A Person Could Disappear Here

by Terri George

  And, of course, my parents became Abbey’s legal guardians for the eight months until she was eighteen, and of age. Which sort of made her my sister, legally, officially – or makes I suppose, because it’s not something that runs out.

  It was a horrible time. It was the end of laughter and whispered conversations in the dark as the rest of the house slept. Abbey withdrew within herself, barely speaking the rest of that summer.

  Then it was back to school. How she got through her A-Levels I don’t know. I couldn’t have. The school was willing for her to defer, but it would have meant taking the whole year off and Abbey wouldn’t have it. It was as if she had something to prove; whether to herself, to her parents, I don’t know. Either way she got straight As and was a shoe-in to her preferred university. And we’re together still.

  The thing about Abbey is, she gets me. I mean the real me. She sees my deepest darkest secret. Sees beyond the bravado: the class clown, fast with a witty quip that has everyone in fits; the unerringly honest child who grew into a mouthy teenager, then confident young woman whose outspokenness sometimes tips over into bluntness. The me who, despite loving, encouraging parents who believe a girl can do anything a boy can, deep down wonders still if she’s clever enough, strong enough, pretty enough. Abbey sees that small knot of uncertainty I keep so well hidden from the world, and she’s always there for me, to hold my hand; figuratively and literally. My safety net when I stumble.

  Never once in the twenty years since that first day at school have I ever regretted my choice of best friend. The closeness of crooks, to paraphrase that old saying.

  So, you see why I have to find her? Wouldn’t you search just as hard for your sister? Because that’s what Abbey is to me. In every way that matters.

  It’s strange, for all the things I do believe in, especially those things Abbey scoffs at, like God, I don’t buy that nonsense about the thickness of blood. Don’t get me wrong, I do love my parents, and Alessandro, but I don’t love them because they’re my parents and brother. I love them for the people they are. (Although I don’t think I tell them enough.) I reckon the true test of your family’s worth is whether or not you like them. If you weren’t related, would you want to be friends with them. After all, don’t they say friends are the family you choose?

  Abbey is my best friend. She is family. So even though I know it’s a monumental task – needles and haystacks spring to mind – I don’t care. I won’t stop looking until I find her…

  I’m yanked from my thoughts by a wailing getting ever closer. Despite the fact that ours is the only other vehicle on this American equivalent of an English A road, and that I quickly pull over into the slow lane, not content with its flashing red and white lights and siren screaming like a heart attack, the driver also feels it necessary to blast its horn repeatedly; as if the hulking red fire truck is somehow invisible to me.

  It passes and veers off down a side road a hundred yards ahead.

  And it’s just me and Alessandro again; the silence broken only by the droning of the car’s engine.

  “Did I thank you for coming with me?”

  Alessandro huffs a laugh. “That’s doubtful.”

  “But you know I’m grateful. And that I love you.”

  “Yeah, I know. Right back at you, sis.”

  Taking a detour to drive up and down the streets of the next town we come to takes all of thirty minutes and yields nothing in the way of red convertibles. I can’t say I’m surprised. With little more than a car dealership and handful of shops selling arts and crafts, antiques and electronics, plus an ice cream parlour, it’s barely a village never mind a town. A blip running parallel with the highway.

  The next town isn’t much bigger or the one after that and neither take much longer to search. See? Told you it was boring.

  Even as the sun sinks behind us, shining orange in the rear-view mirror, a perfect pearl-white sphere already hangs low in the blue-grey sky ahead; shadows tricking the brain into seeing the mountains and craters on its surface as the surprised face of the mythical man in the moon.

  Alessandro looks up from his phone. “The next town’s only half an hour away, and it’s a proper one this time, with restaurants and everything. I vote we check into a motel then find somewhere for dinner.”

  Superficially the town looks like the others we’ve passed through only bigger, but as we drive to the motel I sense something under the surface. A sort of impermanence borne out by the number of ‘for sale by owner’ signs on front lawns and stores with ‘closing down’ notices in their window. All is not well here.

