Date: Sun, 26 Jun 2011 23:30:41 -0400
From: wild wing <wildwing66@hotmail.com>
Subject: Jason's Dilemma  -   Chapter eight

Chapter Eight

"He's gone!!!"

The words reverberated in my ears.  The room began to spin.

"Ben, Ben, are you still there?"

It slowly registered that I was still on the phone and Mike was trying hard
to communicate.

"Yes.  Yes, Mike.  I'm still here.  Your words stunned me."

"Can you tell me anything?" he begged.  "Anything at all that will help me
find him?"

I decided to be up-front with him for Jason's sake.  "I can tell you that
he was extremely unhappy at home.  On several occasions he talked about
running away.  I can honestly say that I tried to discourage him.  I never
thought he would do it."

"That checks out with what Jason told me.  Did he ever say where he would
go?"

"He mentioned the city of Weston," I replied.

Mike went on to say the obvious.  Should I hear from him or learn anything
at all I was to call Mike immediately.  I agreed and put the phone down.

I was in a daze.  Poor Jason.  Where was he and what was he up to?  I knew
he had my phone number memorized and I hoped that he would call.  I found
myself spending countless hours indoors just staring at the telephone.
Waiting.

Two weeks passed and I couldn't get rid of the horrible feeling in the pit
of my stomach.  One morning a shiny car pulled into my driveway.  Two well
dressed men stepped out.  I recognized their gait.  They were policemen.

"You're Benjamin Davis?" the taller one inquired.

"I am," I responded.

They handed me their business cards, confirming my suspicions.  Their names
didn't register with me.

"We're here to question you regarding the disappearance of Jason King."

"Yes," I said quietly.

"What can you tell us?" the shorter one asked.

I suggested we go into my cabin and get comfortable.  I indicated I would
answer any question they posed.  We each took a seat and the shorter one
pulled out a notebook and began to write.

"What's your full name and your date of birth please?"  Everything was duly
recorded.

I admitted I was very close to Jason.  I also related exactly what I had
told Mike.  The officers were quite polite and not threatening in any way.

My story finished, the shorter one explained, "The facts you gave us match
what Mr. King told us.  Unfortunately we got an entirely different picture
from Mrs. King.  She's convinced that you're involved in some way with the
boy's disappearance."

I nodded, acknowledging that I understood what he was telling me.

"Understand, Mr. Davis, that in a matter this serious we must check out
every allegation.  Actually the facts strongly point to another teen run
away.  We don't suspect foul play and you're not a suspect.  Nevertheless
your name will remain in the file until he's found.  If the circumstances
change we may wish to question you again."

"I understand fully," I agreed.  "You're just doing your job and if it were
my boy I would want you to do the same thing."

"Exactly," the tall one replied.

The short one continued, "The one thing we ask is that if you move or go on
a trip for more than forty-eight hours, you inform us of your whereabouts."

"Certainly," I offered.

"Oh, one more thing," the short one continued, "we don't have a search
warrant and you can refuse us but we'd like to look around."

"Of course," I responded immediately.

They took no more than a minute to check my bedroom.  I apologized for the
unmade bed.  They thanked me for my cooperation and turned for the door.

I suddenly thought of a favor that they might do for me.  "Look," I
pleaded, "I'm really worried about Jason.  Could you let me know if you
hear anything?"

"We can't," the tall one explained.  "You're not a blood relative.  You'll
have to ask the Kings."

With that they were gone.

The days ticked by.  I was convinced that if Jason got in trouble or
returned home he would call me immediately.  I sat....and waited.  The
telephone remained silent.

The leaves were turning their yellows and crimsons now.  It was one of my
favourite times for walks.  I always felt that nature was putting on one
final splash for me to enjoy before the grip of winter took hold.  This
year however it seemed that all of the brilliant colours had changed to
greys and blacks.  I still wandered the trails if only for Molly's sake.
She moped along in harmony with her master.  She knew I was sad.

November arrived and the cold winds began to blow.  They were harbingers of
even tougher times ahead.  Of course I wondered if Jason was staying warm.

Towards the end of the month I received another unexpected visitor.  It was
Mike King.

"Look, I want to apologize for the police coming here," he began.

"No need, the police told me that it was at your wife's insistence that
they came."

"We had an incredible fight about it afterwards," he admitted.

I knew Mike had to be hurting at least as much as I was.

"I know I don't deserve it, the way my wife and I have treated you, but I'm
here to beg of you a very large favor."

I smiled and reminded him, "A long time ago I promised you that with regard
to Jason I would help you any way I could.  The offer still stands."

Mike pulled out a tissue and wiped away some tears.  "I miss him so much.
I need you to find him for me!"

I knew that I had said I would help, but did Mike understand what he was
asking?  I was no private detective.  Where would I go?  How would I start?

Mike sensed my reaction for he continued, "The police were able to access
his banking information.  He cleaned out his account.  The last withdrawal
was in Weston."

Weston, I cringed, my old home town.  Two million people live there.  It
covers a huge area and he could be anywhere.

