Missing You, Love Sara

by Jackie French

  Myra made herself a cup of coffee and opened the fridge to look for the fresh bread that Reenie was supposed to have bought, but it wasn’t there, so she ate some Sao’s with cheese and tomato. They were our tomatoes. Dad grows a patch of tomatoes and pumpkins every year, and I’d taken up a bag two days before.

  Then she went to look for the magazine that Reenie was supposed to have brought back.

  There was no sign of it in the kitchen or in the lounge room so she looked in Reenie’s room, just in case Reenie had decided to read it first.

  But there was no sign of Reenie or the magazine. The bed was made up the way Reenie always makes it, even before she has her shower in the morning—Reenie hates any mess at all. And all the shoes neatly against the bottom of the cupboard.

  So Myra checked her own room. Maybe Reenie had slipped the magazine in the door without waking her.

  About then it dawned on Myra (who’s not the brightest person in the world) that Reenie hadn’t been home at all. So she went back to bed.

  She wasn’t worried, of course. There was nothing to worry about. Maybe Reenie had met a friend and gone to have coffee with them at the café. Reenie works there but has Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays off, although she called in there on most days just to catch the gossip.

  Or she might have met Johnnie and gone out to his place or, even more likely, gone to Mum’s for the afternoon.

  Reenie had moved out of Mum’s place five months after she did her Higher School Certificate, but she visited often. For one thing, Mum has a washing machine and a dryer, and the girls didn’t. For another, most of Reenie’s clothes were still at Mum’s place in her old room—they didn’t fit in her wardrobe in the flat.

  Reenie and Mum also chatted every day, either on the phone or in person. Don’t ask me what they talked about. My friend Di and I talk on the phone a lot, but not every day like Mum and Reenie.

  So Myra went back to bed, but being Myra she didn’t think about reading a book so when she didn’t doze off again she got up and put her dressing gown on and watched the kids’ shows on TV. She didn’t even start to get concerned at dinner time because she thought Reenie must be having tea with Mum.

  Mum rang the flat at 8.10 p.m.

  About a year later Mum was saying that she just had a feeling things were wrong, and that’s why she rang but, as I said, Mum and Reenie had to have a data exchange every day and they hadn’t had their fix yet that Thursday, so Mum rang and Reenie wasn’t there.

  ‘She’s probably at Johnnie’s,’ said Myra vaguely.

  ‘She didn’t tell me she was going out there today,’ said Mum, always up to date on what was happening to Reenie or anyone she knew. Then she hung up and she rang Johnnie’s parents’ place, which is out on the Gillyhumpy Road, about half an hour out of town. Reenie wasn’t there and Johnnie said he hadn’t seen her since the day before, but he was sure she wasn’t going anywhere, she’d have told him if she was.

  Reenie would have told Mum too, of course.

  So Mum kept on ringing round. She rang the Nursing Home in case she’d called in to see Gran, and Myra’s friends, and Sylvia at the café and, finally, the hospital and the police, in case there’d been an accident, although since Reenie didn’t have a car the only accident she could have been in would have been in the main street (if she’d been run over or a mad dog had attacked her or maybe some kid’s skateboard knocked her down) and if anything like that had happened, everyone in a town like ours would have known about it and told Mum hours before.

  And in between she kept calling Myra at the flat, in case Reenie had turned up.

  But she hadn’t.

  CHAPTER 6

  Thursday night

  The tap above the sink was dripping—clink, clink, clink. I could hear it every time Dad stopped talking to let Mum speak.

  ‘Look,’ said Dad, trying to be calm, but sometimes it’s hard to be calm with Mum banging round like a sheet of corrugated iron in a whirlwind. ‘She’s probably met a friend or decided to visit someone …’

  Another pause for Mum to speak. ‘Yes, I know you know all her friends but maybe.’

  Another pause.

  ‘Look,’ said Dad again. ‘Give it till tomorrow morning. I bet she turns up at 2 a.m. or something. She’s not living at home any more and.’

  More squeaks from Mum.

