Eleven Hours

There was nothing.

He called the cell phone again, and the useless message came on: ‘The AT&T customer you have dialed is not available or has traveled outside the coverage area. Please try your call again later.’

He tried to remember what the ‘Rich’ he thought he had heard sounded like. He couldn’t recall. It was muffled and distant. He could have been mistaken. It could have just been a ringing in his ears and not his wife calling his name, whispering it. ‘Rich. Rich.’

He must be imagining things.

Rich drove to the NorthPark Mall. If she wasn’t there, he didn’t know where she could be.

Dillard’s at NorthPark was just off Central Expressway. He found two white Town & Country LXi minivans near Dillard’s, but they weren’t Didi’s.

What was their license plate? TRX something. Or was it THX? No, THX was the sound system he was trying to talk Didi into buying. The license plate was TRX 6 something – or was it 7?

He saw a third Town & Country and slowed down. TJX 672. That was their car. He couldn’t believe it. She was at the mall. He had been wrong about her. She was at the mall and had forgotten all about him.

Rich was first mad, then relieved, then mad again. He parked his car a few spaces away from hers and walked over. He opened the door to look in. The car was as they had left it last night after going out to Applebee’s for dinner. Toys on the floor, newspapers, some shopping bags. Nothing new, nothing he hadn’t seen before. The shopping bags were from last weekend’s shopping expedition. Rich had been with Didi when they bought some clothes from Gap Kids.

He slammed the door shut and locked it. The car beeped once to let him know it was locked.

That’s when Rich saw a white paper bag on the ground and bent down to pick it up. He thought it was something that had fallen out of the minivan when he opened the door, but when he looked inside the bag he saw it had one whole and one half-eaten pretzel in it. He felt the pretzels through the bag. They were soft, and this surprised him. He had expected them to be hard. This bag was not something that had been in the car for two weeks. The bag itself was ripped, with a chunk missing. Rich pulled out a receipt for 2x items at 1.19 ea., bought and paid for with $3.00 at 12.25 PM today.

He turned the bag over a couple of times and noticed brownish stains that could have been chocolate. He smelled them. They didn’t smell like chocolate. They smeared onto his hands. But wait, was Rich going crazy? He put the bag to his face to smell it again.

He doubled over, feeling as if someone had punched him in the stomach.

The bag smelled of his wife’s hand lotion. He knew the smell of her lotion very well. Didi wore it all the time, and the aroma would linger long after Didi had left a room. From Bath and Body Works – Sun-Ripened Raspberry. It smelled berryish and creamy – good enough to eat with a spoon. Rich had watched Didi put it on this morning after her shower and before they made plans for lunch. He had watched her spread it over her arms and legs and neck and remembered thinking how lovely she was with that belly of hers. Grudgingly realizing he wasn’t mad at her anymore, he had asked her to have lunch with him after her doctor’s appointment. Usually he went to the doctor’s with her, but today he was interviewing a candidate for the southwest regional sales manager job all morning and couldn’t make it. Why hadn’t he gone with her?

It was her lotioned hands that had clutched the pretzel bag. Maybe another woman, wearing raspberry lotion on her hands, had bought not one but two of the sweet pretzels his wife loved only five minutes before Didi called him in a sharp voice, asking him to come to lunch early. And then dropped the bag right near their minivan.

Rich didn’t believe in coincidences. This was his Didi’s pretzel bag.

He was sure now it had been her voice he heard calling for him from wherever she was, connecting to him, and he had hung up on her and couldn’t get her back.

Holding the bag in his hands emptied him of all feeling and then filled him with anger. She was at her car when she dropped the bag. She was heading out to meet him when she dropped the bag and vanished.

He grabbed his chest, feeling a nightmarish tightness. ‘God, Didi, Didi,’ he whispered, starting to pant and losing focus in his eyes. What’s happened?

3.40 PM

When Didi regained consciousness, she wasn’t lying in the man’s lap, and her face wasn’t squeezed between his abdomen and the steering wheel. She was hunched over on the seat nearly falling onto his shoulder. She realized he must have pulled her up. Her head was throbbing as if her hair were any minute going to be disconnected from her scalp. Squinting, she looked for her bag. He had thrown it down on the passenger floor.

She sat up straight and looked around, rubbing her belly. They were now in the right lane, going sixty-five. No more concerned drivers peering at her through the windows of their cars. Just Texas fields, a few shrubs, some houses off in the distance, a hazy blue post-zenith sky.

