Finding Maisie
Chapter 13
Two weeks later:
'Okay, Callum. Be careful getting into the car,' Joshua said.
Callum was finally ready to be taken home. As I didn't think Callum had forgiven me yet, Joshua had come with me to the hospital. I was standing a few feet away from them to avoid getting in an argument with Callum. The fact that Callum was still annoyed at me for causing his very near death experience upset me. Don't get me wrong, I deserved it, but other than my mum, Callum was the closest person to me. I had already lost one best friend; I didn't want to lose another.
After I had escaped the warehouse I eventually found my way to the main road. Knowing that I was far away enough from the warehouse, I made a call. Joshua arrived quickly after I phoned him to pick me up. I asked him to drive us to the hospital but he said that Callum was still unconscious. When he was finally awake Joshua visited him and told me Callum said he was mad at me. After that day I had only visited the hospital a few times. Even then I didn't go into Callum's room if he was awake. I didn't want to cause him any more stress.
'Yes, thanks Joshua. I know,' Callum replied.
He climbed into the passenger seat and, once he was sure Callum was fine, Joshua sat in the driver's seat. I sighed and got into the back. I was here to try and make amends with Callum, but he hadn't said a word to me.
Joshua started the car and we started our tense journey.
'Josh, can I put this on?' Callum asked about ten minutes into the journey. He was holding up one of my CDs that Joshua had borrowed.
Joshua looked quickly and shrugged, 'Its Poppy's, ask her.'
At the mention of my name I looked up. Callum was looking at me through the rear view mirror. His expression wasn't angry; it was hurt. After about five seconds, he looked away.
'Nah, it's alright. I'll put the radio on,' Callum said. Soon enough the car was filled with soft music.
What hurt was that Callum wouldn't ask me a simple question. He didn't want to talk to me. Was Callum that angry and hurt?
After another ten minutes we arrived back at Joshua's house. Callum got out the car first, probably wanting to prove that he was well enough to do things on his own. I ran after him to unlock the front door. Callums keys were inside. I held the door open for him and Callum walked in muttering a quiet "thanks". I left the door open for Josh and followed Callum into the living room.
The day was quiet, awkward and long. It was mostly filled with Joshua and Callum watching tv, and me sitting on the other sofa hoping Callum would talk to me. Although he never did, I could see Callum occasionally glancing in my direction.
It was eight o'clock and the show that was on TV had just finished. Joshua got up saying he would get us all a drink, leaving me and Callum alone. I could already see Callum looking at me from the corner of my eye. I was about to ask him why he kept staring when my phone vibrated.
I picked it up distracted but when I read the name my full attention was on my phone. It was a message from the abductor. I opened it and saw that it was a picture.
At first I was confused as to why he sent me this. It was a picture of a drawer. A small drawer that looked like it was in the side of a desk. I didn't recognise it, first of all. However, as I continued looking at it there were elements that were familiar. There was a sticker of a flower in one of the corners and drawn on pictures of cats and dogs. I remembered doing those things to these drawers, my mother's drawers. The abductor was telling me to go to my mother's desk and look in the drawer. But the thing that scared me was how the abductor had been in my mother's house to take the picture. She wasn't safe in there and that worried me.
'Is that from the abductor?' Callum asked.
'How did you know?' I asked, not looking at him.
'Your face. You look scared,' Callum said.
'Yeah. The abductor went into my mother's house to take a picture of her desk,' I told him.
'So he's saying to go there then,' Callum evaluated.
'Yeah. Do you want to come?'
'Of course I do, why wouldn't I? I'm part of this treasure hunt and I'm Maisie's brother so, yeah, I'm coming,' Callum said.
'Okay,' I said and continued looking at the drawer. There must something in there, something of importance that I needed to see.
'You're making this hard you know,' Callum abruptly said.
'Making what hard?' I said. I put my phone down and sat up as Callum sounded serious.
'To not be mad at you,' he said.
'How am I making it hard, I said I was sorry,' I told Callum.
'When?' He asked.
'At the hospital!' I said a little loudly. Surely he hadn't forgotten this. 'When you woke up.'
'Oh, that's not why I'm mad,' he said.
'Well then, why are you mad Callum?'' I asked, 'What could I have done in the time since you were shot that could annoy you.'
'You take risks, Poppy. That's what you do,' Callum said. He broke his eye contact with me.
'What do you mean?' I asked.
'You intentionally put yourself in danger,' Callum said, 'Joshua told me he had to pick you up by the motorway. You'd seen the abductor by yourself.'
