Work in Progress

"She's gone," my mother said; and I felt a snap, a loss-of-limb sensation that can happen when a sibling is in trouble. I tried not to betray my panic as I assembled the story from Mother's Alzheimer-riddled recitation. "Did she say where she was going?"
"She went to see a group."
"A group of what?"
"I don't know, but she needed money."
"Did you give her some?"
"Yes, but she said it wasn't enough."
"Did you give it to her from your purse?"
"Maybe. It was quite a bit. $100. $1000." She put the phone down and opened her purse. She began counting the bills in her wallet. I waited until she picked up the phone again. She was crying. "I didn't know what else to do. She got in the car and waved. I didn't know what to do."
"Don't worry, Mom. We'll find her."

Time flowed around me, its pulse throbbing in my head. I should do something. What was it, again? I was 350 miles away from my mother, and who-knows-how far from my sister, my vulnerable little sister. Possibilities lined up like ducks in a fairground shooting gallery: maybe she had told Mom where she was going and Mom simply hadn't registered it; maybe Mom, with her quirky relationship to Time, had no real idea about how long her daughter had been gone; maybe there was an appointment to be kept, a traffic jam to navigate, a flat to be fixed. Too ordinary, these scenarios – each one popped like a balloon in my mind.

The phone was still in my hand. I called my brother, waded through his electronic message and left my own: Our sister is missing. Call her doctor. Call the police.