The officer shows me a photo of the missing child.
“Is this you?” he says.
“If it is,” I say, “do I win a prize?”
He thinks it’s a joke and he narrows his eyes, but what he can’t see is I’m half-serious. The last time I opened my door for police, they went Gordon Ramsay on my couch cushions and earned me a cash settlement in the low four figures.
This officer, with his acne scars, looks more like a Jehovah’s Witness. “Will you please take it?” He rattles the photocopy. I believe it’s still called Xerox paper.
“That looks nothing like me.”
“Do you have any photos of yourself as a child?”
Incredible. I say this aloud—“Incredible!!!”—like a disgruntled dad. The officer, whose name tag says KINSKY, is younger than me but not by much. He’s scrawny, pencil-headed, with a trim goatee and bad posture. His utility belt hangs like a wet bathing suit. Suddenly I am convinced, with not a little excitement, that this is someone’s idea of hijinks.
“Is it true you never met your father?” he says.
“Hey, that’s good!”
“And your mother is deceased?”
“Bang! You hit the nail on the head.”
“Do you mind coming to the station for a DNA test?”
Why not? It’s my New Year’s resolution to get outside more, spend less time on the computer. I fill the cat’s dish with kibble and lead us into the elevator.
Outside, a black cruiser—one of those brawny new ones—is double-parked. A lady cop stands on the driver’s side, eyes barely clearing the roof.
“Ever been in one of these?” she says.
“I think you know the answer to that.”
She grins and already I feel good about our banter. Kinsky opens the rear door. It’s like stepping into a vinyl slab. In the front, Kinsky and his partner trade napkins, forks, condiments. I can see they’ve bought takeout from Vancouver’s Best Mongolian Grill.
“What can you tell me about the boy?” I say.
“Absolutely nothing,” the lady cop says.
“What makes you think I’m him?”
“What makes you think I think you’re him?”
She drives like we’re blaring sirens, at the same time stuffing her face with noodles. I ask to see the photo. Kinsky slides it through the partition. The child has perfectly round eyes, wormy lips, ears like ribbon bows. He looks to be in kindergarten. Above the boy’s head, in fat capitals, is the word MISSING. The description is blacked out.
“What’s his name?” I ask when we’re stopped at a light.
“If it’s a match, we’ll let you know,” Kinsky says. “Right now it’s too easy to get mixed up emotionally.” Ahead of us, a homeless man canvasses the cars for change. The lady cop lowers her window and hands him a hot Khuushuur.
The DNA test takes all of two minutes. They lead me to a dank forensics room where an officer in scrubs is reading Vogue. He snaps to attention, puts on latex gloves, and swabs my cheek. Then we’re back in the car and the officers are taking me home.
“What’s your phone number?” Kinsky says.
“That’s moving fast.”
“We’ll have the results tomorrow,” the lady cop says.
“Is that when I get my prize?”
“You haven’t won anything yet,” she says.
* * *
The first thing I do when I’m home is search the web. He’s not hard to find. In the database of missing children, he appears under 1990. I find more photos on other sites, and plenty of news stories about his disappearance. Matthew was five when he vanished from a Denny’s restaurant. Matthew’s family had recently moved to the Sunshine Coast. Matthew loved animals. Matthew’s family hasn’t given up hope. Today they celebrate Matthew’s thirtieth birthday.
In the last article there’s a digitally aged image. They’ve thinned his hair, given his features weight and blemish, deployed eyes and mouth unevenly across a bloated, lifeless face. He smirks like a polygonal character from a Nintendo game—a Goldeneye villain.
I write about my day and post it on a forum. The thread gets more replies than anything I’ve ever written. Most people don’t believe me. They don’t understand how I could not have childhood photos. They say the police would have disclosed more information, that a DNA test takes two to three weeks. They demand to know more about my mother. They destroy her with words. They call me a liar, unloved, and tell me I should kill myself.
