The Last to See Her

by Courtney Evan Tate

  And he did. He jogged down to the corner, and brought back java and bagels. They ate them in bed and laughed together all morning, as he told her stories of difficult clients, and everything he said was witty and entertaining. He was kind and confident, funny and sincere.

  Everything she wanted in a man. Everything she thought she’d never find wrapped up in one person.

  “You’re exceptional,” she finally said, drawing him back to her, kissing him with yeasty breath from their breakfast, and he kissed her back, slowly, then with urgency.

  They made love again, then again.

  She pulled him to the shower, where they made love once more against the stones.

  By nightfall, they were spent.

  “I don’t want to leave,” he said softly, his fingers threading through her hair.

  “I don’t want you to,” she admitted.

  So he stayed. And then again the next night, and the next, until it was just an assumption that he would never leave.

  He went to work every morning, and she curled up in her window seat and wrote all day, funneling the exuberance of new love into the keys, into her stories.

  Karen called a week later, having read three chapters.

  “This is exquisite, Gen,” she raved. “I can feel everything. All of it. He’s quite the muse for you.”

  Gen agreed.

  That night, they had their first fight.

  It was in the rain, as everything seemed to be.

  They stood on the sidewalk, and she’d given money to a homeless man.

  Thad shook his head.

  “You shouldn’t. He’ll just use it for liquor or drugs.”

  Gen shrugged. “That’s up to him. It’s the spirit of giving that counts. I give it to him freely. I choose to think he’ll use it for food.”

  “You’re too trusting,” he told her, and for the first time, she saw displeasure on his face. “You’ll be taken advantage of at some point, Gen. Everyone isn’t as good as you think they are.”

  “I know that,” she told him, rolling her eyes. “I’m not a child.”

  “You live in a daily dreamworld,” he said, which ruffled her feathers. “In your world, you design the rules, and the dialogue, and everyone is what you think they are because you design them. Reality isn’t that way.”

  She stopped in her tracks, and that’s where the fight began.

  They fought in the rain over his belief in her gullibility.

  They fought hard and fast, and when they made up later, in her bed, it was just as hard and fast.

  When they lay spent after, he whispered into her hair, “I love your passion.”

  “I’m not delusional,” she told him. “I know what the world is. I just choose to see the best in it.”

  He nodded. “I love that, too.”

  They rested quietly, their limbs intertwined, and she was almost asleep when he spoke next, a whisper that was almost lost in the night.

  “I love you.”

  She smiled, and after that, they were Thad and Genevieve.

  9

  Meg, Now

  “Why isn’t Thad there?” her mother asked, annoyed. “That girl has given him everything, and he can’t be there to help find her?”

  Meg couldn’t help but agree.

  “I don’t know, Mom,” she said limply. “It’s very strange. The detective asked if the divorce was amicable, and I have to admit, that for a minute...”

  There was a pause, a pregnant one, as her mother realized where she was going with the comment.

  “You don’t think...” Her mom trailed off. “No, he wouldn’t.”

  “They didn’t have a prenup, did they?” Meg asked. “The detective asked about her income, and I don’t even know. That’s so pathetic. I never asked.”

  “Why would you?” her mom said, annoyed. “There was no reason. She’s fine with money. It’s not our business.”

  “But right now, it could make a difference,” Meg said slowly. “What if she ended up having more money than we knew, and Thad wants it?”

  “That’s a lot of what-ifs, Meghan.” Her mom was stern. “I don’t like how things unfolded with them. But I can’t jump to the assumption that he’s done something...crazy.”

  “I know.”

  “I just have to believe that your sister just got worked up, you know how she does that, and she just went off to process. She’s done it before.”

  Meg sat still, staring at the embossed wallpaper on the hotel room walls and thinking of last year when her sister had driven to a bed-and-breakfast after a fight with Thad and had stayed there for an entire weekend without telling anyone where she was.

  “I know that she has,” Meg said slowly. “But this doesn’t feel like that. Thad wasn’t even here, and she’d never make me worry like that.”

  “We don’t know that. If something had happened to her, I’d feel it, Meghan. And I don’t feel it. So I know she’s fine.”

  Her mother was absolute, and Meg couldn’t tell if it was delusion or denial that was fueling her.

  Either way, she didn’t push the issue.

  “I’ll keep you and Dad posted,” she told her mother as she hung up.

  Meg went back out onto the streets and continued to show her sister’s photo to nearby shops and vendors in the streets, and no one had seen her.

  Two hours later, she found herself on a park bench, sipping a hot coffee, staring into the horizon. It was so hard to focus lately. It was the level of anxiety she was feeling. She found herself constantly staring into space, consumed by emotion. She briefly wondered if this was how her sister felt all of the time. Gen was so much more emotional than she was. Meg was no-nonsense, even brisk. She always joked that she had an ice heart, the opposite of Gen’s bleeding heart.

  “It’s the writer in me,” Gen would always say. “I have to channel my characters, Meg. So I have to feel them.”

