Becca woke with a start in the middle of the night and grabbed the receiver of the phone and pulled it to her ear. “Hello.”
“Me-bec!”
She sat bolt upright. “What’s the matter, Jonah?” she shouted into the phone.
“Me-bec—.” The line went dead.
“Jonah?” Becca shouted into the receiver. “Jonah!”
A dial tone filled the silence in her ear.
Becca jumped out of bed without turning on the light and started to pull on the jeans she’d draped over the chair before going to bed.
“What’s up, Bec?” Zach said sleepily, his head still in the pillow.
“It’s Jonah. Something’s wrong.”
Zach sat up and scrubbed at his eyes. “What’s wrong?”
“I don’t know. He just said my name then hung up or had the phone taken away. I don’t know, Zach. Something’s wrong.” She tried to put on the T-shirt by feel and got it backwards. “Can I please turn on the light?” she shouted.
“Sure, Bec. Go ahead.” By now he was out of the bed and moving around to where she was standing in front of the dresser in the dark.
The lamp on the nightstand came on with a blinding brilliance. Becca had her jeans on and a bra and quickly straightened the T-shirt and slid it on over her head and arms.
Zach came around and slid between her and the dresser. He put his hands on her shoulders and tried to fix on her eyes with his still somewhat clouded by sleep. “Calm down, Becca. Tell me what happened.”
She took a deep breath. “It was Jonah on the phone. He said my name twice then the line went dead. He sounded terrified.”
“How do you know it was him?”
“I recognized his voice, Zach. I know his voice. And he called me Me-bec.”
Zach nodded. “So what are you doing?” He checked the clock on the nightstand. It was 2:12.
“I’m going to Mrs. Brackett’s.”
“Whoa. Whoa, Bec. Wait a minute. You can’t go over there in the middle of the night.”
“Why not?”
“That’s a warzone after dark. Besides, you don’t even know if that’s where he is.”
“I don’t know anywhere else to look.” Her hands and shoulders were shaking violently.
Zach hugged her then guided her to a seat on the edge of the bed. “Sit here a minute. Take a few deep breaths.”
“We’ve got to do something, Zach.”
“I know. We will. If you’ll promise to stay put a minute, I’m going to call Mrs. Brackett’s house.”
Becca nodded. “O.K.” She took a long deep breath and held it in her lungs before releasing it in a drawn-out exhalation.
Zach went to the kitchen and dialed Mrs. Brackett’s number taped beside the wall phone. He let the phone on the other end ring twelve times before hanging up, each plaintive ring like a groan of increasing intensity in his heart—not for Jonah or Mrs. Brackett but for Becca gasping behind him.
He returned to the bedroom. “No answer.”
“She says her phone sometimes doesn’t work.”
“If Jonah was calling from there, then it was working.”
Becca nodded. “So maybe he’s not there.”
Zach shrugged. “Maybe not, but it’s a place to start. Even if he’s not there, she might know where he is.” He took his jeans off the hook on the closet door and put them on.
“Maybe we should call the police,” Becca said.
“And tell them what? That you think you got a call from a boy no relation to you and he might be in trouble but we don’t know where he is or what kind of trouble?”
Becca nodded. “So what should we do?”
“I’ll drive by Mrs. Brackett’s house.”
“Zach—.”
Zach raised his hand to stop her protest. “I won’t even get out of the truck if there’s any hint of trouble. I’ll just drive by and take a look. In the meantime, you keep trying her number and stay near the phone in case Jonah calls again.”
“And I’m just sitting here waiting?”
“You’re here if Jonah calls. You’re trying Mrs. Brackett’s number.”
“And if you don’t come back?”
“If I’m not back in half an hour, or call you from Mrs. Brackett’s to say everything is O.K., call the police and send them over there.”
Becca nodded. “I hate sending you out there. It’s not your fight.”
“It’s ours,” he said as he finished tying his work boots.
She nodded in resignation. “Be careful,” she said, not rising from her seat on the bed, feeling all but paralyzed with fear and confusion and doubt.
“Always am,” he said. He leaned across the bed and kissed the top of her head. “I love you.”