"If you ever wanna find out where I am, say hi to Lou for me first."
That were Persia's last words. Then, the next thing that happened seemed not typical for her to do.
Mr. Yosef read the reply from his phone and slipped it into his back pocket. A slight smile he showed, restless, still kind. He's Persia's driver wherever the girl travels to. About mid-thirties of age and had a family of his own. He knew who I was, of course. We had seen each other so often as I loudly waved my greeting to him after taking off Persia at school.
He's the last person who was with Persia before she fled. And today, he purposely waited for me at the school gate to ask for any leads. Man, this was messy enough that Persia's driver faced the consequences. It was not Persia's character to bring trouble to others. Especially if those people only did well for her.
What would be the effect of everything she had done? She acted selfishly and involved others uninformed.
"It's what Persia told the Chairman. I had no idea their fights are on that level."
"The old man only greeted me after it's confirmed," I mumbled and put my two feet together in front of him. He glanced at our house behind me. He parked his car 10 minutes away from home so we could continue our crucial conversation.
It had been a week since Persia was missing, and it's only counting penalties and threats at Mr. Yosef's side. Furthermore, the School Chairman would not leave him to rest if Persia would not show up.
"If you ever need to go somewhere far, I'm not that great, but I've been around in our city since 17." I nodded and held the tote bag with my other arm. Waving at him as he went off seemed strange. Perhaps, it's because an adult man asked for help from a high schooler.
Then a slight thud on the wooden table as I put down my bag and took out the valuable materials I collected at school.
Not that it's a good thing to feel happy from the reason Mr. Yosef came to me, it's just that it felt satisfyingly exciting that an older person relied on my ability.
I deeply exhaled with my arms on my waist.
"Okay, what do we have here?" I pinpointed the newspaper, event poster, and invitation card. My open palm pressed the news headline that caught my inference. It did take much of my time to find this one and only allusion — an indicator of a scandalous event where the Chairman pressed his compliments to Persia's academic awards. As the second-place rank in the overall examination last year, I was in awe that Persia could get grades that I could impossibly achieve.
Even so, I had no goal of having better scores than I contentedly got all the time. That's me who's talking, but what about those who had great expectations from you?
"Whacha doin'?" I gasped along with the crunch of the sliced cucumber Frei munched.
"Frei!" Jumping off of my feet, my older sister choked me from the tight embrace.
"Get off me already!"
"You're still here?"
"What? You dun wanna?" She stood closer to the table and touched the materials.
"Oh, come on. Instead of you playing Detective Conan, why don't you help us out in the kitchen?" She mumbled as she carried the newspaper and looked closely at the article. I smiled as she scowled and asked, "Is this serious? The journalist must have gotten lucky she got away from the publishing company's keen eye."
It's not usual that the school itself missed on concealing an unseemly Chairman who blabbered only positive praises during the awarding ceremony. With his undeniably baby face and crooked smile, it's frightening enough not to notice the anger he was keeping inside as he announced the top one student's name who outranked his daughter. I could imagine his clenched fists and jaws were controlling his awkward, decent laugh as he engaged with the happy parents. My family was fully aware of the manipulative Chairman who successfully passed the behavior to his wife; the one who dramatically suffered was their sole child.
The wooden serving spoon thud as it scraped on the bowl at intervals. The thick, mushy mashed potato set on the upper side of my plate. I took a spoonful and cooled it from blowing through my mouth in and out.
It tasted buttery with ginger, blended with the soft creamy, starchy potato melting in my taste bud.
"I've once heard Persia speaking ill about her father. She's good at bottling it up," said Frei in the middle of our supper. Mom picked up the bowl of vegetable salad and shifted the conversation to Frei's extraordinary college life. The brainy eldest daughter had been acknowledged by her classmates and their university. In dividing ranks between the ordinary and achievers, she's part of the latter same with Persia.
"Our class is chosen to compete with the other university." Mom nodded vehemently and pointed her spoon to me, saying,
"Right, you two only have until tomorrow. You'll gonna miss each other."
"Mom, you're calling us like four times a week on hours by," I drawled.
We never missed Frei's never-ending story of her daily encounters. Be it petty or confounding — from her whining over the share of a single bathroom and her roommate often taking a bath longer even if she started early. Then the only available vending machine on their way to school contained old food as if the owner had replaced and refilled them over a decade, to the hype of her academic performance and other school gatherings.
"Lou, which flavor does you like, melon or avocado?" My feet headed to the kitchen sink, pressed on the Push-Down pedal of the trash bin with my attention on Frei, sneaking ice cream into the fridge.
"Those have a bitter aftertaste. Anything else?" I yelped as the crumpled plastic bag burst out open, spewing pieces of sandwich wraps and French fries' small boxes from my favorite fast food!
"Mom, where's my Subway?!" Softly grumbling as I cleaned up the floor with the evidence of betrayal eating. The mastermind was nowhere near the crime scene, and her accomplice snickered over it. My frown reached the front yard, carrying the trash, and flashes of camera struck my direction. The man holding the device sprinted to the alleyway.