Chapter 1
Another date meant another reason not to come home—at least for a while. Another state, another town, and potentially another time zone. Distance was measured in the Midwestern way: HELL IS REAL billboards and fast-food signage. The van floor was littered with paper bags, saucy foil, to-go containers, cigarette ash, and illicit paraphernalia. Devin drove twenty over the speed limit because Roosevelt wanted to wait out the snow, a wise decision, as the highway had only just been plowed. Every half mile, tire tracks veered off the road toward snow-covered cars on the shoulder, remnants of earlier accidents.
Devin sat hunched over, gripping the van’s steering wheel with gloved hands, his eyes focused on the road ahead. He periodically shifted into whichever lane had the least amount of snow. His driver-side window was cracked, a lit cigarette protruding from his lips. The wool hood of his jacket was pulled up, covering most of his forehead. Roosevelt sat shotgun, her legs overlapping and her arms crossed, hands tucked under her armpits for warmth. Her hood was pulled tight over her head, and her legs shook. Her nose and cheeks were red, stark against the pale, gaunt lines of her face. Rudy, their drummer, slept in the backseat beside Roosevelt’s amplifier. He had fully encased himself in a sleeping bag to ward off the cold, only his nose and mouth visible. With the uneven pavement, he bounced and flopped against the seat. “Just how many goddamn sex shops are there between Minnesota and Ohio?” Devin said, one hand on the wheel, the other pinching his cigarette. “Too damn many,” Roosevelt replied. “And don’t go taking the Lord’s name in vain.”
Devin had grown up and spent most of his life on the East Coast, while Roosevelt had never left the Midwest before Devin asked her to sing in his band. He spoke with a neutral American accent, and everything he said was blunt and to the point. Roosevelt spoke in an Upper Midwestern accent that thickened the more comfortable she felt around someone. She included many unnecessary details in conversation and told stories in roundabout ways. The opposite of Devin, he always told her it was good for songwriting.
“We need gas,” Devin said as he switched to the right lane. “And I need a little pick-me-up.”
“Well, did-jya eat, er no?” Roosevelt asked.
“Not that kind of pick-me-up.”
Devin took the exit to the rest stop, and the drop in speed and downhill lurch snapped Rudy awake. He coughed up something fierce, mashed his nose against the window button to roll it down, and spit into the cold.
“The hell are we?” Rudy barked, thrashing his way out of the sleeping bag like an annoyed moth tearing free from a cocoon. “Weren’t we in Madison when I nodded off?”
Roosevelt answered, “We’re in Chicago, silly.”
Rudy hastily unlatched the door before Devin fully stopped in front of the gas pump, then folded into it, letting his full, half-awake body slump against the panel until it slowly swung open.
“Cold for no reason,” he muttered, hands tucked into his pockets. With a swing of his hip, he shut the van door and scurried into the rest stop in search of warmth.
Devin gently opened his own door, stepped out, and then opened Roosevelt’s. She smiled and took his hand.
“You get more beautiful with every mile, babe,” Devin said, helping her out of the van.
“Thanks,” Roosevelt said, holding his hand for balance. “This van’s still pretty shitty, huh.”
“It’s not that bad. It’s a 2010, only three years old, babe.”
“Yah, well, it drives like it’s a lot older. Wise beyond its years, I suppose.”
“That’s a great way of putting it.”
Roosevelt stood by the van while Devin and Rudy perused the selection of grub the creatively named Rest N Fuel had to offer. This was no average rest stop. Still unkempt and dingy, it was essentially a more opulent gas station, but Rest N Fuel had a lot more going for it than your run-of-the-mill stop. There were showers to clean in and beds to sleep in. The convenience store sold real groceries, like produce and meat that wasn’t in jerky form. They also sold camping supplies and power tools, and just off the shopping area was a café that served simple food: bagels, cold sandwiches, coffee, warm ham, and omelets. The regular crowd here was truckers, road trippers, nearby campers, and people who didn’t want to be found by the police. Or, in Roosevelt’s case, struggling touring bands with drug paraphernalia.
She opened the cargo area and unclasped her guitar case to retrieve her stash. Roosevelt preferred pills to shooting up like Devin and Rudy, though preference didn’t stop her when drugs were scarce. The pills were sealed in a thin plastic bag with ROSE written across it, the O always drawn as a spiral. She moved over by the employee restrooms, careful to keep Devin’s van in sight. Unless they were onstage, Devin hated leaving the van unattended because of the expensive equipment it guarded. That was why Roosevelt stood alone by it while the others shopped. The band often slept in the van, but when they were lucky enough to afford a motel, Devin parked directly outside the room so he could watch it through the window.
Roosevelt kept the bag in the guitar case and held only enough in her hand to get high enough to make it through tonight’s show. Before indulging, she pulled out her phone and dialed Jancie’s number. It was saved in her contacts, but it was one of the few numbers she had committed to memory.