  Dad glanced at me, as though working out how much I could hear or understand, which was basically zilch, except I could work out that Mum was in a tizz and was blaming Dad for something, don’t ask me what.

  Then Dad said soothingly, ‘Look, Phyl, go and make yourself a cup of coffee … No, I’m not patronising you. Ring me in the morning if there’s any news. Yes, of course she’s my daughter too. Yes, of course I care …’

  So I went and brushed my teeth and when I came out of the bathroom, Dad was off the phone.

  He looked at me sort of helplessly. I hadn’t seen him look like that for years—not since Mum left—and then he said, ‘Reenie’s all right, Sara. She’s at a party or something.’

  ‘Sure Dad,’ I said.

  ‘She’ll be home by tomorrow,’ said Dad.

  ‘Sure Dad,’ I said again.

  But we both knew that neither one of us believed it.

  CHAPTER 7

  Friday

  Friday was school, like any other Friday, except it wasn’t.

  Dad drove me up to town, which was different for a start, because normally I catch the school bus like I told you earlier.

  Dad had spent most of the night phoning up everyone Reenie knew to see if she was there. Mum had already phoned them and they weren’t too happy about being interrupted or woken up a second time.

  He’d even got hold of Elaine in Sydney, but of course she didn’t know anything either.

  No one knew anything at all.

  I was supposed to be asleep all the time he was phoning people and I suppose I did doze a bit, because the night didn’t seem all that long. But it felt as if I was awake the whole night, hearing Dad’s mutter in the kitchen, the phone clink on and off.

  Dad rang Mum first thing in the morning to see if Reenie had turned up. Mum had already phoned the flat and Reenie hadn’t. She’d rung Johnnie again, too, and Johnnie said no, he hadn’t heard from Reenie, he was just about to ring Mum to see if there was any news.

  So Mum rang the hospital again and then the police again, but the police wouldn’t do anything till she’d been missing for longer.

  And then Mum rang Dad while Dad and I were sitting at the kitchen table eating our porridge. Dad makes it every morning in the microwave before he has his boiled egg and then his toast. He’d been doing everything in order even more carefully this morning, as though if breakfast were all right and under control everything else would be too.

  ‘Phyl—any news?’ asked Dad. Mum said something, and I could see from his face that there wasn’t any.

  ‘I’ve been thinking …’ he said, then he put his hand over the phone. ‘Go and get your school bag, Sara.’

  ‘But the bus doesn’t go for …’

  ‘I’ll take you in this morning,’ said Dad, and he turned back to the phone.

  By the time I’d got back to the kitchen Dad and Mum had agreed they would spend the day looking for Reenie themselves.

  It was a long drive into school. Normally I love it; even though it’s the same route day after day, it’s always changing—like who has ploughed up which paddock and what they’ve planted, or who put the bulls in with the cows, or are the poplars at Shallow Crossing turning yellow yet.

  But this morning it felt like we should be talking, yet there wasn’t anything to say. Or rather, there was too much to say, too many horrible things that might just be true, but neither of us wanted to speak any of them in case it made them real.

  Dad pulled into the curb just along from where the school buses pull in, though it was much too early for the buses. A few pigeons wandered round the school, looking more interested in what
was going on around them than anyone else was likely to be for the rest of the day.

  ‘Dad, please let me help,’ I said. I’d asked before we left home, and I knew I’d get the same answer. But I felt I had to ask.

  Dad shook his head. ‘Your mother and I can cover it,’ he said. It seemed funny to hear him talking about the two of them doing something together.

  ‘Maybe the police …’

  ‘The police won’t do anything for forty-eight hours, and who knows what someone may have forgotten by then.’

  ‘Dad. You’ll tell me straight away, won’t you …?’

  ‘Of course, Sara. Just as soon as we know anything. Go on, off you go. I’ll pick you up at your mother’s later. Okay?’

  ‘Okay, Dad,’ I said. I kissed him on the cheek, because he looked like he needed it, though it had been years since I’d kissed anyone goodbye before I went into school.

  Then I watched him through the peppercorn trees on either side of the street as he drove away.

  School was hard.

