As Julia stood before her mother, the photo from the night of their engagement hung from her long fingers.
“Thanks for knowing,” Julia whispered.
As if in answer, someone softly knocked on the front door. Startled, Julia swung around and answered it. Evelyn, Tara, and two other women from the neighborhood stood on her front porch. Evelyn smiled, yet she had clearly been crying. Tara did not make eye contact. The others were the first to step into the Swanns’ home. They wrapped themselves around Julia like a protective blanket. It was well after 2:00 A.M.
“How’d you know?” Julia asked, fresh tears following well-worn tracks down her cheeks.
Evelyn stepped into the house next. The others parted, and it was her turn to hug Julia. They held each other for a time, while everyone else in the foyer stood awkwardly watching. Evelyn let out a choked laugh.
“I told them,” she said. “I had to. What can we do to help?”
Julia felt her heart about to burst. She couldn’t believe that her friends would be there, at that time, to help. It was so overwhelming.
“My mom’s going to stay,” she said.
Evelyn hugged Kate next. She’d known Julia’s mom for some time, as had Tara. Yet the latter seemed frozen on the doorstep, unsure what to do.
“Well, I’m guessing we aren’t going to sleep, so we’ll want some coffee.” Evelyn’s hand lingered on Kate’s shoulder as she moved into the kitchen. Julia followed her while the other women spoke softly to her mother.
“What about your kids?” Julia asked.
“Stop. Everything’s covered. We’re here whether you like it or not.”
“But my mom . . . I’m going back.”
Evelyn nodded. “I know. Just get going. When your kids are up, I’m taking them and everyone else’s to my house. Your mom can get some sleep then. What about you?”
“I’m fine. I don’t think I’ll ever sleep again.”
“You will,” Evelyn said, as if she knew firsthand. “Now get going. We got this.”
Julia grabbed her keys and snuck quietly out of the house, pausing for just a second to watch Evan asleep on the couch.
“We’ll be okay,” she whispered.
Julia slipped out and drove away.
Julia arrived at the twenty-four-hour express shipping store in Wilmington just before 3:00 A.M. The glowing window was the only one lit for blocks. She parked on the empty street outside and hurried in. A single young man in thickly framed glasses and a handlebar mustache looked up from a small television.
“Can I help you?”
Julia didn’t know what to say. She stood staring at the guy, holding nothing but the photo. Her plan was to print flyers that she could put up around the city. Yet she hadn’t made them up. She hadn’t done anything. Instead, Julia walked into the store with a photo in her hand and a look of desperation on her face.
“Are you okay?” he asked.
“I . . . I wanted to make up a flyer.” She laughed, a nervous sound that caused the guy to reach down and turn off the television. “I should have thought about it. Made it up on my computer.” She held out the photo like that might make sense. “I have this.”
A phenomenon occurs during tragedy. People become more human. They are connected by something common and larger. Like adherents of a temporary religion, they come together in peace and love and understanding. This young man was no different. He stepped out from behind the counter and gently took the photo from her hand. Then he walked over to the single computer terminal in the shop. Julia followed slowly.
“I didn’t know where else to go,” she said softly as the guy took a seat. “I don’t even know if you have a copier or anything.”
“We’ll get it done,” he said.
She stood behind him as he booted up the computer and opened the presentation-making program. He leaned over and placed the photo on a scanner. Within five minutes, he had the template for exactly what Julia had envisioned. And he’d done all that, gotten to that point, before asking her a single question.
“Is he missing?” he finally asked, looking up at her.
She nodded. “He was in Penn Station.”
He nodded. She saw the thought he had. It showed like a projection behind his eyes. He thought that Michael was dead. He felt pity for her, but maybe more. Possibly relief, that he and those close to him had been spared. Or maybe something else . . . morbid curiosity? Yet he said nothing. He added words to the flyer, somehow reading her mind again. He only asked for her name, her husband’s name, and her cell phone number, which he added at the end. When he was done, he tilted the monitor up and waited. She looked at the flyer and her heart fluttered, because of what it said and what this stranger had done. Out of the worst night of her life, she had somehow found the purest example of caring she had ever witnessed. The moment burned into her soul, the kind of thing that she knew she would never forget. Though her memories, like a photograph, would be two-dimensional. This man became an angel. And that could never change.
Julia held the flyer in her hand. The heading simply read MISSING. Below that was the picture of Michael and her. She remembered thinking how young they looked, how people might not even recognize that face compared to his present, more aged appearance. But there was nothing to do about that.
She continued to read. The flyer stated that he was last seen in Penn Station and asked anyone who might have seen him or had any information of his whereabouts to call Julia on her cell. Crying, she nodded.
“Thank you so much,” she said.
“I wish I could do more,” he replied.
He printed her three hundred copies and placed them in a sturdy accordion file. When she tried to pay, he refused.
“No way,” he said. “Just come back and tell me when you find him.”