'That wasn't my fault, he abducted me!' I said.
'He what?!' Callum blurted out, 'Well, you're okay now I guess so it's alright. But what about after I woke up. My mum said you ran off somewhere. Where?'
'I'm fine, Callum. I'm alive and fine so it doesn't matter,' I said.
'Yes it does! So, you were fine this time, who says it couldn't have gone differently? You could've died and who would've known? Only Josh and I know about the abductor and we would have had no idea where you went. You would've just vanished.'
'I'm sorry about that Callum but we were still on a search for Maisie. What do you expect me to do?'
'To stop taking risks! To stop putting yourself in near death situations! We can't save Maisie if we're dead.'
'Callum, I can't agree to that,' I said, lowering my voice down to its normal volume, 'This whole situation is a near death experience. You can't expect me not to put myself in danger because it's inevitable.'
Callum sighed and closed his eyes, 'Okay. I agree with that but just promise not to increase that danger; like irritating the abductor, that was a bad idea.'
I laughed very lightly, 'Yes okay, Callum,' I said when something came to mind. 'Hang on, if that's why you're mad at me, are you not mad for me causing you to get shot?'
'Well, no,' he said.
'What?' I said, 'So everything you said at the hospital...'
'Was true,' Callum interrupted, 'At least, at first. When I woke up I was angry and shocked. Everything had changed and, well to be honest, I was scared. When I remembered it was your fault I was angry that you would put me through this, then I was unconscious again. When I woke again I realised something. It would have been.. It would've been worse if you had been shot. Then I was mad that you're not more careful, Poppy. That's why I've been angry.'
'Okay,' I said. 'You know I'm sorry. Can we forget all of this?'
Callum smiled faintly, 'Sure. So when are we going to your mums house?'
'I say first thing tomorrow because you need your sleep.'
Callum nodded and turned his attention back to the TV. Even though I was relieved, I couldn't shake the feeling that something bad was coming. Callum may be fine this time but one of us may be killed if we weren't careful. Or maybe someone we cared about would be hurt. I couldn't help but feel like the picture I had just received wasn't just an instruction, but a warning. The abductor was telling me that, if he wanted, he could get to my mum at any time. I really did have to be careful.
*
The morning couldn't come quick enough. The more I was thinking about it, the more I was worrying about it. I wanted to make sure my mother was fine. I had tried to ring her but her phone was off.
When both Callum and I were ready, we were on our way to my mums. Joshua's house was further away from it than mine or Callum's so we had about a twenty minute drive ahead of us. I switched on the music and to try and pass but the time but I still found my leg twitching in anticipation. A lot could happen in twenty minutes, especially twenty minutes when the abductor was involved.
'Can you please stop moving your leg?' Callum asked, continuing to steal glances at my moving leg.
'Well, the journey's taking too long,' I moaned.
Callum laughed lightly, 'Poppy, I'm driving as fast as I can.'
'No, you're not. You're driving purposely slow to irritate me. It's irritating.'
This time Callum laughed louder but didn't say anything. I continued to look at him, the ghost of a smile still on his face. After a minute, Callum turned his attention to me.
'What, Poppy?' He asked, half looking at me with a confused expression.
'I was just thinking,' I said. Callum looked at me curiously, obviously wanting me to explain further, 'And?'
'Well, I was wondering how we can joke around like this, how we can laugh and be happy when Maisie's still captured?'
Callum sighed, 'Because we have to, Poppy. If all we thought about was Maisie being abducted and all we felt was sadness, I don't know what we would be like. Depressed maybe. Or maybe we would just give up. We need to laugh, Poppy, to remind there's not only sadness in the world.'
I stared at Callum as I realised everything he had said was true. Even though we had enough reasons to live life miserably, we had to remain happy to remind ourselves to be strong. Callum looked at me again, 'Okay; now why are you staring at me?'
'You can be quite smart sometimes,' I said.
He half smiled and turned back to the road, 'Well, you know, one of my many talents,' he said sarcastically.
The rest of the car drive went by quickly and soon enough we were outside my old house. We walked up to the front door and rang the bell. About thirty seconds later my mum appeared, and her face lit up at the sight of us.
'Oh, my gosh, Callum you're alive!' She said laughing. I just rolled my eyes at her comment.
'Nice to see you too mum..' I said, jokingly.
'Oh, of course I'm glad to see you, Poppy,' she said, mimicking my move of rolling my eyes, 'It's just you haven't been in hospital for a couple of weeks, have you?'