"I know I'm asking a lot," he continued, "but I hardly know Weston.  You've
lived there.  You must know it well.  Also since you're gay you would know
where to look.  Please!  I beg of you.  I'll pay for everything.  I know if
you find him he'll come back with you.  I'm not sure if he would return
with me."

"What does your wife say about it?" I queried.

"My wife is out of the picture.  Jason's disappearance was the last straw.
She packed up and moved to her mother's place with Mike Jr.  She wants a
divorce and I agreed to give it to her."

"Doesn't she care about Jason?"

"Not at all," he explained.  "After he visited you last July she called him
the Devil's child.  She washed her hands of him and refused to talk to
him."

Poor Jason, I thought, ostracized by his own mother.  No wonder he had run
away.

Mike was still talking.  "And now I've not only lost my wife and youngest
son, I've lost Jason too.  I'm devastated."

I felt as sorry for Mike as I did for Jason.  Well.....almost.

"I'll pay for everything," he repeated.

It didn't take me long to decide.  I had to at least try.  I responded, "I
haven't visited my clients in person for a long time.  It's about time I
reacquainted myself.  I can spend half days looking for Jason and the other
half talking to my clients.  My business affairs should take about two
weeks.  If it takes longer to find Jason I'll probably need some financial
help."

Mike agreed immediately and couldn't thank me enough.  We spent the next
hour or so discussing logistics.  Mike would make two hundred coloured
posters with our phone numbers and instructions to call collect.  I
insisted on a guardianship document permitting me to bring Jason back.  It
was also agreed that we would visit the police station together to explain
our plans.  I would leave in a week's time.

Mike found a great photo of a smiling Jason and the posters looked
terrific.  The police were not so impressed.

"You'll get tips all right," they warned, "but the vast majority of them
will be dead ends.  Some will break your heart.  Most will come from well
meaning but badly misguided individuals.  Let us do our job and put our
phone number on instead."

We left the posters the way they were.

Mike gave me an excellent guardianship document.  He also provided a
suitcase full of Jason's winter clothes.  I in turn gave him a large bag of
dog food and Molly to tend while I was gone.  She wasn't happy with me.

Around the first of December I checked into the Red Lion Motel on Ingham
Street in Weston.  It wasn't ritzy but it wasn't seedy either.  It was what
I could afford.

I decided to begin my search on the first afternoon by visiting the police
headquarters.  The building was imposing indeed, made as it was of granite
and marble.  After a short wait I was ushered into a small interview room
by a well built detective.  He carried a large binder with him.

"Understand I have half a dozen of these interviews a month with distraught
parents.  Hundreds of runaways gravitate to this city every year.  Frankly
we don't have the manpower to come close to tracking them all down."

"What happens to them?" I asked grim faced.

"Thankfully most go home on their own, especially when it starts to get
cold."

"And the rest?"

"A few find sugar daddies who keep them until they lose their sex appeal.
Then they get tossed out in the snow.  Others stay on the street and sell
their bodies.  Many become drug addicted.  A few of them end up in the
morgue."

I shuddered and gritted my teeth.  "What do they die of?"

"Look," he warned me, "I know this is rough.  Are you sure you want to
know?"

"Please."

"Some get AIDS, but most of them OD on drugs.  Occasionally one gets beaten
to death, but that's pretty rare.  Look, you might find him but the odds
are strongly against you.  Further you might not like what you find."

He finished by showing me his binder.  It contained hundreds of posters of
missing kids from across the country.  I noted that many of the posters
were years old.  I also noticed that almost every picture was of a smiling
face, as if they didn't have a care in the world.  The detective's last act
was to turn to a picture of a smiling Jason.  I left the station very
depressed.

I called Mike from the motel.  I gave him a report but I left out the
gruesome details.

I reasoned that Jason might be drawn to the gay village so the next day I
visited Browning Avenue.  The grey cloudy day matched my mood.  A few
snowflakes, the first of the season, wafted down.

I checked the restaurants and coffee shops but avoided the bars.  I handed
out some posters and talked to strangers, most notably the managers and
owners of various establishments.  I looked at a thousand faces hoping the
next one would be Jason's.  A couple of times I thought I saw him down the
street.  Both times I raced down the sidewalk towards the sighting.  I
accidentally bowled one poor fellow over.  Both times when I got close I
realized that I was sadly mistaken.  I finished by taping more posters up
on the street corners.

Weston had a gay community centre and I chose to visit it the next day.
They were quite cordial.  The director I spoke to admitted they had visits
from parents with missing children all the time.

"You know, the sad thing is that if these parents had accepted their gay
children from the start they never would have gone missing."

He took one of my posters and allowed me to tape another to their community
bulletin board.  I asked him where he thought I should look.  He gave me
the names and addresses of several youth hostels for both straight and gay
kids.  He finished by asking if I had checked out Walden Road.  I professed
ignorance.

"Walden Road is where all the young prostitutes hang out.  It can be a busy
place, especially on Friday and Saturday nights."

