by Traci DePree
“So why didn’t you come back to see us later?” Danny asked.
Bill ran a hand through his hair and leaned forward. “When I was leaving, I saw Livvy with a boy, a teenager. I assumed it was your son.” He turned to Livvy again. “You looked so happy. I felt like I’d be intruding on the life you and Danny made.”
“You wouldn’t have been intruding. You were a good friend,” Danny said.
“So were you,” Bill said.
There was one more question that continued to niggle at Kate, so she ventured to ask it. “Did you and Sonja ever see each other outside of your lessons?”
The professor pursed his lips. “We did have coffee once. Right here in the student union. She seemed to get emotional when she played piano. I don’t know why. But one day she just broke down. I didn’t know what to do, so I bought her coffee.” He shrugged.
That he’d so willingly mentioned the event confirmed to Kate what she’d concluded after visiting with his sisters: Dr. Johnson was in no way connected to Sonja Weaver’s disappearance. He’d been an observer along the way, nothing more.
“I know I asked this before, but did Sonja say anything about where she was going after she left you?” Kate posed the last question in her mental list.
Bill shook his head. “Just that she had an appointment. Said it was something that might change her future.”
Her future? What could that mean?
THE CAR WAS QUIET as Danny drove them down the mountain roads back toward Copper Mill.
“What kind of an appointment can change someone’s future?” Kate said.
“I don’t know,” Livvy replied.
The statement certainly didn’t sound like someone who was depressed. Depressed people didn’t generally think of the future and its possibilities. But both Willy Bergen and Dr. Johnson had witnessed agitation, jumpiness that day. Sonja had been acting oddly, not like herself. The idea of post-traumatic stress disorder reinserted itself.
Then a new thought hit Kate. For the first time she wondered if perhaps Sonja had gone for a second opinion after failing to get an Alzheimer’s diagnosis. It was pure conjecture. Everything she’d learned had pointed to Sonja’s own conviction that she carried the memory-fading illness.
On an impulse, she called the Weavers’ house. Becky answered the phone.
“Hey, Becky, is your dad there?” Kate asked.
“No,” she said, “he’s working night shift at the countertop place.”
“Would it be okay if I stopped over in a little bit?”
“That’d be great. Brian’s at an away track meet. I don’t like being home alone all that much.”
Danny dropped Kate off at her house so she could get her car, then she drove to the Weavers’. The For Sale sign was planted in the front yard.
Practically every light in the house was on, even though the sun had yet to set. Kate smiled to herself as she remembered her own children as teenagers doing the same thing when she and Paul would go out for an evening. Becky met her at the door and gave her a hug.
“Are you okay?” Kate asked, shutting the door behind her and following the teen to the family room at the back of the house.
“I miss Mom. Judy’s been coming over to kind of fill in, but she has a date tonight.”
“Really?” Kate said, her curiosity piqued. “With whom?”
“Walter something or other.” She shrugged. “They’ve been going out for a couple months. I think she’s hoping for a proposal.”
Kate wondered why Judy and Brad appeared to be on a date at one point, but Becky answered the question before she had a chance to ask it.
“She even took Dad out to the Bristol to get his take on the guy. Said that without Mom around to counsel her, she needed Dad to fill in. It’s kind of pathetic if you ask me.”
Kate was glad to have her suspicions about Brad and Judy cleared up. If Judy was that involved with her soon-to-be fiancé, she couldn’t really be after Brad. Kate noticed the girl’s homework laid out on the coffee table while the TV played some reality talent competition.
“Do you watch this show a lot?” Kate asked.
Becky nodded. “Mom’s favorite.”
It made sense, since the woman had had similar aspirations in her younger days.
“So,” Becky began as she took a seat on the couch, “what did you want to see me about?”
“Do you recall your mom taking any medication?” Kate asked.
“Sure,” Becky said, rising and disappearing down the hall toward the stairs. Kate could hear her footsteps overhead.
When Becky returned, she had a brown prescription bottle in her hand. The label bore Sonja’s name and the drug name—Aricept. An Alzheimer’s drug. Kate had seen the ads for it on television. She took note of the doctor’s name: not Gove but Peterson.
“Have you gotten any medical bills from this doctor?” Kate said, pointing to the name.
“Um...,” the teen said, twisting her face in puzzlement. “There’s a pile of mail on the coffee table.” She pointed to the stack. “Dad’s been on a mail strike, everything but the essentials,” she said. “I think he keeps hoping Mom will come back and take care of it all.”
“Can we look?”
“No prob,” Becky said, moving the heap and handing a portion to Kate. They stood side by side, shuffling through envelopes. Then finally Kate saw something from the Diagnosis Specialists in Chattanooga. She paused as her heart changed tempo.
“Did your mom ever mention this place?” She held up the envelope for Becky to see.
The girl shook her head. “What kid pays attention to that kind of thing? She went to doctors all the time.” Becky moved around the counter and pulled out a letter opener, handing it to Kate. Kate noted the postmark: April 4. The letter arrived four days after Sonja’s disappearance.
