City of IF

[kc9cra]

Eric handed Tim a folder with his amateur callsign on it. "What's this for?" he asked.
"Just keep it around, you'll need it," said Eric.

We were used to this. Continuous questions would simply bring forth continuous nonanswers. Eric had turned in to a big mystery since we had been in middle school. He, Craig and I had known each other for several years, but Tim was one of Eric's ham radio buddies. Starting freshman year, Eric got interested in all kinds of weird stuff. He took us to an old house to find ghosts one time. That was creepy, but I didn't see anything. Craig swore he heard a baby crying in one of the bedrooms, but I didn't hear it.

We talked to a girl who claimed to have been abducted by aliens. Even without the alien story, she was weird. By then, so was Eric. They were perfect for each other. They dated for six months until her parents moved and poof, she was gone. He had suspicions that she was put in some kind of institution because of her alien stories, because she hadn't contacted him online. We're still trying to convince him that she just found some other guy and got over him.

All four of us were at this little 50's style diner with some of the best food in Evansville. It was saturday afternoon, the weather was perfect, and we didn't have anything else to do, a perfect day to come out here, park, eat, and do practicly nothing.

I was in the passenger seat, so I took advantage of my position to change the radio station and look for something to listen to.
"Quit changing the station Kyle," complained Craig, behind me.
"Sorry," I said, "I just don't like the damn commercials."

We were in Tim's mom's car, and he was driving. The ten-year-old red sedan had been low on fuel, but the gas station directly across the street from the diner had remedied that problem. I found a song that I liked and focused my attention on the chocolate shake in my hand.

Tim opened the folder. The first item on top was a page with information on it. I recognized Eric's cell number, and his birth date. "What's that," I asked after a long drag from my straw.
"It's all his information," said Tim.
I spied some text near the top of the page, "What's that though?" I asked.
"That's a way to track his laptop online," he said, "You use that if it gets stolen."
"What's the stuff with his phone number?" I asked.
"That's how you log in to his cell phone account," he said.
We pondered the reasons why Eric would give Tim a folder with all of that plus a few other documents that also had personal information on them. Eric was silent through this entire conversation.

I remembered that visit when Wednesday night came, and Tim called me to say Eric had disappeared. "His Mom's freaking out," he remarked.
I asked, "Do you think that has anything to do with the folder he gave you?"
"I think it has everything to do with it," Tim replied.
"Did you go through all of it?" I inquired.
"Yep," he said, "There's a note there that tells me what to do if he turns up dead or severely injured which scares the hell out of me, but there's also a note."
Of course he left me hanging, so I had to ask, "What's it say?"
"It says, wait until I call you, then come find me. Just connect the dots.""
"That's it?" I asked.
"Yep," said Tim.

Eric, in the last couple years, had learned how to tell you something in just a few words. If it wasn't obvious what he meant, you had to figure it out yourself. I asked Tim what all had transpired after we had all seen Eric which had been Saturday. He said they had talked online, the phone, and the radio since, and Eric hadn't mentioned going anywhere. He mentioned how they had planned to skip the last day of school which we all did. All four of us had graduated the week before. The last few days were simply a formality, so noone really cared if a student didn't show-up. Tim and Eric were going to meet-up and drive around. Instead, Eric sent him an email that said, "Got a call, g2g, sry, catch up later. Keep the folder.

"So, what do we do?" I asked.
"Well, you remember us talking about taking a trip this summer?" Tim said.
"Yeah," I said probing him to continue.
"Maybe he wants us to do that," he said.
"Maybe," I pondered, "I know we've all been saving up for a while, but we never really settled on where to go, did we?"
"Nope," said Tim, "That's why I think he's taking off. I know he gets in to paranormal things, and maybe he's trying to get us to do something like that. I really don't know, but maybe it'll be fun."

The idea was to get away from our parents for a while, maybe go camping, something like that. We didn't necissarily care about sight-seeing, or visiting the big tourist attractions, so maybe chasing him around would be fun. I agreed with Tim and decided to call Craig to ask if he wanted to go.

I promise it gets weirder but also has some funny moments along the way. Chapter one is coming soon.