Mateo squirmed in discomfort, once again fiddling with his glasses – an obvious tell that he was nervous. “I don’t know.”

“Does he have a job?” Micah pressed. “One that his parents might not be aware of?”

“Not- not that I know of.”

Mateo was obviously uncomfortable with Micah’s line of questioning, and he didn’t want to push – yet. So he switched back to questions about when Mateo had last seen Nico. “How did Nico leave when he took off on Saturday? Was he on foot? Did he usually take the subway?”

If he had, subways stations generally had plenty of cameras. Perhaps Micah could look into acquiring the security footage of the one closest to Nico’s dorm – before it was eventually erased and taped over, a common occurrence when dealing with CCTV.

Mateo frowned, and then, almost reluctantly… “I think he took an Uber, actually.”

“You think?”

“He got a call shortly before he took off. I think it was the driver, saying he was here.”

“Was that typical for him to use Uber?” Micah asked.

“Only when he was drunk,” Mateo admitted. “It’s cheaper to take the subway.”

Micah hummed. “Did Nico drink often?”

“Not excessively. Just, you know, as much as any other college student.”

“Have you ever seen him use drugs?”

Mateo’s eyes strayed to the recorder.

“You won’t get in trouble for anything you’re about to tell me,” Micah assured, making sure he spoke clearly, and gesturing at the recording device to ensure that Mateo understood he had Micah saying so on record if he thought he’d try to pull something later.

Micah wasn’t sure if it worked, or if it was just his youth that made him seem trustworthy to Mateo, but it had the young man confessing, “We did pot together once or twice. Nothing harder than that.”

Micah nodded. “What about Nico’s behavior? Had he been acting strangely before his disappearance? Any out-of-character outbursts?”

“He’s been normal, honestly.”

“How about the morning he left? Was he acting weird? Nervous, maybe?”

Mateo shrugged, and his hands went to his glasses – again. “Not really.”

“Not really?” Micah pressed. “Care to clarify?”

“He seemed a little… cagey, I guess,” Mateo admitted. “Like, sort of excited, but sort of anxious too. I thought that maybe he was going out on a brunch date or something.”

Micah quickly jotted that down. “But you have no idea who he could have been meeting,” he said – more of a statement than a question since Mateo had already made it clear that he didn’t.

“No.”

“Can you think of anything else that may be helpful in finding Nico? It could be something small, or something you think is unrelated to his disappearance – anything at all that sticks out in your brain.”

Mateo hesitated – it was only for half of a second, but Micah caught it. “No.”

Micah turned off the recorder, and Mateo’s shoulders slumped in relief.