The remaining brothers watched as their mother sat in the parlor. She was weeping as she held a family photo. Seated in the photo, she was surrounded by her four sons, four sons not the three that were in attendance; an attendance required by the death and burial of their father. As she looked longingly at the picture she thought ‘If only I had listened.’

“…And I’m telling you for the last time. It ain’t gonna happen. Christ, we don’t even know where he is.” He spoke in almost a whisper, not wanting his mother to hear him speak

Taking a sip from his drink, the youngest brother said in the same type of voice “Well, we’ll just have to look. Can’t hurt.” He flicked his head towards the parlor and the sight of their mother holding a family picture.

“Fine, great. But how? I mean, he just took off. It’s not like he sent letters or post cards. We haven’t heard from him for years.”

The first brother thought for a minute and then asked “Ok, what do we know? Huh? Well he allegedly left to go to college but never arrived. We check the towns from here to there. Maybe we can rule out some of the smaller ones.” He looked at his brother with hope in his eyes.

The older brother had remained silent during this conversation. Finally he said “Court records.”

“Huh? I mean…” the youngest brother started.

The oldest brother began again “We look for anything filed with his name on it. That will at least give us a start. Sure we’ll get lots of false leads, but maybe and I mean just maybe, it’ll pay off.”

The first brother said “One thing though. What do we do if we find him?”

The oldest brother smiled and said “Let’s find him first. Huh?”