The Missing

9

The last night. The night Papa disappeared, when he fell out of our lives. Considering how much it affected me, you’d think the images that play in my mind would be detailed and clear. Razor sharp. But they’re not. The more crucial the detail from that night, the closer I get to the truth about what happened, the more impenetrable the fog becomes surrounding the events.

What I do remember is what happened before, the little things. For instance, there was a change in the weather a couple of days earlier, and it got colder. From where I was hiding in the dark outside Mama and Papa’s bedroom, I could feel a cool breeze seeping into the apartment. The parts of my body not covered by my nightgown, my calves and feet, quickly grew cold. The fresh air was mixed with the smell of smoke. I didn’t need to peek into the room to know what that meant. Papa had opened the tall bay window and was perched on the windowsill with a cigarette hanging from his lips. And he was probably holding a drink in his hand. I could tell by the way his voice sounded. It was loud and scornful. Mama’s was low and bitter. They were repeating the usual accusations, the same old complaints.

Why do you have to…?

Don’t you understand how humiliating it is for me when…?

Cunt.

I clutched my old teddy bear under my arm. A couple of months earlier, I had turned eight. I was a big girl now. That’s what all the grown-ups said. But I still slept with Mulle every night. I hugged his body, once so woolly but now matted and worn, as I lay in bed and dreamed of a time that must have existed, though I could no longer really remember. A time when Mama and Papa were happy together. A time before Papa began coming home late at night with strange smells on his skin and clothes. Before I could hear Mama crying through the thin walls of the apartment and Papa swearing loudly in reply.

A cunt. That’s what you are.

I flinched and pressed Mulle against my face, squeezing my eyes shut. There it was again. The word Papa used whenever he ran out of arguments. Cunt. For some reason, that particular word got under Mama’s skin, deflated her, demolished her. But Papa kept right on hurling it whenever they argued. Even though he knew how much it hurt her. Or maybe because of it.

The choice of swear words wasn’t the only thing that was repeated. My parents’ fights also followed the same pattern, based on the same building blocks. When that particular curse was uttered, it meant the end was near. And a resounding silence would soon set in. At first, Mama and Papa’s argument on that particular night seemed to unfold predictably. There was nothing to indicate that this argument would be the fateful exception to the rule. Mama had gone on the attack, this time because of a stain on his shirt collar, and Papa had responded with a scornful remark. She demanded an explanation and an apology, but he refused. When she pressed him, he pulled out his sharpest weapon. And once again, the air rushed out of Mama.

It was right then, after I’d already turned around to tiptoe back to my own room, that the fight rapidly and unexpectedly changed character. They kept going, even though it should have been all over. Their voices sounded distorted and hateful in a whole new way.

I know what you did to Greta. Hitting your own child… How could you?

The words reverberated like gunshots. Then it was quiet in there. I froze. There was a rushing in my ears, and I saw it again: the raised hand whistling through the air and slapping me across the face. An image, an event, I’d pushed out of my mind. Now it came back, overwhelming me, striking me full force.

I let go of Mulle, dropping him on the floor. My hand flew up of its own accord and pressed protectively to my cheek. But it was too late. The sting of the slap had already set in. It felt like a thousand sharp and burning-hot needles pricking my skin. Greta, sweetie, I didn’t mean to do it. I just turned around and saw… You know I didn’t mean to, right? I think it would be best if we don’t tell anyone about this.

And I knew at once who anyone was. There was no need to say it out loud. There was only one person from whom it was important to hide what happened. My eyes filled with tears of shock and humiliation as I promised to keep quiet, knowing it was for the best. But now. Now that anyone had found out.

I know that I turned around, and, instead of going back to my room or continuing to hide in the shadows, I stepped into the light and stood in the doorway to Mama and Papa’s bedroom. I know that it took a moment before they noticed me, and before that happened, the silence ended and their voices started up again. I think I heard questions about how and who and why hurled around, but it’s at this point my memory starts to resist. What happened next, the commotion that must have ensued… escapes me. Yes. That’s exactly how I usually describe it.

Of course that wasn’t what I said at the time, right afterward. When curious friends and their equally inquisitive but more discreet parents asked me what happened, I told them nothing. Not a single word. Because I had no words. None were adequate. It was only much later, as the years passed and I grew up, that I began to understand that what happened would never sink into oblivion. Even though Mama and I moved, changed jobs, changed schools, people kept asking and wondering and staring in horror. Finally, I came up with a phrase, one sentence that silences or at least deflects further interest. I have no close friends, but I use the phrase with coworkers and in social settings. I’ve used it on the psychologists I’ve seen, and when I told the story to Alex.

It escapes me.

An excellent turn of phrase, if I do say so myself.