Chapter 2 O’Children by. Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds
Jackie
Janice Reagers and her two children stuck out like a sore thumb amongst the crowd around them. Janice seemed to be around my age, but the stress of two young children had its effects.
Her brown hair was cut short, but it did not stop the young girl on her hip from trying to pull it. That must be Nancy, I thought to myself, who was present at the time of Joey’s disappearance. It was at the thought of the young boy that I finally saw him.
He had light sandy brown hair and glasses that were a bit too big for his face.
He appeared like any other young eight year old boy, but his eyes told a different story.
He had a thousand yard stare, one that I was told I often had myself, but it was the dark circles surrounding his eyes that showed his thoughts may not always be those of a typical eight year old.
“Are you Ophelia James and Oliver Bosede?” Janice asked as Oliver and I approached the table the small family was sitting at.
“Yes, but you can call me Jackie,” I responded as I sat down and took in my surroundings. The family was sat outside a cafe that lined one of the streets of Portland, Oregon. “We really appreciate you meeting with us to discuss the case at hand.”
“Can we get you anything to eat?” Oliver asked. “I can take the kids to get some hot chocolate from inside while you and Jackie begin.”
Janice looked to her young son sitting on the chair next to her as she thought about her reply. “Ummm… yeah, that would be great. Joey, do you want to go with Oliver to get a treat?”
Joey didn’t respond. He simply looked to his mother and then to Oliver as he stood up, ready to follow him inside.
“Here is Nancy. She can walk on her own, but she feels intimidated by the cobblestone streets,” Janice explained as she passed her daughter to Oliver.
Slowly the trio of Oliver, Joey and Nancy made their way into the cafe to give Janice a moment of reprieve. Almost immediately, I could see the tension dissipate from the woman in front of me.
This is why Oliver and I worked well together. While he was distracting the kids, I could speak with Janice candidly concerning the topic of her son's disappearance. Oliver could potentially get information out of Joey as well as he helped the children. He was always better with kids than I was.
“Like I was stating, Janice, we really appreciate you being willing to work with us,” I said as I eased into my line of questioning. “I know this cannot be easy for you to discuss.”
“Jackie, I was the one who contacted you. Well, I guess Goldie. The stories that are spreading about my son…they’re becoming unmanageable.
He’s an eight year old boy and we’re receiving death threats saying he is the next son of Satan.
I read some of your articles following the Ted Bundy trial.
You wrote the truth about who he was, how he was pathetic and not a charmer.
That’s how he lured in the women. You wrote the truth, while everyone else wrote a false narrative.
That’s what I need, someone to write the truth about us,” Janice explained.
With each word I could see Janice’s fear rising in her chest. There was no denying that she would do anything for her kids.
“Well, then I’m really glad that you got in touch with us.
” I reached across the table and took her hands into mine.
She may be a part of a case, a story, but she was a scared mom first. “We want to help, we want to explain the truth of Joey’s disappearance.
I do need to warn you that we’re not detectives, or private investigators, we’re journalists and academics that are here for the truth,” I continued as I looked at the woman in front of me, hoping she understood we couldn’t fix it all.
“We will do what we can, but we may not solve his case.”
Janice sighed as she pleaded to the one person who may be able to help her, and that person just happened to be me. “Jackie, that’s really all I need. My biggest regret will be that I couldn’t keep Joey safe for those five days he was gone, but I’ll do anything and everything to keep him safe now.”
“You are an incredible mother, and we’re here to support you,” I began as I pulled my hands back and grabbed my notebook and pen out of my shoulder bag that was hooked over the arm of my chair. “Let’s get started. To begin, can you recount what occurred the day he went missing?”
“Oh, yes of course.” She took a deep breath to ready herself to explain what was probably the worst day of her life.
“It was around four-thirty in the afternoon, on October twelfth. Nancy had just woken up from her nap and I had some meetings with my lawyer going over my recent divorce. I put Nancy and Joey in his room to play. After about an hour I went to check on them and Nancy was there and Joey… well, he just wasn’t.
