The Empty Place at the Table

by Jode Jurgensen John Ellsworth

  "One, a girl. Gladys. But she'll be with us, you and me. James won't fight me on this."

  "No, no, no, she's James' daughter. I already have a daughter. Now listen to this very carefully. Before there are any decisions made about the you-me-and-James stuff, I am going to find my daughter and bring her home. Home to you and home to me. That is my mission at this point. Whatever happens between you and me--that's for later."

  "Okay." With a rush of new air pouring into my lungs I could breathe freely again. Mark was much wiser that I remembered. He was right, actually, first things first.

  "Every single day my daughter isn't with me or you she's a prisoner. I've done that prisoner thing. You and I cannot even begin to imagine what's she's been through and what it's turned her into. But that's all right. Water washes us all clean in the end. Do you have a laptop along, by the way?"

  "Back in my hotel. I didn't bring it here. Didn't think I'd need it." I laughed.

  "We need it. Okay, Mel. You go get your computer, please. I'll order some pizza brought in and we'll re-open the investigation into the disappearance of Lisa Sellars. You ready for this?"

  It wasn't at all what I'd gone there expecting. Nothing of the sort. I'd thought there would be flowing tears, priests, and pastors, psychologists and philosophers, but no. It was just two parents who loved their daughter.

  And who were going to get her back, come hell or high water.

  Mark's words.

  18

  That was Saturday morning. By mid-afternoon Saturday, with my laptop open on Mark's bed, we had managed to cobble together everything I knew about Lisa's disappearance. Mark said we should brainstorm then, so we did. His theory was that Lisa had been abducted into sex trafficking. He told me that from what he'd seen in Afghanistan, it fit the sex traffic paradigm correctly. The staking out of my house and the hospital by Nancy Callender. The precisely timed taking of Lisa from the hospital when I was away from her room just briefly. The fact of no ransom note or demand for payment for her return. The fact we hadn't heard from her even though she was in her middle-teen years now and even though she had been old enough when taken to know her last name and where she lived. It was all right there, he said. She was someone's sex toy at this point--a reality that I hadn't been able to admit to myself. But now, with Mark at my side, I could coherently think about such things, and I was amazed at how it broadened my thinking about Lisa and where she might be today.

  Which was anywhere in the world. Mark said he guessed someplace like Dubai, where blue-eyed, blond girls are highly valued and where top dollar is paid. So should we start looking in Dubai? Not so fast, Mark said. We needed to trace her movements--if possible--and see where that led, rather than just jetting off somewhere and hoping we were on the right continent.

  So we began with the name, Ignacio Velasquez. We decided that Zone 1 would be Mexico. Zone 2 would be Latin America. Zone 3 would be South America. Mark said we would focus first on Zone 1, Mexico. Why? Because there were kidnappers roaming all over Mexico looking for inventory, as Mark put it.

  We were making plans for our assault on Mexico when a young man in uniform entered Mark's room with an envelope. "Orders, sir," he said and abruptly left.

  "Oh my God," Mark said as he tore open the envelope, "let's hope this is what I think it is."

  It was. The Joint Personnel Recovery Agency--the DoD arm that had placed Mark in Walter Reed Army Hospital--had determined that Mark's capture in Afghanistan was legitimate and that his time in captivity was involuntary and that his time in the service of his country had come to an end. He was discharged effective immediately from any further military service, back pay to arrive by the end of next week.

  We stood there looking at each other, dumbfounded. Then the news hit us, and we were in tears.

  "You don't know, Mel, how much interrogation and corroboration I've been through to convince the powers-that-be that my captivity was legitimate and that I wasn't someone who had abandoned his post."

  "But the helicopter you were flying crashed. Weren't you shot down?"

  "I was. But the military is always suspicious because even crashes of aircraft can be faked. Even where a passenger died, like my case. They're a very suspicious bunch."

