Wanted [REWRITE]

Chapter 12 - Seeking Answers

You had to go back.

The message Rachel had left for you was that you had to go back to that house. She didn't say what would happen if you didn't-- just that she would be back tomorrow and you were going to go back with her, so pack your things and be ready.

No one knew what to say as you sat at the dining table with the boys and Aunt Cass. You and Hiro had filled Tadashi in on everything that had happened with her, and the three of you delivered the same news to Aunt Cass. Now the entire Hamada family had made up their minds-- there was no way they were letting you go anywhere with Rachel.

"Except to court," Hiro said under his breath, but still loud enough for everyone to hear.

Those words made you start to wonder if you could actually have a case to present. Then again, running away from home as a minor was illegal, so you had technically been living as a felon for the last decade (not to mention all the food, water, clothes, soap, and everything else you had stolen in that time). It was honestly fifty-fifty if the law would be on your side or not.

"That does raise an interesting point, actually." Aunt Cass leaned her elbows forward on the table. "If one of my kids went missing, I'd file a report in a few hours, tops. You were gone for ten years, and she never once went to the police about it."

You pressed your eyebrows together. That was news to you. "She didn't?"

Aunt Cass shook her head. "She said so, when she came here looking for you. She told me she's been piecing together clues on her own since you left-- she had a stupid excuse about her career taking too much time, so she never had a chance to file anything legally. And let me just say, that is complete bullsh--"

"They're kids, Aunt Cass," Tadashi reminded her, earning an eye roll from Hiro.

"I'm almost eighteen," he said.

"My point exactly."

"But that's really weird, isn't it?" Aunt Cass asked, looking at you as if you would have the answer to everything. "She went through the whole process to adopt you-- sure, she didn't act like a mother, but even so, that process is not easy, and it's not cheap--, but she never even bothered to try calling the police when you ran away? That's really fishy, if you ask me."

"Everything about the situation is fishy," you agreed. "Even when she adopted me in the first place. I had never met her before. There was no adoption interview or anything like that. She just showed up one day. I guess she asked for me specifically; I have no idea what was going through the staff's minds when it all happened, because clearly that's not how the system's supposed to work, but here we are."

Hiro frowned, clearly thinking hard about what you were telling them. "So somehow she knew you were there, and she wanted you for something specific."

"Could we ask the orphanage for your records?" Tadashi asked, but Aunt Cass shook her head before he even finished the question.

"That place was shut down a few years ago. I remember seeing the story in the paper."

Hiro looked at her. "You still read the paper?"

"I saw it in the stand right on the corner here, and I looked it up on the internet later," she amended. "I haven't paid for a paper in almost twenty years."

"Good." He looked at you. "Back to the point, though: what did Rachel even want you for in the first place?"

"I wish I knew," you told him. "I didn't exactly stick around to ask questions before I ran away."

"It just doesn't make sense. She was motivated enough to find you, and to spend the money to go through the whole adoption process. But she couldn't be bothered to look for you when you ran away?"