  Meg always rolled her eyes because nothing sounded so miserable to her as to experience twice the emotion of a normal person. It literally turned her stomach, and Gen always laughed at that.

  “You’re too hard,” she’d tell Meg. “You need to be a little softer.”

  “That’s weakness,” Meg always replied.

  “I’m not weak,” Gen would say. “I’m passionate.”

  “You’re something,” Meg answered with a laugh.

  Even as kids, Gen would make up creative stories about any given situation. Bumps in the night, animal tracks at summer camp, people passing by. She’d gotten in a lot of trouble growing up for lying, because she hadn’t figured out yet how to channel her creativity. Once she discovered writing, her entire life had opened up into a thousand different worlds.

  Meg had been almost envious, but then she found science.

  The exact knowing of what was what, and what would be, and how it all added up to a perfect answer. She and Gen were polar opposites, yin to yang, and once they’d found their rhythm, it was perfect.

  They balanced each other out.

  They kept each other sane.

  They were the apples of their parents’ eyes, in two separate ways.

  And if Meg didn’t find her sister, everything would fall apart. Without Gen, she’d be too hard, too rigid. She got up and paced the sidewalks, oblivious to the stares. She continued showing Gen’s photo, growing more and more frustrated by the second.

  “Someone had to have seen something,” she told the last person she spoke to. She was met with a sympathetic stare.

  “I’ll keep you in my prayers,” the lady said.

  Even though she knew in her heart that Gen wouldn’t answer, Meg kept texting.

  Come home.

  Answer your phone.

  I love you.

  I love you.

  She knew the detective
had the phone, but some strange irrational part of her felt better from trying to communicate with Gen, almost as if Gen would feel the messages, feel the sentiment behind them.

  Nothing changed, though.

  Gen was still gone, and Meg was still here.

  Alone.

  * * *

  Joe called that night to check on her, and she read Joey a bedtime story over FaceTime.

  “Mommy, when will you be home?” he asked, a smudge by his mouth. She wanted to reach through the screen and wipe it off, to hug him tight.

  “As soon as I can, baby,” she answered.

  “You haven’t found Aunt Nini yet?” he asked, his eyes wide.

  Her own filled with tears, and she brushed at them, annoyed. She never cried.

  “No, baby. I haven’t. But I’m looking.”

  “You’ll find her,” Joey said confidently. “She doesn’t play hide-and-seek very well. She always gives up.”

  Meg thought about that—how whenever they played, Gen always pretended Joey was too smart for her, that she couldn’t find him, and how he always roared with laughter when she’d conceded. She was such a good aunt.

  IS, she corrected mentally. Gen is a good aunt.

  Joe watched her quietly. “She’s okay,” he told her softly. “You have to believe that.”

  “Why do I have to?” she asked. “She’s gone, and I can’t find her. There’s no way to know what happened.”

  “Sometimes, you just have to have faith,” he answered. “She’s probably somewhere, licking her wounds. You know how she is.”

  Her agitation bubbled. “Everyone keeps saying that,” she snapped. “But she wouldn’t make me worry like this. Maybe Thad, but never me. No one understands that this is serious. That this isn’t like her.”

  Joe hugged Joey, and said, “Hey, buddy, run down to the bathroom. I’ll be there in a second to help brush your teeth.” When Joey had gone, Joe turned to his wife.

  “I know that,” he said firmly. “I’m trying to help. I’m not the enemy.”

  She felt immediately guilty for the wounded look on his face, knowing that she’d put it there. None of this was his fault, far from it.

  “I’m sorry,” she said quickly. She wasn’t an emotional person, but she was always quite aware of when she was in the wrong, and she wasn’t afraid to admit it. “I’m sorry.”

  “You’re under a lot of pressure,” Joe told her softly. “You need to give yourself some grace.”

  “And other people, too,” she added. He smiled.

  “Maybe. Everyone is trying their best,” he told her.

  “Except for Thad.”

  “We can’t presume to know what Thad’s thinking, or why he’s not there,” Joe finally said. “We don’t know what happens behind closed doors, Meg.”

  “Are you siding with Thad?” she asked incredulously.

  “No.” Joe shook his head. “I’m just saying we don’t know everything. There are always two sides to everything, and we’ve always only known Gen’s.”

  “Because Thad was being a dick.”

  “I can’t argue with that,” Joe said. “But that still doesn’t mean that there’s not something there that we don’t know about.”

  “Maybe,” she said, chewing on her thumbnail. “Maybe I should try to find out his side.”

  “I didn’t say that,” Joe answered. “I’m just pointing out that he has one.”

  “But I need to find out what it is,” Meg said. “It might make all the difference.”

  “You need to be careful,” Joe told her. “Don’t get too involved in things that might hinder the investigation. Stay in your lane, Meg.”

  “My sister is my lane,” she replied before she hung up.

  Meg didn’t know a lot about what was going on, but she did know that she had every right to try to figure it out.

  She reached for her phone to call Thad.

