"Alex, what's wrong?" Cam asked. There was deep concern in his voice as he reached for my arm and pulled me back up to him. "Are you okay?"
"I'm worried about Liz," I said, wiping the tears from my eyes before I looked up at him. "I think she's in real trouble, Cam. She's in denial about her problem and she won't accept help, and now she's run off and I can't find her!"
"Hey, hey, we'll find her," Cam said as he cupp
ed my cheek with his strong hand. "I promise. We'll look and we'll alert everyone we can think of, and eventually we'll find her."
"What if we don't find her in time?" I asked quietly. The reality was that if Liz was using, she was likely to overdose at some point, and if I didn't know where she was, then I couldn't bring her back. "What if I can't save my best friend?"
Cam held me tightly, resting his chin on my head as he stroked my back. I cried harder than I could ever remember having cried, but it felt good to have him to lean on as I let out all the emotions from the past week. I told him what was going on with the cheating accusations and my fear of not graduating.
"And what if we find her and they kick her out of the nursing program?" I said, and then more quietly, "And what if they kick me out, too?"
"They're not going to kick you out, Alex," Cam said confidently.
"If they conclude that we cheated, they will," I said, shaking my head. "And if they don't make their decision soon, it won't matter. I'll be out anyway, and I won't have a place to live!"
"Yes, you will, don't you worry about that at all," Cam said as he squeezed me tighter. "You won't get dropped from the program and you won't get evicted from your apartment."
"It's nice that you're so sure about all of this," I said as I tried to focus on the task at hand. We needed to get out and look for Liz. With every hour that passed, we were losing the trail from the hospital. "We need to find her, Cam. We need to find Liz."
"I've put in some calls to people I know in the fire department and asked them to contact their people in the police department," he said as he looked at his phone and frowned. "I need to return a call."
I nodded as I moved to the kitchen and started a pot of coffee. It was going to be a long day for us both, and we were going to need to keep the caffeine flowing. I could hear the murmur of Cam's voice as he talked to whomever it was he called. He sounded irritated, and then suddenly I heard him shouting.
"I'm not going to be that bastard's lap dog, Leo! Do you understand me?" he shouted into the phone. "I'll be there for the announcement, but I'm not going to go on parade for him every time he has an event!"
Tesla came padding into the kitchen, looked around, and then sat nicely looking up at me. I figured she probably needed water, so I filled a bowl and put it on a nice placemat on the floor for her. She quickly lapped it up and then lay down with her chin on her paws.
"All right, all done," Cam said as he came into the kitchen and squatted down next to his dog.
"Everything okay?" I asked.
"Yeah, fine," he said, looking at Tesla as he scratched behind her ears. "Just some business I needed to take care of."
"Is this the security firm?" I asked. Cam didn't look up, he just nodded. "You have to be there for the announcement tomorrow, don't you?"
"Indeed, I do." He sighed. "I don't want to do this bullshit, but it's part of the contract, and if I don't do it, we don't sign. Metzler is a real bastard."
"Like father, like daughter," I said with a wry grin as I pulled out two coffee mugs and filled them with the steaming liquid. I handed one to Cam and took the other into the dining room where I looked at the map I'd constructed of all the places I knew Liz might hang out. I'd checked both of our classrooms before I came home and found them empty except for the cleaning crew that was scrubbing the graffiti off of the desks.
"Where do you think she might go next?" Cam asked. "Does she have a place that makes her feel safe and secure? Better yet, do you know any of the people she might be buying drugs from?"
"Don't you think I'd have gone there first, if I did?" I asked in an irritated voice. "I want to go back to her apartment and see if she left any clues there."
"Shouldn't we call in the police to do that?" Cam asked as he sipped his coffee. "I mean, what if it ends up being a crime scene and we disturb evidence?"
"Seriously, dude, we need to find Liz," I said in an exasperated voice. "We don't have time to sit around and wait for the police to file a report and then send someone down to go through Liz's apartment. That could take days, and what if something happens to her in the meantime?"
"Good point, but I still don't know if her apartment is a good place for us to be," he said.
"Fine, then we'll go and check it out to make sure she hasn't come home, and we won't touch anything." I sighed. "Happy now?"
"Very," he nodded solemnly.
"You're exasperating; you know that, don't you?" I said.
"So I've been told." He grinned as I lightly punched his shoulder and motioned for him to follow me. He grabbed my arm and pulled me around to face him. He had a very serious look on his face as he said, "Alex, wait. I know this isn't the time or the place, but after last night, I know you're trying to make a decision about me. I know you don't like the fact that I have a lot of baggage, but I promise you that if you give me a shot, I'll be good to you."