Ransom

“The black ones are for SFPD,” Ted explained, “the red ones are for the FBI. They like to be fancier than we are.” He smiled at him, as the others stood by and watched. They were huddled together as though they took strength in standing close to one another, and Fernanda was hovering over them like a mother hen.

“Why does the FBI like red?” Fernanda asked.

“Just to be different, I guess,” the detective doing them said. Other than that, there was no real reason. But fingerprints done in red always belonged to the FBI.

As soon as he finished doing the fingerprints, he took out a small pair of scissors, and he turned to Sam with a cautious smile. “Can I snip a little piece of your hair, son?” he asked politely, as Sam looked at him wide-eyed.

“Why?”

“We can tell a lot of things from people's hair. It's called a DNA match.” This was a lesson none of them needed, but like the rest of it, they had no choice.

“You mean like if I get kidnapped?” Sam looked frightened, and the man hesitated, as Fernanda stepped in.

“They just want us to do it, Sam. I'm going to do it too.” She took the scissors from the man, snipped a tiny wisp of Sam's hair, then her own, and then her other children's. She made as little fuss about it as she could, and thought it seemed less ominous if she did it for them, rather than a stranger. Shortly after that, talking quietly amongst themselves, the children went upstairs. Sam wanted to stay with her, but Will took him by the hand and said he wanted to talk to him. He thought his mother wanted to talk to Ted about what was happening, and he assumed correctly that Sam would get scared. There was a lot happening to them. A lot had already occurred in a very short time. And Fernanda knew that after midnight, with four armed policemen in the house night and day, their lives would dramatically change.

“We're going to need photographs of them,” Ted said quietly to Fernanda, after the others left the room. “And descriptions. Height, weight, distinguishing marks, everything you can give us. But the hair and fingerprints will help.”

“Will all this really make a difference if they get kidnapped?” She hated even asking him that, but she needed to know. All she could think of now was what it would be like if they took one of her children. It was so frightening, she couldn't even hold the thought in her mind for long.

“It could make a big difference, especially with someone as young as Sam.” He didn't want to tell her that sometimes children that age got snatched, and only turned up ten years later, living other lives with other people, having been kept prisoner in another country or state, and fingerprints and hair would help the authorities identify him, whether dead or alive. In the case of Will or Ashley, the circumstances that would lead them to need hair or fingerprints would be far more dire. And in this case, with a ransom involved, these kids weren't going to disappear into other lives. They were going to be taken, held, and hopefully returned when the ransom was paid. All Ted could hope, if it happened, was that no one would get harmed, and the kidnappers would keep the kids alive. He was going to do everything he could to see that it didn't happen. But they had to be prepared for all contingencies, and the hair and fingerprints they'd taken were important for them to have. He told Fernanda to get him the rest of the information as soon as possible. And a little while later, they left.

She sat alone in the kitchen with the empty pizza box after that, staring into space, wondering how all this had happened, and how soon it would be over. All she could hope now was that the men plotting against her, if they really were, would be caught. She still clung to her doubts, hoping that it was all someone's imagination, and not something that would really happen. The prospect of that was so terrifying that if she had let herself think about it, she would have gotten hysterical, and never let her children out of the house. She was doing everything she could to stay calm, and not frighten them excessively, given the circumstances. And she thought she was doing a good job of staying calm, until she put the empty pizza box in the fridge, poured orange juice in a cup of tea, and put the clean towels in the garbage.

“Okay, calm down,” she said to herself out loud, “everything's going to be fine.” But as she put the towels away in the right place, she saw that her hands were shaking. It was all too terrifying to imagine, and she couldn't help but think of Allan and wish he were there. She wondered what he would have done about it all. She had the feeling that he would have handled it far more competently and coolly than she had.

“You okay, Mom?” Will asked as he walked into the kitchen for some ice cream, just as she was leaving to come upstairs.