I thanked him for his time and strode outside.  A cold drizzle was waiting.
Since the village was nearby I spent the next hour or so scanning faces
before turning towards Ingham Street.  I had precious little to cheer Mike
up with that evening.  I lay on my bed mulling over my next move.  I chose
to visit the bus station.

"Yeah," the fat ticket seller stated, "we get dozens of runaways using the
buses every month.  It gets so that it's hard to remember individual
faces."

I showed him a poster and he furrowed his brow and studied it for a minute.
A grin suddenly appeared.

"Yeah, I recognize him!"

My spirits soared before he raised a plump finger and pointed to the far
side of the room.  "Look at that bulletin board over there," he instructed.

Sure enough among a dozen other posters was a smiling face of Jason.

I sat in a nearby coffee shop pondering my next foray.  I was getting tired
of hearing, "I wish you the best of luck in your search."  I debated just
for a minute about visiting the morgue.  I realized that I could never face
that grim reality and permanently shut the idea out of my mind.  Instead I
pulled out the list of hostels I had amassed at the gay centre.  One was
close by and I headed there.

There was a familiarity in the reception I received.  Lots of sympathy but
not much more.  I put up yet another poster beside several others before I
headed back to the Red Lion.

"I got two calls from the posters you put up," Mike reported that evening.
"One guy said he was positive he saw Jason get on a bus heading for the
west coast.  The second was a woman who claimed she was a psychic.  She
said there was no point in searching because Jason was already dead and
would never be found."

Mike's reports did nothing for my spirits.  Tomorrow was Friday and it was
time to visit Walden Road.

At dusk the next day I parked the car at the top of the road and watched.
I saw nothing at first and wondered if I had the right street.  Where are
the boys? I wondered.  A luxury vehicle passed me and slowly hugged the
sidewalk.  A block away it stopped.  A figure emerged from a darkened
doorway and approached the car.  He stuck his head into the open car
window.  Whatever was said must have worked for he opened the door and
hopped in.  The car drove away at a good rate of speed.

I watched and saw the operation repeated twice more in the next twenty
minutes.  A gentleman walking on the sidewalk stopped and appeared to be
addressing someone in the shadows.  Soon he melted with his shadow into a
dark alley.

It was time for me to go into action.  I drove ever so slowly down the
street.  Just a few buildings on I noticed the soft glow of a cigarette in
an alleyway.  I stopped.  A boy emerged and stuck his head through my car
window.  Well, I called him a boy.  He was actually nineteen or twenty.
His hair was matted and he hadn't seen a bar of soap for some time.  With
his crooked teeth he was downright ugly.

"I'll suck you off until your eyes pop out," he boldly stated.  "Just
twenty bucks."

"Hop in," I told him.

He no sooner got in than he began groping me without being invited.

"Goddamn, mister," he exclaimed, "you're fuckin big!"

"I'm not looking for sex," I replied.  "I want information.  There's two
hundred dollars in it for you."

"Two big ones?  I ain't seen that much money since I was thirteen," he
grinned.

I handed him a copy of the poster.  "All you have to do is show this boy to
me and the money is yours."

He peered at the poster under the dome light of the car.  He admitted, "I
don't think I never seen 'im."

I frowned and suggested he keep the poster just in case.  I then handed him
a ten dollar bill.  "This is for your trouble.  Go and get yourself a good
meal."

"Thanks mister, I appreciate it.  But I sure would like to hang out on that
long pole of yours for a while.  For another ten bucks I'll get you off
easy."

I declined with thanks and moved on.  On the next block another lad stepped
out.  He was a little younger and decidedly more handsome.  His price was
fifty dollars.  He left my car ten minutes later with a copy of the poster
and ten bucks tucked in his pocket.  By one in the morning I was exhausted,
one hundred and seventy dollars poorer, and no closer to finding Jason.  I
got a couple of maybes but nothing concrete.  I headed for bed.

I slept in Saturday morning before I made a report to Mike.  He said it was
tough for him to imagine Jason as a prostitute.  He said he'd had another
call but he didn't bother relaying the contents to me.  We tried to cheer
each other up with some positive banter.  It didn't do much for me.

Saturday evening I repeated Friday's efforts on Walden Road.  I found
fourteen new kids.  One appeared to be about twelve but most were at least
eighteen. There were a couple of repeaters from Friday night.  They had
nothing new to report but they still wanted their ten bucks.

On Sunday I spent almost the entire day in the gay village.  I must have
scanned two thousand faces.  On Monday and Tuesday I covered the remaining
hostels.  By Wednesday I was so drained and so discouraged I called Mike
and told him I was coming home.  He told me he had received several more
calls.

"They were all crank calls," he told me.  "This one creepy kid called me
twice.  He said he had found Jason and he wanted his two hundred bucks.  I
knew it was a crank call though because he said the kid's name wasn't
Jason.  It was Dermot."

"Dermot?" I repeated.  "Dermot!!"  I was shouting into the telephone now.
"That's him!  That's him!  It's Jason.  He's alive!"