  With only a couple of vehicles in its car park it looks like the no-fuss motel is struggling to get guests in its doors, but at least it means there’s no problem getting a room. The receptionist is just as chirpy and the check-in area just as beigely-bland as last night’s motel, although this time with the addition of a migraine-inducing carpet of red and orange swirls. The room is just as well equipped though, and the beds look just as comfy. All in all, I have to say I’m impressed. You certainly get a lot of bang for your buck here.

  Alessandro chucks his holdall on the bed furthest from the window. “Right, I’m starving. Let’s find some grub.”

  After pouring iced water into our glasses the waitress takes our orders. “You’re British, right?”

  And don’t tell me, you just love our accent.

  “This isn’t you guy’s usual holiday destination, but we need all the visitors we can get. So welcome.”

  “Thanks.” At the risk of touching a nerve I’m a bit hesitant, but her comment prompts me to ask, “Has your need for visitors got anything to do with all the houses for sale?”

  The waitress shifts her weight onto the other foot and sighs heavily. “Yeah. Folks are selling up – well trying to. Half the people here worked for the local outdoor retailer, but it’s quitting town. Moving its headquarters seven-hundred miles away to Springfield Missouri.”

  Lucky Springfield. “What are people going to do?”

  “Those who have worked for them for years will be okay. With severance and a bonus for long-term service they could walk away with up to a year’s salary.”

  With salaries being a lot more here than they are at home, that has the potential to be a hell of a lot of money. I wouldn’t mind the thirty grand left over after paying tax I’d get in one lump sum, but even though it sounds like a nice wedge, living in London it wouldn’t last long. “And then what?”

  “Who knows, but we’ll survive somehow, I guess. The town’s known boom and bust before, and there’s always been farming. But when was the last time you met a rich farmer?”

  Blimey, I feel for them. Even if the company I work for folded I’d easily get another job in IT, and if I couldn’t there are plenty of other things I could do. It would mean less money of course, but a job’s a job. And there’s always the last resort of signing on for benefits. But it sounds like the people here don’t have those options.

  That’s the problem with a town putting all its eggs in one corporate basket. If the company leaves town they’re buggered.

  “If you’re looking for a new home, you can snap up a real bargain. Those who have sold were pleased to get out even though it was at a loss. Over two-thousand square feet with remodelled kitchen, but still my sister and her husband only got one-hundred-eighty thousand.”

  I’m not even sure what two-thousand square feet of house looks like, but it sounds pretty big.

  “Sure there’s not much work, but this is a great place to retire to.”

  I watch as our waitress goes back to the counter to place our order with the kitchen before whispering to Alessandro, “Is she serious? Retire here? And do what in the intervening twenty years between retirement and death? Sit on the porch in your rocking chair like mother Abigail watching the corn grow?”

  “I get the feeling you don’t really like it here.”

  With the possible exception of New York, I’ve never had a burning desire to v
isit the US. “Not really.”

  “Well just don’t go pissing off the locals by telling them so.”

  I may be guilty of mouthing off on occasion, but even I wouldn’t be that rude. “Give me some credit. But seriously, I’d top myself if I had to live here. Well maybe not here exactly, but stuck in one of those tiny towns in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by miles of nothing? I’d go bonkers.”

  “You’re definitely a city girl, aren’t you?”

  “Yes. I need restaurants, bars, cinema, galleries, city parks. Life. What’s wrong with that?”

  “Nothing, but I don’t see it’s all that different to country life back home, stuck in the middle of nowhere with just a pub and village shop, if you’re lucky. And these days if it does have one it wouldn’t be the quintessential village general store and post office of the fifties, it’d be a crappy Londis or Spar. And some of it’s just as bleak and treeless. You’d go just as bonkers in a village at home where it’s a twenty-mile drive every time you run out of milk.”

  “Ah but I’d never run out of milk. I’d get Sainsbury’s to deliver it.”

  “Ha ha. I’m just saying don’t judge it based on why we’re here. Give it a chance.”

