Discovering April (33 page)

AS SOON AS I GET home, I knew exactly who to call. Chloe picks up the phone on the first ring. I tell her the entire story through sobs and hiccups and she asks me for my address. She arrives ten minutes later to be there for me like she promised. I don’t even let her close the door to her car before I pounce on her in the driveway. We talk for hours before we come up with a plan. There was something behind Tammie’s eyes and then the nurse that told me he wasn’t there. They were lying.

Here I am in the stairway of the 7
th
floor, waiting for Chloe’s signal. It is genius! I don’t know why I didn’t think of it earlier.

“I don’t understand. He died here! Why can’t I get the death certificate? Just print it out!” Chloe hollers, echoing through the hallway.

That’s my cue. I sneak across the hall to where they hold the charts.

“No, I will not go down to Medical Records! You go down and get them to bring it to me!”

“Ma’am, I understand you are upset, but I don’t have any authority to print a death certificate.”

Chloe breaks into tears that could have won her an Emmy. “You don’t understand. I can’t get the insurance money without this and I can’t bury him because I have no money.”

I hear her again and I smirk, she could have been an actress. I close the door behind me, cutting out the noise from her little stunt and shake the mouse on the computer to bring it to life.

It hums back on and the little screen says. ‘Enter Patient Name’

HOFFMAN, JARED I type.

A list pops up and I double click the one whose birthday matches Jared’s. His file immediately pops up, and on the top right corner I see ‘Room 801.’

I pause with my hand on the mouse still. He’s still here. They only moved him one floor up. Finally getting my nerves back, I shake my head, click out of the file and sneak back across the hall to the stairs.

“Okay, Tammie. I’m so sorry. This is just so hard for me. I’ll go down to medical records.” I hear Chloe wrapping up her little performance.

The door to the stairs clicks shut behind me and I sprint up the stairs two at a time and swing open the door. I try hard to control my running down the hall. I don’t want to draw too much attention as I race towards room 801, but I find it hard to restrict my pace when I’m seconds away from seeing Jared.

Anticipation floods my veins. What if he won’t hear me out? What if he kicks me out? No. I can’t think about that now. I need to think positive. I get to explain myself to him. If he heard my last statements to Tammie, he must have heard me talking to him, washing him; he must know I was there for him all this time. I pause before the plaque that reads 801 and take a deep breath before disappearing inside. The curtain is drawn and I reach my hand out and draw it back. What I find is more than I can bear.

It’s empty. Yet again, I have come to an empty bed. I’m staring at the bed when I hear Chloe open the door behind me. I don’t know how she found me, but she was right on my heels. Once again, I’m crying into her shoulder as I grip her for dear life.

CLOSING THE CAR DOOR behind me, I look up at the brick building that holds New York’s finest and laziest workers. The knot in my stomach twists around and around in nervous synchronization. I really hope Officer Smith doesn’t hold grudges. This is my last tiny hope of finding out where Jared is being held. Balling up my fists, I confidently take the walkway up to the entrance of the building. Once through the doors, my confidence fades. I take in all the desks before me. I almost forgot what it looked like it in here. The last time I was here, the tall ceiling was spinning and the many desks looked almost converged into one.

“Miss Landau.” The familiar voice makes me bite my lip as I turn to face the blue eyes of Officer Smith. “I didn’t think I would see you again anytime soon.”

“I… I’m sorry.” I begin to whisper my well thought out speech that I had been memorizing.

“Save it. What did you really come here for?” His voice is harsh, covering up the hurt I sense behind his eyes.

“I need your help,” I admit as my shoulders droop in defeat.

“Funny how that works, huh?” He chuckles to himself as he grips the coffee between his hands tighter so that his knuckles turn a dark shade of white.

I take a deep breath to focus my mind before I fail my self-imposed mission. “I need to report a missing person.”

“Let me guess—”

“Yes. Can you please help me?” My voice cracks as the tears behind my eyes threaten to fall at any moment.

He closes his mouth from making another smart remark when he pauses to look me in the eyes. “Come.”

He directs me over to a desk in the corner and waves for me to sit in the chair at the edge of his desk. “I don’t know where he is …”

“Your neighbor?”

“Yes, he … he disappeared from the hospital.”

“I see.” His voice is clipped; he’s on to me.

“I think he might be in danger!” I try to cut to the chase.

“April, did he disappear or did he leave?”

“Both.” I glance down at my sneakers as I admit he’s caught me.

“You know you can’t just use the police department to find all your ex-boyfriends for you!”

“He’s not my ex-boyfriend!” I meet his angry glare with my own.

“Apparently, he is if he doesn’t want you to find him.”

“But he’s hurt and he doesn’t know what he wants. He doesn’t know the whole story!”

“It doesn’t matter. You can’t report a missing persons if that person isn’t actually missing.”

“But he is!” I slam my fists into his desk and a few officers look up at us.

