"And when was the last time you had contact with your mother?" the woman asked, her voice slightly bored but still professional.
I wanted to reach through the phone and shake her. This was my mom, for crying out loud! The person I loved most in all the world--and now she had just vanished--on Mother's Day!
I tried to stay calm as the woman asked me more questions. Finally, she said I couldn't fill out a missing person's report until Mom had been missing for forty-eight hours. I was crushed.
"Isn't there something you could do right now?" I asked, my patience gone.
"Have you checked with her friends, the places she usually goes?
These things usually turn out fine. Somebody misses a bus or forgets the time . . . "
But I didn't know about Mom's friends, aside from Gwen, the older lady that Mom always talked about. On Tuesdays they would go to the senior citizens' center together and knit for some children's project.
I placed the phone back on its cradle. If they weren't going to do anything about finding Mom, then I sure would!
I picked up the phone book and tried Gwen's number, but there was no answer.
This is the price you pay for working ten-hour days, I told myself.
I was divorced with no children. I had two older brothers who lived on the coast. I was the only one who lived in the vicinity to look after Mom.
"And a fine job you're doing of it!" that sarcastic voice in my head told me.
I couldn't call my brothers--not just yet. They trusted me to look after Mom. After Dad had died eleven years ago, Mom lived in a run-down apartment on the east side of town. She loved the place, though; she said it had "character." No matter how much I pleaded with her to come live with me in my condo, or at least find a better neighborhood, she refused.
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