Didi moved as far as she could away from him and pressed her body against the passenger door. She wished she could become a liquid and pour herself into the door and disappear. There was obtrusive and persistent ringing in the ear where he had hit her. The radio was playing country music, and the man, cheerful and unperturbed, continued to hum to it.

Didi had to go to the bathroom. The baby’s head was pressing too hard on her shrunken bladder. She had hoped she could just sweat out all the liquid in her body.

‘I feel that we got off on the wrong foot here,’ she heard the man say. She could not believe the words coming out of his mouth. She wanted to say something nasty back, but her teeth felt too large for her mouth and her tongue too unhappy. So she said nothing and waited for him to speak again. Why did her tongue feel so swollen? She rolled it around her mouth. It hurt. Maybe I bit it when he struck me. Parting her lips, she let some air in. Maybe I’m just thirsty.

‘Don’t you think so, too?’ the man said to her.

He’d asked her a question. What was she supposed to say to that? The Belly was locked in a Braxton Hicks. She held on to it for a few seconds and then said, shrugging lightly, hunched over against the door, ‘I guess so.’

‘No, no, we definitely did,’ said the man. ‘And it’s my fault, and I’m sorry for that. We didn’t have time to be properly introduced, and then I was so busy getting us out of Dallas that time just flew. You never even told me your name.’

She opened her mouth to speak. His voice was gentle now, soothing, as if listening to soft country music had relaxed him and made him calm. Had it made him calm enough to stop the car and let her out here in the middle of the highway?

‘When we were in the mall, I was trying to figure out what your name was,’ he said. ‘Did you try to guess what my name was?’

What was he talking about? She needed a drink. A sip or two of water. She was going to lick her wet-with-sweat hand again and then thought better of it.

‘Uh-huh,’ she said, her mouth barely moving. She said it very quietly. ‘Is it John?’

‘No, no.’ He laughed. ‘When I sat and waited for you to be done at Dillard’s, and you did take a long time, you know, I almost left. But anyway, when I sat and looked at your back and hair and legs, I tried to figure out what your name was. Let’s see…Ellen? Sonia? Maybe Jackie?’

He waited for her to answer him.

No, she said, or thought she said.

He nodded. ‘You don’t look like a Melanie, I decided. My wife is a Melanie, and you look nothing like my wife.’

Didi stared at her yellow sundress. She had felt so happy when she put it on this morning.

‘Monica?’ he continued. ‘No, that’s a tall name, and you aren’t tall. Annette? No. That’s a short name, and you aren’t short.’ He glanced at her, a smile widening his lips. ‘You are just right.’

She looked away.

‘You aren’t blond like a Jennifer, or made up like a Jessica. You don’t look smart like a Melissa, or lazy like a Megan. Am I right so far?’

‘You’re right so far,’ Didi said faintly.

He tapped on the steering wheel. ‘I’m having fun here. Right. This is tons better than working at some pathetic little job for a few bucks.’

I knew it. He wants money, thought Didi.

He seemed to be enjoying himself. He was smiling and looked as if he hadn’t a care in the world. The tension was gone, though he still kept both hands conscientiously on the wheel. ‘Hey, want to play a little game? Guess mine and then I’ll guess yours.’ He almost giggled with delight.

‘Listen,’ Didi said. ‘I’d love to play, but do you think we can get a drink somewhere first?’ She thought that stopping would be preferable to being stuck in the car with him. There would be people, she might be able to get away, call for help, anything but sit in the car and sweat.

The man’s smile dimmed a little. ‘What? And have you perform one of your little antics again? You’re dangerous enough in a moving car. No, I’m going to take you to a safe place. Now guess my name.’ He paused. ‘Tell you what.’ The smile returned. ‘If you guess my name in three tries, I’ll stop and get you a drink. Don’t want to dehydrate a pregnant woman, do I?’ His hand reached out to – oh my God, what was he doing? Was he thinking of touching the Belly? Didi was sitting too far away or he reconsidered, because he put his hand back on the wheel. ‘No, no, we certainly don’t. But you have to play a part in quenching your own thirst. Is that fair?’

Is that fair? she thought. Up to one o’clock, the unfairest part of today had been the doctor telling Didi the baby might be too big and they might need to induce labor a little early to make sure there were no complications during delivery. And she remembered thinking to herself, God, it’s unfair, to be penalized for having a big baby.

