We Loved Her So Much

We Loved Her So Much

(Dedicated to Tara Grinstead (Georgia) and Jennifer Kesse (Florida). My sincere wish is for both cases to be solved. Soon.)

The kitchen door downstairs closed a bit loud. Still, I was relieved for I knew it was my wife Linda and that she’d now make some tea. How I could taste a hot cuppa! I continued working on my drawing. I had only two days more to complete it. I was a self-employed architect and customer satisfaction, indeed, customers’ wows, were everything in this business.
About five minutes passed and I began to feel odd. Linda would normally put the kettle on (like Polly) then come upstairs to put her coat and bags away and say hello. Come to think of it, I hadn’t heard the car. I looked out the studio window and saw it. But Linda was getting out. Had she gone back for something she’d forgot?
Well, it would do no harm to go down myself and say hello. I could also remind her of the tea.

The kitchen was empty. I looked out on the porch, which also was empty. The car was there but no one was in it. Fall had arrived. Leaves blew round in the yard as they became separated from the tree limbs. I’d never felt so strange in my life. It was like a horror flick. I mean, here we were, the Johnsons—Linda and Mack and their two kids, Pam and Josh. A somewhat typical, Cobb County, Georgia, couple. Both my parents and my in-laws lived less than an hour from us. I didn’t like what I felt even though I didn’t understand what I felt.

I’d never prayed much, but I remember saying some little prayers. Out of terror, mostly. My family’s well-being was in jeopardy! Who wouldn’t pray?

At that moment Pam pulled her car into the side yard. She immediately noticed the worried look on my face. Either that, or I was truly pale.

“Dad,” she said. “What’s wrong? You look like you’ve seen a ghost!”

I kissed her as usual.

“I hope I haven’t, Honey. It’s your mom. I can’t find her.”

“Hmm. Well, I’ll help you look for her, Dad. Have you checked the shed?”

“No, Honey. Not yet, but why would she be there? Your mom’s not exactly a gardener, you know.”

“Don’t be silly, Dad. Let me go look. Wait here.”

Pam returned from the shed. No luck.

“When did you see her last, Dad?” she asked.

“It hasn’t been more than twenty-five minutes, Hon. I was working in the upstairs studio when I heard your mom come in the house. In the kitchen. Then, when she didn’t come upstairs within five minutes or so, I looked out the window. There she was in the car again. I presumed she’d left something in it. Gee, I wish your brother was here.”

Josh Johnson was away at university. He had about a year to go before graduation.

“Dad,” Pam said. “Look at me. We can handle it. The two of us. Now let’s start looking round. What was mom wearing?”

“Well, she looked normal. A yellow scarf. She was wearing a yellow scarf for the wind.”

Pam looked seriously at her father.

“Did you see her face, Dad?”

“Well, no I didn’t, Honey. But she looked normal enough otherwise. She was always looking down. Down at the ground.”

Mack noticed that now it was Pam who was pale.

“Dad,” she said, “mom doesn’t have a yellow scarf. Unless it’s one she bought today. I think we’d better call the authorities.”

To cut some, five years have gone by. We haven’t seen Linda. No one we know has either. Strange car tracks were found by the police like a hundred yards from the house. The guess is that someone took Linda away by force, which, of course, is the only way Linda could be taken away (if you knew her). I think it was someone who did not live around here. If it was a local, why, there’d be some kind of evidence, wouldn’t there? Somebody would surely know something. There have been far too many cases like Linda’s in this country. Cases like Tara Grinstead’s or Jennifer Kesse’s. Something has to be done. I live with rage thinking of someone taking another person away by force. Anyone. It’s the worst evil.

We loved our Linda so much.