Unfinished

Barry isn’t a complicated man. He doesn’t lie awake at night sifting through thoughts in his head. He isn’t burdened by a plethora of complex desires or fears. He doesn’t have a tendency to strain his relationships with intense conversation or inappropriate comments. When he’s at home with his wife and daughter, he likes to sit with a scotch on the dark blue sofa and chat with them. He often helps Julia with her math homework or cooks dinner while Janet watches television. On the weekends they sometimes go to the movies – all three of them – or Barry meets Jack Farmer or maybe Dan Schmidt at the cigar bar. His days at work are spent grappling with numbers and virtual boxes, and the uneven yet persistent clicking of his keyboard gives him the pleasure of knowing he’s making progress, doing good work. Barry is a man who gains a certain satisfaction from rising before his alarm goes off, coming back from lunch 5 minutes before his hour is up, and packing up to leave the office at exactly five o’clock every afternoon. Which is why, on a frosty February morning last year, when he awoke to find the space beside him in the bed empty and cold, Barry immediately felt an unsteadiness below his ribs and a sharp rise in the pace of his heartbeat.

He paused for a moment to think, to try and remember why Janet hadn’t slept in their bed. But he couldn’t come up with any explanation, and so he launched into action. He swung his feet over the side of the bed into the maroon slippers Julia had given him for his last birthday. He walked to the closet to grab his dark brown dressing gown, was annoyed that it clashed with yesterday’s black dress socks which he’d slept in, but talked himself out of bothering about it until he’d solved the mystery of Janet. He brushed his teeth quickly and more vigorously than usual, took a piss, tied the robe across his bare chest and headed downstairs.

It’s incredible the work a mind can do in a time like this – even a mind like Barry’s, which wasn’t accustomed to rigorous activity. There are 21 stairs between the first and second stories of Barry’s house, and on his way down them his mind covered a lot of ground. She could have fallen asleep on the sofa watching television. Maybe Julia had a nightmare and she slept in her room to calm her. Perhaps there was an emergency, and she didn’t have time to leave a note. What kind of emergency? Her mother, maybe her mother needed her. But wouldn’t I have heard the phone if she’d called? It must be something I’ve forgotten! She told me, she mentioned staying out somewhere for something… no, not that, I can’t remember anything like that and besides where would she be and why? It doesn’t make sense, doesn’t add up. Aw, hell –

He was downstairs, and could see through the living room to the kitchen. No one was there, it was stagnant and silent but for the murmuring of the television in the den. He wandered in there, his panic growing steadily as his eyes fixed on the coffee table. Lain side by side were Janet’s watch, her strand of pearls, and a folded tea towel.