  I kept imagining Dad and Mum asking everyone in town about Reenie: all the shops, the hospital, the bus company. They were also going to drive out to Lefton Creek, the next town just north from us, and ask at the petrol station and the shops there. If Reenie wasn’t in town, she must have gone somewhere and someone must have seen her leave.

  Or maybe someone had taken her somewhere. and that was the thought we didn’t even want to think of yet.

  I had assumed that everyone at school would have known, but no one did—not my friends, anyway—in spite of Mum and Dad’s phone calls to everyone. I suppose none of my friends are in the same family as Reenie’s friends.

  I didn’t say anything about Reenie being missing at first—I mean, with something like that it’s hard to bring it up in conversation—but then at lunchtime my best friend Di asked me what was up, so I told her.

  I thought she would be all horrified, but she just twisted her ponytail from one side of her neck to the other, as she does when she’s thinking, then said, ‘I bet she’s just gone off for a couple of days. Gone to Sydney or something.’

  ‘But she’d have told someone!’

  ‘Maybe she did and they’ve forgotten to pass on the message,’ said Di reasonably. ‘It has to be something like that. She only works at the café on the weekends doesn’t she?’

  ‘No. She works Mondays and Fridays too. She’s supposed to be at work today.’

  ‘Maybe she forgot. Or maybe Sylvia gave her the day off last week and she’s forgotten. You know what Sylvia’s like.’

  I nodded.

  ‘Well, there you are then. I bet she’ll be back at work tomorrow.’

  ‘But Mum said …’

  I hesitated. Maybe Mum had just gone overboard about it all, and infected us with her drama. Like the time she was sure I had appendicitis and I had to stay at the hospital all night, even though the doctor said it was just a bug I’d picked up at school. Even Dad had been chewing his fingernails, and all for nothing. And then there was the time.

  Maybe Mum was just making a fuss about nothing and Dad was caught up in it, and me …

  ‘There’s probably lots of explanations,’ said Di practically. But just a bit defensively too, like I was trying to be the centre of attention without good reason.

  ‘Yeah. Sure,’ I said.

  And for a while that afternoon I really felt there probably WAS nothing to worry about.

  Maybe Reenie had come back to the flat after all, when Myra had been snoozing, and Reenie had left a note that got lost. Maybe she’d even said something to Myra but Myra had been half asleep or forgotten about it.

  There was probably a really good explanation that we hadn’t even thought about, but would seem so obvious when Reenie came home.

  The bell rang and we traipsed back into school.

  CHAPTER 8

  Friday afternoon, May 5th

  Dad was waiting for me in the car after school. He just shrugged as I opened the door.

  ‘There are only so many places you can look,’ he said.

  ‘No one saw her at all?’ I asked, though I realised there hadn’t been.

  ‘It just doesn’t make sense,’ he said. ‘There has to have been some sign of her. No matter what happened. Even if she just decided to stay with a friend overnight, someone must have seen something.’

  ‘Where’s Mum?’

  ‘At her place. Waiting by the phone in case Reenie rings.’

  Mum had an answering machine, just like we did. But when there is something really important going on it’s hard to trust answering machines to get it right.

  Reenie didn’t ring Friday night, or Saturday either.

  By Sunday the police finally decided Reenie really was missing. They went to Mum’s place first, then they went to the flat and talked to Myra.

  Then they came to us.

  CHAPTER 9

  Bob Munn

  He didn’t look like a policeman.

  He was younger than Dad, but not by much. He didn’t wear a uniform—not even a suit and tie. He just looked like anyone you might see in town on Saturday morning doing the shopping or stopping for a cup of coffee before they went home for lunch.

  He was from Sydney, not a local; not Constable Severn who lives in town. We used to have a Sergeant and two Constables, but the Government keeps cutting back on police in country areas, so Dad says, and I suppose Constable Severn has too much to do to look for missing people. Maybe searching for people is a specialist thing anyway.

  ‘I’m Bob Munn,’ he said, holding out his hand for me to shake, just like I was an adult. He didn’t give his rank or anything, but I knew he was the policeman because he had rung Dad to say he was coming.

