I pass a dining room, a half bath, the master bedroom, and end up in the bedroom of seventeen-year-old Colin Thatcher, the navy walls and White Sox—egad—pennants and high school textbooks that were never returned. In the closet still hang some clothes: a football jersey and a pair of ripped jeans, and on the floor a pair of dirty cleats. There are posters of 1980s athletes thumb-tacked to the walls, and hanging in the closet, a discreet pullout of Cindy Crawford where his mother won’t see. There’s an afghan Kathryn likely crocheted when her hands still could, folded across the end of the bed, and a hole in the wall where, in a fit of rage, Colin might have thrown a punch. There’s a radiator lining the wall beneath the window and in a small frame beside the bed, a very young Colin, a beautiful Kathryn and a quarter inch of a man’s head, the rest ripped off and tossed.
I take the scenic route on the way back. I mosey into the master bedroom, the unmade bed reeking of BO. There are dirty clothes in a pile. The blinds are shut, the room dark. I flip on a light, but the bulb has burnt out. I yank a cord in the closet and a scant amount of light enters the room. There are photographs of Colin Thatcher in every stage of his life. He doesn’t look that different than me. Just your typical bundle of baby fat, turned football jock, turned America’s Most Wanted. There are dandelions pressed behind glass; he might have collected those for her when he was a child. There’s a stick figure drawing. His? And a cordless phone that’s been knocked to the floor. I pick it up and return it to the base. It’s dead. It will take hours for the battery to charge.
I make a mental note to get telephone records. I consider a phone tap.
In the front room, I run my fingers across the keys of a dusty piano. It’s out of tune, but the sound beckons Mrs. Thatcher, who hobbles into the room. There is corn on her chin. She misses her footing on the way and somehow I manage to catch her in my arms.
“Colin,” she says for the umpteenth time as I lower her onto the couch. I encourage her to lie down and prop a pillow behind her head. I find the remote and click on the volume to the TV. God knows how long she’s been watching on mute.
There are scrapbooks lining an oak shelf, one for every single year of Colin Thatcher’s life until the age of thirteen. I take one and fall into a leather armchair. I flip through the pages. Boy Scouts. Schoolwork and progress reports. There are leaf collections, picked up on afternoon walks and pressed in the pages of a massive encyclopedia. Newspaper clippings. Miniature golf scores. A Christmas list. A postcard to Ms. Kathryn Thatcher from Grand Marais, Minnesota, a fifteen-cent stamp stuck crookedly in the corner. The date 1989 is printed on the card; the image is of a forest, a lake, nature. There’s a simple inscription: Dad sucks. Miss you.
There are photographs up the wazoo, mostly older ones that are yellowing and beginning to bend.
I stay with Kathryn Thatcher as long as I can. She needs the company. But she needs much more than that; she needs something I can’t provide. I’ve said my goodbyes and promised to be in touch, but I don’t go. The TV dinners will be gone in no time, and all it takes is one good fall to give her a concussion that will end her life.
“Ma’am, I can’t leave you here,” I admit.
“Colin,” she whispers.
“I know,” I say. “Colin takes care of you. But Colin isn’t here now, and you can’t be alone. Do you have family, Mrs. Thatcher? Anyone I can call?”
I take her silence as a no.
This makes me wonder. If Colin had been taking care of his ailing mother for so long, what would make him leave her?
I remove a few things from Mrs. Thatcher’s closet and place them in a bag. I collect the medicine bottles. There’s a nursing home in Gary. For now that will have to do.
I tell Mrs. Thatcher that we’re going to go for a ride. “Please. No,” she begs as I lead her to the car. “Please. I want to stay here. I don’t want to go.”
I have a coat draped over Mrs. Thatcher’s robe. On her feet remain fuzzy slippers.
She’s protesting as vehemently as she possibly can, which isn’t much. I know that she doesn’t want to go. She doesn’t want to leave her home, but I can’t leave her here.
A neighbor steps onto a front porch to see what the fuss is about. I hold out a hand and say, “It’s okay.” I show him my badge.
I help her into the car and reach across her to secure the seat belt. She’s crying. I drive as fast as I possibly can. In a few minutes this will all be through.
I think of my own mother.
An attendant meets me in the parking lot with a wheelchair and lifts Mrs. Thatcher from the car like a stuffed animal in a child’s arms. After I watch him drive the wheelchair into the building, I peel out of the parking lot.
Later I search through the wretched garbage bag with a pair of latex gloves. It’s a bunch of junk with the exception of a gas receipt dated September 29—I can only assume Mrs. Thatcher’s license has been revoked—and a grocery store receipt with the same date, totaling thirty-two dollars. Enough to last a week. Colin Thatcher planned on returning in a week. He didn’t plan to disappear.
I sort through the mail. Bills, bills and more bills. Past-due notices. But that’s about all.
I think of that postcard, of all the trees. I think that maybe Grand Marais would be an amazing place to visit in the fall.
Colin
Before