  "Okay," I said, "but as of right now, it's time to celebrate. Let's get you out of here and someplace comfortable. I think that for tonight you should come to my hotel room and take the extra bed and sleep there. We can have room service, you can enjoy the view out of my suite, and we can spread out and work at an actual table."

  "Maybe that's a good idea, Mel. But you and I have a history of winding up in bed together. You're married now, and that can't happen at this point."

  I had the feeling he saw where I was with this. He needed confirmation that I would stay on my own side of the room, so to speak. I totally agreed with what he was saying, that we couldn't afford to sleep together, not if we were going to be able to focus on Lisa.

  "Simple," I said, "we just don't go down that path. What we're doing to find Lisa is much bigger than all that. We don't need marital drama in the middle of it to screw things up. You'll have your space in my room, and I'll have mine. Or, I can get you your own room, and we can work from there if you think you can't resist my stunning beauty."

  He laughed. "Actually, with my religious beliefs being what they are now, you're safe with me. There are certain lines I can't and won't cross. Illicit sex is one of them. As much as I'd like to jump your bones, I won't be doing that. Shacking up in the same room is totally safe with me."

  Despite my circumspect intentions, at that moment an immense feeling of disappointment swept over me. I had my husband back but not really. It was very confusing as I reset in my mind where I was, who I was with, who was waiting back in my home, and what I was doing. I knew at that moment that I'd make a terrible mistress because I'd be so destroyed by guilt and self-hatred. Plus, Lisa overrode all of it. Nothing could be decided until we had our daughter back. Assuming she was even still alive.

  On the taxi ride to my hotel, we discussed that third possibility--that she might have been taken and killed right away. That her body was moldering in the ground somewhere or at the bottom of Lake Michigan. Mark was able to put these things into words, and I listened and agreed out loud to what I'd already known inside but couldn't bring myself to admitting. Our daughter could already be dead, and we were beaten before we even started.

  Nevertheless, when we got inside my room, we took up right where we left off in Mark's hospital room: from the assumption that Lisa was still very much alive and that she had probably been taken to Mexico at first.

  "Now, who in Mexico would take her?" he said.

  I said, ”The cartels. That's who I believe took her. One of the cartels."

  "Which cartel?"

  "Well, I’ve done some reading. There are three main cartels. One is in Tijuana, the other is in Culiacán in Sinaloa. There's also the Gulf Cartel. They are all terrible gangs. So let's do some looking online and see if anything jumps out at us."

  I set up my computer on the dining table in my suite and called down to room service for coffee and sandwiches.

  Then we began.

  Tijuana was of course almost straddling the U.S. border. From what we could turn up on the Internet, Tijuana, of the three cartels, was most heavily involved with U.S.-Mexico border crimes other than drugs. Prostitution on both sides of the border. Illegal firearms. And a steady flow of coyote vans and trucks moving undocumented souls into the U.S. That--along with the drugs--was the biggest moneymaker for the Tijuana Cartel. We rated it number one on our short list of probable kidnappers.

  Next, we moved east and south and found out what we could about the Sinaloa Cartel.

  The Sinaloa Cartel operated primarily within the Golden Triangle, an area in north central Mexico, and was considered by the U.S. Intelligence agencies to be the most powerful drug cartel in the world. Due to its greater distance from the border, it had a much smaller presence i
n human trafficking and human smuggling than the Tijuana Cartel. We rated it number two.

  The Gulf Cartel seemed distant and remote. A not-very-interesting number three.

  All in all, we decided that Tijuana should be our first stop. It seemed percentage-wise to have the highest number of crimes against people of any of the three Mexican Cartels.

  Next, we began planning our assault.

  We decided to pinpoint the leader of the Tijuana Cartel and to infiltrate his base of operations and see what we could learn. How to do that? We talked for several hours, with Mark taking the wheel on this part of it. He had participated in hundreds of covert raids in Taliban country in Afghanistan, and he knew everything there was to know about gaining a foothold and working from there.