Denny’s, from what I can remember, is not a place I have ever been. However, there are certain things I know about Denny’s. The Fisher-Price food. The salty waitresses and outsized menus. The fact that kids under ten eat free on Tuesdays.
I go to a pub and strike up a conversation with the first person I see. I tell him my story, and he’s just as confused but also lonely and drunk enough to try to unravel it with me.
“What’s your earliest memory?” he says.
“Playing with matches.”
“How old were you then?”
“Three? Maybe four.”
“Your mom never took photos?”
“She did, but she lost them.”
“Your birth certificate?”
“She lost that, too. She was no good at keeping things.”
“You didn’t ask about it? She’s dead?”
“She was no good at answering questions.”
I can’t drink any more beer. I switch to red wine and buy us another round. In the back of the pub, some girls are throwing darts. It looks like a bachelorette party.
“I don’t know,” says my new friend. He’s got the picture on his phone. He steadies it beside my face. “I mean, that could be anyone. That could be your kid.”
“They got me on a break and enter.” Now I’ve gone way off topic. “She visited me once. I hadn’t seen her in a few years. She knew all the guards, but it was like she barely recognized me. She brought a thing of chili. It was all she knew how to cook.”
“What about them?” He shows me the phone. A photo of the boy’s family. They stand solemnly in front of a house—mom, dad, and a little girl. They hold a sign that says COME HOME MATTHEW. The little girl’s eyes brim with tears.
The bachelorette party is on its way out, but first the bride stops and gives us kisses on the cheek. Her friends break into a cheerleading routine, something I can’t follow but that ends in the word “beaver.” One of them marks two X’s on a small chalkboard.
My friend and I leave, too, after the bartender cuts us off.
“You’re a good egg,” I say outside the pub.
“I hope you find what you’re looking for,” he says.
Home again, I get on the computer and pull up the family photo. I focus on the mother, her tired, hopeful frown. I try to remember. I read the attached article. It says the parents work as trademark lawyers. I find their Facebook profiles, the website for their practice.
“Hello?” It’s a woman’s voice.
“Were you sleeping?”
“Who is this?”
“It’s Matthew.”
I can hear the change in her breathing, the ambient noise on the other line. I think of how I feel right now, my heart racing, and I imagine how it must be for her.
“No, I’m sorry,” I say and end the call.
* * *
I never remember my dreams. All I know is there is often a horrible weightless feeling, like time and space shifting in every direction at once. I wake up, the sheets are damp with sweat. My mother’s voice calls from somewhere in the room, that voice as much a part of me as my pulse, my skin. I hear it everywhere I go. In the darkness, in my unconsciousness. It could belong to anyone. The words are never anything to remember. I know it’s her because of the feeling it gives me. Time and space shifting. Colorless shapes. A familiar nightmare.
* * *
I don’t leave my bed until the next afternoon, when my phone rings.
“It’s the VPD.”
I recognize her voice.
“Your test came back negative.”
“No match?”
“No match.”
“So that’s it?”
“That’s all she wrote.”
“But why me?”
“I wish I could tell you, but the truth is I don’t know.”
It’s getting dark already. The cat wraps around my leg. I put food in the dish, take the elevator downstairs. I walk half a block to Vancouver’s Best Mongolian Grill.
“Number four?” the server says.
I hand him ten. He knows to keep the change.
There’s a park nearby with an embankment where you can sit and watch the city. I eat my food in the cold, wet grass and stare up at the darkling sky.
When I was a kid, I used to bet myself about the shape and position of the moon. Over the years I’ve had people try and teach me the science. They say it’s simple enough. I tell them I like the surprise. I like the moments right before you find it, when you wonder if it will be there at all. Sometimes it’s right above your head. Sometimes it’s just gone. And sometimes, when it’s the last thing on your mind, it shows up, shining, in the light of day.
Hal Walling lives in Victoria, BC, Canada. His short stories have appeared in Kenyon Review, The Missouri Review, Southwest Review, The Malahat Review, The Dalhousie Review, The New Quarterly, and Prairie Fire. He is working on a novel.