We’re going someplace where we can be real and not have to deal with anyone else’s expectations.
I’ll let you know that I’m alive.
T
“This is a joke,” I said briskly. “A taunt. She’s trying to shake us up.”
“It’s not a joke. She wouldn’t do that.”
“It’s conceivable to you that she would run away with Mick but not that she would try to rattle our cages?”
Maureen started crying, covering her face with her hands and weeping into them. I tried to comfort her, but my mind was racing. Where could they have gone? What was Tanya trying to do? She wasn’t even seventeen yet; was she out of her mind?
I called the police. “My daughter has been kidnapped,” I said when someone answered. Maureen looked up from her tears when she heard this, but I continued.Mick might not have physically abducted her, but he had done exactly that emotionally. He turned her into someone so much darker than she was.
Maureen and I spent the twenty minutes it took for the police to arrive on our respective cell phones because we didn’t want to tie up the landline. She called Codie because she knew Tanya adored her and confided in her. Then she called her mother and father, presumably just to vent, as they could hardly do anything from North Carolina. I called several of Tanya’s friends peppering them with questions about any information they might have about where Tanya and Mick had gone. The best I could get out of any of them was Tanya’s friend Elizabeth telling me that they talked about taking a trip to Montauk before the weather got bad.
“It’s because of the baby,”Maureen said at a point when we’d stopped making calls at the same time.
“It’s because of that bum she’s dating.”
“It’s not just that. Do you remember how she cried in her room after we told her? She thought we were replacing her.”
“That was a long time ago.”
“She never wanted to talk about the baby.”
“She never wanted to talk about anything. I couldn’t even ask her what she wanted for dinner anymore without getting a snarl from her.”
Maureen seemed ashen. Given the advanced stage of her pregnancy, I was more than a little concerned about how this was affecting her. “Gerry, what are we going to do if she stays away?”
“She’s not going to stay away.” I put an arm around her shoulder and guided her over to the couch. “She’ll be back in a few days.”
The cops came and we told them what little we knew. Maureen showed them the letter and this essentially put the lie to my kidnapping theory. They asked us questions for several minutes, and with each one I became more uneasy about how they would pursue the case. I understood that they had numerous responsibilities, most far more pressing than tracking down a runaway teenager. But it seemed obvious that they wouldn’t come close to dealing with this the way I wanted them to.
Maureen was back on the phone as soon as they left.
“I’m going out,” I said.
She put her hand over the phone. “Where are you going?”
“I’m gonna try to find her.”
“How?”
“I don’t know.”
I got in the car and drove, clueless about where I was going. I passed by Tanya’s school and the park nearby that kids hung around on Saturday nights. There were dozens of teenagers at both, many with open liquor bottles. I was always so proud of Tanya for not being one of them. I drove onto the campus of the college that Mick attended. Again, there was the sound of wild partying with music blaring that I might have liked under different circumstances. And then I just started driving aimlessly, searching left and right, pent on bringing my daughter back and doing physical harm to the man who stole her. I drove for hours this way, nearly getting into two car accidents because my mind was decidedly not on the road.
When I got back home, Maureen was still awake, seated on the couch, the cell phone and the portable phone by her side. She looked up at me hopefully for a fraction of a second before she lowered her eyes.
“Nothing?” she said.
“Not this time.”
Maureen started to cry again. I sat down next to her.
“She’ll be back,” I said, wondering why I was so strongly convinced that this wouldn’t really be the case.
I didn’t sleep at all that night, frazzled by the amphetamine kick of anxiety and frustration, unaware of how much anxiety, frustration, and the biggest gut-punch of all – futility – lay ahead for me.
• • •
Reese got up during the night three times on Friday, and I got maybe two-and-a-half hours sleep. It didn’t matter. The trip I was taking Saturday morning had me so wired that I would have been fine staying up with him all night.
I let Codie sleep until ten, though I was itching to get on the road. There was no particular reason for me to leave this early. In fact, I could have driven to Pittsburgh Sunday morning and still gotten to the arena in plenty of time. But I wanted to give myself a huge margin for delays and other eventualities. I wouldn’t let Tanya slip past me again because of a traffic jam.
Reese was on his playmat, and I was rolling a ball back and forth in front of him trying to pique his interest when Codie came into the family room.
“Sorry about all of the noise last night,” I said. “I don’t know what was bothering him.”
“He made a lot of noise last night?”
I stopped rolling the ball. “He is going to be safe with you, right?”
“Yeah, of course. I vaguely heard something. I promise I’ll keep my ears open tonight. You ready to head off on your mission?”
“I was ready Thursday night. I’m all set. I have a bag packed and a few new playlists on the iPod – including a couple made up of Tanya’s favorites, assuming Mick hasn’t convinced her to listen only to trance music.”
I went into the kitchen and poured some coffee into a travel mug, then picked Reese up from his mat and kissed him. I walked with Reese and Codie toward the front door.When we got there, I kissed the baby one more time and then handed him to Codie. She hugged me tightly.
“I hope this goes well,” she said.
