Laura Altom - Three Boys and a Baby

“She must’ve been starving.” Ella stroked the girl’s blond tufts of downy hair. “Now, how about you gentlemen tell me how you got this angel?”

JACKSON WOKE SLOWLY, disoriented as to where he was. Splitting his time between the firehouse and home, rarely getting a full night’s rest, he was used to catnapping. But lately, his sleep seemed to come on faster and harder. Deep and dreamless.

He rolled off the sofa, struggling to his feet.

Though he wasn’t the least bit hungry, for Dillon’s sake, he needed to make good on nuking his mom’s meal.

His mother had been a godsend throughout the divorce. When he was on shift at the firehouse, she kept Dillon with her. His mom also saw to it that they ate pretty much three squares a day. There were times Jackson felt ashamed by how dependant upon her he’d become.

“Yo, Dillon!”

When the boy didn’t answer, Jackson assumed he was outside, playing with his friends.

Peering out the front window, he found the moon rising on twilight. A few fireflies hovered above the half-dead lawn, and across the street, Joe Parker’s legs stuck out from under his ’63 Chevy. There were not, however, three boys playing catch or Frisbee or capture the flag.

Frowning, Jackson checked the kitchen, Dillon’s room, the den where they kept the computer, the backyard where the boys staged naval battles in the six-inch-deep plastic pool. His son occupied none of his usual haunts.

Jackson was just picking up the phone to see if Dillon had gone to his folks’ place when the doorbell rang. He hightailed it that way to see the shadowy figure of a woman behind the screen.

Upon closer inspection, he recognized Ella Garvey.

“Hey,” he said, having to lift the broken-hinged door to get it to swing properly. “Come on in. I don’t suppose you’ve seen Dillon?”

“Funny…” She laughed, only the sound came out more panicked than happy. “I was hoping you’d seen Owen and Oliver.”

“I DON’T KNOW about this,” Owen said, trailing behind Oliver and Dillon. He carried his mom’s medical bag and formula and blankets while Oliver carried the baby and diapers and Dillon hauled towels and chips and pop and cupcakes.

“Quit whining,” Oliver said, ashamed of his little brother.

“You’re not the boss of me,” Owen said. “This is a bad idea.”

“I am too the boss of you,” Oliver said, “and if you don’t quit complaining, I’m not going to let you play my new Xbox game.”

“Dad’s not even gonna buy you that game,” Owen fired back. “He loves me more than you.”

“Does not.”

“Does, too.”

“Does not!”

“Zip it!” Dillon hollered. “Do you two dummies wanna wake up the baby?”

“Yeah, Owen.” Oliver shot his brother a dirty look.

Owen rolled his eyes. “How much farther?”

They’d been walking a really long time, and they’d had to cut cross-country so no grown-ups would see. The stitch in Oliver’s side hurt really bad, and though he wouldn’t tell his twin or Dillon, he was kind of scared. It was getting dark and he’d never been this far from home without being in the car with his mom and dad. Now that his dad didn’t live with them anymore, he hardly ever saw him. It used to make him sad that his father loved a new family better than him, but most times now, he was just mad.

Oliver was gonna be a way better dad to this baby than his own father was to him. Which was why when Mom said they had to call the police, and then she’d gotten on the phone, Oliver had told Owen and Dillon they had to run away.

Everyone knew when the police got you, you went straight to jail. What was a baby going to do in the slammer? They’d probably only feed her roaches and stuff and no way was he going to let his baby eat roaches. She was too cute for that.

“Please,” Owen whined, “let’s stop.”

“Not yet,” Oliver said, holding the baby tighter. “We’re almost there.”

“THEY FOUND WHAT?” Jackson liked to think he’d heard it all, but Ella’s story was a bit far-fetched.

She explained about the boys having stumbled across the abandoned infant in the park. About the note attached to her basket. Through it all, he held his breath, waiting for the joke’s punch line. Only, when Ella ended, her gray eyes pooling upon telling him all three boys and the baby were missing, he wasn’t laughing.

In his line of work, tears were the norm, yet something about the way Ella looked near crying, but somehow keeping it together, affected him more than if she’d sobbed.

His ex had never cried.

Even on the day their divorce had been finalized, she’d remained coolly professional, as if to her, their marriage had been nothing more than a losing day in court. Just once, he’d wanted Julie to acknowledge what she’d thrown away. To have maybe at least come to him, cluing him in on the fact that there’d even been a problem. It’d hurt so damned bad knowing he couldn’t save their marriage when saving was what he did. He rescued little kids and kittens and bedridden elderly. He didn’t stand by, letting their lives end, any more than he gave up on vows he’d made before God and family. Julie was the only quitter in his house.

Frustrated anew by the uncomfortable position he found himself in, Jackson’s voice was more gruff than it should’ve been when he asked, “Have you talked with Hank?”

Hank was a longtime friend and the town’s sheriff.

“No,” Ella said, looking away, then back. Wiping her eyes so he wouldn’t see how upset she truly was? “Hoping the boys were here, I wanted to check with you first.”

“Sure,” he said, already on his way to the kitchen phone.

Five minutes later, Jackson had shared all pertinent information, and Hank had set official wheels in motion.

“Three boys and a baby,” he said to Ella, who was again looking near tears. “They can’t have gone far. We’ll find them in under thirty minutes.”

“I know.” Her words were confident. Her thin voice scared.

What was it with women? Why couldn’t they just say what they felt? Why couldn’t she admit she was upset and ask for his help?

Maybe the better question was, what was it about her heartbreakingly concerned expression that made him care?

Please, God, let Hank find them all safe.

Ella had said the prayer hundreds of times during the endless night, but now, with the early-morning sun filling the boys’ second-story bedroom, why did her throat ache worse than ever? Why, when Hank had told her to stay put, had she desperately wanted to help with the search?

The living room and kitchen teemed with concerned friends and family. Tables were laden with cold cuts, cookies and cake, as if food could somehow fill the gnawing emptiness that had consumed her since Jackson’s promised thirty minutes had faded into ten hours without her boys.

As a doctor, she’d trained for all sorts of emergencies. Broken arms and legs she could handle, but this not knowing just might be the end of her.

A knock sounded on the boys’ open door. “Your friend Claire said I’d find you up here.”

“Jackson.”

Hugging Owen’s favorite stuffed tiger, she glanced the man’s way. “Any sign of them?”

“A dirty diaper and a few granola-bar wrappers out by the old Hampstead place. Looks as if they may have camped there for the night, but no sign of them now.”

She nodded, willing down the bile rising in her throat. “What’s next?”

“A couple of hours ago, we called in help from Buckhorn County. About fifty National Guardsmen have also joined the search. My…um…ex has connections. She called in favors. It won’t be long till we bring them home.”