My mother kept Laura’s room almost exactly as she had left it.
My father stopped talking about her almost entirely.
Neighbors walked the roads.
Police asked questions.
Our parents called relatives, hospitals, friends, anyone who might know something.
For months, every unfamiliar car slowing near the house made my heart jump.
Every phone call after dark felt important.
Every knock at the door made me run.
But eventually, the calls became less frequent.
The searches stopped.
People returned to their normal lives.
I didn’t.
Neither did my family, although we learned how to pretend.
My mother kept Laura’s room almost exactly as she had left it.
My father stopped talking about her almost entirely.
And I spent years wondering whether my sister was alive somewhere, whether she had been hurt, whether she had left willingly, or whether something terrible had happened to her.
The not knowing was the worst part.
Death, as unbearable as it is, at least gives you something definite to grieve.
Laura left us with a question mark.
I carried that question into adulthood.
Into marriage.
Into motherhood.
Then grandmotherhood.
I learned to live around it.
But I never really stopped waiting.
Even decades later, whenever I saw a woman with Laura’s hair or heard a familiar laugh in a crowded store, some part of me still turned.