“Only to
you
!” he argues back at me, lowering his voice.

“Yes! To me! Don’t you understand? He thinks I betrayed him somehow. I just want to tell him it wasn’t anything like that! I have to tell him! Please, John. Please help me!” I grab for his arm. He lets me take his hand but his eyes remain unchanged.

“There was a time when I wished you would like me like this.”

I pull my hand back, sinking back into my chair.

“It’s okay,” he says. “I’ve wised up since then.”

“I…I …”

“I know,” He takes my fallen hand back in his. “April, I knew your heart was taken when I first saw how your eyes gravitated to him once he entered the precinct. Even drunk, you wear your feelings out on your sleeve. I was in denial. I couldn’t believe it – and it was my own fault.” He looks down at his hand holding my pale one. “I can’t file a missing persons report. I could lose my job.”

“I understand,” I whisper, keeping my eyes on our hands, as well.

“But I’ll do some digging, okay?”

My eyes meet his and I jump up to hug him. “Thank you, John. I’m so sorry to involve you in this. I wouldn’t bother you if it wasn’t a last resort.”

“April, promise me something?”

“Anything!”

“Make sure he’s worth all this.”

Why does everyone keep saying that to me?

“He is,” I hear my own voice respond automatically.

THREE MONTHS HAVE gone by, and it feels like three years. Jared has never returned home once. I haven’t heard from Officer Smith. I have no idea if he is even looking into it like he said he would.

I even tried getting it out of Tammie, but it turns out that she doesn’t really know where Jared is. The hospital won’t release the information to her, either. I tried calling the insurance; they politely informed me that they haven’t received any claims yet and have no further information. I called every hospital or rehab center in the 20-mile vicinity and no one had any patient by that name.

I don’t know if that was the truth or a very calculated lie, or maybe Jared is going by another name. I think that’s taking things a little too far, but what do I know? I’ve tried calling Stacey, Eric, Mack and the office once – that’s when I reached Zach – but no one has any information. If they do, they don’t let me in on it. I’m not proud of it, but I even looked through his mail to see if he received any correspondence from where he was staying. There was nothing but bills and coupons.

I even try going to work to see Jack. As I pull up to the coffee house, I notice all the lights are out and when I try the door, it is locked. There is a layer of dust across the window, and it looks as if no one had been there in weeks. It seems that Jack has straight up disappeared into thin air. Without a job, behind in my schoolwork, and struggling with a lost, recovering boyfriend, I find I don’t know where to turn. My parents have since flown back to Florida, so instead I call Ro. Not the most comforting person, but a friend nonetheless.

“Hey, girl!” She opens the door, pulling me into a hug. “You look awful!”

“Thanks, it’s good to see you too!”

I pretty much interrogate her at her kitchen table about what has been going on. She has a lot of information. The dorms were finished and the construction crew are onto their next task. I missed two months of classes and would have to retake them, Jack’s Coffee Bean apparently never opened its doors after the night redheaded siren Sera kicked me out of the shop. Oh, and last but not least, no one has seen or heard from Jared in months. Not the information I wanted to hear, but information nonetheless. At the end of our ‘girl talk,’ I burst into uncontrollable sobs. I can’t seem to hold them back anymore. I’ve become somewhat of a blubbering mess.

“Oh, dear!” Ro mutters, looking around uncomfortably before she finally climbs out of her chair and pulls me into a hug. “I knew you loved the kid, but this… this is some next level stuff.”

“I don’t know what more I can do?” I sniffle.

“Sometimes the best thing to do is sit and wait things out. You’ve tried; things are in his hands now.” She pushes me an arm’s length away. “Now, wipe those tears and man up. If it’s meant to be, then it will be.”

“What am I going to do if it’s not?” It comes out like a whisper; I’m almost afraid to say it out loud.

“We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it.”

ANOTHER MONTH HAS PASSED, and I’m walking up the steps to the hospital to see my old friend Tammie. Getting on with my life has been slow, but I’m gradually improving each day. I’ve submitted medical paperwork to retake my classes from last semester; I have a new job working reception at the local clinic, and I’ve actually been able to pay all my bills this month! My parents did a little more than help while they were here. They paid up all my past due notices and cleaned the house for me. I guess they wanted me to come home to order and not more chaos.

I am nervous as I ascend the stairs. I haven’t seen Tammie since my breakdown quite a few months ago. I’m almost embarrassed to show my face here.

Opening the doors, my eyes immediately lock with hers and I hear her clipboard drop.

“Well, I’ll be damned!” She smacks her hand on the desk loudly before closing the gap between us by pulling me into a hug. “How are you, girl?”

“I’m doing good,” I whisper, holding back tears.

“Come, let’s go have a chat. I have a lunch break to take!” She ushers me into the elevator and then out through the lobby to the coffee house across the street. We have a seat in the back and she starts right in. “I haven’t heard from him, if that’s what you’re here for.”