I could see in Todd’s father’s face that he had given up hope. He knew his son was dead. He knew Todd wasn’t going to return home and wonder why a different family was living in his house.
I desperately wished I could give his mom that same level of closure.
“Thank you for what you did,” Todd’s dad told me. “You were always a good friend to him. You did everything you could, and we’ll never forget it.”
I didn’t know what to say to that. Mostly I just wanted to start crying, but I held it together.
“If you need anything, please don’t hesitate to let us know,” said Mom.
The five of us stood in the living room, ill at ease, until finally Todd’s dad said, “Well, we’d better get back. We’ve got a lot of packing left to do.”
Nobody seemed sure if this was a hugging moment or not. They knew each other as “my son’s friend’s parents” but had never been friends themselves. Finally, Todd’s mom decided that it was indeed such a moment. Hugs were exchanged all around, and then they left.
I stood in the shower and decided that though I couldn’t let Mr. Martin get away with his crimes, there was no rush.
As long as he stuck to the truce, I had time. Todd was dead. There was nothing I could do for him. He and the others weren’t going to come back to life. I liked to believe that I was seeking justice instead of revenge, but either way, I thought the “dish served cold” saying was appropriate. I’d nail that son of a bitch in due time.
By waiting, I’d gain more of an advantage. His advantage over me was that the authorities couldn’t protect my family and I forever. If I ratted Mr. Martin out, I’m sure there’d be a state trooper parked outside of our home for a while, but they weren’t going to assign us twenty-four-hour protection forever. Eventually, and probably fairly soon, Mr. Martin’s friend would have his opportunity.
But this worked the other way, too. Was his plan to call his friend once a day for the rest of his life? Surely there would be a point where he’d decide that he was safe, that the situation had blown over. Would the news of a child killer being arrested in Alaska make its way down to the lower forty-eight? Just how closely was his friend—if this guy even existed—monitoring things up here? When Mr. Martin was given his phone call after being arrested, would he squander it on calling that guy?
I didn’t know. All I knew was that the longer I waited, the greater the chance of taking him down. I wasn’t talking about years. Whatever sickness in his mind made him commit these atrocities might become uncontrollable if I waited too long. But weeks? Months? Enough time for him to let down his guard.
For all I knew, he was having sleepless nights, too. Waking up in a cold sweat from a nightmare where the FBI broke down his door. Seeing steel bars everywhere he looked. Wondering if each day, each hour, each minute, could be his last moment of freedom.
I loved the idea of him suffering like this.
So, yeah, I’d wait.
And then school started again.
Fairbanks had three different elementary schools, where you went from first through sixth grade. In seventh grade, everybody was together at Ryan Junior High, so your possible social group suddenly tripled in size. In ninth grade, everybody would be divided between two different high schools, so former friends would become fierce rivals.
So as I began eighth grade, there were a lot of unfamiliar faces walking the halls—seventh graders who’d gone to different elementary schools. And though I recognized pretty much all of the eighth graders from last year, only a third of them were kids I’d grown up with. I hadn’t been particularly popular last year, mostly just hanging out with Todd. This meant that my new identity, as I walked into the school, was “the kid whose best friend is missing and probably dead.”
Eighth graders are not very good at expressing sympathy for this sort of thing. My presence in the school was awkward and strange. Lots of stares and whispers. I’m not saying that the crowds parted as I walked down the hallway, but there was a definite sense—possibly imagined on my part—that they felt like my tragedy might be contagious.
Todd and I weren’t devoid of other friends, but while I’m not saying that our mutual friends tried to avoid me, I got the definite sense that they weren’t comfortable talking to me. The usual, “Hey, how was your summer?” small talk didn’t work anymore. They were his friend too, but it felt like all of the weirdness was on me. In fifth grade, my classmate Mark’s mother had died, and before he returned to school, the teacher had given all of us a lecture about how we needed to be really nice to him. When he came back, we all just kind of stayed away from him, which in retrospect was horrifically cruel. I didn’t actually make the Mark connection at the time, but I could tell that the other kids didn’t much want to be around me, because if they were they might have to say something about Todd.
I had all-new teachers, who presumably hadn’t been given a dossier on who was friends with the missing boy, so they didn’t treat me any differently, at least.
This school year was going to suck.
When my mom asked how the first day went, I told her it had gone fine.
Maybe school would be okay after everybody had a chance to adjust, after my peers realized that I wasn’t going to burst into tears at random times and scream, “Why, God, why?”
The entire week sucked, but Friday sucked less than Monday