“Can you read it out loud?” Becky asked, her eyes conveying her trepidation.
Kate began,
Dear Mrs. Weaver,
As we discussed when you came in for your appointment and subsequent follow-up appointment on March 13 we are also informing you in writing of the conclusions of our recent testing.
While it isn’t possible to diagnose Alzheimer’s with complete certainty until after death, we are able to assess whether a person is likely to be a victim of this disease given the tests that you underwent. Your MRI and CT scans came back positive for the illness. These combined with the cognitive tests we performed put you in the category of “probable early-onset Alzheimer’s patient.”
Our psychological tests have further determined that you suffer post-traumatic stress disorder from an event that happened at an earlier time in your life.
Since we have already gotten you started on some prescription medications we’ll see how you respond to those and adjust as needed. We would also like to set up times for counseling with you and your family to help keep these debilitating illnesses at bay.
Sincerely,
Dr. Weston G. Peterson
Kate stared at the words as their full impact struck her. Sonja had gotten a second opinion—and this one not only confirmed her Alzheimer’s suspicions, but it also pointed to post-traumatic stress disorder as a contributor to Sonja’s symptoms.
If the medicine was still here, it meant Sonja didn’t have it with her. Her symptoms would only have gotten worse.
Sonja was lost, not only in the physical world, but also in her very mind. The truth of that reality was stark. Devastating.
Chapter Thirty-Three
The ringing phone made Kate and Becky both jump. Becky rushed to answer it.
“Hello?” she said. “No, he isn’t here.” She listened while the person on the other end talked. “We’ve told you to stop calling us! My dad just got a job; we’ll start paying as soon as we can.”
Instantly Kate was on alert. That guy. “Can I talk to him?” she whispered to the teenager, who gladly handed the phone over.
“Hello,” Kate said to the young man on the line.
“Listen,” he said, “I’m just doing my job, trying to get a few back mortgage payments.”
“I understand,” Kate said. “Have you called this number before?”
“Have I?” He laughed. “I’ve been calling every day for weeks.”
“Weeks? The same time or at different times?”
“Different times. Sometimes the morning, sometimes at night. The guy always tells me he’s going to get a check in the mail, and then nothing.”
Kate had a hunch. “What’s your name?”
“Ronnie G. We don’t give out last names.”
Ronnie G! Kate couldn’t believe it.
“Do you have a record of the calls you make?”
“Sure.”
“Did you make a call here on March thirty-first?”
There was silence as the young man clicked computer keys. “Yeah,” he finally said. “At noon on the thirty-first. Actually, that would’ve been my first call to this number. I’d been given the case by another agent who was leaving.”
“Who did you speak with?”
Kate could hear him clicking computer keys. “Sonja,” he finally said.
“Did you tell her your name?”
“We always do,” he said.
Ronnie Gilbert! He’d traumatized Sonja, and that circumstance had become the fulcrum that shifted the course of Sonja’s life.
Kate glanced at Becky as excitement coursed through her veins. She’d practically forgotten the young man on the other end of the line.
“So, are they going to send payment or what?” he was saying.
“I’ll have Brad call you,” Kate promised, writing the collection agent’s number on a Post-it that she stuck on the refrigerator.
Kate didn’t want to get Becky’s hopes up too high. After all, what evidence did she have that would be of any real help in finding Sonja? Only evidence that Sonja did indeed have Alzheimer’s and PTSD...and a name: Ronnie G.
Kate stayed with the girl until Brian got home from his meet, then said good night.
As she drove home, the tumblers in Kate’s brain started falling into place, and she began to piece together the events of the day Sonja disappeared. Brian had come in late the night before, so Sonja was already in a fragile state. Then she and Brad had argued that morning before work, and a man had called telling her he was Ronnie G. She was confused about time and place and thought he was Ronnie Gilbert.
Maybe Sonja thought she was in high school again, or maybe she thought Ronnie had come back from the dead. Either way, she was upset, so she went to the creek to walk the dog, read her Bible, and pray. But the dog took off. She chased it and came across Willy Bergen. Something he said must have sparked the confusion about Ronnie again, because she called him by that name and took off, shedding her jacket in the bush and losing her car keys. When she got to the parking lot her car wasn’t there since it was in the lot two miles away. But the alarm went off on her phone, reminding her of her piano lesson.
In her confusion, Sonja called Dr. Johnson instead of Brad for a ride. Perhaps his name was on the reminder on her phone, or Sonja remembered his kindness from the time after her piano lesson when they’d had coffee. The professor took her to Pine Ridge where she had her lesson. There she told Bill Johnson she had an appointment afterward that could change her life.
“An appointment that could change her life?” Kate murmured, as she tried again to come up with what that meant.
She glanced in the rearview mirror as she turned onto Smoky Mountain Road. Post-traumatic stress disorder—the words pulsed in neon in Kate’s mind. Victims of the disorder often suffered flashbacks. In Sonja’s mind, she was still a teenager, and Ronnie Gilbert was tormenting her.
Kate’s eyes widened as she instantly knew where Sonja had gone.
