“Can you tell me about Vera?” I prompted. Her eyes flew back to my face, a new solemnity filling them. “It’s okay, Miri. I just want to help. I’m a friend of Vera and Roza. I visit them almost every week at the flea market. See this bracelet?” I held out my arm so Miri could see the handcrafted jewelry cuffing my wrist.
Miri’s eyes locked on the thin-pounded silver and the embedded stones that marked the piece, no doubt recognizing its craftsmanship. Her fingers trembled as they reached across the table to brush against the cuff. When her eyes returned to meet mine, they were full of unshed tears.
“I can help,” I told her in a gentle voice. “Please just tell me what happened. I promise you won’t get into any trouble. I need to know that she’s okay.”
“She’s gone,” Miri whispered, her eyes staring through me. “She was taken.”
“What do you mean?”
Miri’s eyes pressed closed, and I could tell she was afraid to reveal anything else.
“Miri,” I whispered, squeezing her hand in my own. “I know you’re scared. But I need your help right now.Veraneeds your help.”
Her eyes opened slowly. “There’s a man,” she began, visibly shaken. “He watches us — the young girls. We don’t know why… But he’s always there. He’s always watching.” Her breath caught in her throat. “I told Vera not to walk by herself. I told her not to go.”
I nodded, my chest beginning to ache with foreboding at the direction her words were taking. I didn’t want to hear the rest of this story any more, since it likely didn’t have a happy ending for Vera — but I knew that I needed to.
“She didn’t listen. It was Roza’s birthday, and she wanted to get ingredients for a cake. To surprise Roza, you know?” Miri’s eyes filled with tears that quickly spilled over her lashes, leaving wet trails streaking down her cheekbones.
I squeezed her hand a little tighter, transfixed by her hushed words. Blood pounded in my veins as I watched tears drip from her chin onto the tabletop, polka-dotting it with tiny puddles of grief.
“She’s my cousin. My best friend. We do everything together.” Miri’s voice was hollow, her expression one of clear self-blame. “Normally, I would’ve gone with her that day. Ishouldhave been with her. But I had the flu, so I stayed home in bed. And she never came back.”
The ache in my chest began to spread through the entire cavity, as though someone had sucker-punched me in the stomach and knocked the breath from my lungs. I fought hard to keep the tears out of my eyes, looking up at the ceiling for nearly a minute to stem their flow. I had to be strong — Miri was practically a child, and she was somehow managing to maintain control.
“What—” My voice cracked, betraying my internal struggle. “What happened?”
“The man,” Miri said. “The one who watches. It was him.”
“How do you know?”
There was a beat of silence, as our eyescaught once again across the tabletop.
“Because,” Miri whispered. “He takes all the girls.”
Five words. Eighteen letters. They changed everything.
The air around me seemed to still, her words triggering within me a cataclysmic reaction that set my world atilt on its axis and blanketed my atmosphere in an overcast cloud cover that shaded everything a hue darker. When I once again found the ability to speak, my words were a study of restraint, each pushed out through my lips without emotion.
“Vera wasn’t the first to disappear.” It wasn’t a question; it was an affirmation.
Miri nodded.
“How many gi—?” My voice broke on the last word, and I quickly reined myself in. “How many others have been taken?”
“I don’t know for sure,” Miri whispered. “Three or four from our neighborhood, maybe more.”
Three or four. Maybe more.I clasped my hands together in my lap beneath the table where Miri couldn’t see them, and felt blood well as my nails cut harshly into my palms.
“Do you know what happens to them, Miri?” I swallowed. “After they’re taken?”
Miri shook her head. “Nothing good,” she murmured sadly. “They never come back.”
“Why aren’t the police involved?” I asked, trying to reconcile what I was hearing with the world I thought I lived in. This was America - girls didn’t just disappear here, without anyone noticing. If this were true, where were the news crews? Where were the human rights activists, with their picket signs and protests? Surely, this must be a mistake. Some grand misunderstanding.
My paltry reassurances sounded trivial even in my own mind.
“We can’t trust the police,” Miri whispered. “Can’t trust anyone.”
“Why not, Miri?”
“Santos,” she told me. “The man who watches…”
I nodded, storing that name away in my mind.
“Heisthe police.”