‘Let’s play,’ said Didi.

3.45 PM

Rich felt like bashing his head against the nearest car. What’s happened to my wife? he thought, and then screamed. Screamed right in the middle of the Dillard’s parking lot.

‘Didi!’ he shouted, and her name echoed amid the Toyotas and the Hondas and the Fords. ‘DIDI!’

A couple walking by turned to look at him and then lowered their heads and sped up. Rich ran after them.

‘Have you seen my wife?’ he said fervently. ‘My wife, five-seven, brown hair, brown eyes, very pregnant?’

They stared as if everything was not all right with him.

‘Please,’ he said, in a lower, pleading voice. ‘My wife. Very pregnant. Have you seen her?’

The woman took her husband’s arm. ‘No, sorry,’ she said and tried to push past Rich. The man followed, casting a sympathetic look at him. The man understood. But the woman shot him a frightened sneer; she must have thought Rich was crazy.

Clutching the pretzel bag, Rich ran inside the mall, heading straight for the Freshens Yogurt stand. As he ran, he was thinking that perhaps Didi had been walking to the car, dropped the bag by accident, thought of something she’d forgotten to buy, and gone back to the mall. But he knew that made no sense. She went back and didn’t call him? Her phone had been on, her voice whispering ‘Rich,’ when he dialed her number. She could have called him. But she hadn’t called him. She hadn’t got into an accident. The car was in the parking lot. Didi wasn’t calling because she couldn’t call, and the proof was in his hands.

A girl stood behind the Freshens Yogurt counter. She smiled. ‘Can I help you?’

‘I hope so,’ said Rich intensely. ‘I hope so. My wife –’ He stammered. ‘My wife was here earlier today.’ He thrust the bag at her. She moved away. ‘My wife was here and bought these two pretzels.’

‘Walt, hold on, hold on, sir,’ said the girl. ‘I just came on. I don’t know anything.’

‘Who worked before you?’

‘Alex. He just left.’ Rich’s face must have implied urgency, because she said, ‘Wait, maybe he’s still in the back changing. Hold on.’

She came back a few minutes later with Alex.

‘It’s your lucky day,’ said Alex.

‘Somehow I doubt it,’ said Rich. ‘Unless you want to redefine the nature of my luck.’ He thrust the bag with the receipt and the pretzels at Alex. ‘My wife was here earlier. She bought these here.’

Glancing at the receipt, Alex said, almost defensively, ‘Is something wrong with them?’

‘No, but something could be wrong with my wife,’ said Rich. ‘She’s disappeared.’

Alex smirked a little. ‘Do you think it had something to do with the pretzels?’

The counter rattled when Rich slammed down his fist. ‘You think that’s funny? Perhaps I didn’t make myself clear. Let me explain. My wife, nine months pregnant, was here earlier today shopping. At twelve twenty-five she bought these from you. At twelve-thirty she called me and asked if she could meet me for lunch earlier than planned. At one o’clock she didn’t show up, and no one’s heard from her since. So now, tell me what part of that you find funny, so we can laugh together.’

Paling, Alex said, ‘Hey, look, I’m sorry, I didn’t do anything. What did your wife look like?’

‘Pregnant. Extremely, inordinately, unbelievably pregnant. How many pregnant women did you serve today?’

‘Well, one that I remember,’ said Alex grumpily. ‘But you know, the counter is high – I don’t look over and check out my customers’ stomachs.’

Rich reached over and grabbed Alex by the shoulders, shaking him. ‘God, help me. Please,’ he whispered. ‘My wife is missing.’

Immediately he let go; Alex looked noticeably upset. Rubbing his arms, the teenager said, ‘Look, I don’t know anything. I just saw one pregnant woman here, long dark hair, carrying a lot of bags.’

Rich brightened. ‘Yes?’ he said. ‘That sounds like my wife. What was she wearing?’

‘I don’t know – oh, wait. A yellow dress.’

Rich nodded. ‘That’s my wife.’ Did that make him feel better? If it did, it didn’t make him feel better for long.

‘Yeah?’ Alex said. ‘That’s all I can tell you. She bought a couple of pretzels, I think. Paid. Left, carrying all her bags. A guy who was here buying a pretzel for himself caught up to her and asked her if she needed some help with the bags –’

Rich asked in a small, stricken voice, ‘What guy?’

‘I don’t know. Some guy. I’d never seen him before.’

‘No, of course not. Did my wife seem to know him?’

