Chapter 8 #2
“He’s not fine,” I said after I managed to pry apart my jaw enough to speak.
“He just walked away from everything in his life without a word. That’s not normal.
” The officer started to speak, but I cut her off.
“Listen. I don’t think you understand. My brother has stage four cancer.
That’s not something a person can just walk away from.
He didn’t even take his medication with him.
He just disappeared. He’s probably dying out there somewhere.
If you can’t file a Missing Persons report, then fine, but just help me get in contact with him so I can make sure he’s okay. ”
Once the blue pens were in place, a new ring of red pens was started. There were only a few, but the officer took extra care to make sure that each red pen sat an equal distance from each other in the ring.
“As much as you may not like it, it’s not illegal for a person to walk away from their life.
Even taking medication is a choice. What would you have us do?
Arrest him? Strap him down and force him to take medication.
We’ve contacted your brother, and he’s made it clear that he’s fine, everything he’s done or not done is his own choice, and he doesn’t wish to be bothered.
We can’t waste any more resources looking for a man who isn’t missing. ”
Talking to these people was like bashing my head against a wall, and I was about ready to start tearing my own hair out. Over the course of several months, I’d visited the police three times. I’d talked to three different officers and tried to argue my case in three different ways.
Each time, it ended up the same way. Being told I couldn’t do anything and to stop causing trouble.
Taking a deep breath, I grasped for the last shreds of patience I still possessed.
“Aaron may think its his own choice, but its not. He’s sick and he’s not thinking clearly.
He was talking to some questionable people online.
I think he was recruited by some cult that’s got him convinced they can heal him.
If he doesn’t take his medication, he’ll die.
This cult is going to kill him. I’m just trying to save my brother’s life.
Please. If you can’t give me his contact information, can you at least tell me where he is so I can check on him? Surely, that’s not too much to ask.”
The officer had moved on from the pens and was now organizing the individually unique writing instruments.
A highlighter, a white-out pen, and a sharpie were already clustered together in the center of the cup, pressed together by the limited remaining space.
The officer paused with a bright green glitter pen in hand, the oversized pompom on the end sticking straight up in the air, and finally looked me in the eye for the first time.
“Mister Beckham. I know this may be hard to hear, but your brother has not given us permission to tell you where he is or give you any of his information. My advice to you would be to go home, take a good look at yourself, and consider if there is a reason for your brother to cut contact with you.”
The last glittery pen was placed securely in the cup, filling the last remaining gap and returning the officer’s desk back to its proper order.
I was too furious to even speak. No matter how I tried, no words would come out and I was left gaping at her like an angry fish.
With a wordless shout of frustration, I knocked over her cup and scattered the pens back into a chaotic mess, before storming out of the police station.
I stayed angry all the way back to my apartment. On the public bus, other passengers avoided me, but I hardly noticed as I leaned against the window grumbling under my breath.
How dare that officer imply that I was somehow at fault for my brother’s sudden disappearance?
All I’d ever done was support him through his illness.
I’d sold my home and moved into this crappy little apartment so that I could help pay off his medical bills.
I’d taken care of him when his chemo left him so weak he couldn’t get out of bed for days.
I’d spent a year living off of mostly instant ramen noodles and tv dinners so that I could afford better quality food for him, cashed in all my vacation and sick days at work so that I could take him to doctor’s appointments, and reorganized my entire life around taking care of him.
And then he just walked out the door one day and disappeared.
It wasn’t fair. I’d done everything I could to take care of him, yet the officers at the police station looked at me like I was in the wrong. I must have done something to drive him away.
My anger persisted until I was back in the little apartment I shared with my brother, sitting on our couch and looking around at the furniture I’d bought for us. The couch was old and sagging, but still comfortable, and the coffee table placed in front of it was only a little slanted.
A pill bottle sat on the table, its bright orange plastic clashing harshly with the brown wood surface.
At the sight of that bottle, all the anger drained out of me and my head collapsed into my hands as I cried.
My brother was sick. He could be dead right now, and I would never know.
Aaron and I had once been very close. We were born barely a year apart, so we’d grown up together and hit most of our milestones around the same time.
Even once we were adults, we’d stayed in constant contact.
Then, when our parents died, and we were the only family left for each other, we grew even closer.
I always thought, no matter what life threw at me, that I’d always at least have Aaron in my corner.
Then he got sick.
At first, he tried to reassure me, saying that people beat cancer all the time. Soon enough, everything would go back to normal, and we’d be able to laugh about it one day.
Yet, that day never came. With each failed treatment, and with each worsening symptom, he grew more and more distant with me, until some days I could barely get two words out of him.
He spent most of his time online, talking to people I’d never heard of.
These people said ridiculous things, claiming that his cancer was a result of living in a modern city, surrounded by sin and filth every day.
That he could be cured if he just returned to the way humans were supposed to live.
I asked Aaron about it once.
What was this way that humans were “supposed to live?”
It was such a vague statement that didn’t make sense.
He never answered me.