Chapter Thirty-Four
She went to Nashville!” Kate said to herself, recalling the story Judy had told of the fateful audition.
If she’d gotten the role, that appointment could have been life changing!
As soon as Kate got home, she dialed the number for the Pine Ridge bus station, but the place was already closed for the night. “We’re sorry,” the voice on the recording said, “but there are no more buses running today. We open for business at seven o’clock on weekdays. Try us again later or leave a message at the tone.”
Kate hung up. She’d just have to be there when they opened first thing in the morning.
THE PINE RIDGE BUS STATION was a nondescript building of cement block painted an off-white. The sign in front read simply Bus, with a painting of one of the vehicles beneath it.
Kate was there promptly at seven o’clock. She prayed this wouldn’t be another wild-goose chase. A part of her, the part where faith presided, told her to keep moving forward even though there were no certainties.
She walked up the long narrow sidewalk from the street where she’d parked. The weariness she felt attested to her lack of sleep the night before. The short female attendant was unlocking the doors just as Kate got to the front entrance.
“That was good timin’,” the woman said with a soft Southern drawl, adding a shy smile as she went through a door that led to the back side of the counter with a pass-through window. “The first bus doesn’t come for a couple hours.”
“I’m not here for a ticket,” Kate said.
The attendant raised her eyebrows. “What’re you here for, then? Meetin’ someone?”
“I’m looking for a woman,” Kate said. “She’s been missing since March thirty-first.” She reached into her handbag and pulled out the newspaper clipping with the photograph of Sonja.
The woman squinted hard as she studied the shot. “What’s her name?”
“Sonja Weaver,” Kate said.
The woman was typing something into her computer on the other side of the counter. “That’s Weaver?” she said.
“Yes,” Kate confirmed.
“Sorry, there’s no one listed by that name on the thirty-first, or the first of April.” She swiveled the screen around to show Kate.
Just when Kate thought she’d finally found the way to Sonja, another dead end. She thanked the woman and turned to leave. Where else could Sonja have gone? What place could have changed her future?
Kate passed the rows of seats, looking for anything that might point her to Sonja when she noticed a sliver of pink in the corner of one chair. She paused to study it. Something was stuck in that chair. She sat down and reached between the cushions, pulling up a pink cell phone. Kate turned it over to see if she could identify its owner. It was powered off, so she pressed the button to turn it on, hoping there was enough juice in the battery to look through the contact list. Finally the screen lit up.
Kate pushed the button that led to the contact page. She couldn’t believe her eyes! There were numbers for Brad, Becky, Brian, and Judy Connelly—and the listing that read “home” was the number Kate had dialed many times in the past few weeks.
It was Sonja’s phone! The one she’d used to call Dr. Johnson. She had been there. Fiddling with the phone in her hands, Kate glanced back at the woman behind the counter and wondered why Sonja wouldn’t have been listed on the roster. Then the realization hit her. If Sonja thought she was back in high school, she wouldn’t have used her married name.
Kate quickly returned to the ticket window. “Excuse me,” she said, trying to recall the maiden name Judy had mentioned the first time they’d met. “Can you try Sonja Russell?” She waited as the woman typed the new name in.
The attendant turned the screen toward Kate, and there it was in black and white. Proof that Sonja had bought a ticket to Nashville!
Kate called Paul to tell him what she’d discovered as soon as she climbed into her car to go pack an overnight bag.
“Do you want me to come?” Paul asked.
Kate did, but she knew he had a lot of work to do. “I’d love that, but I don’t think you have to. At least not yet. We’ll see what I find when I get there.”
The drive from Copper Mill to Nashville was only two and a half hours. It was a good opportunity for Kate to think through where to head first. Judy had mentioned an audition. But where had that been?
Kate dialed Hamilton Road Florist to see if Sonja’s friend could remember.
“This is Judy. Can I help you?” the woman answered.
“Good morning,” Kate said. They exchanged a few pleasantries, then she turned to the reason for her call. “I’m wondering if you remember where Sonja’s audition was all those years ago, when Ronnie Gilbert showed up.”
There was silence on the line, and Kate wondered if Judy had heard her. “Are you there?” she finally said.
“Yes,” Judy said. “Why would you want to know that?”
“I have a hunch that I want to follow up on, about Sonja.” She didn’t want to elaborate in case that hunch was wrong.
“Of course I remember,” Judy said. “It was at the Grand Ole Opry.”
“Would she have gone to the Ryman Auditorium?” Kate asked, knowing that the beautiful theater had been the original home for the show.
“Hmm.” Judy paused in thought, then said, “I don’t think so. I’m pretty sure she went to the one at Opryland USA.”
Kate asked her for directions, which Judy knew off the top of her head, then hung up.
Two hours later, Kate exited the interstate and followed Briley Parkway north toward Opryland. The area was sprawling with building after building dedicated to the musical haven—hotels, a mall, as well as the relatively new Grand Ole Opry.
“She could have gone anywhere,” Kate said to herself, looking at the maze of attractions, including an amusement park and a glass-enclosed arboretum/hotel.