oregon 2:3

We drove the streets looking for her, a city of bridges, back and forth across the river, utterly pointless and obligatory. I called the police. They would keep an eye out. Routine runaway tracking procedures could begin in the morning. What should we do? I asked Jack. Find her, he said. We kept driving, in widening circles around the restaurant where we'd lost her, two men now looking for Jack's two women, his mother and his sister, both lost, one in the city, one in the world. I'm sorry, Jack, I said. Me, too, he said. I wanted this six-year-old boy to comfort me, and he wanted his sister to comfort him. Why'd she leave? he said. She's just confused, I said. What's confused? That's how you feel right now, I said. Confused is bad, he said. Yes. I'm hungry, said Jack. We hadn't eaten at the restaurant. I'd gone to wash my hands, and she was gone when we came back. We'll look for her in the morning, I said. The police will look, okay? Okay, he said. We'll get a snack now and find a place to sleep. Okay, he said. He didn't trust me without Jill, I thought.

move on...