Pied Piper

CHAPTER 6

Since the birth of her son Hayes, six months earlier, Trish Weinstein had felt out of synch, as if a week or a month had been stolen from her and she had never made up that loss. At twenty-seven she was feeling tired and old. Her body had not come back the way she had hoped; her stomach still looked like a five-day-old balloon; she still couldn’t get into her favorite jeans-the standard by which she measured her progress. Life as a mother was not what she’d expected, not always the maternally blissful state of joy everyone made it out to be.

Thursdays were her haven, a day she eagerly anticipated all week.

On these days, her mother-in-law, Phyllis Weinstein, arrived right on time, shortly after lunch. Same schedule every week.

“Hello, dearie,” Phyllis called out in that slightly condescending tone of hers, letting herself in through the back door without knocking first. Overbearing and protective of her son, Phyllis Weinstein seemed to view Trish as little more than a baby factory for furthering the diluted family line. As a gentile, Trish was never going to win the woman’s full affections; she felt tolerated-in the worst way-but her son Hayes had gained her some unexpected points.

“Hi, Phyllis,” Trish responded belatedly, a bit wearily.

“Where’s my little Hayes?” Phyllis asked, pushing past her daughter-in-law without any further attempts at niceties. She moved about the small house, Trish following. The woman just couldn’t stand still, stop talking or avoid mentioning bowel movements.

“Just waking up,” Trish explained. No matter her own relationship with Phyllis, it was good for all to have a grandmother around.

In a voice that grated like bad brakes, Phyllis admonished, “Don’t forget some shower scrub, will you? Sidney says the shower is growing into a rain forest.”

Phyllis then turned in time to watch Trish blush scarlet at the idea that her husband was reporting her housecleaning abilities to his mother.

“It’s the climate,” Trish explained with the knowingness of a transplanted Californian. “Hang out a fresh towel, it’s damp by evening.”

“Which, though it’s bad for a lot of things, is good for the skin. You know, Trish, you could use a little moisturizer around the eyes.” She winked. A little harder and the entire fake lash would have fallen off.

Trish reminded, “I’m at the gym ’til two, then the market.”

“Same as always,” the older woman said. “I’m not stupid, you know.”

“Home at three,” she reminded, heading to the back door, glad to be out of there.

Throughout the crunches, the leg lifts, the treadmill, the Northwest News Station carried updates on the Pied Piper kidnapping. A blonde-it had to be dyed-realtor was said to be a possible eyewitness that police and FBI were questioning. An adorable picture of the missing child was repeatedly shown and an 800 number superimposed on the screen. Trish felt God-awful for the poor parents. The TV reporter said something about thirty thousand children going missing each year, though most were over six years old. But for Trish and the rest of Seattle, it was only one child that mattered right now, and that was Rhonda Shotz.

She didn’t know what she would do if she ever lost Hayes. The kidnapper had overcome some teenage baby sitter. Thank God for Phyllis, she thought, in a rare moment of appreciation. She pitied the man who crossed Phyllis.