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By Root 290 0

worked at his father’s gas station. He insisted that Shawna never would have run away without telling him; that she loved him and was going to marry him. Greg had had a rap sheet of his own as a juvenile, but had been clean since working with his father for over two years. He had been investigated as a possible link to Shawna’s disappearance but no evidence of any foul play was uncovered. He provided a color photograph of Shawna, a close-up of her pixielike face, framed by short-cropped boyish blond hair. She had sparkling green eyes, and a pug nose, pierced with a small gold hoop. She wore a bright smile and a look in her eyes that told Lydia she was in love with whoever had snapped the photo, presumably Greg. Photographs of living people now dead always made Lydia angry. They were cold, eerie reminders of how easily life was lost, how vividly alive people remain in the memories of those who loved them, and how grief is the slick-walled, bottomless abyss between those places.

A month after her disappearance, Shawna was still missing. There were no leads.

“So why are we assuming that this girl didn’t just run away again?” asked Jeffrey.

“One: She didn’t take anything with her like before; she had a habit of stealing from her foster parents before taking flight. But this time, nothing of theirs and not even her own belongings. Two: She had a boyfriend who clearly loved her. Show me one damaged teenage girl who runs away from love, probably more love than she’s ever had.”

“What makes you think he loved her? Maybe he beat her. Maybe he killed her.”

“Maybe, but it says here he visited the police station three different times to check on progress, insisting that she wouldn’t have run away.”

“A lot of serial killers insinuate themselves into an investigation.”

“He’s too young to be a serial killer. And he doesn’t fit the typical profile. Not smart enough, not antisocial enough.”

They pinned Shawna’s picture on the board, and below it they placed index cards listing everything they knew for a fact to be true about her, vital statistics, date last seen, address. On the map board they placed a red pushpin at her last known address.

Christine and Harold Wallace had had a troubled marriage, according to a state-appointed abuse counselor. Both frequently unemployed, both recovering methamphetamine addicts, their life together had not been an easy one. Pulling each other back and forth into and out of addiction, their relationship had been violent, ranging from a slap in the face to a brutal beating which left Christine in the hospital for three weeks, to a stab wound that just missed Harold’s vital organs.

In the ten years they had been together, only three years had seen both of them out of prison or rehabilitation clinics at the same time. But at the time they went missing, they both had been off drugs for a year, both were holding down work-fare jobs cleaning the park in the middle of town, and there had been no incidence of abuse in more than eight months. Christine was studying for her GED.

When they did not show up for work that first day, their supervisor did not call it in to the welfare board. He liked them and didn’t want them to get kicked out of the program that had been helping them move forward in their lives. But after the second day, he had to call it in. When counselors went to the Wallaces’ home in the barrio, a small two-room house, they found the door standing open. All their possessions remained; no evidence of struggle or forced entry. They were simply gone. Calls to each of their parents revealed that both had been estranged from their families for over ten years. No one was interested that they were missing and could offer no information.

The last entry the social worker made in her file, a week before they disappeared, read: “I am so pleased with Christine and Harold’s progress. They are both working, drug-free, and seem to be healing their relationship. During our last session, they were holding hands.”

The only pictures available of Christine and Harold were their respective mug shots. Though