The only thing in the room that had changed was that Joey’s closet door was open,” Janice explained.
“Was that uncommon, for the door to be open, I mean?” I inquired.
“Extremely. There’s a lock on the top of the door to keep it closed. We used to store Carter’s, my ex-husband’s, military uniform and weapons in there. We keep the door closed out of habit, and it was locked when I left the room.”
“To confirm, there was no way Joey or Nancy would be able to unlock the door on their own?”
“Yes, that’s correct. The police assumed the abductor must have done it when they entered the room, but no one can explain why,” she answered as she began to fidget with her hands, showing her anxiety and fear.
Taking the cue, I knew there was something that wasn’t being shared in regards to the closet door. “Do Nancy or Joey know how the door came to be opened?”
“They both have a… well, I call it a theory,” Janice mumbled as she tried to reveal as little as possible.
I could understand her hesitancy to share what had happened, but I needed the full story. “A theory?”
Janice deflated as she began on the story her children had concocted concerning the closet and what was found in it. “Both Nancy and Joey said that it was the shadow that opened it.”
“The shadow?”
“Yes. I never told the Police this because I knew it would only add to the hysteria that has surrounded the case. Nancy and Joey have been talking about a shadow that comes through the closet to visit them. It happened shortly after Carter left. I assumed it was a coping mechanism for losing their father, like an imaginary friend. Right before Joey disappeared, the stories they shared about the shadow became darker. Joey stated the shadow was planning on taking him away to his home and that the shadow was showing him dreams about people he didn’t know.
It was after one of these stories that I saw the drawing in the back of the closet,” Janice explained as she retold the stories from her son.
“There were no discussions of drawings in the case file. Do you have a picture of this or a description maybe?” I asked as I dictated the conversation into my notebook.
“Yes, I do,” Janice began as she reached into her purse and pulled out a polaroid and handed it across the table to me. “Here it is. Please don’t publish this. It will only add fuel to the fire.”
As I took the photo into my hands, my breath hitched looking at what was drawn in Joey’s closet.
The picture showed an upside down star, like a pentagram without the outer circle.
There were three sixes drawn surrounding the top point of the star.
The lines were not clean and looked as though they were drawn in a rush with someone’s hands.
The paint color used was a sickening red that eerily resembled blood.
I was awestruck looking at the nefarious symbol, but it wasn’t unfamiliar.
It felt like I had seen this before, but where?
Maybe from when I was growing up?
“Would you mind if I hold onto this?” I asked as I looked up to Janice sitting across from me.
“That’s why I brought it,” Janice explained as she gestured to the photograph.
“I don’t know who drew it or when. Maybe my husband did as some sick prank at some point.
The only thing that worries me is that ever since Joey reappeared, he has been drawing it, almost nonstop.
I have hundreds of pages of that symbol drawn by my eight year old son. ”
“Does he explain why he draws it?” I inquired.
“Only that he needs to be ready.” Janice signed. “Ready for what? I don’t know. I don’t think he does either.”
“Thank you, Janice. I know this is hard to discuss. I don’t want to make you relive anything you’re not ready for,” I stated as I again grasped Janice’s hands that were laying across the table. “If you need to stop, please let me know.”
“No, no, it’s okay. I want to tell you. I really think you’re the only person who can help,” she began.
“Other than the drawing and the closet door, there was nothing off in the room. Nancy couldn’t explain where he had gone, but she’s so little, I would have been surprised if she could.
For the next five days, there was nothing.
No sign of Joey, no leads as to where he was, no suspects.
There was nothing.” Janice slowly looked up, trying to hold back tears.
“Everyone was losing hope, I thought I would never see him again. Then I got the call. He was picked up in the middle of the street in a city here in Oregon. Eugene, to be specific. He had no memory of what happened and thought he had been gone for an hour.”
“Eugene? That’s where he was found?” I inquired, taken aback by the location the boy had reappeared in. Eugene was my home.
How had I not heard about this?
“Yes. I am not sure the exact street, it should be listed in the case file that the police put together. He was still in the clothes I had put him in the morning he disappeared,” Janice stated.