too familiar environment.

‘That’s the club I took Finn to.’ I point towards a picture currently shown on screen. ‘Most clubbing pictures are in there.’

‘So, it’s safe to assume he goes there a lot.’ Stan smiles. ‘I think we’re going out tonight.’

‘And then what?’ I snap. ‘Ask him, yet again, if he’s seen Finn?’

‘Ask him about the Ritalin, right?’ Stan pushes me. ‘You wanted to lure him in by pretending to want some.’

‘Oh, right.’ I remember my own plan. I was planning on retracing Finn’s steps, along with the Ritalin.

‘Are you going to seduce him?’ Stan wiggles his eyebrows. ‘That would be the ultimate way to relive Finn’s last couple of months.’

‘I’m not gay.’ I deadpan. ‘But maybe befriending him will give me some insights on Finn’s life outside of school.’

‘Right.’ Stan sighs. ‘Just be careful. He has a bad temper.’

‘I can’t believe Finn experimented with him.’ I mutter, covering my face with my hands. ‘He sounds way too shady.’

‘Well, according to Finn, he was good in bed.’

‘I don’t want to know.’ I whine, covering my ears in the process. I should tell you, Stan is bisexual and has no problems with gay sex on any level. He even tried to convince me gay sex is better than straight sex. Apparently, it was one of the reasons Finn kept going to him for pod. They’ve shared the bed a few times themselves.

Finnley is totally not as innocent and nerdy as I thought he was. I didn’t even know he lost his virginity, let alone had sex with at least two different guys.

I just keep wondering, what more was Finnley hiding? If I continued my own search to uncover the truth, what exactly would I uncover?