M.I.A.

Georgeann is listening to the 10th ring shrilling in her ear, again, as her hands are shaking, knees trembling, and tears begin to form in her eyes. Scott isn’t answering. She and her second husband Donald are worried, along with Scott’s biological father, Peter. She’s called like 30 times, and has left over a dozen messages. She’s on her next. And onto her third glass of Pinot. With her super short hair, long nose and lanky stature she reminded people of Helen Reddy and Olive Oyl, but without their warmth. Known for her detached cool, she was uncharacteristically vexed and disconcerted.
“Scott, it’s me, Mom. Again. Where are you? Are you at Ohio State? We’re really worried. Please answer me,” she monochromatically repeated into the phone as she paced the kitchen of her suburban ranch, her words as empty and flat as she felt, experiencing the wave of numb that follows anxiety, just before sheer panic sets in and leads to incoherence. She’d stopped calling his older, adopted brother John, as he was already devastated with the news that Scott was missing. John grew up the miscreant. If Scott, the “good” son was missing, it did not bode well. Georgeann used to be known for her good meals, well seasoned and made with care. Now pots literally slammed onto the stove, and mac and cheese from a box, too liquidy and tasting of cardboard, became dinner du jour.
After the first 24 hours went by they were finally able to call the police and file a missing person's report. The police officers were unhelpful as Scott was not a minor. They took some basic information, but just kept saying “we’re sure he’ll come back.” That was incredible frustrating and hard for Georgann to hear.
It has now been two days, almost three, still no one has heard from Scott, including John, and his trio of high school friends at OSU, and those from Xavier, his current alma mater. Before Scott left he put a note on his dad’s refrigerator letting him know that he was going to visit some friends at OSU, since Xavier had a different spring break. He was driving there, alone, in his Ford Tempo, a yellow junker steps from the scrapyard purchased with his lifeguard earnings. It was only two hours from Cincinnati and from his dad’s three bedroom condo. At 19 he’d driven further and no one thought it would be a problem since it was that close, until he stopped answering. His parents called his friends at Ohio State who said he never made it there. That’s when Georgeann poured her first glass.
No one could imagine where he could be. Peter met Georgeann, Donald and John at Georgeann and Donald’s small house. They brainstormed, like maybe his phone died and he had no way to charge it, but one day became two, two became four, then five, then six… until two weeks disappeared in a daze. Countless messages were left on his phone until his mailbox was full, but still no sign of Scott. They contemplated some more ideas, like maybe he met a girl; he was good looking and muscular with luscious, long brown hair, tall too, about six feet, and ambitiously studying business at Xavier. He was a catch, really. His family knew that was unrealistic though.
A detective finally called back. He met Peter, Georgeann, and Donald at Peter’s apartment. Georgeann couldn’t help herself, as soon as she got there she wandered into Scott’s room. Somehow the blue walls of his bedroom made her sad, knowing it was his favorite color didn’t help. It was still adolescent, with a Cincinnati Reds pennant swishing over his Bengals bed cover. His baseball bat and mitt rested in his room, well used, reminiscent of childhood and definitely pre-college. She started to have flashbacks to his high school baseball games. He was a pitcher, and a talented player. She sat on his bed holding his pillow and began to cry, closing her eyes, just thinking about holding and hugging her son, wishing she’d made more time for him, unable to remember the last time she’d told him she loved him. “Was he a toddler then?” She asked herself. Had the tough love approach she used at work cut him off from talking to her? Donald came in and gently nudged her; it was time to join Peter and talk to the detective.
When the detective got there Peter poured everyone a glass of water (in the days before bottled) and they all met at the table. Georgeann eyed the wine, in the early throes of what would become a later, lifetime addiction.
“Please. Find my son. Please.” Georgeann begged. A social worker and an ordained minister, she had made a career out of calm grace, meeting situations like these for others with a balanced sense of urgency. Now she gave up on any pretense of decorum. Her hand shook as she tried to drink.
The detective, a nondescript man with close-cropped short hair, a white Ralph Lauren polo and khakis, went through all the basics. He flipped open his steno pad and began:
“Date of Birth?”
“February 10, 1970,” she answered this first question stoned face trying to stay strong.
“So he’s 19? Which is why it’s hard to file a Missing Person’s report. Got it. Height?”
“6 feet.”
“Weight?”
“150 pounds.” Georgeann trying to keep from crying responded in a monotone voice eyeing the wine bottles on the counter.
“Date last seen?”
“March 13th, 1988.”
“What kind of car does he have?”
With a pit in her stomach, and ball in her throat she said, “1984 Ford Tempo.”
“Color?”
“Yellow,” she said as the tears started rolling down her face. She couldn’t help it.
And so on. Before he left he took a picture of Scott and said:
“I will do everything I can to find your son.”
Once he left Georgeann already balling headed straight for the wine cabinet and took out a bottle.
A few months go by, still no sign of Scott. Georgeann could not stop crying, she barely left her room and was hardly seen without a glass placed next to her. Donald wasn’t any help, and John wouldn’t speak to anyone. Then, on a Tuesday evening, Georgeann gets a call from the detective.
“Mrs. Smith, we have a lead on Scott. We found a car off a cliff in in the Arizona desert. No one was in it. It seems as if someone tried to push it off because it was stuck in a tree. Can you please come down to the junkyard and identify it? It had Ohio plates, and we traced them back to Scott.”
Georgeann was completely distraught at hearing this. She handed the phone to Donald because she couldn’t form words. Donald made an agreement for them to meet him and he, Georgeann and Peter drove down to the junkyard together to identify the car. The detective met them there. It was Scott’s 1984 Ford Tempo. Skyline’s four-way chili wrappers were crumpled on the floor, and empty cans of Mountain Dew pop peppered the back seat, landing where Scott had absentmindedly thrown them while driving. Georgeann broke down. The detective explained that a park ranger was hunting out in Arizona and spotted the car off the cliff. He then climbed down and called the police.
“We think that Scott was selling drugs and stopped at his dealer's house in West Chester, Ohio, to get drugs and was in the wrong place at the wrong time.”
At this Georgeann whimpered, she couldn’t imagine her son doing something so illegal.
He continued: “We think the dealer killed someone and we think that Scott saw that and that the dealer killed him too and then used the car to make a drug run and when it died, ditched the car,” he explained, talking quickly, repetitively, until he saw Georgeann nodding comprehension, while crying.
“We excavated the farm that the dealer lives on, but didn’t find his body. It’s the most likely scenario. Once we told his friends we found the car, they told us Scott was dealing to help pay for expenses and extras. Not a big time dealer, but, again wrong place, wrong time.”
Georgeann didn’t believe in giving her sons money for expenses. They had to work during high school and college, pumping gas and pouring Dunkin Donuts coffee. Though she hadn’t questioned Scott’s ability to buy Christmas presents last holiday, she still refused to believe the worst and found it hard to digest the detective’s long ramble. She went home and told John everything.  He abruptly stood up and screamed “Nooooo” and left the room, slamming every door en route to the second floor. Smashed plates and mugs, probably with leftovers, hit and ricocheted off the walls of his room. Anger and his disbelief reverberating. Georgeann poured two glasses of wine, setting them onto the low wooden coffee table, now dotted with rings from the stems, and drank them both.