“Or a fugue state.” I googled it last night: Why do men disappear without a trace. “There was a guy from Delaware who went out for doughnuts,” I tell the Pigeon. “Found him two weeks later, trying to get a face tattoo in San Diego. Had no idea how he got there. Anyway”—I hold up the flyer and take a step further inside—“Thank you for letting me know.”
I close the door and stay in the foyer, listening to her retreat down the driveway. When she reaches the hedges, I turn the lock and read the flyer again. “Meet at Lucky Strikes at 10 a.m.! Dress warm!”
In the kitchen, I take my clipping of Harriet Eager’s article and go to the library, where I slide open the pocket doors and remove the purple binder from the shelf. At Agatha Lawrence’s desk, I carefully punch three holes into the flyer and the article and then snap open the metal rings, putting them in place at the back of the binder. I close the rings and page forward through the contents, past Sam’s credit card bills, which I added this morning, to the very first entry in Sam’s binder. The interview he gave.
I’ll never forget the day I came upon it and first learned about Sam. I’d been living in Chestnut Hill for three months—alone, in this big house, filled with a dead woman’s memories. I called a contractor to come fix a leak in the living room ceiling, and came downstairs as he finished to find the wood floors covered with duplicate copies of the Daily Freeman, Sam’s face peeking out every few feet. I picked up a copy and read the interview. Local boy, he was moving home to take care of his mother, the former secretary at the high school. His answers were charming and funny and I went straight to Google, staying up into the night, reading about his work, and I knew right away that he was someone I wanted to know.
I close the binder, return it to the shelf among the others, and go hunt for my boots. The search for Sam starts soon. I should go.
Chapter 20
Annie sits behind the wheel, Sam’s dirty T-shirt in her hands. She presses it to her face, breathing in the lingering scent of his sweat, imagining him coming home from the gym earlier in the week in this shirt. Four women pass in front of Annie’s car, wearing matching purple St. Ignatius Catholic Church raincoats. They open the door to the bowling alley and disappear inside. Lucky Strikes, the unofficial headquarters for the Search for Sam! event advertised on flyers some classmates from Sam’s high school photocopied and hung around town this morning, exclamation points in no short supply. “Meet at Lucky Strikes at 10 a.m.! Dress warm!” Annie’s been sitting in her car for twelve minutes now, watching cars pull up and people jog through the rain toward the entrance in waterproof boots and hoods pulled up under a misty rain.
She imagines Sam in the passenger seat beside her, the two of them just another couple here to join the search, happy for something exciting to do on a Friday morning.
Look at what you’ve done, she whispers. Moving home and bringing the town together like this. You should run for mayor when you reappear.
Good idea, he replies. Will you host the Greet and Meet? She can feel his hand reaching across the seat to take hers. You have to go inside.
I don’t want to.
Why not?
I don’t know, she whispers.
Of course you do, dummy. He threads his fingers through hers. It’s because you’re deathly afraid that at some point today someone inside that bowling alley is going to come across my car, and discover my remains, and you can’t bring yourself to face it.
Her phone rings on the passenger seat, startling her. It’s Gail Withers, the branch manager at the closest Chase Bank, twenty-nine miles away.
“Ms. Withers,” Annie says, snatching the phone. “Thank you for calling me back.”
“You left quite a few voice mails this morning,” Gail says. “How can I help?”
“My husband has a checking account with your bank, and I’m trying to find out the last time his ATM card was used.”
“Are you listed on the account?”
“No.”
“I see.”
“I’ve spent a lot of time on the phone, calling different 1–800 numbers, trying to get some answers.”
“And what were they able to provide you with?”
“Jack shit.” Annie presses the ache that is building behind her eyes again. “Which is why I tracked you down. I thought talking to someone more local, that maybe . . .”
“I’m sorry, Ms. Potter, but the bank doesn’t share information with unauthorized users. It’s for our customers’ protection.”
“I’m not asking the bank to do this, Gail. I’m asking you.”
She hesitates. “I’m sorry, Annie. I wouldn’t be able to do that even if I wanted to.”
Annie takes a breath, resisting the urge to scream. “I haven’t spoken to my husband in two days,” she mutters. “I don’t know what to do.”