'Just let us in, mum,' I said.
She chuckled and stepped to the side, allowing Callum and I to enter the house. We followed my mum into the living room and we sat on the sofas. Unlike Callum's old houses' mismatching sofas and random souvenirs from holidays, my mum's house had three of the same cream sofas with a few expensive vases. There was a dark, polished wooden fireplace with a TV on the wall above it. There were a couple of bookcases and coffee tables as well. Even though I loved my house, I had felt relaxed and at home in the Millers house straight away.
My mother walked into the kitchen to get drinks and Callum leaned in closer to me, 'Make an excuse to go upstairs soon to get to the desk and search it. I'll keep your mother distracted by chatting to her. If it's anything important, text me. Deal?'
'Deal,' I said as my mother walked back in the living room. She set down a tray of ice tea on the coffee table.
'I would have just made us tea, but it's still extremely hot outside,' my mum said. She seemed happier than usual, probably because Callum was better. Little did she know the troubles her only daughter was facing.
'Its fine, thanks, Mrs Leads,' Callum said as he took the closest drink.
'So, everything's good, Callum? There's no damage from the gun shot?' My mum asked. Callum just shook his head as he had drink in his mouth. 'And they still haven't found the people who did it?' She said.
'No,' I replied. 'They left no evidence and the only lead they had were our accounts.'
My mum smiled sadly, 'Well, I'm sure something will turn up soon.'
We carried on talking about the gun shot and then began reminiscing back to the time when Maisie was still here. We laughed about some memories and then sat in sad silence on others. When my mother started talking about how she missed Maisie as she had been like family to her, I wanted to scream out that she may see her again, that we all may see her again. If we completed this treasure hunt and defeated the abductor, then we would have Maisie back in the family.
'Do you remember when your Uncle Henry got drunk at that wedding?' My mum asked as we thought over another memory.
'Heather, Emilies and Adams dad?' I asked, seeing as I hadn't seen my family in years.
'Yeah, I think your dad was right, Poppy. Henry did like to drink,' mum said.
'Wait, whose wedding?' I asked.
'Your second cousin, Steves.'
'Oh yeah, I remember that..'
*
'Poppy, eat with a napkin, you'll spill something on your dress!' My mum said with annoyance on her face. I threw my dirtiest face - well the dirtiest face a just-turned-seven year old could muster - and picked a delicate, white napkin. I placed it in the collar of my purple, frilly dress and carried on eating my ice cream with my fingers.
'Oh, for goodness sake, Poppy,' my dad said, chuckling, 'We're at a wedding! Use your spoon.'
So what if we were at a wedding? I always liked to eat ice cream with my fingers - I liked the cold feel of it - and so I would eat the ice cream with my fingers! Parents! They treated me like I was twenty not seven; seven year olds are meant to eat things with their fingers! I threw another one of my, if I say so myself, terrifying dirty looks and picked up a spoon. I must've had ice cream on my face or something because my dad started laughing harder.
It had been two months since the BBQ at my house. My seventh birthday had come and, as Heather had said, I had a big party in my garden. Although I had invited him, Adam refused to come. Nothing had changed with him. He was still mysteriously acting distant and angry. I had decided; I was going to find Adam and ask him why he was annoyed at me. As I looked around the room, I couldn't see Adam. But I still needed to talk to him.
'Daddy, I'm going to find my cousins,' I told him.
He nodded, in the middle of a conversation with Mr Miller, and I walked off. Little did I know that that was one of the last times I would see my dad. He disappeared a couple of days after the wedding.
I walked onto the dance-floor and scanned the room. There was no sign of the grumpy eleven-year-old. I sighed and spotted my Uncle Colin dancing with a girl.
I tapped him on the shoulder, 'Uncle Colin, have you seen Adam?'
He looked at me distractedly. He wanted to carry on dancing with the girl, 'No, sorry, honey.'
I sighed again and looked around again. Now that I thought about it, my Aunt Melonie - Adams mother - wasn't here either. They must've stayed at home whilst Heather and Emilie came with Uncle Henry.
I was distracted from my search by a noise on the stage. The music stopped. I turned around and saw that the band playing had been stopped by my Uncle Henry. He was swaying on the stage with a drink raised in the air.
'I would like to say a biiiiig congrats to the couple!' He said, slurring. He was obviously drunk. Out of my short life, the only drunk person I had seen was Uncle Henry.
'Marriage is a happy thing,' he said and then began laughing to himself, 'At first... You just wait for the lying and backstabbing to start. You wait for your wife to love your children too much that she doesn't care for you anymore.'