  And there it is in a nutshell. It’s not here I hate, it’s the reason I’m here.

  The food wasn’t half bad and when Alessandro and I have finished I leave our waitress a generous tip.

  In the spirit of giving it a go I agree to see more of the town and find a bar. Truth is, I could use a drink, and a bar sounds more appealing than taking a bottle of wine back to our room and trying to find something worth watching on TV. Blimey, I thought the radio was bad, but all the adverts breaking up programmes into little more than sound bites is beyond annoying. Just as you’re just getting into it someone pops up on screen telling you (loudly) why you need the latest this or that. No warning, just bam! It makes watching anything nigh on impossible. No wonder everyone has Netflix.

  The bar we end up in is everything I imagine when I think of an American version of a pub: dim lighting, lots of wood, large screens behind the bar showing sports, and only domestic lager on tap.

  On a hot summer’s day, a pint of Caffrey’s with a deliciously creamy head goes down a treat, but generally speaking I’m not a big beer drinker at the best of times – and when I say beer I mean proper beer: bitter or ale (like Caffrey’s) that’s naturally lightly carbonated from the fermentation process, not the fizzy gnat’s piss all lager is.

  Given the looks we get from some of the locals when we walk in and take seats at the bar, I decide Alessandro wouldn’t thank me if I asked to see their wine list. So, black rum and coke it is then.

  I’ve nearly finished my first drink when Alessandro goes to the loo and a bloke who was sitting alone in one of the booths ambles unsteadily to the bar and sits on the stool next to me.

  We Brits have many wonderful ways to describe being drunk (some rude, some weird, some funny) including: arseholed, lashed, rat-arsed, bladdered, trollied, plastered, pissed as a fart, judge, lord or newt, and the brilliant one I discovered recently, from the seventeenth century inspired by (and perfectly describing) the staggering gait of someone who’s drunk, that should be reinstated into the vernacular immediately, bumpsy. From the lager fumes he breaths in my face, I’d say this bloke’s well on the way to being any or all of them.

  “Haven’t seen you in here before. So what are you, on vacation or more rich city folk come to take advantage of a buyers’ market?”

  “Neither. Just passing through.”

  Maybe he thinks this is code for ‘I’m up for a one-night stand’, I don’t know, but he obviously thinks it’s reason enough for him to put his hand on my thigh. Bloody cheek. I mean, seriously, this bloke’s late forties if he’s a day.

  “Looks like you need a refill. Can I buy you a drink?”

  This isn’t the first time I’ve had to deal with the unwanted attentions of a drunk and know it’s always best not to piss them off. So I smile pleasantly as I peel his hand off my leg. “Thanks, but you’re alright.”

  “What’s the matter, my money not good enough for ya?”

  “I just don’t want another drink. I’m going when I finish this.”

  I wasn’t going, but I’m not staying here with this pisshead.

  The bloke’s demeanour changes and the belligerent look in his eyes as he leans closer has me on my guard.

  “You’re British ain’t ya?”

  “Yeah, so?”

  “All the same you Brits. Stuck up snobs. Well we kicked your asses outta here once, so why don’t you just go back where you belong. Because it sure as shit ain’t here.”

  Okay, a) I am not stuck up, and b) what the hell? Is he serious? It was over two-hundred and forty years ago. “Don’t worry mate, come tomorrow morning I’ll be outta here before you’ve sobered up. And seriously, let it go. We have.”

  I really should know better than to laugh at a bloke, especially when he’s drunk, and this one isn’t humourously three sheets to the wind, he looks like he’s gearing up to get really nasty.

  There must be something about the bloke’s body language that gives him away because Alessandro wouldn’t normally look concerned to see me being chatted up at the bar. Having reappeared from the loo, he stares daggers at the bloke.

  “You alright, sis? This bloke bothering you?”

  The bloke huffs a sneering laugh. “Jesus, another one.”

  He slides unsteadily off his stool, pointing a finger in Alessandro’s face, but whatever he’s about to say, a hand on his shoulder stops him.

