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He drove each and every road within five miles of the house two
or three times before finally going back home. It was three a.m.
and the house was empty. After another vodka he cried himself to
sleep.
In the morning, when he woke, he was enraged again, and with a
hammer he smashed the flowerpots she kept in the backyard.
Breathing hard, he went to the phone and called in sick, then went
to the couch and tried to figure out how she’d gotten away.
Someone had to have picked her up; someone must have driven
her someplace. Someone she knew. A friend from Atlantic City?
Altoona? Possible, he supposed, except that he checked the phone
bills every month. She never placed long-distance phone calls.
Someone local, then. But who? She never went anywhere, never
talked to anyone. He made sure of that.
He went to the kitchen and was pouring himself another drink
when he heard the phone ring. He lunged for it, hoping it was
Erin. Strangely, however, the phone rang only once, and when he
picked up he heard a dial tone. He stared at the receiver, trying to
figure it out before hanging up the phone.
How had she gotten away? He was missing something. Even if
someone local had picked her up, how had she gotten to the road
without leaving footprints? He stared out the window, trying to
piece together the sequence of events. Something seemed off,
though he couldn’t identify what it was. He turned away from the
window and found himself focused on the telephone. It was then
that the pieces suddenly came together and he pulled out his cell
phone. He dialed his home number and listened as it rang once.
The cell phone kept ringing. When he picked up the landline, he
heard a dial tone and realized that she’d forwarded the calls to a
cell phone. Which meant she hadn’t been here when he’d called
her last night. Which also explained the bad reception he’d
noticed over the past two days. And, of course, the lack of
footprints in the snow. She’d been gone, he now knew, since
Tuesday morning.