The Airnapped Child Read online

  “Alright, my love. I’ll see you soon, the both of you. I love you.”

  “I love you, too,” she said, clinging to the receiver a little too tightly. She heard the line click as the connection was severed but she held on to the phone for minutes longer, as if somehow the act would keep her world from continuing its dance of disintegration.

  ***

  When she awoke, it was with labored breath and beads of sweat clinging to her skin like silk. She realized she had been having a nightmare. The dream had started like most other regular ones but it had fast turned into a dreadful experience. She had been playing with the baby, placing him on her thighs as she cooed and tickled him. He smiled the toothless smile of all babies his age. Elizabeth tickled him some more. And then she watched with horror as the boy slowly turned to smoke and slipped from her grasp. The tighter she tried to hold onto her little boy the quicker he disappeared in front of her frightened eyes.

  She realized she was breathing hard and forced herself to slow down. Momentarily disoriented, she wondered where she was. But it did not take long for her to see that she was right where she was hours before when the call from her husband came in. She had obviously fallen asleep on the sofa, the phone tossed carelessly on the floor.

  She bent down and retrieved it, placing it in its cradle on the little bench beside the sofa. She wished daylight would come soon and with it news of her baby being found, but when she looked at the grandfather clock hanging over the mantel place, she realized that dawn was still hours away.

  The worst nights are always the longest, she thought resentfully. She noticed with delight that she was hungry. Not because she had an appetite for food at the moment but because making it would help keep her busy while she waited for the morning. She had no intentions of falling back asleep after the nightmare she had just escaped.

  She got off the couch and made her way to the kitchen. She turned on the lights, filling the spacious room with luminescent white. Subconsciously, she worked her way back to the dream which felt less terrifying now that she was awake. In place of the terror, it had left a deep-seated feeling of guilt. As she assembled the ingredients for her late night dinner or way too early breakfast, she realized the dream had been nothing but self-indictment. She had not just been careless with her child but that singular act of leaving him with stranger had been responsible for his misfortune. She shook her head hard. She could say it in her head but her heart did not believe it. The more she thought about it, the more the ill-feeling grew stronger until it felt as if she would very choke on it like a real life grip around her neck.

  She collapsed onto the kitchen stool closest to her.

  “Breathe, Elizabeth. Breathe,” she said aloud, willing herself to get rid of the horrific thoughts running through her imagination.

  Almost a minute passed before she was able to get up and resume making the meal. She stared at the ingredients laid out on the work surface before her. Somehow, her hands had chosen stuff meant for an elaborate pot roast. There were a few unnecessary items lying beside the beef and vegetables too. She gathered them up and tossed them unceremoniously into a cabinet.

  The kitchen was a wide, l-shaped space with monochrome furnishing. The kitchen island had been finished with gleaming white tiles contrasting sharply with the black of the floor tiles. The stools were painted white to match the table top. The cabinet doors were all white too, with black handles. The walls had smattering of black in the shape of daffodils. They were Elizabeth’s favorite flower and it gave her extreme joy to have had those little details added into one of the places where she spent a lot of time, being a stay-at-home mom and wife. The interior decorator hired to fix up the place had had a hard time agreeing with her choice. They argued that daffodils never occurred in black naturally and to represent them as such was quite odd. Elizabeth had insisted, anyway. Her kitchen would be black and white and she would have her daffodils up the wall. When the job was done, she had no need to convince the decorator that she had great taste after all, the latter gushed overtly about the beauty of the place and its uniqueness. Such random thoughts in the middle of the worst nightmare any parent could have.

  Elizabeth stood for a long while staring at one of the flowers now, willing them to give her the feeling of peace that was her reason for loving them her whole life. Instead, her mind raced with unpleasant calculations. She sighed, turning away from the wall. She grabbed a carving knife from its white holder. Several swings later, the chunk of meat before her had been reduced to little red bits of flesh. She worked slowly and meticulously, gathering up the meat and dumping them in a pot. She turned on the stove. Its blue flames leaped to life, caressing the bottom of the pot like a lover’s kiss. She let the fire do its work as she proceeded to reach for the vegetables. She cut them up in small cubes and placed them in a glass bowl. When she returned to the steaming pot of meat, it had lost its blood red appearance and taken on the gravy brown palette that promised rich, tasty gravy. She turned the fleshy bits over with a wooden spoon, letting it steam for a while yet.

  Minutes passed, her hands worked deftly with the practiced precision of a thousand meals before. Water, seasoning, vegetables and soon, the food was ready. She turned off the cooker and relished the aroma of cooked meat. The clock hanging above the white lintel of the door put dawn at a couple hours. Elizabeth felt a need to delay going upstairs for as long as she could. She knew she would break down if she had to pass by her baby’s nursery on the way to the master bedroom she shared with her husband. The kitchen would be her haven then, she decided finally.

