The next surprise was that Emily had withdrawn two thousand dollars in cash from the bank. That certainly suggested that she was planning some sort of trip.
You can’t get that much from an ATM, at least not in our town. The police said that the closed-circuit camera footage from the bank showed her at the teller’s window—alone. On several successive days. It seemed possible (to paranoid me) that a criminal or carjacker was waiting for her outside, threatening to hurt her or her family if she signaled for help. I could never understand why the cops never seemed to take this scenario seriously. Didn’t they watch the news? Innocent moms were being abducted from mall parking lots practically every day.
Sean told his company that he couldn’t travel until his wife was found. He offered to go on unpaid leave. But they understood, and they put him on half-time. He’d be assigned to a local project so that he could work from home with only occasional trips from Connecticut into the city.
Sean was so there for Nicky. So caring and so fully present that it was beautiful to see. He brought Nicky to school every morning and picked him up every afternoon. He had frequent conferences with Mrs. Kerry, in part to keep her updated on the progress of the investigation, though probably she already knew everything—or at least a lot—about it.
At first there was some publicity, thanks (I think mostly) to Dennis Nylon. Connecticut mom disappears! Sean, the brave, anguished husband, went on TV and asked anyone who might have seen Emily to please contact the authorities. He was entirely convincing, and I’m sure everyone believed him. But it was only the local news, and already our story had stepped down from the attention-grabbing segment starring Dennis Nylon.
When the detectives found out that Emily had rented a car and made a sizable bank withdrawal, the case seemed even more like a story about a runaway wife. The media interest gradually leaked away, and the reporters moved on. The husband’s alibi checked out. There were no new clues, no leads, no evidence, and Emily was still missing.
If Nicky hasn’t fallen apart, it’s because of us. Sean and I work together. Nicky and Miles have lots of playdates. I gave Sean the name of the therapist to whom I took Miles after his dad and uncle died, when Miles was constantly hiding from me in public places so I couldn’t find him, and then laughing when I went crazy with worry. The therapist had said that lots of children played that game. He said children are always testing us. That’s how they learn. I shouldn’t blame it on the tragic loss of Miles’s dad and uncle, though obviously that had been extremely traumatic.
The doctor said that I should calmly ask Miles to stop hiding, and he would. He said that Miles had a conscience. I liked hearing that, just as I like the feeling I have now: that Sean and I are doing everything we can to make this as easy as possible on Nicky. Not that it could ever be easy.
Miles had stopped hiding, and now I tell myself that Nicky will stay strong. We’ll get through this together.
We’ve kept Nicky away from the reporters. His photo never appeared with the pictures of Emily and Sean. He stayed at my house during those first days when his dad had interviews with media people and meetings with the detectives.
The rental car was never located. Sean had to fill out a ton of paperwork to get Emily declared a missing person, which voided the rental agreement. I think he got help from the lawyers at his firm.
Sean and I are a team. Nicky is our project. We have long talks when Sean brings Nicky to play with Miles, and when we meet outside school in the afternoon. I give Sean support and encouragement for insisting that the police keep searching for Emily. We both agree that it’s way too early to tell Nicky that his mother might be dead—or even to suggest it. Nicky will ask when he wants to know, and we will tell him that there is still hope.
Until there isn’t.
Before Emily disappeared, I hadn’t spent any time with Sean. Maybe if Davis had lived, we might have been couple-friends. We might have invited them over for dinner. But Davis had been dead for two years by the time I met Emily. Sean always seemed to be at work or traveling for business, so Emily and I had a pure mom friendship.
Though it’s hard for me to believe now, I hadn’t much liked Sean. I guess I saw him as a snobby upper-class British frat boy, a wannabe master of the universe. Tall, handsome, entitled, self-assured—totally not my type. He works in the international real estate department of a major Wall Street investment firm. Though I’m still not entirely sure what his job involves.
It’s always a blessing when you find out that someone is a much nicer person than you’d thought. I wish I could have found that out about Sean without Emily having had to disappear.
Emily used to complain about him. She said he was never home, he left all the childcare to her, he didn’t respect her intelligence, he criticized her, he made her feel flaky and irresponsible, he didn’t appreciate how much she did, he undervalued her contribution to the family, not only in terms of childcare but financially too. He had no respect for what she did at her job. He thought the fashion industry was nothing more than a lucrative bit of fluff. She liked books, and he liked TV. Sometimes (and Emily would only say this after the second glass of wine) she thought that Sean wasn’t nearly as smart as he thought he was. Not nearly as smart as she thought he was when they met.
She did say that sex with Sean was great. Life-changingly great. She said that the sex made everything else seem less important. Life-changing sex was another thing that I tried not to envy about my best friend’s perfect life.
Anyway, Emily said Sean wasn’t cheating on her or drinking or gambling or being violent or doing any of the things that really terrible husbands do. The truth is, I liked it when Emily grumbled about her marriage. I loved Davis with all my heart and soul. I still miss him every day. But it wasn’t as if we hadn’t had issues. Every marriage does, and the pressures and demands of raising a small child certainly don’t help.
Davis often made me feel stupid, even when I was sure, or almost sure, that he didn’t mean to. He knew so much about architecture and design, and he had so many opinions. It got to the point where, when we went into a store, I was afraid to say I liked this or didn’t like that for fear of the withering look he’d give me (unconsciously, I knew) when he didn’t agree. Which was almost always. It got to be sort of a bore.
But as I’ve blogged about so many times, being a widow means that unless you are in a support group—which I never have been, though I understand why so many women find them helpful—none of the married women I meet will even mention her husband, not even to complain. I guess they’re afraid of making me feel worse because I don’t have a husband to complain about. As if I needed to hear a woman gripe about her husband’s snoring to make me miss Davis.
I hadn’t liked my phone conversation with Sean when I’d reached him in England early on, when Emily hadn’t come to get Nicky. He’d sounded not only sleepy but annoyed. Well, sorry if your wife has disappeared. Sorry I woke you. He didn’t seem to know who I was, though he pretended in that phony-polite British way. Oh, Stephanie, yes, of course.
I got the feeling that Sean didn’t remember meeting me, which was not very flattering. I’ve blogged about how many people (mostly, but not only, men) can’t tell one mom from another, maybe because the only thing they see is the stroller. When Sean said that Emily had planned to be away for a few days on business, he’d made it sound as if I was the flaky one.
Sean didn’t take Emily’s disappearance seriously until he got home from England and she wasn’t there. And that’s when he drove right over. I’ve blogged about how seeing him and Nicky in my house made Emily’s absence finally seem real.