It had been almost 72 hours since Hannah went missing. The word had spread around like wild fire. Everyone in school had made posters with a collage of Hannah's photos saying either 'Help Us Find Hannah' or 'Come Back Hannah.'

After searching for evidence for signs for kidnapping or abduction, Detective Rhodes had found her phone smashed beyond recognition in her bedroom. It was hidden in the space between her bed and the wall behind it. Besides her phone, everything else in the room was intact as it had been before. But few of her clothes were missing along with a duffel bag. She had also withdrawn a few thousand bucks from her bank account on the same day she went missing. But had left both her debit and credit card here at her home. There had been no call or message from anyone asking her parents for ransom. Therefore, all this led the detective to the conclusion that this was not a case of abduction but that of a runaway.

Seriously? Runaway? That was the last thing Hannah would ever do. Well, atleast the Hannah that I knew.

"Why on earth would she run away?" I asked Sarah. We were in my bedroom discussing about Hannah for the past hour.

"No idea," Sarah frowned and shook her head, a distant look on her face as she gazed out of the window.

The police had tried tracing her phone but the last call she had made was from Elk Grove itself, on the same night as my after-party. To Vanessa. Why Vanessa? Did this mean something? Did Vanessa know something that she was not telling? When Detective Rhodes had asked about the call, Vanessa had said that she had called just to ask about the class assignment. Hannah calling Vanessa to talk about studies? Something didn't quite fit here. The police might have believed her but I was going to find out what that call was really all about.

Vanessa was probably the last point of contact that Hannah had. What did they talk about on that phone call? Whatever it was, it definitely was not some school assignment! This phone call kept bugging me, clawing its way into the depths of my brain.

"So they are just going to stop the investigation? Just give up like that?" Sarah asked, drawing me out of my thoughts.

"They have no further clue. Completely nothing!"

"Did they check those little hotels and lodges on the outskirts of the town?"

"Yup. No luck over there too. She really has runaway Sars, why else would she withdraw such a large amount of cash and leave her cards and phone over here."

"Because she didn't want to be traced." Sarah answered as a matter of fact rather to herself.

"But still the question remains. Where the hell is she? No one just disappears into thin air, Sars."

******

The past four days had been a haze. Going to the police station, explaining what had happened to my parents, calling Mrs. Chamberlain to check if she was okay (which she obviously wasn't), answering those nagging questions which were thrown at us by our school friends and lastly trying to find some clues which would lead us to Hannah, on our own. It was as if the all the happiness had been sucked out of our life. I and Sarah barely even smiled, forget telling some lame-ass joke and laughing.

Mr. Chamberlain had started distributing flyers with Hannah's smiling face pasted on it and the words 'Have you seen her? Please contact if you have.' written below the photo along with two phone numbers which belonged to Mr and Mrs. Chamberlain. The photo had been taken during the summer break when the three of us had gone camping. Hannah was standing near the edge of the small river that we had stumbled upon, her eyes sparkling and giving us a hint that she was about to take her shoes off and sprint off into the water. Ah, the good days!

"Rach, what's wrong?" Sarah asked me, her voice full of concern.

I just shook my head and wiped the lone tear from my cheek. In all the mess that was happening, there was a small part in me that believed that Hannah was just being her regular, rebellious self and that she was hiding somewhere to get away from her parents for a while and would come back in a day.

But now sitting here at the school lunch table, scrolling through all our photos from parties and birthdays and school plays, I realized that she was not going to come back anytime soon. What if something bad had happened to her? The thought gave me a shiver so I pushed it aside.

"Come on Rach, say it out. It will make you feel better," Sarah prodded and took my hand in hers, giving it a light squeeze.

"I thought that I was missing her when she got close to Amelia. But it is now that I'm truly missing her. I'm worried as hell but at the same time I can't stop being angry at her for putting us through this. Putting her parents through this," my voice got a bit louder, "how can she just run away without saying anything to anyone. The girl who always showed everyone how brave and dominant she can be, turned out to be a real chicken! And for what? What was it that made her take such a big step?"

I took a huge breath and looked out the window after my mini outburst. Sarah removed her hand from mine and gave a sigh. We sat in silecne for a couple of minutes. Suddenly I snapped my head and looked at her.

"You know what?" I said.

"What?" Sarah widened her eyes a little and looked at me as if I was about to punch her due to frustration.

"We need some answers. And I have one person in my mind right now"

*****

Why does it always happen that when you are trying to find a person desperately, they are nowhere to be found. The lunch break was about to get over in eight minutes to be precise and I had looked almost everywhere for Vanessa or anyone else from their group. Where do these people go during lunch breaks?

"Parking lot?" Sarah said as if reading my mind. And we both ran as fast as we could.

There they were, standing near Aaron's car. As we got near to them we saw a cigarette in Aaron and Amelia's hand. So that's the reason they come out here. Kyle was sitting on the hood while the rest of them were standing. Sal wasn't with them.

"Vanessa, can we talk to you for a sec?" I asked looking straight at her and ignoring the rest of them.

She eyed me and Sarah for a moment and spoke, "Look if it's about Hannah, I have already told what I know to the police."

"About that call too, right?" I folded my arms in front my chest and raised an eyebrow.

"What call?" Amelia's head snapped towards Vanessa. Now all of us were looking at her, waiting for her to speak again.

"The night Hannah disappeared, she made a call to Vanessa and that's the last call in her log," I replied when Vanessa chose not to answer.

"Wait, why don't I know about this? What did you two talk about?," Amelia said, narrowing her eyes at Vanessa. 

"She had called to just ask about the class assignment. God! What's the big deal Rachel?" Vanessa finally spoke.

"You were the last person she spoke to," Sarah chipped in.

"Yeah, so what?" Vanessa narrowed her eyes at Sarah and took a step towards her as if challenging her, "you think I might have done something? Hurt her? Tried to ki-" The bell rang indicating the end of lunch break and Vanessa got cut off.

"Girls, enough for now. Just let go of it," Kyle said hopping down from the hood, "If Vanessa says they talked about an assignment, then that's what happened. I believe her. The police believe her. End of story." Saying this he went towards the school and the rest of them followed.

Vanessa whispered something in Kyle's ear and he nodded, waved and went inside with the others while Vanessa turned back towards us.

She looked at me and Sarah for a moment and gave an expression which resembled pity. "You need to be careful around her," she said in a low tone.

"What!" I asked but she had already turned and started walking fast to get away from us.

Who 'her'? Was she talking about Amelia? It had to be Amelia, right? But why would Vanessa say something like that? Was she trying to give us some kind of clue? Had Amelia done something to make Hannah run away from us? And if Amelia was involved why would her bestfriend Vanessa try to rat her out?

Ughh! Maybe I shouldn't have come here to them in the first place. In the hope of getting some answers, I was stuck with another bunch of unanswerable questions. Why did Vanessa had to be so cryptic all the fucking time?