  She knew the meal she had just made would taste divine yet she had neither appetite nor the stomach for it. So, she left it to cool right there on the stove before she would pack it up and store it in the refrigerator. Bored and tired and alone, she turned on the TV sitting in the left corner of the kitchen just beside the window. She had no desire to watch anything but she figured the moving pictures might keep her mind busy. She idly flipped channel after channel with nothing catching her fancy. She sighed. Moving to the refrigerator, she retrieved a bottle of chardonnay. She grabbed a tall glass off the rack and poured the wine until the glass was brimming full. She took a large sip and returned to her perch on the stool. Wine glass in her left hand, she continued channel surfing with her right.

  “…disappearance of baby Benson.”

  The words leaped out at her, forcing the remote to clatter to the tiled surface of the kitchen island. There was a freeze frame of the airplane she had been on just hours before and a picture she had posted on her Facebook profile the month when she had had her baby. She was glowing with such joy- the kind that only having watched a life grow inside of you before making it out into the world could bring. The baby was wrapped in her arms with nothing but his covered head being visible.

  These damned media people, she thought angrily, wondering if they were allowed to go pilfering content from people’s personal spaces for their stupid stories. And then, the weight hit her all over again. This was really happening. It was not just some nightmare she hoped daytime would shove back into the shadows of forgotten nights. It was real and it was on the news. In fact, it had been on the news for hours, she thought stupidly, recalling her husband’s comment. What she had just watched was a replay of the news her husband had mentioned seeing earlier.

  Presently, the news person wrapped up with messages of hope and faith that the FBI would find this baby and return one woman’s joy. Elizabeth said a silent prayer of hope along with them. Then she downed the remaining contents of her glass in one swig. She put the glass down, switched off the TV and backed out of the kitchen, weary as Sisyphus and his burden. She turned out the kitchen lights and shut the door quietly.

  In the darkness of the empty kitchen, her pot roast sat untouched on the stove.

  ***

  Hours earlier, in a cab meandering through busy streets, two figures smiled with a sense of accomplishment.

  “I was so, so scared,” one
of them said.

  “I told you not to be. I had it all figured out, babe,” the other replied, sporting a smug smile. “I didn’t finish top of my class for nothing.” The smile blossomed into an all-out self-glorifying grin.

  “Sometimes, it’s hard to believe you learned all these skills in force school. I mean, you’re meant to be the good guys,” the first one said. She rocked a bundle back and forth on her knees.

  “What, you think I’m the bad guy?” the other one asked sternly. The smile had disappeared from his face.

  “No, I didn’t mean it that way…”

  “Of course, you didn’t, love,” he cut her off. “You know better than to rubbish the sacrifices I make for us. You know I do all this for us, don’t you?” he was smiling again but there was no warmth in his eyes.

  She nodded, looking down at the bundle in her lap.

  “So, what do we do with him?” she turned to look at her partner.

  He smiles mischievously and says nothing, staring straight ahead as the cab continued its journey, winding through traffic.

  ***

  Samuel Clark arrived home, his mood anything but light. The stint with the police guy at the airport had left a sour taste in his mouth. How coincidental that he was the only one with a criminal record on the flight, or so it seemed with the loudmouth rambling about how he recognized Clark.

  He plopped onto a couch and switched on the television with the remote. He rubbed at his temples. It was a good thing the lady cop hadn’t been an asshole like her colleague, he thought gratefully.

  He looked up to his horror. His face was staring back at him on the TV. He picked up the remote and turned up the volume. The reporter was running a short story of his criminal history. Served three years for burglary, spotted on a flight with a missing infant whom she identified only as Baby Benson and then let go like the others. But could it be possible that he had somehow slipped back into crime and was somehow connected to the baby’s disappearance, she speculated.

  He turned down the volume angrily, even as his face faded and another pair of faces took the position where his had just been not many seconds before.

  That one mistake would haunt him his whole life, he figured. No one seemed to care that he had been straight before that crime and for all these many years after. One stupid mistake and his image was ruined for life and there was nothing he could do about it, he thought weakly.

  Chapter Two

  ALL EYES ON ME

  Samuel walked into his kitchen. He was terribly hungry and wanted a quick breakfast. A hurried search through his cupboards revealed he was out of groceries. An angry groan escaped his throat. Minutes later, he was dressed and walking down the street. The mini-supermarket where he had shopped since he moved into this neighborhood was barely a three-minute walk away. He whistled silently as he covered the short distance. A shadow flitted across in front of him. He whipped his head around back to see who it was. Nothing. He continued his walk. Soon he was at the mart. He pushed the heavy glass door open and walked in. A man sat in a corner, head bowed over a newspaper. Not a strange sight at a place where people usually sat to have their coffees but it left an uneasy feeling in the pit of Samuel’s stomach. He tried to shake it off as he moved further inside and walked through the stacked shelves of goods he picked a pack of sugar, canned beans, milk, some floor, bacon. Tins and cans and more tin and cans. He soon reappeared at the counter. A long line had formed there where there had been no one when he first walked in. He dropped his shopping basket on the ground beside him as he waited his turn. He looked around. The man and his newspaper were still seated in the corner as still as a mannequin. The line moved painfully slowly.

  After what seemed to Samuel like the million-year reign of the Christ, he was finally standing before the cashier. He put his purchase on the counter as she ran the prices.

  “Seventy five dollars, please,” the cashier said, politely.

