by Dan Dillard
*****
I pulled into the driveway and parked cockeyed. Tears leaked from my eyes and for the first time since his death I cursed my husband. A car took him from us and now some lunatic had taken our children and I had no one to scream at, no one to help me. Not real help. Not the kind of help true love provides. I wept until my sides ached.
When I got control again, I pulled my cell phone from my purse and dialed Lisa Martin. Her two girls were the fourth and fifth children in the class. The phone rang and rang again.
“Hi, this is Lisa and Jim. Leave us a message if you want us to call you back,” her voicemail said.
Then the mechanical vixen of voicemail instructed me to leave a message after the tone.
“Lisa, hi. This is Valerie. My twins are in daycare with your girls. Please call me as soon as you get the chance.” My voice shook. I’m sure it sounded desperate. I went in the house to make the second call.
“Hello,” the woman said.
“Is this Kelly?”
“Yes, who’s calling?”
I introduced myself.
“Oh hi!” she said in a chipper voice.
Of course she was chipper. She had her son at home.
“Kelly, have you heard anything about the daycare this morning?” Silence. “Kelly?”
“I just got back from the hospital with my son. That crazy bitch bit him.”
“The police told me, but have you heard anything this morning?”
“Police? Did they arrest her? I called them from the emergency room.”
“Why is it you took him to the ER this morning? Didn’t you see the bite mark last night?”
“Yes, at bath-time. I was furious, but it was neatly dressed and I figured one of the children had done it. I was going to have a word with the teacher this morning. John woke up screaming last night saying his arm hurt so I took him to the ER.”
I hated where this was going. She went on. “When I got there, they took an x-ray and found out it was fractured. They also told me it was too large a bite to be from a child. That bitch bit my baby hard enough to fracture his arm. I’d get my kids out of there if I were you.”
That was what I was afraid of. The very words I could’ve used at 7:30 rather than 9:45.
“They are missing,” I said. Tears began to roll again.
“What? Who?” she asked.
“My twins. And the Martin’s girls as well. When the cops got to Sunshine’s Jeanette was gone with all of the kids. No one can find them.”
“I…”
I heard her begin to cry in the background.
“I’m so sorry. I had no idea,” she managed.
“Just please let me know if you hear anything. I can’t get hold of Lisa Martin.”
“I’ll try to contact her. Oh my God…My God, I’m so very sorry.”
I hung up. I wasn’t going to tell her it was ok. It wasn’t. Jeanette might’ve been a lunar cycle child-biter, but I knew this wouldn’t have happened if she hadn’t called the cops. At least it wouldn’t have happened that day.
A thought occurred to me, a stupid thought. Jeanette owned a minivan which wasn’t in her driveway. I thought I would go look for it. Maybe she had been smart and left town. Or maybe she was waiting around to see what happened.
