A few minutes later, I told Tyler I wanted to show Aidan something downstairs — something I kept in the basement.
Tyler smiled and said he’d be right up after grabbing drinks.
I led the young man down the stairs, let him step through the basement door first, and then, before he could say anything, I pulled the door shut behind him and turned the key in the lock.
“We’re calling the police now,” I said through the door, my voice steadier than I felt. “I’ll explain everything.”
PART 2
Tyler came up from the kitchen with three glasses of lemonade and found his mother standing in front of the locked basement door, phone in hand, talking to a 911 dispatcher.
“Mom?” His face went from confused to horrified in about two seconds. “Mom, what are you — where’s Aidan?”
“Tyler, sit down. Please.”
“Where is he? What did you do?”
From behind the basement door, a voice — Aidan’s, but different now, harder — called out: “Tyler? Tyler, your mom’s insane, she locked me down here, get me out—”
“Mom, unlock the door!” Tyler was frantic. “This is — I knew you’d find some reason, I knew it, you said you were fine with it but you’re not, you locked my boyfriend in the—”
That accusation went into me like a knife, because it was the thing I’d feared he’d think, and I understood in that moment that I had about thirty seconds to make my son believe me or lose his trust forever.
“Tyler.” I grabbed his shoulders. “Look at me. This has nothing to do with you being gay. Nothing. I would throw a boy AND a girl in that basement if they were who I think this person is.
Two months ago. The parent group. The scammer targeting college kids. Do you remember me telling you about it?”
Tyler’s face flickered. “That’s — Mom, that’s crazy, that’s not—”
“Get my phone. My photos. I saved the warning. I saved it because you were leaving for college and I was scared. Look.”
With shaking hands, Tyler scrolled to the saved image.
The warning. The photo.
The face now shouting behind my basement door.
I watched my son’s world tilt.
“That’s… that’s not Aidan,” he said weakly. “The name says—”
“The name says Marcus. And last month a different warning called him Ryan. And before that, Devon. He uses a new name every time, sweetheart. He used a new name for you.”