Then, a few months ago, I went out to refill his prescription, and when I came back the apartment was empty. Aaron took nothing but some cash and his ID with him. His cellphone, his credit cards, even most of his clothes, were all left behind.
That was when I filed the first Missing Persons report and was dismissed by the police for the first time.
I sat on that couch crying for nearly an hour, until finally the tears stopped. At that point, I didn’t even care if Aaron refused to come home. I just wanted to know that he was really all right. That he was happy, and his cancer was being treated properly.
I just didn’t want to lose the only family I had left.
At some point, while I cried, I’d picked up the medicine bottle and was clutching it so tightly in my hand that the rim of the cap was cutting into my hand.
No, I wouldn’t give up. No matter what any officer said, I would keep looking until I knew Aaron was okay.
Or I got confirmation that he was dead.
Another month passed without any sign of my brother.
I used the last of my savings to hire a private investigator, but I couldn’t afford more than a consultation and a periphery investigation.
It was enough to tell me that my brother was probably still alive, as no John Does matching his description had turned up recently, but it still wasn’t enough for me to actually find him.
In that time, I was fired from my job for missing too many days of work.
I didn’t really care. It was just a menial office job that paid barely more than minimum wage.
I couldn’t stand the place, but without a job I had no money, and without money, I had no means to keep looking for Aaron.
Each day looked a little more hopeless, but I still didn’t give up.
Then, one evening, I got a text from an unknown number.
It’s Aaron. Meet me here.
A map with a pinned location was attached to the message.
It could have been a scam. Most people probably would have questioned such a cryptic message before blindly following its order.
However, I was so desperate to find my brother, I never even hesitated.
I spent my last few dollars on a bus ticket to a completely different state and headed off that very night.
The pinned location on the map led me to a small town called Rynkirk. The location turned out to be a run down motel on the edge of town. When I arrived, I received another message telling me what room number to go to.
There, lying on the stained motel bed, was my brother.
“Aaron!” I shouted as I ran to him, dropping to my knees beside the bed.
It had been months since I last saw him.
He’d changed so much that he was barely recognizable.
He was once a robust man just like me, but now he resembled a skeleton draped in skin rather than a human.
His breathing was shallow and raspy, and when he looked at me, it seemed to take all his effort just to open his eyes.
“Ellis, hey,” he greeted me, his voice as rough as sandpaper. “Didn’t think you… you’d actually show up.”
“Of course I showed up.” I gripped his hand and nearly jumped at how cold it was. “I’ve been looking everywhere for you. I was so worried. You just disappeared and I… I…”
Aaron squeezed my hand. There was barely any pressure to it, but he seemed to be putting everything he had into that grip. “I know. I messed up. I was so stupid. I never should have listened to them, but I was just so scared. Nothing was working. I was dying, and I didn’t… I didn’t want to die.”
“You’re not going to die,” I insisted, but he cut me off with a weak shake of his head.
“I am. Don’t think I have much time left. Those bastards lied to me until the very end, were probably laughing at me behind my back, but I finally wised up.” He smiled, and I could see that his gums had receded around his teeth. “In the end, I’ll have the last laugh. Look in the drawer there.”
The motel room didn’t have much. Just a bed, a small side table with a chair, and an old TV that didn’t work. It wasn’t hard to figure out what drawer he meant.
Inside, I found a few hundred bucks in cash, and a wooden box with an antique key.
“What is this?” I asked after bringing the box and the cash over to the bed.
“That’s my revenge.”
Aaron started laughing, but the laugh quickly turned into a cough.
He grabbed a tissue from a box sitting on the bed next to him to cover his mouth, and when he pulled it away it was stained with blood.
When he finally stopped coughing and his breathing returned to a steadier pace, he tossed the tissue into a nearby trashcan with other bloodied paper.
“I don’t have much time left. I’m sorry to put this on you, but I can’t just let them get away with it. Take the cash, take the key, and disappear.”
“What?” I shook my head, still holding the box with the key. “What do you mean disappear?”
“I mean go somewhere they can’t find you,” Aaron snapped.
The sudden burst of emotion sapped his energy, and he had to take a moment to catch his breath.
“I’m sorry. You’re confused. Of course you are.
I’ll explain, but just promise me that you’ll hide this key somewhere that no one can ever find it.
They’ll come looking for you, so you’ll have to hide, too.
You always liked camping. That might work.
Just get a tent, go out into the woods, and stay there. ”
I stared down at the key, sitting comfortably in its little box. It was definitely an antique, with an intricate design and artistic flower carvings around the handle. It was the kind of key that would be used to unlock something important.
But not more important than my brother’s life.
I wanted to argue, to throw away the key and forget about it, but Aaron was so insistent with his request, there was only one answer I could give. I promised to hide the key, so long as he let me take care of him first.
We stayed in that motel as he explained everything about the key and The Tamed Souls . During that time, I took care of him and tried to make him as comfortable as possible.
Two days after I first arrived at the motel, Aaron closed his eyes for the last time.