The Missing Person Read Online Free PDF

the cheek and left.
    I went behind the counter to my mother’s office, asking myself what Francie meant by “friend.” Then, in the moment before she stood up, I saw her blush and knew the answer.
    â€œLynnie,” she said, “you remember David Michaelson.”
    The burly man turned and smiled at me under his mustache. He was wearing a navy-blue suit whose jacket sported Western piping and pockets. He also had on cowboy boots, and it was the boots, for some reason, I remembered first. Before my father died we used to live next door to the Michaelsons. Their two boys, younger than Wylie and me, were sports stars of some kind.
    â€œHello,” I said, shaking his large hand.
    â€œI invited David to lunch.”
    â€œGood. Great,” I said.
    â€œNew Mexican okay?”
    â€œExcellent,” I said, smiling hard.
    We left the refrigerated offices and headed down the street to a restaurant, surrounded by the heat and noise of the traffic. Behind me, the thick heels of David Michaelson’s cowboy boots made knocking sounds against the pavement, and I could hear him whistling under his breath, a sprightly, unidentifiable tune. I wondered if the real reason my mother wanted me to come home was to reintroduce me to David Michaelson. I wondered what had happened to his wife and his athletic children.
    Inside, we sat quietly as our drinks were served. I’d ordered a frozen margarita, my mother an iced tea. David Michaelson sat back in his chair and took a large slurp of Coke, crunching the ice in his mouth. He was heavier than I remembered; his stomach strained against his light-blue, snap-button shirt and bulged over a square brass belt buckle that was practically the size of my head. With the belt and the mustache and the chest he reminded me of some early, imperious monarch: Henry VIII of the Wild West.
    I took another long sip of my drink. “So you’re a lawyer, right?” I said.
    â€œYes, that’s right,” he said.
    My mother smiled at me.
    â€œWhat kind of law do you practice?”
    â€œOh, a little of this, a little of that,” he said with a shrug. “Corporate, mostly, but whatever I can get my hands on. A client’s a client, that’s what I like to say.”
    â€œWe weren’t sure if you’d remember David,” my mother said.
    â€œOf course I do.”
    Silence fell. I didn’t know what to say about the wife and the athletic children. The waitress brought a basket of chips to the table. Half my margarita was already gone.
    â€œWhat about Wylie?” my mother said. “Did you find him yet?”
    â€œI went to his place, but he wasn’t there.”
    â€œI don’t like this,” my mother said.
    David Michaelson reached over and rubbed her arm, his expression at once sensitive and plastic. I remembered the boys’ names, Donny and Darren, and their sport, hockey. Throughout the arid winters they’d get up at five in the morning and trundle out to the car, lugging enormous duffel bags with their pads and sticks and helmets, as if they were traveling to some distant part of the country, where such materials would be required.
    â€œDavid thinks we should consider an intervention,” my mother said.
    â€œI thought that was for alcoholics and drug addicts.”
    â€œIt’s for anyone in trouble,” he said, then picked up a chip and snapped it cleanly between his teeth. “And your mother seems to think that Wylie’s in trouble.”
    â€œHe doesn’t eat, he quit his classes, he lives with nothing— you should see his apartment, Lynnie.”
    â€œI saw it.”
    â€œI thought you said he wasn’t there.”
    â€œSome guy was,” I said as the waitress arrived, balancing plates of enchiladas on a manhole-sized platter. I shoveled some food into my mouth and burned my mouth on the cheese, then gulped down the rest of my margarita in an attempt to ease the pain. The