“How’s my rockstar?” Jancie said before Roosevelt had the chance to offer a friendly greeting. “How are the groupies?”
“Hush your mouth, Jancie,” Roosevelt said with a giggle. “This rockstar has eaten seven Hot Pockets this week alone. I didn’t think you could get sick of drive-thru fries, but yeah no, here we are.”
“It’s trial by fire, baby. Your body will adjust. Then, when you guys become millionaires, it’ll adjust again to caviar and actually buying appetizers as appetizers, not the main course.”
“Yah, well, tell that to my stomach. She’s not used to it.”
“Your stomach is gendered?”
“It’s on a lady’s body, so it’s a lady stomach.”
Roosevelt and Jancie spoke affectionately for a few minutes before ending the call with I love yous and blown kisses into the phone. Roosevelt had become friends with Jancie shortly before she met Devin, though she had known of Jancie’s existence since Jancie moved to Ohio from Florida in the eighth grade. They didn’t become friends until much later.
Roosevelt didn’t have many friends, if any, until after high school. There were acquaintances and people to share a lunch table with, but friend implied more. It implied trust, confiding, and the belief that the other person had good intentions. Roosevelt had never felt that until she met Jancie. She often told herself that a lonely upbringing had been worth it, because it led her to her. Roosevelt believed she never would have been handpicked by Jancie if she hadn’t been alone first.
Jancie first saw Roosevelt stoned and drowsy at a bowling alley. Roosevelt was attending an outing for her church’s young adult ministry. Everyone wore matching shirts that read World Changers, and there was no real spirit of competition. Applause followed every frame, regardless of how many pins actually fell. The phrase young adult was stretched thin enough to include any unmarried Christian under forty-five. The group’s leader was a man in his mid-thirties who stole glances whenever Roosevelt, or any younger, in-shape woman, took her turn.
Roosevelt wore the same uniform shirt as everyone else, paired with frayed black jeans and beige bowling shoes two sizes too big. Her long, light-brown curls were tied back in a neat ponytail she kept undoing and redoing, as if it never sat quite right. Everything about her was baggy. The hoodie wrapped around her waist looked three sizes too large. She was stoned in a way only another user would notice. One look was enough for Jancie. It was in the way Roosevelt walked, the way her eyes never quite focused on anything. She would finish a frame and sit apart from the others, nursing a Diet soda, or pop, as Roosevelt called it. Jancie knew she was a user because she was one herself.
A single “Hi, my name is Jancie” was all it took, because Roosevelt’s Midwestern politeness did the rest. Soon enough, Jancie had drifted away from her bowling group, and Roosevelt had slipped from her church group. They ate bad frozen bowling-alley pizza and drank expired soda from the dispenser.
Jancie felt drawn to Roosevelt because they shared a similar look: addicted, skinny brunettes. Jancie filled out her clothes more than Roosevelt and didn’t have her dimples, but they were kindred spirits from the start. They traded phones and entered each other into their contacts. Roosevelt was astonished by how many contacts Jancie had. Jancie added a heart after her name in Roosevelt’s phone.
Devin was Roosevelt’s first everything but friend. He was her first date, first kiss, first time, first love, first flight, first apartment, first eviction, and first arrest.
Devin met both Roosevelt and Jancie at a karaoke bar in Cleveland. He had passively observed them but didn’t take real interest until Roosevelt went up and sang Screaming Infidelities by Dashboard Confessional. Her vocal range and emotion swept him off his feet. Or at least, that was part of it. The first thing he truly saw was success for his band.
He made his way over to their table and complimented her performance, using words like astounding and generational, all of which made Roosevelt blush. Jancie didn’t like Devin, but she didn’t want to dim her new friend’s night. Still, she hated that the first words out of his mouth were, “So, Dashboard, huh? You like that chick music, don’t you.”
Within the hour, Roosevelt had agreed to go on a date the following night and attend band rehearsal the night after that. Devin would have pushed for rehearsal the same night, but he needed a day to fire their current vocalist.
Outside of Rest N Fuel, Roosevelt sat in the snow beside the employee restrooms on a plastic bag she’d found so her pants wouldn’t get wet. She cupped a hand over her mouth as if to yawn, but really to swallow the pills. She closed her eyes and leaned back against the cold brick wall. The cold never bothered Roosevelt. In fact, she embraced it like a friend. She inhaled deeply and pressed both her hands to the sides of her face.
When she opened her eyes, a young boy, no older than six, stood a few feet in front of her. She took a moment to collect herself, then gave him a big smile and an exaggerated wave.
“What are you doing out here all by yourself, there, bud?” she asked.
The boy stared at her for a moment, then turned and walked out of view. Roosevelt stood and looked around the corner, but he was nowhere to be found.
