Page 29 of Stalked By Shadows
I shrugged, not really having the answer to that.
Lukas sighed. “You need someone. Not me, not mom or dad. You need someone to take care of and to take care of you. I wanted you to have someone, something, to focus on. Micah is a good fit.”
Was he nuts? “You’re trying to set him up with me? Not only a job, but like a relationship?”
“Physical attraction is a good start, and I know you’re already attracted to him. Plus you have a lot in common.”
“Like what? We’re both nuts? We both hear screaming in the dark?”
Lukas frowned. “Huh? When?”
“At his house at three a.m. He told me to go to sleep because if I thought too hard about it, the screaming would get worse. Does that sound like someone you want me with? Someone who might be as crazy as I am?” And that was the kicker wasn’t it? I’d had a few moments of thinking maybe we did have that in common, not in the same way, but something from his disappearance that changed him in a similar way that I’d been changed. Our eyes opened even if we didn’t want them to be.
“I thought two lonely people might find something in common,” Lukas said.
“He doesn’t seem lonely to me. He has Sky, Tim, and Brad for starters.”
“Whom he keeps at arm’s length.” Lukas shook his head. “He may be sexually uninhibited, but he’s very careful with his emotions. A good showman, but rarely giving anyone a true look at what he’s feeling. Always has been, even before… And the disappearance only made it worse.”
“You knew him before?”
“Not really. The Micah you meet now is very different from the little boy who went hiking with his boyfriend and vanished in the woods. Brad is more like Micah was. I only knew him because Micah and Tim volunteered at the gay youth center. That’s where I met Sky too, though she wasn’t a volunteer, she was a kid in need. But that was after… the search. It was tough you know?” Lukas said.
He sat down hard on the couch, and I sank to the floor at his feet. “We all responded to the search, nearly every cop in the state. Combed the area for weeks, going through it over and over again. Nothing. Not a damn trace. People don’t just vanish like that. Not in a forest.”
“Micah said everyone treated Tim really badly.”
Lukas nodded. “Of course. He was a suspect. Micah’s boyfriend, older by a decade, and collecting money for a porn channel starring the young, hot, and barely legal boyfriend? Plus being gay put him on a lot of old cop’s radars. But nothing fit. It was the middle of the day. The group was together. They turned down a bend, Micah at the back of the group since he wasn’t used to hiking, and he was gone. No clothing, tracks, or anything left behind.”
“He says he doesn’t remember it.”
“Same song and dance he’s been telling for years.”
“You don’t believe him?”
“I think he remembers more than he’s willing to share, but since what he remembers doesn’t make sense…” he deliberately paused, “he hides what he does remember. I went with Tim to collect him from Reno. He came home and the whole thing seemed to start all over. Everyone asking questions, demanding answers. Micah was thin, missing his shoes and socks, but wearing the same clothes he’d vanished in. It was bizarre. He was treated like a criminal for vanishing, and everything fell apart. Him and Tim’s relationship, the channel, the money, and he was on the verge of having to go home.”
“That was a bad thing? He made it sound like his parents were supportive.”
“Of their kid being a porn star? Is anyone? If he went home, he’d have to become a teacher like his parents or find some other trade. Honor is still a real thing in Japan. Especially family honor. I’ve met his father, he’s very traditionally Japanese. Micah is really creative and a bit scattered. He was doing one of those cosplay boudoir channels when he met Tim online. Making his own costumes and posing in sexy ways for paying fans. He doesn’t do that anymore, but he has new projects all the time. Those are the things that make him happy, not technology and rule books set by family expectations.” Lukas looked at me. “Sounds like someone else I know.”
“I’m not crafty at all,” I said, thinking back to Tim’s comment about how Micah found time to do all that stuff. Candles, shawls, blankets. The loft craft area made sense when I realized that Micah used it to make things to sell in his shop. He said it was stress relief, and maybe part of it was.
“Right? ‘Cause who built the tree fort out of those old barn pieces?”
It had lasted a couple summers. I was surprised he remembered it as we’d been kids.
“Then there was that Comic Con you went to when we were teens? The one where you became Optimus Prime by taping together and painting cardboard boxes? And who can dissect any weapon and put it back together in new and interesting ways? Do I have to remind you of a letter you wrote about receiving a reprimand for reconstructing pieces from broken weapons into the parts to fix a coffee pot?”
“Coffee is essential,” I said. The Optimus Prime thing had been inspired even if it had broken the first day and I’d spent the entire con weekend gluing parts of it back together.
“Mypoint,” Lukas said, “is that you’re just as creative. Mind always working, thinking, analyzing. I think that’s why the rules of the military worked for you, as you could follow orders and still let your mind wander. It was a job that didn’t take you away from having the freedom to think. Not everyone can do that. You needed someone else to set the rules so you could actually commit to them. Now you need another project, and maybe you haven’t found your craft yet.”
“You make me sound flighty.”
Lukas looked at me incredulously. “No way? You think?”
“Asshole.” Okay, I was a little flighty.