The disappearance of James Harris

2 | Lexi

"Hey how's your brother, Harris?" a boy yells as he walks past me with his friends. They all laugh and pat him on the back like he just said the funniest thing in the world.

The pestering started again because of James' memorial, and I've never wanted to disappear more than right now.

"Ignore them," Marie, my so called 'friend', says "They're just a bunch of losers."

"Yeah," Angela, my other so called friend, adds "Like I can't imagine what you're going through, right?"

"Right, like it's so hard to lose a family member. When my grandma died I tried to kill myself." Marie says, and Angela slaps a hand on her mouth as she gasps.

"No," she says

"Uh-huh," Marie says as she nods.

I stare at them both in shock, not because of Marie's so called suicide attempt, but because I know her grandma's not dead.

What am I doing with these two here again? Right, I don't have any other friends.

"I'm going to the bathroom," I say as I get up from our lunch table.

Behind me I could hear Angela and Marie talking as I walked to the doors.

"She's so weird,"

"Right?" Angela responds and they both burst in a fit of giggles and laughter.

I'm the weird one here? Part of me wants to walk back and confront them, but then I remembered that there's no use in starting fights. Whatever, in ten years I'll know none of these people and they won't know me.

I speed-walk to the girl's bathroom, ignoring the stares of others on my way, and I lock myself in one of the pink colored stalls.

There's sharpie on the wall beside me; Never give up, there's always a good ending. Yeah right, tell that to my seven-year-old self and I'd probably get myself killed.

After a few in and out breaths, splashing my face with the probably infected water, and contemplating whether I should skip school or not, I finally walked out of the bathroom with a bad gut feeling.

Just as the door closed, the school bell rang and suddenly the halls were empty. Not completely, because a person stood in front of me the second I walked out.

"Hi," Owen says. Of course he's the bad gut feeling.

"Hi," I respond confusingly.

"I, uhh" he says hesitantly, and after a long pause and a cough he continues his sentence "I hate this place too,"

I raise my eyebrows.

"Wanna leave?"

--

I somehow find myself sitting on the pavement in front of a popular diner James used to take me to as a kid.

Owen and I bought slushees from a near gas station and now we're sitting on the sidewalk, and the only thing I can do is pray my mom doesn't walk or drive by.

It's the second week of fall. The leaves are brown and a slight wind gushes by every minute or so, yet it's a pretty hot day.

"So," he starts. If he starts about James I'm pushing him in front of this car. "What kind of slushee is the best in your opinion?" he asks, holding an imaginary microphone in front of my mouth.

"The red ones I think, I don't like the blue ones." I answer as I stir the straw.

James used to like blue slushees, he used to like every sort of sugary treat in blue. Cotton candy, jelly beans, gummies. Until he puked one day and his vomit was blue, that's when the every blue food got banned in our household.

"What?" he gasps "How do you not like blue?"

"The blue ones make my tongue and teeth and lips blue," I answer "It's annoying,"

"Is my tongue blue?" he says, sticking his blue stained tongue out.

James used to do that.

I nod slightly and look down at my shoes. He's alive, he's out there. He has to be.

When I started my own investigation, was when I first felt alone in my life. Everyone had given up on James, everyone believed he died. I had no one. My mom was depressed and got addicted to her antidepressants, Daisy suddenly developed a hate towards me, and my dad left a week after James was pronounced dead.

"I could help," Owen says suddenly, snapping me back to reality.

I look confused at him and he continues "I'm sorry about last year, I really am. But if you want to look for your brother I really want to help,"

I stare at him "Why?"

"I owe you," he answers with a smile. I assume it's for the bullying, so I decide to leave it in the past. If he's willing to help me look for my missing brother, get involved in police stuff, and possibly go missing too, then it's definitely a real apology.

"Okay," I say. Owen's face lights up as he jumps up from the pavement.

"Alright!" he exclaims loudly "Murder mystery!"

"Without the murder,"

"Without the murder!" he repeats as he stretches out his hand to me like a gentleman. I smile and take it, he pulls me up and we walk along the empty street.

Maybe I'm not alone after all.