"Jon, we've been walking forever. I think if your mom's car was anywhere on this road, we would have seen it already," Karyn said. "I mean, if your mom was the one that took the car, why would she even come down here? There's nothing over here but outlet shops and bars."
"Maybe she swapped with someone. Maybe ..." Jon said, but then his voice was drowned out by a loud engine approaching them.
They turned and saw a car speeding down the road. At first, they thought it might be a cop, but it wasn't a police car. It was just someone driving really fast, faster than the speed limit.
As it passed, they looked at the driver. Karyn saw a thirty-something red-headed woman wearing a baggy T-shirt. Jon saw a bald man with a goatee and several tattoos wearing the same T-shirt, although fitting his body a bit better.
"Where's she off in such a hurry?" Karyn asked.
"You see the driver as a woman?" Jon asked.
"Yeah. A woman wearing a guy's T-shirt."
Jon figured that it was someone who was unchanged and was trying to get out of town before they were. But if the guy had already swapped with a woman, why was he in such a hurry to leave?
"Hey," Karyn said, grabbing Jon's attention. "There's your mom's car," she said, pointing down the street. It was parked across the street from a pawn shop.
They approached it, but saw that it was empty. His mom or whoever stole the car was nowhere to be found.
"Why do you think it's here?" Karyn asked.
They looked around, but the only thing that wasn't out of business or completely condemned was the pawn shop across the street.
"It's as good a place as any to start looking," Jon said, then they crossed the street and went into the shop.
The guy behind the counter looked kind of shady, but maybe all pawn shop owners looked like that.
Jon walked up to the counter, which caused the guy to leer at him. "Hey, baby. I haven't seen you around here before." Then his eyes shifted to the right and saw a little girl standing nearby. His leer faded, then he asked "You have something to pawn?"
"Actually, I want some information."
"This is a pawn shop. Not Wikipedia. If you're not gonna pawn something, get lost."
"Listen," Jon said, slamming his hand down on the counter. "I want to know if someone came in here earlier that was acting ... well ... strange."
"All my customers are strange."
Jon was about to say something else, when suddenly he noticed something familiar in the display case. "Hey, that belongs to my mom," he said, pointing to a necklace. He had seen her wear it now and then. It was unmistakably hers.
"Yeah, right," the guy said. "The woman who gave me this was no older than you."
"Did she have a stone?" Karyn asked.
"A what?"
"A stone," Jon repeated.
"Yeah. Yeah, I think she did. So what?"
Jon turned towards Karyn. "I guess we know who has the stone. A girl that's no older than me ... uh ... I mean Meagan."
"That's not much to go on. Where do we start?" she asked.
"She was here with another girl," the guy said. "A redhead teenager. You know, it was weird, but after a minute or so the redhead just left the shop, looking shocked or something. I don't know. Just kinda weird."
"Okay, now we're looking for two people," Karyn said, as they walked out of the shop.
As soon as they left, they heard someone crying nearby. Curious, they followed the sound to the alley that ran along the side of the pawn shop. Once in the alley, they saw a woman cowering between two trash cans. She was dressed like a mix between a gypsy and a witch. Tears were flowing down her face. She was clearly upset about something.
"Are you okay?" Karyn asked, looking down at her.
The woman looked up and said "She's dead."
"Who's dead?" Jon asked. He looked around the alley, but didn't see anyone, dead or alive.
"Her," the woman said, pointing at nothing. "She's invisible."
Jon almost laughed. An invisible woman? That was definitely ridiculous. But then again, he knew that not too long ago, the wishing stone was in this vicinity. It was quite possible that someone used it to make someone disappear.
He walked over to where the woman said the body was, while Karyn comforted her, and he nearly tripped. There was definitely something there. But there was no way to know if it was a person.
He looked around the alley, trying to find something that he could pour over the thing that was invisible. Then he could at least see the shape of whatever it was. For all he knew, it could have been a dead cat or a dead dog.
He found a container filled with pebbles and sand and dumped it over the thing that was invisible.
The woman was right. It was a body. And a body of a woman. But he had never seen her before.
Karyn walked over. "Who is ..." She stopped and fell silent.
"Karyn? What's wrong?"
"Jon, it's your mom," she said slowly.
"What?" He looked back at the body. The shape of the woman he saw didn't look like his mom in the slightest.
"She looks a little younger. But that's her. Oh god, Jon. I'm so sorry." She started to cry.
"Karyn, that's not my mom. This woman must have swapped bodies with her. Which means that my mom is still alive, but just looks like this woman."
Karyn's tears went away, realizing that Jon was right.
Jon bent over and looked closer at the body. "She was stabbed. In the neck."
"Who would do something like this?" Karyn asked.
"I don't know. But the stone isn't here. I think whoever killed her took it with them."