  10

  Gen, Then

  “Why don’t you ever talk about your past?” Gen asked Thad as they held hands and walked along the lake. The water lapped at their bare toes.

  “What’s the point?” Thad asked. “It’s the past. I only like to focus on the future.”

  “Very diplomatic,” she laughed. “But the past can be learned from.”

  “Or it can drown us,” he pointed out. “If that’s all we focus on.”

  “And everyone says I’m the dramatic one,” she rolled her eyes.

  They stepped over a piece of driftwood.

  “All I’m saying is, we’re here at my parents’ lake house, and you seem to like the family interaction, but you never invite me over to your family’s functions, and you never talk about your past relationships. It’s like you’re a ghost.”

  “Oh, my God, Gen. You are the dramatic one.” He rolled his eyes now, and she had to laugh.

  “Okay. You’re not a ghost. But you act like you’re an army of one.”

  “I’m not an army at all. I’m just a man in love with you. And I love your family, too.”

  He kissed her nose, and they climbed the stairs to the house, where everyone else was gathered around a board game. They squeezed in, and soon, an afternoon-long game of Trivial Pursuit was going.

  Thad and her father teamed up and skunked them all, and at dinnertime, her mother heaped food upon Thad’s plate. That’s when Gen knew he had been accepted into the fold. Her mother showed her love through food, through taking care of everyone, and now Thad was under her wing.

  “I like your parents,” Thad told her as they huddled under the covers that night at bedtime.

  “Shh,” she cautioned. “You’re not supposed to be in here.”

  “You really think they’re dumb? That they don’t know I sneaked in?”

  “We have to keep up the charade,” she whispered. “It’s the respectful thing to do.”

  From down the hall, they could hear Joe and Meg talking in their room. “Joe and Meg get to sleep together,” Thad pointed out.

  “Joe and Meg are married,” Gen answered. “That’s the difference. My dad is old-fashioned.”

  “Then marry me,” Thad said suddenly. “Marry me, Gen. Be with me forever. Never leave me.”

  Gen sat up, stunned, staring at the man beside her.

  “Marry you?” she repeated slowly. “We haven’t even discussed that.”

  “Marry me,” he said again, smiling now. “I’ve never wanted anything more.”

  “Me, either,” she said, sounding surprised.

  “Is that a yes?” he asked, studying her face.

  She nodded. “Yes.”

  He let out a whoop that was loud enough to be heard two towns over, and they collapsed together laughing. There was a knock on the door two minutes later, and her dad stood there, stern.

  “We’re getting married,” Gen told him, still laughing. “I said yes.”

  The entire family came out of their bedrooms, and everyone milled about. It was decided they’d go ring shopping in the morning.

  “I can’t afford a lot right now,” he told her when they went back to bed, this time without her father saying a word about it. “But I’ll buy you something bigger someday.”

  She shook her head. “That doesn’t matter, Thad. I don’t care.”

  And she didn’t.

  The next day, they found a simple small diamond at the jewelry shop in town, the band woven like a vine around her finger. She loved it, and showed it to everyone who would look. Her excitement was infectious, and everyone was smiling.

  “This is the best day of my life,” she told Thad later in the day, as she still was staring at her ring. He smiled.

  “It’s the first of a million,” he told her. “Each will be better than the last.”

  “Is that a promise?” she asked.

 
He nodded. “Absolutely. My mission in life will be to make you happy. To build you a huge life. To provide you with every possible thing your heart desires.”

  “I can provide those things myself,” she said quietly. “All I need from you...is you.”

  He nestled his head against her neck. “I need to provide for you. My father never did for my mother. I always said I’d never be him.”

  It was the first he’d said anything about his family, and she froze, almost scared to prod him.

  “They’re divorced?” she asked, hesitantly.

  “No. They’re dead. They died when I was twelve.”

  She sucked in her breath. No wonder he didn’t like to talk about his past.

  “Do you want to talk about it?” she finally asked.

  “Not right now,” he answered, utterly calm. “I don’t like to think about it. It was a difficult time.”

  “I’m sure,” she answered, shaken. “That’s understandable. Just know that I’m here, whenever you do want to.”

  “I know,” he said. “And that feels amazing. Thank you.”

  She fell asleep, knowing that she’d given him something he’d never had before—a confidante, and that felt amazing, too.

  In the morning, he acted normally, just as he always did, and so she followed his lead. When he wanted to talk about it, he would. She wasn’t going to push him.

  They’d gone boating on Lake Michigan with her family, and her mother packed a picnic of fried chicken and cheese. He seemed so happy, so impressed with the little things, and now she understood why.

  His mother had died when he was so young that he didn’t remember what it was like to be cared for. It triggered her maternal instincts, and she vowed he’d never feel that way again.

  In the evening, when they returned home, she started the shower for him, and handed him a towel.

  He kissed her softly.

  “You’re so good to me,” he told her.

  “This is just the beginning,” she promised.

  And it was.

  11

  Gen, Now

  Gen stirred, her head splintering in a thousand different shards of pain.