  So we asked ourselves, what profile would stand the greatest chance of coming into the zone of influence of the leader of the Cartel? We thought about enlisting the help of a Mexican private investigator to infiltrate the cartel.

  "Someone like that would need to be very brave and steady in the boat," Mark said.

  "Plus I don't know how much I could really trust someone else. It just seems to me that the cartels have so much power and influence that they can buy off anyone. The added danger to a Mexican national would be trying to resume his life after we grab Lisa. When Lisa disappears, he'll be the first one they come for. No one's signing up for that, I don't care how much money we offer them."

  We sat and quietly stared at each other. Neither of us had anything further to offer as far as using outside resources. It had all been said. So we said the inevitable. Mark was going to go undercover in Tijuana as a player in the drug business. We talked for hours, afraid we'd maybe missed something. Like maybe we were overlooking a key feature of Tijuana and the cartel there that could instantly get Mark killed. We were getting very close physically by now at the table, and our hands would inadvertently touch, or our legs would touch under the table, and I found I liked the closeness, that I yearned for my husband Mark's touch. Of course, he wasn't my husband--I knew that. But in a way, he was because he had done nothing to be dislodged from that position in our lives. I had done it. I had done it with the help of the U.S. Army. But none of that matters when you're in the now, and you're at last able to touch the person you thought you lost. Things get very jumbled after that, I found. So I did the next indicated thing.

  "I can't do this," I told him. "I want you too much."

  Leaving Mark with my Amex Platinum card, I grabbed my purse and a small bag and headed downstairs. From there, Dulles International was a stone's throw. I took a taxi there and went from airline counter to airline counter until I found a nine p.m. flight to Chicago. Then I called Mark.

  "I know I left abruptly. I did it because of the feelings I was having for you."

  "I figured it was something like that. I was feeling the same way despite my strong religious aversion to infidelity. Only the infidels do that stuff."

  "So here's what I propose. Tomorrow you go to the airport and catch a plane to Chicago. I'll meet you and we'll put you up in an executive hotel with long-term stay. Someplace furnished and roomy where you'll be comfortable and where we can get together easily and plan the mission."

  "Sounds perfect. I'll have some money by Friday, and I can pay you back then."

  "I'm not even going there. I sold our house years ago, and you got none of that. I owe you a big fat check for your half."

  "No, you don't. Besides, I would've wanted you and Lisa to have the house and leverage it into what you have now. We're going to call us even at this time."

  "We'll never be even. I didn't wait for you."

  "Hey! Melissa, snap out of that! You relied on some information that twelve years later you found out was false. Nobody's holding your feet to the fire over something like that. It was what anyone would've done. Besides, let me cut right to the chase with you. If I ever get involved again, it will be with a Muslim woman. I've changed, and maybe you don't get that right now, but over time you'll see what I mean. We live in two different worlds, but we both happen to have one foot in a very exclusive world of our own, one where Lisa exists. Let's leave it at that, all right?"

  "All right," I sniffed through my tears. "This is just very, very hard. Because I still love you."

  I whispered that last part into the phone as if someone might hear me. But in the Captain's Lounge at the airline, there was no one else around to hear. Just the opposite: I was totally alone in more ways than one. I had the feelings; Mark no longer did. End of story. Get over yourself, girl. You're a married woman, and even the man you adore has moved on. Time for you to do likewise.

  When I hung up, I found I was relieved. I could move on now without guilt.

  At least until the next time our hands or legs touched.

  A young woman dressed in the airline's hostess garb came around passing out flight bags. She gave me one that said "Captain's Club" and I stuck my purse inside and went out and bought a book to read on the plane. Into the bag it went.

  Where it remained until I unpacked it the next day at home.

  19

  James and Gladys were ecstatic to have me home. I don't know which one missed me the most. But it was reciprocal; I had missed them terribly too. I always did when I had to travel.

  And nothing will ever match the look in James' eye when he saw we were still married, loyal, and that we would remain that way. He was suddenly brighter around me than possibly he'd ever been. Which made me happier and which made Gladys happier by default.

