heartstrings

Chapter 43

Evangeline
March 7th 2018

Right after school, I sent Nic a quick text.

Me: How r u?
Me: Text me when you're free, gotta tell u smt

I haven't heard from him  all day, and something about that gnawed at me.

He has never been quick to respond so I didn't stress it at first, but this time, minutes turned into hours, and there was still no reply.

By the time I got home, I couldn't shake the uneasy feeling that something was wrong.
I stared at my phone, I almost stared so hard that it burned up in flames, hoping it'll buzz with a message from him, but it never came.

I finally decided I couldn't just sit around waiting anymore, because with every passing minute I lost my mind more and more—I needed to see him in person, to know he was -would be alright, maybe one day we would be fine.

Cass drove me to Nic's house, not once questioning my choices.

When we arrived at his house I stepped out of the car eager to talk to my boy, when Cass grabbed my hand gently. "If anything happens, you call and I'll come. Okay?"

I nodded and walked away from Cass' car.

The walk up the drive way was torture, every stone on the ground seemed to cut me even deeper.
Quickly I noticed that his car wasn't in the driveway, and the house seemed eerily quiet.

I knocked on the door, nobody answered, I kneeled down, picking up a vase next to the entry and grabbing the gold key beneath it.

The walk up the cream stairs was even more exhausting as usually, I knocked at the familiar door in front of me.

No answer.

I pushed the door open, only to find the room once giving him security empty.

My worry started to spiral. I quickly pulled out my phone and called Matt, hoping he might know where Nic was.
He picked up on the second ring, as if he was waiting for a call.

"Hey Matt, has Nic been to school today? Or is he over at your place?" I asked my questions coming out in a rush, my voice filled to the top with worry.

"No, I haven't seen him all day," Matt replied, his voice tinged with concern. "Why? Isn't he home?"

I hesitated, my heart racing. "No... I- I'm at his house now, and he's not here. We need to find him Matt. I don't think he's alright."

The silence on the other end of the line was heavy. I could tell Matt was beginning to worry too. "Alright," he finally said. "Let's check the shed. Maybe he's there. Eve can you check other places, maybe ask some friends, I don't have a good feeling about this."

„Me neither."

By now, it was late afternoon, the sun starting to dip lower in the sky, casting long shadows across the yard. We met at Nic's place and headed to all kinds of places, Matt and I went to the shed first, that's the one place where he sometimes went to be alone. I sent out Cass, Emma and Liam to look around too.

I held my breath as Matt opened the door, but the shed was empty, just like the house. The knot in my stomach tightened.

This wasn't good at all.

Matt and I exchanged worried looks.

Something was definitely wrong.

We couldn't keep looking on our own, so we started calling a few of our other friends to help search for him. It wasn't long before we had a small group ready to scour all the places Nic knew and their surrounding areas. I teamed up with Cass, giving commands to Emma and Liam every once in a while, meanwhile Matt paired up with a few of his other friends.

For the next few hours, we searched everywhere we could think of—parks, streets, the hill, even the quiet corners of the town where Nic might have gone to clear his head.

But with each passing minute, my anxiety grew. Every time I thought I saw a glimpse of him, it turned out to be someone else, and my heart would sink all over again.

Just when I was beginning to lose hope, my phone rang. It was Matt.

"Eve," he said, his voice strained, "you need to come to the hospital. They've found him."

My breath caught in my throat. "Is he... is he okay?" I asked, but Matt didn't have an answer. The uncertainty in his voice terrified me.

I hung up and rushed to the hospital, my mind racing with worst-case scenarios. The drive felt endless, each second stretching out as my worries consumed me.

All I could do was pray that my boy was alright, that we had found him in time.

But the dread in the pit of my stomach wouldn't go away.

I just wanted to see him, to know he was okay, and to understand what had happened, why he didn't call for help.