  He talked to Dad first. I stayed in my room reading—or trying to read. Half of me wanted to sneak out into the hall and listen to what they were saying, but I was afraid they might see me, and Dad would be angry because it was bad manners, and the policeman might think I was being sneaky because I had a reason to be sneaky, that maybe I’d murdered my sister because I was jealous of her or I’d locked her in the hen house or something …

  They talked for about an hour—I’d left my watch in the bathroom and you have to cut across the living room in our place to get to it. And then Dad knocked on my door and told me that the policeman would like to see me now.

  I combed my hair and went into the living room.

  He stood up when I came in, really polite, and that’s when he held out his hand. He sat in one armchair and Dad sat in the other. I think it’s a rule or something that you have to have someone with you at interviews with the police when you’re a kid (someone on your side, I guess), and I sat on the sofa, where I always sit to watch TV.

  He smiled at me. He had a nice smile. He was the sort of person you might get a crush on if he was a teacher.

  ‘I’ve got a niece your age,’ he said. ‘She wants to be a nurse. Have you decided what you want to do yet?’

  I shrugged. I didn’t see what this had to do with Reenie. ‘Not yet,’ I said.

  He nodded his head at the window. ‘It must be a wonderful place to grow up. All the space.’

  ‘It’s all right,’ I said. I love this place as if it was sewn onto my heart and if anyone tried to hurt it I would tear their fingers off, but he was a stranger and I wasn’t going to tell him that.

  ‘Did Maureen visit the farm often?’ he asked.

  It sounded funny to hear her called Maureen.

  I glanced at Dad. His face was expressionless, as though to say, He wants you to tell him, not me.

  ‘Not much,’ I said.

  Dad usually had dinner with Reenie up in town. It had been ages since she’d come down to the farm, maybe a year or even more.

  ‘Why was that?’ he asked.

  You know, I’d never thought about it. She didn’t come because that’s what she was like. The farm and the bush just didn’t matter to Reenie.

  ‘She was busy,’ I sai
d slowly. ‘You know, with her HSC and all that.’ But I was thinking all the while that that wasn’t really the answer at all.

  Reenie was nearly thirteen when Mum and Dad split up. I was only eight and I suppose things go over your head a bit when you’re eight. Maybe she had memories I didn’t have. Bad associations. Maybe that’s why she kept away …

  ‘Did Maureen have any problems that you know about?’ he asked.

  I shook my head. ‘No, none. She was going to uni next year—she wanted to work for a year to make some money first.’

  ‘I’ve told you all this,’ said Dad.

  ‘It’s good to check,’ said Bob Munn. ‘Every little bit helps to build up a picture.’ And it suddenly struck me how little he trusted me or Dad. That he might think Dad was a psychopath, or that she had run away because he’d hurt her.

  ‘Everyone liked her?’

  I nodded. ‘Yes, of course everyone liked Reenie.’ Reenie was blonde and pretty and always did things perfectly. But I couldn’t tell the police that.

  ‘No one who would wish to harm her in any way?’

  ‘No,’ I said, then I thought about it just to make sure, but it was really crazy thinking that anyone had anything against Reenie. ‘No one at all,’ I added.

  ‘Do you know her boyfriend?’

  ‘Johnnie? Sure. He was in the same year at school as her. They’ve been going out for ages … six months at least. His sister Mary is in the class below me.’

  ‘Did you know they’d quarrelled?’

  I stared, and glanced at Dad. He hadn’t mentioned anything about it but he didn’t look surprised. This Bob Munn must have told him before I came into the room.

  ‘No. Are you sure? When?’

  ‘Wednesday night. The night before your sister went missing.’

  ‘But they can’t have quarrelled …’ I said stupidly.

  ‘Because your sister would have told you?’

  ‘Yes,’ I said, though I wasn’t at all sure she would have. But to say that would have meant admitting we weren’t close and I wasn’t admitting that to anyone. Besides, Reenie would have told Mum and Mum would have told me. And, anyway, Johnnie hadn’t said anything about a quarrel to Mum or Dad.