Standing adjacent to the van and peeking around the corner, Roosevelt caught the attention of Devin and Rudy, who were walking back toward the van. Rudy carried the bags, while Devin walked empty-handed beside him. Devin was the tallest in the band at six-three. Rudy stood five-eleven, but next to Devin he looked like a son walking with his father. Roosevelt looked up to both of them, literally and metaphorically. She was five-two, and they were older, more seasoned musicians.
“Long time no see, babe,” Devin said, wrapping his arms around her and lifting her for a kiss. “You can head inside now if you’d like. We’ll watch the van.”
“You’re not too shabby yourself, mister,” Roosevelt said back, kissing Devin. “Yah didn’t happen to see a little boy, did-jya?”
“Nope,” he answered, setting her back down. “Did you see anything, Rudy?”
“Hell no,” Rudy said, arms crossed, head tucked low. “I’d notice a lost little boy in this weather.”
Posters for missing children on every other gas pump caught Roosevelt’s attention. She couldn’t make out the specifics, but the picture of a child and the text told her enough to fill in the blanks.
“I just get so worried, you know,” she said. “At least the boy was wearing a coht.”
Devin and Rudy reassured her, each resting a hand on her shoulders. Roosevelt walked along the wall, around the corner, and into the Rest N Fuel. Cheap motels, life in a van, and gas station snacks were normal for her bandmates, but this was a new world for Roosevelt. She had worked several jobs of varying lengths since she was sixteen. Her father had been proud when she began her first entrepreneurial venture, walking dogs for her wealthy neighbors. Her mother thought it pointless, worried it would distract from her studies, but Roosevelt only wanted enough money to support her habits.
She used to invent friends, carefully writing down their names and backstories so the lies wouldn’t slip. It kept her parents from asking questions, from worrying too much, from looking too closely. It gave her permission to leave the house and somewhere believable to say she was going. ’“I’m going to Georgia’s house” worked whether she was alone, getting high, or nowhere in particular. Her parents never did ask to meet her friends.
The interior of Rest N Fuel was smothered with missing children posters and warnings about sex trafficking. Behind the cashier’s counter, a banner about the opioid epidemic loomed like a reminder meant for her. Roosevelt averted her eyes and browsed the shelves. Bread, pickles, peanut butter, beef jerky, and deodorant. She walked the aisles, filling the basket hanging from her arm. Rudy always made sure to stock up on essentials, things like toiletries and items for maintaining the van. Roosevelt shopped for what looked good: Honey Buns and brownies.
She came across another missing child poster, this one at eye level and within arm’s reach. It was pinned to the bulletin board by the entrance to the seated dining area. Roosevelt stopped and took a closer look.
CLIFFORD TILLER MISSING SINCE OCTOBER 17, 2012
The poster said he was last seen wearing a black knit cap, a Spider-Man shirt, and blue jeans. He was four-foot-one, Black, and eight years old.
LAST SEEN AT WOODLAWN MALL.
Children, young women, and unprotected male youth were going missing at an alarming rate. Parents liked to say things had been simpler and safer when they were growing up. With their rose-tinted, internet-free memories, they sounded nostalgic, even naive, but they weren’t wrong. It wasn’t just the internet making people more aware, or the media sensationalizing trauma for profit. There was a problem.
A girl in Roosevelt’s sixth-grade class went missing. She and her parents attended a vigil. Her father joined the search parties. It all proved futile. The girl’s body was eventually found dumped in the woods, not far from a walking trail. No one talked about her again. Her parents came to the school to clear out her locker after identifying the body, and they divorced shortly after.
Roosevelt felt a tug on her jacket and looked over, but saw nothing. When she looked down, the little boy from outside stood there. She was ready to smile and greet him, but there was something frantic in his eyes. He didn’t speak or make a sound. He only kept pulling at her jacket.
“Hey there, little guy, what’s goin’ on?” Roosevelt asked, crouching down to his level. “Where’s your mom at?”
He didn’t respond. Roosevelt stood and called out louder, her voice carrying through the store. “Hey, um, has anyone seen this kid’s mom at all?” The cashier shrugged. The few customers inside shook their heads.
Holding the boy’s hand, Roosevelt walked the store until she reached the customer restrooms. The men’s room stood open and empty. The women’s room was locked, the handle marked occupied.
“Hello?” Roosevelt said, knocking gently. “I know this is a bit weird, sorry, but is anyone in there?”
On the second knock, the locked door cracked open. Roosevelt pushed it just enough to lean inside. The restroom was lit harshly, bright as a doctor’s exam room. She opened the door a little more and saw a woman in her mid-thirties slumped on the floor, unmoving. Still holding the kid’s hand, Roosevelt walked to the register. She motioned for the cashier to lean closer and whispered something in his ear. His eyes widened, and he reached for the phone mounted on the wall behind him and quickly dialed 9-1-1.