“I’m gonna do everything I can to make it go well.” “I know you will. Stay cool, okay?”
“I will.” I kissed Reese one more time. “Have fun with the kid.”
“Us? We’re going to have a great time. He likes lobster and champagne, right?” She hugged me again and I headed out the door.
I felt buoyed during the first few hours of the trip by the feeling that I was finally doing something about bringing Tanya home. I’d been feeling so powerless. Now, there was great music on the car stereo and I had a true sense of purpose. About an hour into the trip, I put on the live River album that I’d downloaded Friday afternoon. This was the third time I listened to it, feeling like in some odd way this would help me to get to know my daughter better. It didn’t hurt that I liked the music, very ’70s in feel with numerous tempo changes and long instrumental passages punctuated by occasionally clever lyrics. I would have liked this band a lot in high school or college and could imagine myself listening to them with some regularity even now.
I got off I-78 in Bethel and drove around for a few minutes looking for a place to have lunch. I felt like this trip demanded something better than rest stop food and was rewarded when I found a decent little country kitchen with surprisingly good coffee and a dessert selection that forced itself upon me. While I was there, I checked in on Codie and Reese – he was napping after what Codie described as a “very full morning.” Then it was back on the road to another highway that would bring me ever closer to my destination.
Whether it was the lack of sleep catching up to me or the huge stretch of road in front of me, I sagged about and hour later. I tried to pump myself up with U2’s Joshua Tree album, but even this didn’t help. And with this slump came the first doubts I had since Codie’s phone call Thursday night. Mellon Arena held 17,000 spectators. How would I pick Tanya out of a
crowd this large? What would I do if Mick got in the way? What would I do if Tanya wouldn’t talk to me? I clicked off the iPod and drove the next forty miles in silence, suffused in apprehension. This could go wrong in so many ways. I even began to wonder if I should turn the car around.
I thought about what Maureen would have done in this situation. If Codie had called her instead, would she have gone off after Tanya immediately? Would she have worried that doing so was a mistake? The more I thought about this from her perspective, the more I realized that her reaction would have been the same as mine: if there were any chance in the world to convince Tanya to come home, she would take it.
This knowledge fortified me, and as I got off I-376 around 6:30 that night and headed toward the hotel, I knew once again that what I was doing was right and necessary.
Still, having an entire day in Pittsburgh before the concert was much more than was good for me. Now that I was here without any delays, it seemed a little foolish to have arrived so soon. I did as much Internet research as I could about the Riverriders and learned that many of them liked to camp out around or near the concert hall before a show. So after a quick dinner, I walked down to Mellon Arena in the hopes of finding Tanya or someone who knew her. But the parking lot was full for the hockey game that was going on.
I drove for a while, but I had no idea what I was looking for. I imagined scenes from Woodstock with sitar music and tie-dyed shirts, even though I knew this wasn’t at all what Riverriders dressed like.When I found nothing that looked like a cluster of rock and roll fans, I convinced myself that Tanya wasn’t even in town yet and was probably still on her way here from the band’s last stop in Cleveland.
I went back to the hotel, called Codie, and kept her on the line much longer than I think she wanted. When I hung up, I tried to occupy myself with reading and television, but found that nothing held my attention. I opened the minibar and poured myself a $10 Scotch, but that did little to help. I went to bed, only to find myself watching Saving Private Ryan on HBO at 2:30.
I walked over to the arena again in the middle of the next afternoon. There were four parking lots and, as expected, they were all nearly empty at this time. I wanted to be there before the crowd, assuming most Riverriders would do the same and that this was my best shot at finding Tanya. Of course, it also gave me plenty of time to become anxious and to feel conspicuous passing security guards and parking attendants repeatedly while I made my circuit. Finally, I explained what I was doing. I didn’t want anyone arresting me for loitering when my daughter was so close. I approached a security guard in his early twenties, assuming that a younger man would have a better idea of what I was talking about. He knew all about the Riverriders and told me that arena staff had briefed the entire security force about them. The promoters had in fact prearranged that they would be gathering in the West Lot. I wasn’t sure how the Riverriders would know this, but there seemed to be some kind of communications net amongst them.
This information made it easier for me to watch out for Tanya. Around 5:00, I saw a van enter with oars sticking from its windows in signature Riverrider fashion. I felt a surge of adrenaline along with another of apprehension as I walked toward it. It had North Carolina plates. Five people got out, opened the back, and pulled out chairs, a hibachi, and a cooler.While one person poured charcoal into the hibachi and another took food and beer out of the cooler, the other three played with a Frisbee. They could have been attending a football game.
None of the five was Tanya or Mick. I thought about approaching this group, but realized that it was ridiculous. Riverriders came from all over the country, and while they communed with one another and even hooked up and traveled in packs, the odds against any one of these people knowing Tanya were enormous.
Over the next hour, the parking lot began to fill and more and more Riverriders staked out their territory. I monitored each car and van carefully. There were dozens of them in this gathering now, maybe even more than a hundred. The air was filled with cooking smells, the scent of marijuana, and the sounds of various River albums playing at high volume. There were still no signs of my daughter.
