Free The End of All Things Beautiful by Nikki Young Page B

sure meetings that are scheduled
have someone present.
    As
soon as I step off the elevator, Claire greets me with a series of missed calls
and all the information I asked her to pull regarding my clients and closings I
have over the next three days. I can’t put these off and I know, without my
presence, there’s a possibility things won’t go the way I planned.
    Jack
put me in charge of these clients because they are some of the most difficult.
But as much as this has consumed my life, I can’t let it deter me from taking time
off to find Benji.  
    A
few minutes after I arrive Jack is in my office and I’m handing off all the
information to him. The conversation is completely professional and Jack has
yet to bring up our little stray from the norm and my admission of Tommy’s
suicide.
    “How
long do you think you’ll be gone?” he asks as he’s leaving my office.
    I
don’t answer him right away because I have no idea. It could be a day or two or
it could be a week. I haven’t been in contact with Benji since I left school so
I have no idea where he’s living or how he’ll respond to any of this once I
find him.
    “I
guess as of right now, just a few days, but it could be longer.” I pause and
look up at Jack. I can tell he’s struggling to not ask me any more questions
and for that I’m thankful. I’ve told him more than I planned already.
    “Just
keep me posted,” he says as an uneasy look forms on his face. “And Campbell?”
he adds.
    “Yeah,
Jack?”
    “Be
safe. Call me if you need anything.”
    I
raise my eyebrows at him and give him a small smile. “No worries, Jack. I’ll be
just fine.” I try to reassure him, although I know my life isn’t in danger, I’m
still not certain what lies ahead.
    He’s
now standing in the doorway to my office, his eyes focused on mine. “You haven’t
been fine in a really long time.”
    What
am I supposed to say to that? It’s the truth, but again, acknowledging it is
somehow admitting too much.
    When
I don’t respond, he gives me a quick nod and leaves my office. I breathe a sigh
of relief and get down to the other reason I came back to my office.
    It’s
about time I find Benji. Nine years apart and while I now realize it’s
something I should’ve done a long time ago, I just wasn’t ready to confront
that part of my life. I’m still not sure I am now.  
    I
start simple by typing his name into Google, but I come up short almost
immediately. Finding only a few old news articles from high school when he
played hockey and some information on his enrollment at Ann Arbor. I try
several different searches, but still come up with nothing. No information on
him since basically after the accident. This shouldn’t surprise me. I did the
same thing. I disappeared for at least four years and it wasn’t until I started
working for Jack that my name began to appear in internet searches.
    As
ridiculous as it sounds, I ran searches on myself fairly regularly, because of
the fear that all of this would at some point come back to haunt my life and
not just through nightmares.
    We
left the scene of an accident, lied to the police and then all but disappeared.
I was waiting for that moment when they showed up looking for me. It has yet to
happen and there are times that I find relief in the fact that it’s been nine
years, but then again, I worry. I wonder why we were never questioned more than
on just the day that the police showed up to tell us Sam was found dead. It
never extended beyond that day.
    After
an hour of searching and finding nothing, I open up a program we use to
research companies and clients before we decide to start the process of
purchasing a business. If Benji works for a large corporation his name will
instantly ping back to me. At the time I left, Benji was majoring in computer
science and instructional technology, so if he graduated, it wouldn’t be all
that unrealistic to think he’d be working for a large business.
    But
again, nothing is