  We took Gladys to Fuddruckers for burgers the next day at lunch. She loved the long tables of hamburger condiments and vegetables, loved getting to be a big girl and make her own, and lived for the strawberry shakes. We sat at the Beatles table and ate slowly, each of us happier than maybe we'd ever been.

  It was like a storm had been weathered. The toughest possible temptation had been tossed in my path, and I had overcome. In a way, I felt very proud. But I also had to remind myself to remain cautious and guarded around Mark. Simple lapses could escalate into full-scale lovemaking between us regardless of our predilections, just like when we'd been young and at first didn't much care for each other. One night together ended all that, no further questions necessary, thank you.

  That night after Gladys was asleep I curled up beside James on the couch in the family room. It was Saturday night, and he was watching Saturday Night Live. Intermittent outbursts and laughter shook and regaled him. I put my head in his lap and closed my eyes. Then I started dreaming about James and having another baby. I swear it: I saw her in my mind. She was unlike either Lisa or Gladys but, in my dream, looked very sad. She was riding a pony, and the pony refused to go where she wanted. So she climbed off and went around and scolded him with her finger. Believe it or not, that dream pony nodded and swung around to face the other direction. I remember calling out to her in that dream, asking her to tell me what she said to him. I knew it was important: I memorized the glade and the distant house in the place where this girl rode her pony.

  Later that night, James made slow, gentle love to me. I kept my eyes closed and inhaled him and allowed my mind to see all the men I'd ever been with and James became them all. With a jolt, then, I realized in the next moment that I felt Mark's hands on me, felt Mark inside of me, whispering my name, giving me a new baby, a new child that looked exactly like the girl on the pony. With my arms stretched back over my head, I whispered Mark's name into the dark.

  "What?" said James.

  "What?" I said, coming out of my fantasy.

  "You said 'Mark.'"

  "No, I didn't. I didn't say anything."

  "Oh, yes, darling, you said your dead husband's name who isn't so dead anymore."

  He rolled over off of me and pushed away.

  "Did you two make love?"

  "No, definitely not!"

  "How can I know that for sure?"

  Always the lawyer; the question was seeking evidence because I knew James and k
new that was how he operated.

  "You just have to take my word."

  "Your word is shaky right now. You said Mark's name while I was making love to you."

  "If I did, I'm sorry. It was inadvertent. I was thinking only of you."

  "And just happened to get my name mixed up with his. Shit, Melissa. What have you done?"

  "James, he was my husband, for the love of God. My mind is very confused about it all. I'm the first to admit it."

  "I don't like this at all. It doesn't make sense that you would say his name while I'm inside of you."

  "Well stop trying to make sense for once. Feel the feeling instead of thinking. Don't I feel like I love you? Isn't my body responding to you?"

  It was an old issue with us. He was a lawyer, and he thought life. I felt life. We were very different. We'd even been to see a counselor. We came away knowing that we were very different people with very different ways of being in the world.

  "Are we off on that again? That I don't feel things enough, that I'm too cerebral?"

  "No, there are just times I wish you could go with the feelings rather than the thoughts."

  He stood up on his side of the bed and began pulling on his jeans. "This is bullshit. You never complained about my feelings before Mark came back. Now I'm not feeling enough? Well, feel this: I feel like you're comparing me to your real husband and you're sorry you ever married me!"

  "Jesus, James, settle down. You'll wake Gladys up. Now come back to bed."

  "No, you take the bed. I'm taking the guest room."

  "Please don't do this," I whispered, "the whole thing is ridiculous."

  "So now my feelings are ridiculous? I've gone along with you every step of the way since he came home. Now I need to protect myself if you're going to be thinking of him when I'm making love to you. You know what I feel? You want to know my feelings?"

  "Yes, James. What are you feeling?"

  "I'm feeling embarrassed. Embarrassed that I was so into you and so stupid for it while you were thinking about your real husband."