The police had gotten a few leads. Several people had seen the boys heading to the bathroom before, and a few more claimed to have seen them with a man in the arcade. One couple who were standing outside claimed to have seen the man dragging the two boys to his car. Allegedly, they had been yelling about a video game, so the couple thought that the kids were upset because their father hadn't let them finish playing their video game. There was a description of the car. They hadn't thought twice, however, about license tags.

It seemed that the days only got drearier. I had called home to my parents, and had had to explain that I wouldn't be able to leave the state of Oklahoma until the boys were either found or the case was closed. The Lawyers were staying as well in Tulsa. Everyone agreed that we (the kids) should go to a school temporarily in Tulsa, so that we wouldn't get behind in our education. I didn't know how much school would do for us. We'd be too preoccupied with thinking about Mac and Joe.

Despite Taylor's little pep talk, I still found myself thinking guilty thoughts from time to time. Especially whenever somebody would accidentally call their name or mention them. I can't help but think that maybe if I'd sent Isaac with them, they wouldn't have gotten kidnapped. None of this would be happening, and the Lawyers and I would be heading home on Saturday. That was another thing: I wanted to go home and see my parents.

Isaac and I spent a lot of down time together. We felt horrible for everything. When we wanted to feel guilty, we felt it together. I don't know how many times we sat in the guys' basement room munching on anything unhealthy we could get our hands on and we'd ramble on and on about how it was all our faults. Then we'd decide that we weren't so bad, and we'd push on.

Zac and Nicky were beginning to calm down. Thankfully, none of the other kids blamed us. I don't think Zoe or Ezra really understood what was going on, anyhow. They just kind of looked lost, because nobody was paying them a whole lot of attention.

We kept on the lookout. We stayed as up-to-date on the situation as possible. The Hansons even bought a scanner to put in the living room. They listened to it in shifts, trying to see if anyone heard anything about 2 missing blond boys.

The situation was really intense. I never thought I would see the end of this hellish nightmare. In fact, I was pretty sure I would die not knowing what had happened to Joe and Mac; not knowing if they were being tormented in some rathole, dead and half-buried in some woods, or merely on the road and scared out of their minds. All the options were so frightening. Even the BEST conditions that I could imagine them being in were horrible. No matter what circumstances they were in, they were always the worst.

I think we all tried not to think about it at all. We walked around like zombies. We shut off our brains and numbed ourselves to the thoughts of where the boys might be. I worked really hard to stay focused on getting them back. I figured if I kept doing that, I wouldn't let anyone down again.