Leap of Faith

Day Four

“How do you know that his real name is Theo?” Georgie asks as she scrolls through her online social networks. Since arriving an hour ago, my best friend has been intent on helping me find Theo but so far, we haven’t turned up any leads. “Look, Cate…” Georgie turns to me with a defeated look on her face. “I don’t want to burst your fairy tale bubble or anything, but I’m getting a really bad vibe from this guy.”

Although I hated to admit it, I was starting to think the same thing. Georgie Sanderson was one of the most connected students at Capshaw Academy and if her Facebook, Twitter and Google+ profiles didn’t show up any results for Theo, then it was almost certain that he didn’t exist.

“He said his name was Theo,” I repeat the same sentence for the tenth time. “Why would he lie about his name?”

Georgie shrugs and tosses her cell aside. “Ok, let’s think more logically. Do you have our Year Books?”

I point towards my overcrowded book case. Being the socially awkward outcast, I had learnt over the years that books were a perfect form of escapism. Getting lost in stories was like therapy and each book on the shelves represented a ‘session.

“You need to get out more,” Georgie jokes as she starts scouring through the books. When she finally finds what she’s been looking for, she comes back to sit on the bed next to me. “I love Year Books,” she smiles as she cracks the spin of our freshman year’s Book. “It’s like a walk down memory lane. That, and a directory. Every student from our graduating class is listed in here. Every student except for your guy, apparently.”

She tosses aside the first book and reaches for the next. She flicks through the pages, grumbles when she doesn’t find Theo and throws that one aside too.

“He said he moved to live with his dad recently,” I remember some details of our closet conversations. “Maybe he transferred here at the start of Junior or senior year.”

“Now, that I can work with,” Georgie clicked her fingers together, took a Sharpie from my bed side table and started searching through our third Year Book. “Theo… Theo… Theo…”

While Georgie got to work on finding my mystery man, I took out my camera and searched through the photographs I had taken over Christmas break. For AP Photography, I had to create a portfolio of work and had chosen ‘Portraits’ as my theme. I had a strange fascination with people and you could tell a lot about a person just from looking at their face. Emotions seeped through- love, anger, pain, passion… they were all there. The subjects from my portfolio were brave, because Lord knows I could never let myself be that open and wear my emotions so publically.

“Christos Theoris,” Georgie announces much to my confusion.

“Who?” I ask, placing my camera on the floor and looking over Georgie’s shoulder. I looked at the photo she had circled and saw a boy with dark hair and brown eyes smiling out from the page. I look at the name under the photo but it doesn’t ring a bell. “Do you know who he is?”

“No idea,” she says with a shake of her head. “But if you give me your computer password and ten minutes, I can get you all the deets on this Greek God.”

I logged on to my laptop and left Georgie to do whatever it was she needed to do. I made my way to the kitchen and started rustling some dinner for us. My parents had taken Libby and David out for dinner before my soon-to-be brother-in-law had to take a red-eye back to Boston. Anna and Sawyer had gone back to San Francisco this morning.

As the world’s worst cook, I made the only thing that even I was incapable of messing up. I took out some white flour tortillas and sliced them into even strips, spread tomato pizza sauce along their lengths and sprinkled mozzarella cheese on top. After rolling them, I placed them in the oven to cook.