Since when had Arius cared about Gabriel’s valedictorian graduation? Gabriel kicked at an empty Coke can and watched it roll across the sidewalk ahead of him. The streets were packed with slowly-moving cars, the air full of the sounds of car horns and distant tire screeches. The summer air was quickly heating up, bringing with it a mingled stench of melted rubber, flowing sewage, and sweltering garbage.

              Despite having spent the night on the street himself, several cups were extended Gabriel’s way as he passed the numerous panhandlers dotting the sidewalks and intersections. Loafers stared out at him from the shadows of doorways and roof overhangs. But their watching eyes barely so much as caught Gabriel’s attention.

              He couldn’t shake the sick feeling in his stomach. He had been sure Arius would walk it off and come back. So sure, he had waited two hours under the bridge. Every time a stranger had come wandering up the sidewalk, Gabriel’s heart had lifted for a moment. But Arius did not return.

              He can leave if he wants to, Gabriel told himself silently. He’s nineteen, he’s an adult, he can take care of himself. But reassuring himself was futile. He needs help. I wanted to help. Damn it, now he’s alone.

              Gabriel stopped in front of the first open and inviting store he found—a slightly run-down thrift store—and went inside. He walked straight up to the front. An elderly Hispanic woman greeted him from behind a checkout counter. “Excuse me.” Gabriel gave her his sweetest smile. “Is there any chance I could use your phone for a few minutes? Por favor?”

              The woman cocked an eyebrow at him. But when his gallant smile did not waver, she smiled amusedly back. “Fine.” She lifted her hands in the air. “But don’t tell any of your hobo friends I let you borrow it just this once.” She gave him an almost flirty side-glance, then took out her device and handed it to Gabriel. No matter what Arius said, handsome looks paid off.

              The dial pad was open already, and Gabriel wasted no time dialing in his mother’s number. For one moment, then two, he waited with bated breath while the dialing tone sounded. One ring, two rings. Then nothing. Without warning, the call cut off. “Shit,” Gabriel muttered under his breath. He lifted the device away from his face and hit the call icon a second time. Once again, the call only lasted for two rings before dropping. “What the fuck?” Gabriel looked at the phone like he suspected it might be broken. His mom’s voicemail had not come up, and the call was clearly trying to connect. It wasn’t like her phone could be turned off or without reception.

              “One more,” Gabriel told the woman, who was now giving him a skeptical stare. He hurriedly dialed Monica’s number, then lifted the device to his face again. This time, the dialing tone did not sound. A recorded message informed Gabriel that the number he was calling could not be reached.

              Her phone is shut off or doesn’t have service, Gabriel numbly told himself as he handed the woman’s phone back. He started back outside.

              He had had his doubts. All this had been something similar to the feeling of walking in a dream. The fear was real. The images were real. But some part of Gabriel’s mind still did not believe it. Maybe there had been an honest mistake at the clinic. Maybe that one nurse was crazy. Maybe the police officer didn’t know what he was talking about.

              Now, finding he was unable to reach his family, the nightmare became suddenly more tangible. Did the clinic staff still have his family’s phones? Had they confiscated them to keep Gabriel and Arius from getting in touch with the rest of their family? Maybe that police officer was right. Arouras would stop at nothing to get to Arius. Why?

              Signs for a Greyhound bus stop appeared ahead, but rather than following them, Gabriel turned off into the parking lot of a small grocery store. A woman loading groceries into her car caught his eye, and he approached her. Stopping a respectful distance away, Gabriel asked, “Excuse me, is there any way you could spare five dollars? I need to buy something to eat. You could—” His own words were already twinging at his gut before the woman cut him off.

              “No, sorry.” She flashed him a fake smile, then turned abruptly away.

              “Have a nice day, then,” Gabriel muttered. He walked away, only starting off for a moment before he spotted someone else. A little old man was putting groceries into the bed of a beat-up blue pickup truck. Gabriel eyed the sacks of potatoes he was passing from cart to truck, one after the other. Then, telling himself he didn’t have a choice, he approached the short figure. “Excuse me, is there any way you could spare five dollars? I need to buy something to eat. You could come with me into the store, if you’d like. I really just need food.”

              Almost surprised he had gotten through his entire delivery this time, Gabriel waited for a reaction. The little old man did not so much as glance up at Gabriel, as if deaf to his request. After two more sacks of potatoes had been loaded into the bed of the truck, and still nothing had been said to even acknowledge his existence, Gabriel started to turn away.

              A well-chewed toothpick moved from one side of the old man’s mouth to the other. “Load up these potatoes, and I’ll go in with you.” He had a low, muttering voice, his address of Gabriel so subtle, the twenty-two-year-old did not immediately realize the short little man was speaking to him. But when he turned back, beady gray eyes under sagging lids were peering up at him. He was unmarried, by the ringless fingers of his work-calloused hands. Too much labor under the sun had drawn out a dark shade in his weather-worn skin. But despite his short stature, he had a firm build with sturdy shoulders, strong arms, and feet clad in thick work boots. This man was a short, wrinkled, fifty-year-old cowboy complete with the appropriate hat and red bandana hanging out of his back pocket.

              “Of course,” Gabriel immediately agreed. “Thank you, Sir.” He walked up to the shopping cart and lifted a sack of potatoes out of it and into the bed of the truck. He deposited it carefully, then reached for another.

              The short little man stepped back and folded sun-scarred arms across his chest. Beady eyes observed Gabriel in silence. Like an inspector, he watched as one sack after the other was moved, until Gabriel had finished loading the potatoes and put away the cart.

              “Let’s go inside, then.” Again, his voice was little more than a low mutter. Without pausing to check that Gabriel would follow him, he started for the grocery store. Once inside, the little old man gave the store a brief wave. “Find what you need,” he told Gabriel.

              It was illogical but automatic, the way Gabriel started immediately for the aisle where the crackers were. The store carried Arius’s favorite brand of gluten-free crackers. Numbly, Gabriel reached down a box. I’ll find him, he was telling himself as he did so. I’ll find him, so it’s okay if I get his crackers. Gabriel turned back toward the short little man, only to discover those beady eyes were giving him an odd look.

              “Those aren’t the normal ones,” the little man informed Gabriel after a moment of silence. Sharp eyes moved briefly across the label on the box Gabriel held. A work-calloused finger tapped a red and blue Ritz cracker box on the shelf. “This one’s the normal stuff.”

              Normal. He said the word like it bore an important weight. “These are gluten free,” Gabriel explained. “My brother is gluten intolerant.”

              Those beady eyes seemed to narrow slightly. “Your brother?”

              “Yes, he has a number of food sensitivities.”

              For a moment, it felt as if the short old man was actively sizing Gabriel up: the dirt on his clothes, his unwashed face, mussed hair, tired blue eyes. Silently, the man reached out and took the cracker box from Gabriel. “Very well,” he muttered.

              Purchasing the crackers and parting ways outside the grocery store went smoothly. A short time later, Gabriel was heading back the way he had come. He would go back to the bridge. Maybe Arius had returned by now. If not, Gabriel would look for him.

              And that was when he saw it. At a cross walk, waiting for a red light, Gabriel noticed a poster pinned to the light pole. “HAVE YOU SEEN ME?” in bold print at the top, and below, a full-color picture of a very familiar face.