  “I think it’s time you went home, don’t you, Dan?”

  Dan, as I now know him to be, looks sheepishly at the woman who appears to be a good decade younger and half his size. At first glance I took her to be a peroxide blonde, but then I realise her hair is pure white. With soft grey eyes there’s something ethereal, almost fairy tale about her, like she’s just stepped out of the realm of Narnia.

  She’s certainly got the authoritative air of Lewis’s White Witch or Andersen’s Snow Queen as she holds out an open palm. “Keys.”

  Dan opens his mouth to protest.

  “You can either walk home or sleep it off in the cells. Your choice.”

  Clearly deciding he’d rather sleep in his own bed, Dan hands over his car keys, downs the remains of his beer and staggers out of the bar.

  “Sorry about that,” the woman says. “You’ll have to excuse Dan, he’s having a hard time. Got laid off a few months ago, then his wife left with the kids, and now the bank’s threatening to foreclose. He kinda hates the world right now, so don’t take it personally.”

  I hadn’t really, even though he was bloody rude. But now I just feel sorry for the bloke. I wouldn’t wish all that on anyone. “Poor sod.”

  “Times are tough and going to get tougher for a lot of folks around here,” the woman says, then shrugs it off with a sigh and a smile. “Anyway, I’m Sheriff Wetzler. Shari to my friends. Can I buy you two a drink? Prove we’re not all unwelcoming.”

  She’s the sheriff? Well that explains mention of sleeping it off in the cells, and why Dan turned from argumentative to acquiescent in the blink of an eye.

  Sheriff Wetzler raises her eyebrows and twirls a finger in a signal to the barman for the same all round.

  “This isn’t exactly a tourist hot-spot and definitely not a vacation destination normally favoured by Brits, so what brings you two to our town?”

  Sheriff Wetzler’s attention didn’t waiver as I told her everything about how Abbey met Jensen on Facebook, came to the states to meet him in person and hasn’t been heard of since he took her to Nebraska. It felt good to get it all off my chest to someone who’s not just listening, but really listening, as if she genuinely wants to know. Right up until mention of the photos of Abbey and Jensen has her gaze wandering to focus on some indeterminate point.

  “So just as the British police decided your friend isn’t missing after those
photos were posted on her Facebook timeline, likewise ours in Denver and here in Nebraska.”

  They probably would have, if I’d told them. But I knew if I did, their reaction would be the same as detective Blake’s back home. The same as Sheriff Wetzler’s now seems to be. I knew I shouldn’t have told her, but her interest seemed sincere, and I let my big mouth run away with me as usual.

  She takes a sip of her drink. “Guess I better put that right.”

  “You’ll help us?”

  “Sounds like someone has to. Come by my office in the morning and we’ll talk it over. See what I can do to help you find your friend.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  ABBEY

  JOURNAL ENTRY ELEVEN

  Some days it feels like he keeps me here to be his personal maid, picking up after him, cooking his meals and cleaning the house. Those are good days.

  Other days I’m his sexual plaything. Literally a thing he uses to indulge his perverted predilections.

  And when he’s been drinking, I’m his punchbag.

  The bruising from his last beating is beginning to heal, chartreuse feathering the fading aubergine. He’s careful only ever to slap my face. His punches always aimed at the softest part of my body and where it doesn’t show when I’m dressed. It’s odd really, his meticulousness when targeting blows. I mean, who’s going to see?

  I know what his plans for me are – in the long term at least. I know he’s never going to let me go.

  Even if he dumped me on a deserted road somewhere just as remote as here, maybe even in another state, he must know I’d find the nearest house, town or police station and start screaming blue murder.

  We must have been caught on CCTV somewhere in Denver. You can’t even pop to the local shops back home without being filmed on multiple cameras. Plus, people there know I came here to meet him, so there’s a link between us.

  I may not know exactly where in Nebraska it is, but I can describe the house in detail. I should be able to, I’ve cleaned it enough, and he’s taken his depraved pleasure of me in almost every room.