I didn’t dare open my eyes. I couldn’t have fallen asleep and dreamed this—
“Seriously, Lynn, move your purse. This stupid coat is going to take up a seat in itself.”
“How are you here?” I asked.
Roxy struggled to take off her long overcoat and unwrap her scarf before unceremoniously plopping down. “We have about two seconds to get off this plane. But we’re going to raise some eyebrows if I start dragging you down the aisle. So, I’m here to yank you home if—for the first time in your life—you’re drunk. Or perhaps overly medicated. But most importantly, I am here to find out what the hell you’re doing.”
“I don’t know what I’m doing. How are you even here?”
“Here are the Cliffs Notes, as the attendants are circling. You didn’t make it easy, sister. Stella called me after midnight, pretty frantic, even though you texted her to say you were all right. I figured you were driving around, maybe even got a hotel room to get some peace. You never carry cash, and you lost your debit card last week—as you will recall—so that meant you used your credit card. And for shits and giggles, I checked the Peddler charge card—thanks for putting me on that account, by the way—and it showed you’d bought a ticket to Denver. So I booked myself a ticket too and hustled my fat ass over here. I stopped to kiss Ed and tell him to burn the stash and pop a few extras to numb the pain. I told him I could be back this morning. Or it might be a few days, if you needed to meet Tom in Champaign.”
“You can’t leave Ed, not if he’s having pain—”
“For Christ sake, Lynn, he has stage-four colon cancer. He’s gonna have pain. But he’s fine. I filled him in on what happened with Steven’s arrest. Well, not everything—for God’s sake, I don’t want the man to have a stroke as well as cancer. Now, Lynn, what are you doing?”
“I’m so glad you’re here.” The words barely came out of my throat. “I can barely breathe, I’m so nervous.”
“Lynn, you need to tell me right now if whatever it is you’re doing—you are doing it of a sound mind and body. Or if you’ve been threatened and are in danger of some kind.”
“At this second, I am lucid. But my stomach is doing backflips.”
“Well, there’s a convenient puke bag right here if things go south. But let’s avoid that if we can. Do I need to order you a drink?”
I shook my head, and Roxy waved over a tired-looking flight attendant. “Can we get a cup of water? Thanks.” Roxy then dropped her voice. “Why are you going to Denver?”
“I’m not going to Denver. I’m going to a town called Argentum, somewhere in the Rocky Mountains.”
“And why, pray tell, are you going there?”
The flight attendant brought over a small cup and reminded Roxy to fasten her seatbelt, as they were preparing to take off.
“Time’s up, Lynn. This is when you tell me if you need me to get you off this plane, or if we’re about to make a cross-country flight.”
“You can’t go with me.”
“I most certainly can and will. Case closed. Now, why Colorado?”
I set the cup down in the console. “I think it’s where Steven thinks they’ve taken William.”
Roxy’s eyebrows rose. “That little nugget of information was not shared during our wonderful experience with the girls. And just who is it that’s taken William? I can’t believe I continue to say this, but—the aliens?”
“I don’t know. I don’t know anything. And I could be completely wrong about all of this. All I know is I have to try, because if I don’t…”
“Here’s what we’re going to do. We’re going to use this flight as good long nap when we take off. But first, you’re gonna spill it all, friend. Everything. Got it? Start with telling me everything about going down to Murfreesboro and seeing Dr. Richards. OK?”
I took a long drink.
Roxy nodded and bit her lip a few times to keep herself from interrupting. I couldn’t bring myself to talk about Daddy’s letter to Steven, so I finished with the discovery of the celestial map fitting onto the road atlas. “There wasn’t time to ask him if that’s what he intended me to figure out. And God, Roxy, I could be wrong. Steven could be insane, he could be trying to confuse me to keep the investigation off himself. The FBI could be completely right, and I’ll be in Colorado when my family needs me the most.”
He couldn’t have faked my father’s handwriting, though.
Roxy settled into the chair. “I need some time to think this through. Of course I brought nothing useful, as I had no time to pack anything, but I happen to carry my sleeping mask during Ed’s chemo. So it’s yours. It will be daylight soon, and you need sleep.”
“I can cry myself to sleep and now no one will see.”
“You’re due some tears. Now lower that window shade.”
We slept the entire trip, waking groggily to a ding alerting us that we had landed at Denver International Airport. After the plane came to a halt, we walked down the connector onto a red carpet, standing amongst the sea of people at the gate.
“Well, I’ve been wearing these clothes for two days now; shall we buy ourselves some nice ‘I love Legal Marijuana’ sweatshirts? Speaking of love, I’d kill for a shower. Can we get a room and sleep some more?”
I powered up my phone. “I can only imagine how many calls I’ve missed.”
“What do you want to do, Lynn?”
“If we’re going, we’ll need clothes and a car. And I did get a new debit card after I lost mine, thank you very much, and I took out a bunch of cash before I headed to the airport, so there’s no way for anyone to know where we are now.”
“You don’t watch Dateline as much as I do. If Tom starts to suspect you’re not in Nashville, it will take the FBI two seconds to get access to all your credit cards, and they’ll see our flights. And I know Tom never balances your checkbook, but if he looks at your account, he’ll see the money you took out. And if they want to know where you are, all they have to do is track your phone to the closest cell tower. Wherever we’re going, we better get there fast. Or seriously convince your family you need time alone to grieve. I also clearly watch too much Dateline.”
I pressed my phone to my forehead. “I’ve missed fifteen calls and there are ten voice mails. I have twenty-five texts. I can’t even look at them.”
Roxy pointed to the rental-car signs. “We can get a car. It’s now or never. We either book a flight back home or head to Enterprise.”
I sat down in an empty row of chairs. “Tell me doing this isn’t crazy.”
“Lynn, we are nearing seventy.” Roxy sat down beside me. “Women our age are dyeing wool and wandering through yard sales. Instead, we have gone to Illinois, broken into an office and a house, met with UFO researchers, and you just witnessed an FBI raid. So I think we’re already far along on the crazy train. Flying to Colorado on a hint from someone who could be a lunatic seems pretty par for the course.”
“He’s not a lunatic.”
“Listen, I’m not going to tell you this isn’t crazy. The last six months have been horrible. You’re desperate to find your grandson, and I don’t blame you for that. And I know what you’re thinking: It’s not only William you’re trying to find. You’re trying to bring Brian back from whatever dark place he’s in. But you have to be prepared for all of this to be a hoax, and the possibility that right now the man who kidnapped your grandson is in police custody and William is gone. I won’t judge you, whatever you decide to do. I’ve told you that before. Even if I don’t believe in these alien abductions, I have always believed in your instincts. So tell me, what does your gut say—?”