His wallet was in the glove compartment.
His phone had not been used after 11:43 p.m.
There was no ransom note.
No body.
No blood.
No clear witness.
Just an empty car, a folded jacket, and a silence that grew heavier every year.
At first, the whole town searched.
Volunteers walked through woods, fields, drainage ditches, abandoned lots, and every patch of land between the banquet hall and the strip mall. Flyers went up in grocery stores, gas stations, churches, schools, and laundromats.
My father drove the same route between the banquet hall and the strip mall so many times that my mother eventually begged him to stop because she was afraid he would drive himself into a ditch from exhaustion.
He did not stop.
Not for months.
My mother kept Jesse’s room exactly as he had left it.
