My brother, Dakota, he was always really into gaming and all that techy stuff. Ever since we were kids. Your laptop froze? Dakota had it fixed in an hour at the least. Your crappy desktop from 1995 moving too slow? Dakota had it fixed like new. But one thing about Kota is that he believed anything. He’d probably be one of those idiots who got offered ice cream and would go into the back , not realizing that it was in fact not an ice cream truck. One day, he got an email from this big company and my mom and I thought it was pretty sketchy but he’d explained how he’d been applying for offers at companies all week. This one was just one of the many. So, this one was supposedly very legit. He did all the things he was supposed to. Filled out the information and stuff online. A couple weeks after, he felt as if he was being followed. Mom and I had been telling him to be careful with that stuff and he promised he would. There was really nothing we could do, to convince him otherwise.

I remember the night before he disappeared.

“Mads?” He says while looking at the ceiling.

We shared a room in a small apartment, while our house was being built on the other side of Cincinnati. I didn’t mind. I liked small, cozy spaces.

“Yeah...?” I question, looking up from my laptop.

I had this big term paper that I had to have finished by midnight on Monday.

It was Thursday and I was nearly halfway through.

“Can I ask you something?”

Annoyance overcame me. I love my brother...seriously. But even though he’s got one of the purest hearts and he’s good with technical stuff. He’s usually finding these dead end assignments that never fall through. I end my sentence with a period before turning towards him to give him my full attention.

“Sure.”

“Do you ever feel like you’re being followed?”

“Like...creepy stalkerish followed?”

He sits up to look at me.

“Yeah...something like that.” He’s now rubbing the back of his neck.

“What makes you think so?”

“You know how in scary movies.... when like the main character is like walking to school or something and someone is walking behind them the whole time but they don’t ever catch them? But they keep looking behind them continuously because they can sense something?”

“Sure, yeah.”

“That’s how I feel.”

“I’m sure it’s nothing Kota... after all you did say that you made sure all of the jobs you applied for were legit and you did online interviews with real people...what’s the issue?”

I now realize what I was saying was just something to wave him off so I could get back to my term paper.

His eyes shift. As if he’s given up.

“Maybe you’re right...I have an in-person interview tomorrow that’s probably what it is. I’m just nervous.”

“Yeah...that’s probably it.”

He gets up to turn his lamp on before changing into some comfortable clothes, I’m already back on my paper by now.

“Night, Mads.” He says before going to turn the lamp off and getting into bed.

“Night.”

The next morning, when I woke up he’d already left before me.

Something felt off. I ignored the feeling as I got ready for my day. School was cancelled due to a teacher workday and so that gave me more time to work on my assignment.

So, after I ate breakfast and went for my run, I worked on my paper all day until about 6 in the evening. Only stopping to eat some dinner. It was Friday, so I ordered take out.

I had texted mom to let her know I ordered dinner.

In which I got an immediate response that said that she was on her way.

I’d also texted Dakota to let him know.

In which I did not get a response.

Which was weird because his phone is always glued to his hand. I wasn’t worried about it though because he had an interview and maybe he got it and didn’t get a chance to look at his phone.

I told myself this so I could subside the feeling in my stomach.

My mom got home an hour and a half later.

After she’d taken a shower and we sat down to eat dinner she’d explained how she hadn’t talked to him either.

Then we heard his phone ringing.