Sam had procured much better accommodations in the last few months since he had been working steadily at the local school district. Rather than hovelling in a burned out trailer home, as he had started his new life, he now lived in an abandoned shotgun a few miles outside of town. It was apparent when he moved in that the last squatters did not care about the property nearly as much as he did, and while he didn’t concern himself with the modern conveniences of the twenty-first century, he did appreciate that there were no holes in the roof and the fireplace worked.
Like most Hunters, he didn’t sleep much, but other than working on the house and yard, he didn’t have too much to do to keep himself amused, so most nights he did spend a few hours on the dusty old bed in what was likely the previous owner’s master bedroom. His shift at the school didn’t start until 2:00 PM, but most mornings he was up and at ‘em near the crack of dawn. This morning was different, however. He had been up late working on the house and it was late into the morning before the old cowboy stretched and pulled himself out of bed, finally ready to start a new day as Danny Yokes, custodian. Glancing at his watch, he could see it was almost ten o’clock. Four hours of tinkering around the old place before he’d have to be off to work.
The fireplace worked perfectly for putting on a pot of coffee. It reminded him of his former life out on the range at the turn of the last century. As he waited for the percolation to begin, he returned to the bedroom and pulled on his jeans and a flannel shirt. Sitting on the edge of the bed, he slid his feet into his boots and then reached over to the nightstand for his wallet, school ID, and phone.
That’s when he realized something was terribly wrong.
At first, he was sure he had just misplaced it, but as he scanned the floor around the nightstand, under the bed, and behind the furniture, he could plainly see it was missing. He desperately grabbed at his pockets, sure it was not in there, but needing to double check. He had but one spare pair of pants, and he hurried to where they hung in the closet to make sure he hadn’t left it in there. After that turned up nothing, he proceeded to tear the house apart, undoing months of work, searching desperately for the lost cell phone, the one apparatus that could potentially lead LIGHTS right to him. It didn’t seem to be anywhere.
He flew out the door, throwing open the door to the 1964 Ford F100 he had bought for cheap and fixed up when he’d first arrived. He kept his cab immaculately clean, so it was easy to see the phone was not anywhere in plain sight. He felt beneath the seats, scoured the glove compartment, and searched anywhere and everywhere the phone might have fallen. Again, it was nowhere.
Sam sat down on the running board, his hands running through his gray hair as he desperately racked his brain trying to think of where it might possibly be. Had he gone anywhere besides work and home? No. Had anything unusual happened that may have caused him to take the phone out of his pocket? Not that he could recall. After all, he never used it for anything and only kept it as a last resort in case he needed to get ahold of Alex or someone else in an emergency. He went over the events of the day before in his mind, remembering arriving at school just before the kids left for the day, avoiding the little bastards as much as possible. He’d made his way to the janitor’s closet, checked in with the daytime janitor to see if there was anything he hadn’t gotten to during the day, and then began his daily routine. Nothing unusual had happened, nothing out of the ordinary.
And then he remembered the landslide in Mrs. Lawrence’s classroom, the pile of crap that had fallen to the floor. Was it possible that when he stooped to clean up the mess his phone had fallen out of his pocket?
“Shit,” he exclaimed quietly in his baritone voice. For the first time in a long time, he used his superhuman speed and rushed back into the house to grab his truck keys. Within seconds, he was peeling down the drive on his way back to school, cursing under his breath the entire time, desperately hoping that no one had turned on that cell phone.
He didn’t bother to pull into a parking space when he reached the elementary school, but taking some deep breaths, he resigned himself to walk into the building at the same rate he normally did when he was pretending to be Danny Yokes, human, custodian.
The receptionist was a spunky, petite brunette named Patty who always had a smile on her face. This morning was no different, and as soon as he entered the office, she jumped out of her seat to greet him. “Good morning, Mr. Danny. Are you here to help Juan move those desks off the stage for the first grade play?”
“Mornin’, Patty,” Sam replied, trying to keep his voice even. “No, ma'am. Not now anyway. I was wonderin’ if anyone might’ve turned in a cell phone this mornin’. Seems I misplaced mine, and I’m expectin’ an important call from my daughter,” he lied.
“Oh, no!” Patty exclaimed, the concern in her voice clearly genuine. “Well, no. No one has turned anything in up here. Do you want me to call it and see if we can find it that way?” she asked, already reaching for her phone.
“Well, that’s the thing,” Sam continued, his eyes darting around her desk and the rest of the office, despite her assurances. “I’m purty sure it ain’t on right now. I don’t keep it on too long ‘cause it don’t hold a charge much anymore.”
“Oh, well, that’s no good,” she replied, glancing around the room herself in case she had missed something.
“No it ain’t,” Sam continued. “You know, I was thinkin’ on my way over here, though, I remember hearing a thunk last night when I was sweepin’ up Ms. Lawrence’s room. I didn’t see nothin’ at the time, but I’m a’ wonderin’ if maybe it didn’t fall out in there. I know the kids is a tryin’ to learn right now, but do you think it might be all right if I was to go check with her right quick?”
Patty seemed to consider the request for a second before nodding her head. “Sure, I think that would be fine. Just go on back and see if she’s found it and just hasn’t had a chance to turn it in yet. I’d hate for you to miss your daughter’s call.”
Before she even finished her sentence, “Danny” was out the door and headed toward the fifth grade hallway.