  He fished in his back pocket for his wallet wondering what exactly he had bought that amounted to all that. He produced the cash and handed it over somewhat reluctantly. The salesperson bagged his purchase and handed them over. They fit into three big grocery bags.

  “Need a hand?”

  Samuel turned towards the voice. It was the man with the newspaper. He was visibly struggling with all three bags and it was hard to refuse the offer. He refused anyway.

  “I can handle it, thank you.” He managed to gather the bags into his arms.

  The man obviously did not hear him because he continued behind him at a languid pace. Samuel could feel worry beginning to gnaw at him. Who the hell was the man and why was he following him? He walked out the door and picked up his pace. The man also picked up his pace, jogging lightly to catch up with Samuel’s long strides. From the sides Samuel gauged the man; he wasn’t dressed terribly, his clothes were neat, ironed, even though a little too formal for someone who was just sitting at a grocery store reading a newspaper. Samuel concluded that he probably was not a robber. In any case, someone who was out to mug you would not offer to help you with your luggage beforehand, and out in the like that. Of course, he knew he was mostly trusting his instincts, he had been a burglar before so he would know. Also, the man had none of the twitchy, fidgety look of a drug peddler. If the guy’s intention was to sell him some dope, he was doing a poor job of it because, from experience, he knew that the fastest way to scare a junkie away was looking respectable, like a cop or something.

  At this thought Samuel stopped on his tracks. What if? What the hell? Why would they be trailing him? There was only one way to find out. So at the next intersection, he cut to his right, then ran through the short alley appearing on the other side of the building. He was banking on the inexperience of the other guy. Although he had lived in the neighborhood for just a short time, he had been around enough to be able to know some of the hidden alleys in the area; this was one of them.

  He jumped over a low fence and waited for the other man to catch up. It was not long before he saw the other man run past, huffing and puffing. After a while he ran back, looking around, obviously confused. The alley led straight to the end of the street and the only way out was back through the way they had come in. The man looked out of his depth. He stood still at the same location, peering left and right as though waiting for Samuel to materialize before him. Samuel heard what sounded like a curse, then dial tones. After a while he heard the man speaking,

  “I lost him.”

  Samuel did not hear what the person on the other end said to him, but from what he could make out, it was as though the man was being berated. He kept apologizing. Then the moment Samuel had been waiting for came. The man said,

  “I will go back to join some of the other officers at the station.”

  *********

  For a few minutes after the man dropped the call and left, Samuel stood transfixed to a spot. He could not believe what he had just heard. The police were tailing him. For what reason? Did they think he was a suspect or something? Based on what evidence exactly? Did the mere fact that he had happened to be on the same flight as the missing child, and also that he had been unfortunate enough to have a record qualify as basis for him to be trailed?

  He felt a rush at anger and rage. So much for the government’s touting of their stance on the rehabilitation of prisoners. What he had just witnessed was proof that the government merely said those things to play to the gallery. In truth, it appeared as though no one really expected reformation for a criminal. It seemed the idea was that once a person was a criminal; there was no hope of redemption for him.

  He scaled the low fence and began to make his way wearily back to his apartment. It was as though the hunger that drove him in the first place had all but evaporated. What he felt was dread sitting in the pit of his stomach. Perhaps he should have stayed back at the house and drank cereal. He walked briskly and within a short time he burst out at the entrance of the alley he had entered earlier, he then turned and began walking
towards his apartment. His senses were heightened, so every few minutes he turned to look at passersby, wondering which of them was a plain clothes policeman lurking in the shadows, trailing him in the bid to gather evidence. He had made the other guy mostly because the man had been clumsy, but he was not sure that would be the same for all of the other guys. He was probably being paranoid, but judging from what had just happened, there was enough justification for him being so.

  When he turned the corner of his apartment, he could see a group of men and women gathered on the steps to his apartment. The janitor was arguing with them, and from the way he was gesticulating, it was obvious he was asking them to leave the property. From their paraphernalia – they had cameras slung over their necks – he could tell that they were journalists, and from different media houses, this he saw from the different insignias emblazoned on the different trucks parked on the street. He had no doubt who they were after too. He turned to walk way. He would find a place to lay low and maybe return when they had waited and left. He could not believe that his life had been reduced to skulking away from journalists. As he turned away, one of the journalists caught sight of him, and immediately began to make her way towards him. The lady had a hawkish nose and a crooked wig on. The wig was a different color from her hair color and she had not even made the effort to blend it in properly. As he saw her heading towards him, he quickened his pace. But she had sighted blood and began running after him, the other men soon joined her.

  Hello, Mr. Clark, if I could have just a moment of your time.

  Samuel could hear her piping behind him, but he did not even bother to look behind him.

  What do you have to say about the missing child? Are you aware that you are the prime suspect?

  One of the other men asked, obviously he had decided that the polite path taken by his colleague was not working. Samuel stopped, then turned and began pushing his way through the horde of journalists towards his apartment. There didn’t seem like there was any escaping the journalists. Microphones were pushed into his face and questions were thrown at him. Even if he had any intentions of answering the questions, the rate at which they were thrown at him made it impossible for him to begin to respond to any of them.