I looked to the right of the stage and saw the groom climbing on it. I only knew this from his outfit; I hadn't paid attention to the ceremony, I found it boring.
As I watched the groom walk on, recognition hit me. This was my second cousin, the one who I met upstairs in my house at the BBQ. The one who knew me when I didn't know him. The one who said I had always looked scared of him.
He took hold of Uncle Henry and leant into the microphone, 'Sorry, everyone,' he said before looking at me, smiling.
I fiddled with my dress awkwardly. Why was he always so friendly to me? His name was Steve, I thought. My mum had said we were going to Steve's wedding so that must've been his name.
Steve led Uncle Henry off the stage as he shouted his protests.
'I wasn't finished! Let me speak!' He bellowed.
The other guests were either laughing or sat on their seats shocked. I was confused as to what had happened. I turned around and bumped into someone.
'Oh, sorry Poppy,' they said. I looked up at them and saw someone unfamiliar. They had black hair and a slight stubble. They looked a little younger than my dad. I looked up at him confused.
'You're wondering how I knew you're name aren't you?' He said, laughing, 'I'm your second cousin, Poppy.'
I groaned loudly, 'Not another one!'
He chuckled loudly, 'You're not a fan of us then?'
'Well, it's just everyone seems to know me when I don't know them,' I moaned.
He laughed quietly, 'Well, Poppy, that's because I like to know who's in my family. And also your dad and I used to be close friends around the time you were born so I know who you are.'
'So then you know who Adam is then?' I asked.
'Yeah, I guess,' he said, shrugging.
'Do you know what happened to him?'
'No, love, I don't. Probably just because he is turning into a teenager, I wouldn't worry about it,' my second cousin said.
'Maybe. What's your name anyway?'
'Richard,' he said smiling and holding out his hand. I shook it and decided to forget about Adam, and went to find his sister Heather instead. From then on, I never saw Adam again.
*
'Yeah, well that wedding was.. Interesting,' I said.
My mum smiled at me and I looked at Callum. He was looking at me with a look on his face telling me to hurry up.
'Um, mum I need the toilet,' I said as I stood up.
'Okay, you know where it is,' she said.
I walked out the room and climbed up the stairs. My mum had moved her office upstairs as it used to be next to my playroom; I was always noisy and distracted her. I walked past the toilet door and found the right one. Swinging the door open I walked straight to my mother's desk. Her office was pretty bare. It had a wooden floor and cream walls with one desk carrying a computer and a couple of plants. There was also a bookshelf filled to the brim with different types of books. On the desk were a couple of family photos. I smiled sadly at them. Even though my mother didn't mention him much, she really missed my dad. It made me angry to think that he had just left us.
Walking over to the desk, I knelt down to the drawer that I had stuck stickers on. I tried to pull it open, but it was locked. It hit me then that this must've been something important. Why else would my mum lock the drawer? She had never worried about me going through her work because I had never been interested in doing that, work was boring to a child. So whatever she had locked away must've been something she just couldn't risk me finding.
It didn't matter though; I knew where her keys were, I was just too young to reach them. Above the desk was a shelf with a small pot on it. In this pot were spare pens, pencils and her set of keys. I pull them out and looked for a small one that would fit the drawer. A little, silver key caught my eye. It didn't look like it had been used very many times, there was minimal scratching and it still had a shine despite the fact it was old.
I inserted the key in the lock and turned it. As it was the right key, the drawer unlocked easily. I opened it eagerly and saw a simple brown envelope. It was brown and thick, showing that there must've been some type of documents inside. Picking up the envelope, I carefully unsealed it. There were already rips in the packaging but I didn't want to make anymore, just in case my mum noticed.
Inside the envelope were a lot of papers. I slid them out and glanced at the first page. My eyes widened. It was a document, confirming a fostering.
I pulled out my phone and texted Callum telling him to get to the office I was in. A minute later he was standing next to me looking curious.
'We have to be quick; I told your mum I was going to find out why you were taking long. What did you find?' He asked.
I handed him over the document that confirmed the details of my grandparents fostering Callum and Maisie's dad.
'My dad was fostered by your dad's parents?' He asked.
I nodded. Even though I was shocked at this information, it kind of made sense. Maisie had told me once that her father's parents had died in a car crash before she was born. I had known that both our fathers and their parents had been great friends for as long as they could remember, so when Mr. Miller's parents died my grandparents must've taken him in. That also explained why the Miller family were always at our family gatherings. My father would've considered Mr. Miller as family.
