1. Joe

The strangest memory of my childhood concerns my father's disappearance.

This is what I remember:

It was late September. I was nine years old, and my sister Heather was seven and a half. Although summer was officially over and we'd been back at school for weeks, the weather continued warm and sunny, fall only the faintest suggestion in the turning of the leaves, and nothing to hint at the long Midwestern winter yet to come. Everybody knew this fine spell couldn't last, and so on Saturday morning my mother announced we were going to go for a picnic in the country.

My dad drove, as usual. As we left Milwaukee, the globe compass fixed to the dashboard—to me, an object of lasting fascination—said we were heading north-northwest. I don't know how far we went. In those days, car journeys were always tedious and way too long. But this time, we stopped too soon. Dad pulled over to the side of a country road in the middle of nowhere. There was nothing but empty fields all around. I could see a farmhouse in the distance and some cows grazing in the next field over, but nothing else: no park, no woods, no beach, not even a picnic table.

"Are we here?" asked Heather, her voice a whine of disbelief.

"No, no, not yet," said our mom, at the same moment as our dad said, "I have to see a man about a horse."

"You mean dog," Heather said. She giggled. "See a man about a dog, not a horse, silly."

"This time, it might just be a horse," he said, giving her a wink as he got out of the car.

"You kids stay where you are," Mom said sharply. "He won't be long."

My hand was already on the door handle, pressing down. "I have to go, too."

She sighed. "Oh, all right. Not you, Heather. Stay."

"Where's the bathroom?" Heather asked.

I was already out of the car and the door closed before I could hear her reply.

My father was only a few feet ahead of me, making his way slowly toward the field. He was in no hurry. He even paused and bent down to pick a flower.

A car was coming along the road from the other direction: I saw it glinting in the sun, though it was still far away. The land was surprisingly flat and open around here; a strange place to pick for a comfort stop, without even a tree to hide behind, and if my dad was really so desperate, that wasn't obvious from his leisurely pace. I trailed along behind, making no effort to catch up, eyes fixed on his familiar figure as he proceeded to walk into the field.

And then, all at once, he wasn't there.

I blinked and stared, then broke into a run toward the place where I'd last seen him. The only thing I could think of was that he'd fallen, or maybe even thrown himself, into some hidden ditch or hole. But there was no sign of him, or of any possible hiding place when I reached the spot where he'd vanished. The ground was level and unbroken, the grass came up no higher than my knees, and I could see in one terrified glance that I was the only person in the whole wide field.

Behind me, I heard shouting. Looking back, I saw that a second car had pulled off the road beside ours: an open-topped, shiny black antique. This was the car I'd noticed earlier coming along the road from the other direction. My mother had gotten out and was now in agitated conversation with a bearded man in a suit, a woman wearing a floppy hat, and two girls.

My mother called me. With a feeling of heavy dread in my stomach, I went back to the car. Heather was still in the backseat, oblivious to the drama. Seeing me approach, she pressed her face to the window, flattening her nose and distorting her face into a leering, piggy grin. I was too bewildered to respond.

"Where's your father, Ian?"

I shook my head and closed my eyes, hoping I would wake up. My mother caught hold of my arms and shook me slightly. "What happened? Where did he go? Ian, you must know! What did you see? Did he say anything? You were with him!"

"I was following right behind him, then he wasn't there," I said flatly.

"Yes!" The cry came from the woman in the old-fashioned car. She nodded eagerly. "That's exactly what happened! He just winked out of existence." She snapped her fingers in emphasis.

Copyright © 2005 by Lisa Tuttle