The Slow Reveal ...

How it all started ...

On my way home I passed a few telephone poles and even a storefront that had bad photocopies of a picture of a girl with the words; ‘Have You Seen Me?’ on the top and a contact number on the bottom.  I thought bitterly about putting up posters of my own face with the words; ‘Do You See Me?’, but I’d be afraid that no one would call my contact number even if I had one.

Later ...

While I was waiting at the bus stop I noticed a new photocopy poster with another girl’s face on it.  This one said; ‘MISSING’ and gave the girl’s name and a description of the clothes she was wearing the day she was last seen.  Vancouver was full of girls and women who were down on their luck and who were always heading out somewhere else to find a better life.

Hitting home ...

“I like your hat.” I said, looking down at her pom-pom.  She tilted her head and smiled up at me, then something caught her eye and her face got serious.  I looked and saw what bothered her; it was another poster in the window of Chum’s sandwich shop.

“Another runaway?” she said.

I looked at the photocopied picture of the girl taped to the inside of the window and the bottom dropped out of my stomach.  I knew that girl.

I squeezed Angel’s hand tighter.

“Let’s go home.”

I wanted to get us off the street because it felt suddenly dangerous to me.