I saw Daniel walking beside a girl.
In the video, they walked through the gate and toward the bus stop. They got on a city bus together, and then they were gone.
“I need to speak to Maya.” I turned to the principal. “Can I?”
“Maya doesn’t attend this school anymore.” She gestured to the video. “She transferred suddenly. That was her last day here.”
***
I drove straight to Maya’s house.
A man answered the door.
“That was her last day here.”
“Can I please see Maya? She was with my son the day he went missing. I need to know if he said anything to her.”
He frowned at me for a long moment. Then something in his face seemed to close off.
“Maya isn’t here. She’s living with her grandparents for a while.” He started to close the door, then paused. “I’ll ask her if she knows anything, okay?”
I stood there, unsure what to say, some instinct telling me to push harder — but I didn’t know how.
Then he closed the door.
Something in his face seemed to close off.
***
The weeks that followed were the worst of my life.
We put up flyers and posted on every local Facebook group and community board we could find.
The police searched too, but as the months went by, the search slowed down. Eventually, everyone started calling Daniel a runaway.
I knew my son. Daniel wasn’t the kind of boy who just vanished without a word.
And I would never stop looking for him, no matter how long it took.
