EVERMAN, Texas — He was small, but mighty.
Patricia Paris, the missing 6-year-old Everman boy Noel Rodriguez-Alvarez’s foster mom, described him as a playful boy who always had a toy in hand and was full of laughter.
“That was my son,” Paris said. “That was my baby.”
Between 2020 and 2021, Paris fostered Noel and two of his siblings for about a year. Noel was 3 years old when she first welcomed the child into her home.
They quickly bonded and he became a special part of her family, Paris told WFAA.
“Wherever I went, he was like my shadow,” Paris said. “That was my buddy.”
Paris said even after Noel was returned to his mother, she would often reconnect with him through monthly Facetime calls and visits. Her last visit with the little boy was during February 2022. According to Paris, phone calls to Noel’s mother, Cindy Rodriguez-Singh, stopped going through after that date.
It wasn’t until a relative watched a news report on television that Paris learned Noel was missing and hadn’t been seen by family members since November 2022.
“I said, ‘What? That can’t be true.' I still couldn’t believe it,” Paris said.
She said she's struggling to come to grips with the idea that the boy she watched overcome so many obstacles, despite his disabilities, is gone. Noel was born prematurely and had developmental and physical disabilities, but in videos Paris filmed of him, he could talk, play and navigate a tablet.
“Everything a kid with special needs is told he can’t do, he mastered that,” Paris said.
According to Everman Police Chief Craig Spencer, Noel’s mother told relatives he was evil, had a demon in him, and she worried he would harm her newborn twins.
“She could’ve given him to us,” Paris said. “We asked for him. “He’s not the demonic monster kid that his mom said he was.”
Earlier this week, investigators excavated a concrete patio on the property where the family lived. Cadaver dogs alerted to a scent of human remains, which investigators believe were present at some point. Police say he's presumed dead, but Noel’s body still has not been found.
“He needs to be found, so he can be laid to rest,” Paris said.
Alvarez-Singh, her husband, Arshdeep Singh, and six of Cindy’s children boarded an international plane without Noel last month, and their final flight destination was India.
Paris wants Cindy and Arshdeep to come forward and explain what happened to Noel.
“They need a long time to think about what they’ve done and live with that decision,” Paris said. “He did not deserve what has happened to him.”
After weeks of seeing the little boy’s face on television screens and billboard signs, the idea that Noel’s gone is beginning to set in for the Paris family.
On Wednesday, the family sat on the couch and watched videos of Noel. At times, they laughed and remembered the boy’s big personality.
Upstairs, Paris’s adopted son, who also suffers from disabilities, wailed “I’m hurting.”
He was crying for Noel.
“No matter what, he was loved while he was here,” Paris said.