I was no more than a hundred feet from her when she got out of a green van behind Mick. She smiled back at a laughing, curly-haired woman who helped her unload their cargo.
I found it difficult to move. I hadn’t seen Tanya in more than five months and she’d undergone some changes. She now had blond streaks in her brown hair, and it was longer than she ever wore it. She had on jeans with huge holes in the thighs and an oversized denim jacket. But the thing that distinguished her most from the Tanya I remembered was how easily she laughed with her fellows. Mick seemed as taciturn as ever, but Tanya seemed relaxed, extraordinarily comfortable with her environment, and content. I hadn’t seen her look this good in years.
This threw me. I had expected the grim, distant girl who last glowered at us from across the dinner table. The girl I sparred with over everything from politics to boyfriends to television shows. The girl who needed saving. To see her call a greeting to someone in another van and dance to whichever of the several songs she heard made me wonder, albeit briefly, if my being here would really do her any good. But my need to have her back with me overrode any other notion.
I found my legs and walked slowly through the cluster of people who separated us.Mick, who sat on a bumper, turned and saw me first, putting his head down and moving around to the front of the van. Tanya didn’t notice me until I practically stood next to her.When she did, her face dropped and her eyes, instantly filled with tears, darted away from me. She didn’t make any move in my direction.
“What are you doing here?” she said haltingly, wiping at her eyes.
I stopped walking toward her, though I was desperate to pull her into my arms. “Can we go somewhere and talk?”
“I’m not going home with you. Let’s just get that on the table right now.” Her expression darkened, transforming her back to the Tanya I came to know. “Where’s Mom? Oh, right, she has a different kid now.”
I took a deep breath. “I think it would be a really good idea if we went for a little walk together.”
The curly-haired woman approached us and asked Tanya if she was all right. Tanya said she’d be “fine in a minute” and the woman walked away. She turned back and looked at me. “It’s a hell of a drive from Port Jeff.”
“It was worth it to see you. You have no idea how much I’ve missed you.”
“Why’s that? Not enough arguments in the house without me.”
Stay cool, okay? I heard Codie’s voice in my head. I knew that lashing out at Tanya was counterproductive, as was reminding her that since she was a minor I could force her to come home.
“Something has happened, Tanya. Something terrible.”
Her expression softened. There was worry there now. The kind of worry that a teenaged girl might experience. “What are you talking about?”
“Let’s go somewhere and talk.”
She tilted her head forward and held her gaze. “Tell me.”
Never in my life had I imagined this moment. Not with Tanya only seventeen. The confluence of different songs impressed itself on my consciousness as I ran my fingers through my hair. I had prepared to break this news to my daughter. But while I thought of what to say, I greatly underestimated how hard it would be to say it to her face.
“It’s your mother.”
Tanya took two gentle steps backward and leaned against the van. Tears started rolling down her face almost instantly. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw one of the people from the van look in our direction, move toward us, and then stop.
I wanted to reach out to her. I wanted to hold her as I hadn’t in so many years and tell her everything I felt and how much I needed her. But as I approached her, she stiffened and I stopped in my tracks.
“What happened?” she said.
“It was a blood clot to the brain. I found her when I came home from work.”
“When?”
“In January.”
Tanya turned away, rested her head against the van, and sobbed. Even the cacophony of music couldn’t mask this sound. I put my arm around her shoulders. She didn’t shrug me away, but she also didn’t ease into my embrace. As I held her, Mick came around the other side of the van. I looked up at him as he stood next to us.
“What are you doing to her?” he said.
“Get away from us,” I said with more contempt than I ever put in my voice before. If Tanya turned to him then, I didn’t know what I would do. But if she even knew he was there, she didn’t acknowledge it. Mick tried to stare me down, but he was completely overmatched. “She doesn’t need you,” he said thinly.
“Go away now.”
He averted his eyes and then turned and walked off. I only wish I could have done the same to him a year ago.
Tanya still hadn’t turned around. I leaned into her and kissed her on the head. Her hair smelled foreign to me.
“Come on, Queenie,” I said. “Let’s go home.”
She shook her head slightly. “I’m not leaving.”
She said it so softly I could barely make it out over the blare. I shut my eyes and reminded myself that she was in shock over the news. “It’s time for you to come back.”
She turned at that point, her eyes rimmed in scarlet. “There’s nothing there for me now.”
If she was trying to hurt me, she was doing a sensational job. “Your friends are there for you. Your aunt.” This got a roll of her eyes. She obviously felt betrayed by Codie, knowing this was how I found her. “Your brother. Me.”
“Mom’s gone, Dad.” A tear rolled down her face with stunning rapidity. “I can’t be there with Mom gone.”
I couldn’t conceal everything I was feeling. Not with the way things were going. “Tanya, you’re seventeen. What makes you think you’re old enough to make a decision like this? What makes you think you’re ready to live on your own?”
“I’ve been living on my own,” she said angrily. “And I was doing great until you came around.”
When You Went Away Page 9