Outside, she moved fast through the trick-or-treaters. The sounds of fireworks had begun, explosions in the distance, some nearby, but untraceable, popping from alleys and behind cars. The sky, far away, was streaked hot red.
James knew Finn’s height, his weight, the color of his socks. He repeated these things.
Ana turned onto their block. She watched a man and woman walking quickly, knocking on one door and the next, like urgent trick-or-treaters without a child. Then she saw the crowd on the sidewalk in front of the house, James in the center. She sped up and then slowed down. Should she rush toward this dark thing in front of her? Yes, she decided. Finally, yes, and she broke into a jog.
Ana was next to James. He looked at her blurrily.
“You’re the mother?” asked Sandra.
“What?” asked Ana.
“Yes. Basically,” interrupted James. “Finn is—I can’t find him.”
Ana blinked, took in this information. “When—”
“About forty-five minutes ago. I don’t know. An hour. They’re looking.”
“Who? Who are these people?” asked Ana.
“Neighbors, I guess,” said James.
Ana went inside the living room and saw a man in construction overalls on the phone. Chuckles looked even browner against the white furniture. He held out a hand. “Mario Pereira,” he said. His hand was gentle in Ana’s. “Pleased to meet you. My buddy’s a cop. They’re on their way.”
“Cop,” Ana repeated, letting the blunt magnitude of the word settle. “When are they coming? Did you look everywhere?” But Mario had turned, was speaking into the Bluetooth, passing on the color of Finn’s boots.
James followed Ana as she moved through the house, bending to peer below tables, into cupboards.
“He’s probably hiding in the basement,” she said, trying to coax the words out normally.
“People are looking,” said James. He corrected himself: “We have looked.”
Outside the kitchen, the porch lights flooded the yard. Ana and James saw it as if for the first time. The workers had finished. The limestone pieces fit together like the jagged countries on a map. The knee-high grasses around the perimeter swayed.
But there were two people in the backyard, strangers, a young couple in their twenties.
Ana opened the French doors.
The girl, wearing a loosely knit hat topped by a large pink flower, rushed to Ana, grabbed her hand.
“We’ll find him, don’t worry,” she said. “I’m Erica. That’s David. We rent the apartment next door.”
“Yes,” said Ana. “I’ve seen you. Thank you.” David was shaking James’s hand. James was looking over his shoulder, eyes on the tall grasses swaying.
“We looked in every inch of this yard,” said Erica quietly. “Several times.”
James walked around them, off the limestone and into the garden.
“Dude, he’s not here,” said David. The bored, rock star voice struck James as untrustworthy and he kept moving, pushing apart the grasses, squatting in the shadows. Nothing.
He sprung up and left the two of them, rushing inside. All the doors were open in the house, front, back. A chill had entered the house.
“I’m Sandra Pereira, Mario’s wife.” She extended a hand, and Ana thought quickly: I have shaken too many hands today—but the hand landed, instead, on Ana’s shoulder. The woman’s voice was grave: “The police are here.”
The police were a young man and woman, almost as young as the couple in the backyard. They looked awkward in the white club chairs opposite Ana and James. The woman sat right on the edge, her ponytail swaying.
“When did you last see your son?” asked the male officer.
“He’s not our son. We’re his guardians. His father died.” James was growing angry at this question, the complication in it.
“You adopted him?”
“No, not yet,” said James. Ana absorbed the last word of the sentence. Everything had been decided somehow, when she wasn’t looking.
“His mother’s in the hospital. You can call his social worker if you want,” said Ana.
James blinked at her.
“It doesn’t really matter right now. The main thing is, we need to find him,” he said.
Ana was scrolling through her cell phone for the number of Ann Silvan.
“Here’s the social worker’s number.” She handed the phone to the woman cop.
“Ana …” said James. Her trust in authority made James’s stomach churn. In the look on his face, pained and nauseated, Ana saw suddenly what he was afraid of, saw holes that they might slip inside, court rooms, a boy removed. But had she not recognized this possibility when she handed over the number? Perhaps she had. Perhaps she was orchestrating a quick, swift conclusion. Was she now this kind of person? But no, she told herself, I just want to do it aboveboard. I just want to be honest.
And James next to her could feel her cycling through these thoughts, could see her abiding every formality, filling in every blank, and he loathed her, he loathed her. She was risking everything.
They sat there as the police officers spoke, and both Ana and James silently arrived at the exact same thought, bristling with shame: I am not sure what I am capable of anymore.
James said the things he had said several times in the past hour, perfecting his description of Finn. Each time he said it out loud—the panda suit, the black boots, the yellow-and-gray-striped T-shirt underneath—the horror grew a little more pronounced. Finn became smaller, farther away from him. The outside became darker.
“What do you do in cases like this?” asked Ana. “How will you find him?”
“We’ll engage all resources, ma’am,” said the woman cop. The woman cop spoke to Ana, and the man to James.
“What does that mean?”
“We’ll need to interview you both,” said the male cop.
“Now?” asked James. “I need to look. I need to be out there.”
In concert, the cops’ faces had narrowed from sympathetic to something distant, aloof. This shift began around the time James had mentioned the fact that they weren’t Finn’s parents. Ana saw them through the eyes of the police. She saw the house, white and empty (the housekeeper had come; it was so damned tidy), the childless couple within it, tourists to parenting. What had they done to deserve this boy? What did they know of little boys? She thought of Marcus, young and at the hands of his father, the scar below his lip. She thought of unknown little boys lured to drainpipes by bearded men. She saw James at the bottom of the ladder of images just because he was a man with a beard sitting next to his barren wife.
“Do we need to get a lawyer?” she asked. “I’m a lawyer. I can make a call.”
James turned to her. “What? That seems a little premature.”
“We’re not arresting you,” said the female cop. “We just need some information.”
“I think we should get a lawyer,” said Ana. “I’ll call Elspeth. No—I’ll call Rick.”
“What are you talking about? Ana, my God.” He turned to the officers, both of whom had assumed a studied blankness. “We’re happy to talk to you. We’re doing it right now.”
Ana said nothing.
“If it’s all right, I’ll talk to you in the kitchen,” said the male police officer, standing. James followed him.
“Can we shut the door?” The officer looked around for a door.
“Open concept,” said James. He led him to the breakfast nook by the garden, where two people continued to search behind plants that had been searched behind already.
The officer took out a small notebook, clicked his pen. James began to sweat, rivulets from his Adam’s apple down to his chest hair.
The officer asked him the time, the outfit, the names of friends. James moved through each question dully, feeling the water seeping through his shirt, approaching his sweater. His beard began to itch from the sweat.