‘No. He seemed nice, though. Kept asking her questions about the pregnancy, you know, when she was due, that sort of thing.’

Rich stepped back from the counter. ‘This guy, what did he look like?’

‘I don’t know,’ said Alex. ‘I didn’t pay attention.’

‘Please try to remember.’

‘I really don’t know. Maybe your age.’ Alex looked Rich over. ‘How old are you?’

‘Thirty-four.’

‘No. I don’t know. He was older than me, that’s all I know.’

‘Beard? Mustache?’

‘No, clean-cut. Short hair. Taller than me.’

‘Taller than me?‘ asked Rich.

‘How tall are you?’

‘Six feet.’

‘No, I don’t think so. Taller than your wife.’

‘Do you remember what he was wearing?’

‘Listen, he was just a guy. There was nothing special about him. He was just another customer, you know?’

‘You don’t remember what he was wearing?’

Shrugging, Alex said, ‘No, not really.’ He glanced over at the salesgirl, who was listening to the conversation. She shrugged, as if to give him moral support. Alex turned back to Rich. ‘I think jeans, a jacket. But I can’t be sure.’

Rich was quiet. ‘You said he approached my wife and asked her if she needed help with the bags?’

‘I think that’s what he asked her.’

‘And she?’

‘I don’t know. They were, like, too far from me. I didn’t hear her. I assume she said no thanks, because he lagged behind and she walked on by herself.’

‘When you say lagged behind –’

‘What?’

‘“Lagged behind” implies he followed her. Or did he turn around and go the other way?’

Scratching his head, Alex said, ‘No. I think he lagged behind. I think he went the same way she did. I’m not sure. I got another customer, and stopped watching them.’

Rich’s hands were drumming on the counter. ‘Did you get a feeling about him?’

‘No, I got no feeling about him,’ said Alex, for some reason sounding offended.

‘Did you see him again?’

‘No, I got busy. It was lunchtime. I didn’t see anybody.’

‘Didn’t see my wife either?’

‘Uh – come to think of it, I did see him. I saw her too. She was walking back from over there.’ Alex pointed. ‘She had more bags in her hands. She looked tired, but was walking faster than before. Like she was hurrying, you know?’

‘And when did you see him?’

Alex thought. ‘I don’t know. I think after I saw her. He was kind of shuffling along.’

‘Was he going in the same direction she was going?’

‘Well, I don’t know if it was in the same direction.’ Alex pointed to the mall aisle. ‘You see, either someone is walking to the left or they’re walking to the right. They either disappear behind the wall to the right or they disappear here to the left. Occasionally they may go into Dillard’s or sit near the fountain. But that’s it. I saw her going to the left, and I saw him going to the left too.’

‘Yes,’ said Rich in a raspy voice. ‘What time was that?’

‘I don’t know. Maybe a little after one. I went on my break at one-thirty.’

‘Alex, please take a ride with me, will you? To the police station.’

‘I’m not going anywhere,’ said Alex, looking nervous. ‘I’m not getting in a car with you. I don’t know you.’

‘Okay, then can I use your phone? I have to call the police.’

They let him call the police, and then they waited. Rich called home, found out that Didi had not called or returned. He asked Ingrid to call his mother and ask her to come and take care of the children for him.

‘Is everything all right?’

‘Yeah, sure,’ said Rich, closing his eyes as he leaned on the counter for support. ‘We’re just – I’m just going to be delayed – listen, don’t worry. How are the girls?’

‘Hold on,’ said Ingrid. ‘Irene wants to talk to you.’

Rich tried to put on his cheeriest voice. ‘Hi, honey. How was playgroup?’

Three-year-old Irene didn’t want to talk about playgroup. ‘Daddy,’ she whined, ‘Manda won’t share Sing and Dance Barbie with me!’

‘It’s okay, honey,’ Rich said. ‘Where’s yours?’

‘Mine broke and now she won’t share hers!’

In the background, Rich heard Amanda’s voice. ‘She broke hers and now she wants to break mine!’ Then, ‘Give me the phone! I have to talk to Daddy too.’

Rich took a deep breath. He heard the phone crash to the floor, followed by piercing screams. Ingrid picked up the receiver and said, ‘Everything is all right.’

‘Good,’ Rich said. ‘Please call my mother.’

‘If you want, I can stay a little later,’ Ingrid said.

‘Thanks. I don’t know how late we’ll be, though.’