'It says here that he was fostered at the age of thirteen. That was the age he was when my grandparents died,' Callum said.
'I thought so,' I replied. 'And this is also why your family were always at my family's get togethers.'
'But, why?' Callum asked. 'They weren't actually related, it was a fostering not an adoption. No one from our families are related.'
'Yes, but they would've loved each other like brothers. They were friends long before the fostering as well,' I responded.
'I guess,' Callum said, shrugging,' But the question is, why did the abductor want us to know this?'
'I don't know, Callum, but I have a feeling we'll find out,' I said.
There was a calling from downstairs, 'Poppy, Callum, come look at the photo albums with me!' My mum called.
I rolled my eyes, not wanting to look at them, but walked downstairs with Callum at my tail. We both sat back on the sofa, either side of my mother, as she had the photo album in her hand.
The first one we looked through was one of our holidays. It was when we went to Spain when I was aged five. This holiday was just with my parents and myself so I told mum to speed through it quickly. They pretty were all similar and I didn't want Callum to get bored. My mother let me choose an album to look at next and I chose one labeled "Christmas 1999, with the Millers". At least in this one Callums family would be there as well.
After we had been through pages of our families smiling round the Christmas tree or pictures showing the opening of presents that had now been lost or broken, mum chose and album called "The Family".
She flipped it open and I saw many pictures of different members of our family. Some I recognised, some I didn't. In this album were family members from both sides of my family so it was full to the brim with photos.
'Who's that?' I asked, pointing to a teenage girl who looked vaguely familiar.
'That's Emilie,' my mum said smiling.
'My cousin Emilie?' I asked shocked. It dawned on me then how much time had passed since we last saw them. It had been about ten years since I had seen my cousins, the Trevors.
'Yes,' my Mum said smiling sadly, obviously thinking the same thing.
My mum turned the page and as I skimmed through it, my heart stopped. There was someone on there who really shouldn't have been.
'Mum, who's that?' I asked pointing to the picture. I looked at Callum and he had the same horrified expression as I did. How was this possible?
I looked down at the picture of Max again, the Max who helped the abductor. He looked exactly like he did when I had seen him too many times before. That meant this picture couldn't be that old. He was wearing a black hoodie and was on his phone, not making any effort to smile.
'Him?' My mum asked as I nodded, 'Well that's your other cousin, Adam.'
'Adam?' I asked not really comprehending it.
'Yeah, he's changed a lot hasn't he?' Mum said.
I nodded my head weakly as I couldn't think of anything else to say. How could Max be Adam? How could the Adam who used to be my friend, have tried to kill me on multiple occasions? We used to play games when we were young and we would all joke about how we would be best friends forever. But now he was working with the man trying to kill me and enjoyed it. I saw the excitement in his eye when he thought he had me trapped or whenever he would get close to killing me. What I wanted to know was why he did this, why he was trying to kill me. How could one of my favourite relatives turn into this? I needed answers.
'Mum, we need to go, I've got work later,' I said. We all stood up from the sofas.
'Okay,' she said, giving us both a hug. 'But don't be strangers, okay?'
'Okay,' Callum said, 'Thanks for the drinks.'
'No problem,' she said as we began to walk out the front door, 'Bye!'
I waved quickly and walked out of view from the house. As the house was on a private road, there were very few people around.
I walked down an isolated path to make sure none of the few neighbours could see us. It was dark on the path as thick tall trees stood either side of it. I stopped walking and Callum looked at me confused.
'What are you doing?' He asked me.
'Going to talk to the abductor,' I said. 'Wherever we are he always seems to be with us. He must be watching us; he knew we were coming here.'
Just as I said it a shadow seemed to grow from one end of the path. I looked up and saw the abductor standing in his usual black and secretive attire. With him just standing there, the enclosed path seemed to darken even more and the wind seemed to cool. My heart was beating faster than usual.
Callum stepped to my side reassuringly as I thought of what to say; there was only one think I really could say.
'Adam Trevors, or should I say Max,' I yelled at him from the distance between us.
The abductor stood completely still, I couldn't even see him breathing. He was so still that even the air around him seemed to stop, scared of angering the deadly man. I was scared of how he would react. Would the abductor try to kill us again for knowing too much information?
All of a sudden, the abductor turned around and began running. He sped off down the path but the opposite way to where Callum and I were standing. He was running away from us, but why? Where was he going?
Soon enough the abductor was out of sight, leaving Callum and I standing in the cold, mysterious air.