Ryan Wiley - Disappearance

The memories keep coming like I’m re-living what happened…

I try calling her back but she doesn’t answer. Hearing her voice has given me a shot of adrenaline; she’s alive. It makes sense for me to go to the reservoir but what does alone mean? Does that mean she’s alone, or does it mean I need to come alone? I try calling her again. “Come on Abby, pick up!” She doesn’t answer, though. I have to assume this means to come alone, so I start driving as fast as I can. I drive around ninety miles per hour on the highway and, fortunately again, I don’t pass any police cars. It’s the most intense hour of driving I’ve ever done.

When I make it to the reservoir, I drive by a small bait and tackle shop. Time is critical but I need some kind of protection. When I enter the store, I see it’s mostly various fishing equipment. Tiny fishhooks are not my idea of protection. Right when I give up and am about to leave the store, I see an ax beside the door. At first I think it isn’t for sale, but then I pick it up and see a price tag of $19.99, so I run to the front desk to buy it. I pay with cash because I don’t want the police knowing I just bought an ax, especially since I didn’t tell them about my phone call from Abby.

Why haven’t I called the police yet? I’m really not sure, but something inside me feels like if I don’t come alone he’ll kill her.

When I get to the reservoir, there’s nobody around. In the summer there’s always lots of people out, but it’s the middle of a weekday in late fall. I go through back roads for about fifteen minutes; I have the route memorized.

The entrance to Abby’s place is hard to spot, but after you find it it’s easier to navigate once inside. Despite not being an official road, you can drive part of the way. Even my little Cavalier can handle this off-road path, although on a normal day I probably wouldn’t go out here if it were raining.

Once I find the entrance, I don’t look back because I know there aren’t any cars or humans for at least a mile. The path is just as I remember. Trees on each side, the leaves are starting to turn colors with the fall season. The path gets darker and darker the farther you go in. After a few minutes, I reach the end of the trail section where you can travel by car. There’s a little area where you can make a U-turn out, which always made me wonder if this trail was somehow human built at some point. The trail looks natural, but it seems odd that it perfectly fits a car.

I stop and turn the car off, then reach for my ax. I take the $19.99 price tag off, which is my way of procrastinating for what’s about to come. I’m not even sure if Abby is here, but something deep inside me believes she is.

I take a deep breath and think for one last minute if I should call the police. I look at my cell phone, which still has one bar signal. I think about how long it would take them to get out here and if I would be able to describe where to find me. I’m no hero and would love for the police to be here. The location, I think, is ultimately what makes me not call. I’m lousy with directions, and even worse at giving them. By the time I explain how to get here, Abby could very well be dead. No, I won’t call, but I’ll keep my phone in my pocket in case I get in a pinch. Maybe the police can find me through the GPS on my phone, not that it will do me any good if I’m dead when they get here.

I get out of the car, not shutting the door all the way because I want to remain as inconspicuous as possible. Abby’s place is a pretty far walk, but it’s a beautiful little area carved out in the woods. It’s near a creek where you can listen to the sounds of the water flowing over the rocks. It’s shaded, but has a little opening where you can get some sun if you want. If you were the type of person interested in living in the middle of the woods, this would be the spot.

After twenty minutes of following the trail, I finally get there. As soon as I do, I know something isn’t right. Abby’s place no longer looks anything related to the place that I know. In the center, where we usually lay a blanket down and have a picnic, there appears to be a huge hole. The ground around it has mounds and mounds of dirt.

All of a sudden I’m terrified. I get my ax and hold it with my best baseball grip. I look around but don’t see anyone. I feel like at any moment someone is going to come up behind me and club me when my back is turned. I do a 360-degree turn to see if they’re behind me, and when I don’t see anyone I run to the hole and look down.

What I see are my most terrified thoughts coming true; Abby is lying at the bottom. The hole is around twenty feet deep. It must have taken weeks, if not months to dig up — a real lunatic did this.

“Abby!” I shout. She’s curled up in the fetal position. It’s hard to see, but I think I see her move.

“Abby, can you hear me? It’s Andrew.”

Still no response, then I remember our brief phone conversation where I could barely understand her… “Re..ser…voir. A…lone.”

She doesn’t speak, but what she does next, I find quite peculiar. Slowly, she moves her arm up and points a finger at me. Why is she pointing at me?

By the time I make the connection that she isn’t pointing at me but at what’s behind me, it’s too late. I feel a hand against my back, pushing me into the hole. In that split second, as I’m falling forward, instinct takes over and I turn my body around. With my left hand I make a desperate attempt at grabbing hold of whatever I can. By sheer luck, I grab the shirt of the kidnapper — the kidnapper who I now know to be Zach Jones. He’s dressed in all black, and the snarl on his face fills me with rage. As soon as I get a firm grasp of his shirt, I pull him down with me. His snarl turns to shock. He does everything he can to keep his balance, but his size and strength aren’t enough. It’s too late for both of us. We both go tumbling down into the hole, and the next thing I remember is being in a hospital bed hearing Nurse Jackie’s footsteps.

“Oh, Andrew. That’s horrible,” my mother says as she wipes tears from her eyes. My father, who rarely shows emotion, is even fighting back tears. Before I have a chance to say anything, Nurse Jackie comes in.

“Hey, so sorry to interrupt. I just wanted to let you know there will be an officer coming in shortly to speak with you. I did everything I could to prevent it. I told them you weren’t in good enough shape to be interrogated at the moment, but they insisted it was urgent.”

“It’s OK,” I tell her. At this moment, I’ve never liked Jackie more. Just based on her expression I can tell she’s on my side and looking after me. “I’d rather talk now and get it over with. Nurse Jackie, go ahead and let the officer know I’m ready whenever they are.”

“Sure thing, hon.”

As she leaves, I scramble my brain to think of anything I need to tell my parents. I imagine it won’t be long before the officer is here to see me.

“Mom, dad, don’t tell anyone what I just told you. Let me be the one who tells people what happened.”

“Sure, Andrew. Of course,” my mother says.

Why do I want to keep it secret? I can’t think of a good reason why I should, other than I naturally tend to keep things to myself. I suppose it doesn’t really matter if they know the details. They found me and they know I didn’t do it. Since I was found they must already know about the hole and Abby’s secret spot. Now that I think about it, how did they find me? I didn’t tell anyone where I went, and there’s no way anyone could just stumble on Abby’s place.

I imagine this officer as a real dick — someone who doesn’t take shit from anyone and yells and gets in your face. I hope he’ll go easy on me because I’ve just been in a coma, but the man I’m envisioning would do nothing of the sort.