‘Is Didi having the baby?’

And in the background, Irene shrieked, ‘Mommy’s having the baby! Mommy’s having the baby!’

Rich tensely rubbed the bridge of his nose. All he wanted to do was hang up. ‘No, she’s not having the baby. Just call my mom, Ingrid, please.’

He had no stomach to call his mother himself. He had nothing to tell her, anyway. He just needed her help. His mother was going to lose it no matter what. Ingrid had never called before to ask Barbara Wood to come over and help with the children. Rich knew that talking to his mother required too much of him, and he didn’t have the patience for it. Ingrid asked again if everything was all right, and Rich said yes, sure, but had to hang up. He could barely hold himself together.

Five minutes later the police arrived. There were two officers – Officer Charles, a man, and Officer Patterson, a woman. Patterson did not seem particularly sympathetic and Rich took an instant dislike to her. She reminded Rich of the disapproving older woman in the parking lot. Like, what’s the matter, your wife is away from you for a few hours and you panic? What about when you leave us to go on your business trips and we can’t get in touch with you? What about when you go out with the boys and say you’re coming home at midnight and it’s three and you’re still not home? Don’t worry, Officer Patterson’s casual expression read. Your wife is probably at the movies.

Officer Charles was talking, but through the din in Rich’s head he could barely hear him. Then he realized the din was there just so he couldn’t hear Charles speak, because Rich didn’t like what he was hearing. Something about not jumping to conclusions.

Rich wasn’t sure if he needed to respond to that or just get in his car and go home. He said, ‘I thought you came to help me. If you can’t help me, then let me talk to someone who can.’

The officers tried with little effect to be more helpful. ‘Could your wife have gone into labor?’ said the woman officer. ‘Could she be in the hospital somewhere?’

Shaking his head, Rich said, ‘We’re preregistered at Columbia Medical. If she was having a baby, that’s where she would go, and they have my number. Also she has it. She’s not there. I called them. And no one’s called me.’

‘Could she have been in an accident?’ said Charles.

‘Yes, yes, she could have,’ Rich said impatiently, failing despite his best wishes to talk slowly, calmly, reasonably. ‘No, absolutely. You’re so right. She could have been in an accident.’ He paused. ‘But not in her own car. Because our car is parked out –’ and he flung his arm for emphasis – ‘there.’

Officer Charles stared at him. ‘Perhaps she had an accident in someone else’s car?’ he said.

‘Maybe she met a friend and decided to spend the afternoon with him or her,’ Officer Patterson suggested.

Rich rubbed his eyes, shaking with frustration, and other things. ‘Oh, dear Jesus! We had a lunch date at one. She didn’t show up. She has the cell phone with her –’

‘Maybe it ran out of power,’ said Patterson.

‘You mean to tell me that my wife decided to stand me up after calling me and asking me to meet her early?’ he said loudly. He may have even shouted. The officers asked him if he wanted to go upstairs and talk to them privately in the security offices. Rich refused.

‘Could she still be in the mall, maybe?’ said Charles, while Patterson looked at Rich disapprovingly.

‘Okay,’ said Rich. ‘She buys a pretzel from Alex at twelve twenty-five, at which point she’s accosted by a stranger who offers to carry her bags. She refuses. He follows her –’

‘He goes in the same direction she’s heading,’ Officer Patterson corrected him.

‘Of course, excuse me. At twelve-thirty she calls my office and asks me to meet her a little early for lunch. That’s unique in my experience.’

‘Maybe you’re prejudging your wife,’ said Officer Patterson. ‘There’s a first time for everything.’

Rich faced the male officer. ‘She shops for a little while longer, and then Alex sees her heading that way.’ Rich pointed. ‘Which is where her car is parked. I know because it’s still there. The man is walking in the same direction she is. I know you say it’s a coincidence, but how many can we have in one day?’ Rich could not stop moving. ‘If my wife met me for lunch, then I’d say everything’s hunky-dory and isn’t it all so coincidental. But she didn’t meet me for lunch. No one’s heard from her. Her car is still parked outside. Which means that my pregnant wife with all her shopping bags is still in this mall, because the bags are not in the car. Except for this bag, the pretzel bag. I found it next to our minivan. Look, there’s a receipt in it, two pretzels, my wife’s smell on the bag, and what to me looks like her blood. Look!’ He shoved the bag rudely into Officer Patterson’s face and then into Officer Charles’s. ‘What do you think it is?’