âI am an emotional plagiarist, stealing other people’s pain, subsuming it into my own until I can’t remember whose it is any more.â -Sarah Kane.
They struggle to write articles about you.
Was your hair curly? Brown? Maybe even had a couple of split ends from all the convenience store hair dye?
They struggle to describe you because they want to get it right.
The police report that was recently released was no good. They filed it in a hurry between shifts. Even the hard copy that made its way to the courthouse had donut crumbs all over it. But your parents donât mind because thatâs the kind of disrespect theyâve come to expect from our underfunded council services.
Thereâs an empty bedroom in the apartment flat now. But donât worry, your grandma is coming soon, and tomorrow her fragile body will fill your bed. Sheâs in town to console your parents in their time of need. Right now, your mom needs her mom, almost as much as you need both of them. Hopefully, having the family’s matriarch under the roof will help stabilize the situation.
Your Grandma’s stoic nature has always been good for that, to help keep a sense of calmness. She picked up that personality trait from growing up in the north of England, somewhere near Manchester. But you know how she doesnât like to talk about the town sheâs from. Sheâs a part of the generation thatâs still ashamed of heavy accents. The only thing thatâs really northern about her is her sarcasm, and, unfortunately, thatâs not helping us much. Weâre trying to find a missing person.
And yet, those fools at the local paper are still struggling to write an article about you. Newly grads all nervous and anxious, theyâre still showing up to the office dressed like university students. Blue jeans and casual dress shirts everywhere. Up until this point the whole team has only had to write about little things;
        Mayor Romano announces plans for the city to purchase new garbage bins.
        St Andrew Technical School wins the local county Rugby Tournament.
        Community Centre braces for budget cuts after federal budget announcement.
Weâre not the kind of newspaper that writes about a missing person. This is the kind of newspaper that writes the same headlines that all the other irrelevant common papers print. All across the country, it feels like weâre all typing those same sentences.
Iâm looking around the office, and I see all the clippings about research we got on your file. We havenât interviewed your parents yet, and they arenât in any state to sit down with a reporter for a meeting. Theyâre still in shock from the whole ordeal. Their faces with no affect hold their tongue, emotionless and bitter, like a detained schizoid.
We all have our moments of anxiety. What your folks really need right now is to talk to a therapist, or maybe even a priest if theyâre religious. Then again, nobodyâs an atheist in times of crisis.
They keep on staring at me, your parents, with frightened hollow eyes. Glaring in disbelief that this is all happening. Looking at me, sitting in my cubicle in my stupid monkey suit, trying to get answers from me.
Everyone hates tabloid journalists, including me. Weâre all just a bunch of vultures. Nothing but a bunch of preppy assholes whose job is to chase down tragedy after tragedy. Somedays, this line of work really eats at your soul.
The only leads weâve managed to get about you comes from that dreaded police report, or from your friend Veronica.
I assume itâs a fake name, like, Veronica, really? Nobody has a name like that around here. It sounds like the name of a character straight out of a sitcom. She walked in earlier, with her bright purple hair and animated personality, and immediately started chatting away.
Veronica says sheâs worried about you. Describes herself as a âsort ofâ friend of yours. Defiantly not an acquaintance, but certainly not your best friend. Claims she met you at an AA meeting. She spoke highly of you and about all of the progress youâve made in combating your drinking problem.
Unfortunately, due to the anonymous nature of the âtwelve-stepsâ program, we canât use any of Veronicaâs testimony. She must known that, and I think she only came into the office this morning to vent her grief. That would explain the obvious fake name. Like, âVeronicaâ really? Oh, come on girl. Sheâs clearly just here to find someone to dump her raw emotions onto.
And so, I spent my morning holding space and playing the role of unofficial therapist for an hour. Afterwards, I wished âVeronicaâ well, and then thanked her before sending her on her way.
A more senior co-worker tried to tell me afterward that I didnât have to sit and listen to that chatterbox. Especially when her testimony is clearly useless to us. But I guess Iâm too polite to interrupt. Itâs the Canadian in me.
During her incoherent waffle, âVeronicaâ told stories of you. I heard rumors about your habits. How you would spend many late nights strolling the East End co-ops. Somewhere in that awful sketchy neighborhood where all the meth-heads live. Allegedly partying with the wrong crowd, she gossiped about cocaine and tequila without any soda.
Did you ever take off your clothes while visiting those brutalist flats? How many cigarettes did you manage to bum? Your legendary charisma manages to transcend those back rooms.
Your mother and father donât want to see you in that way. They want to hold onto this image of you as a little girl. The child who took karate lessons, and swam at the local swimming pool on weekends. That carefree young child playing in the warm sun.
The girl who would try to play her fatherâs guitar in the evening. Badly singing Taylor Swift and Bruce Springsteen songs with a shaky youthful voice. That person⊠thatâs who weâre trying to describe here.
And with that minimal amount of information, they continue to struggle with writing articles about you.
We have to come up with something quick, social media is starting to blow up with posts about your sudden disappearance. All of your friends are worried, sharing images of you with the captions, âHave you seen her?â. Now, thereâs a real risk of misinformation spreading, so we have to move fast.
The fluorescent lights overhead begin to flicker, which almost makes me lose my cool. I hate those cheap lights above me.
Someone in the meeting room suggested that we emphasize that this was just âa girlâ. Someone else opposes, insisting we refer to you as âa womanâ out of respect. We must treat this story with the sensitivity and care that it demands.
Only, when does one become a woman anyway? When she opens her first credit card account? When she drinks her first lager? When she experiences heartbreak for the first time?
Twenty-one is still a young age, despite what the media wants everyone to think. Itâs a time when an adolescent still carries awkward bones around. Joy Division still sounds hopeless, instead of bleak, at twenty-one.
Are you a lost little girl, who rebelliously ran away from your suburban home? Are you a missing woman, a Jane Doe, who vanished from the scene? Or, maybe abducted by aliens from another galaxy?
What if youâre now Ophelia? I would feel awful if they were true. That we arrived too late and found you drowned in flowers from overwhelming grief. That everyone and every system in this town failed you.
Itâs a story weâve all heard. In Dublin, Moscow, Bangkok, Vancouver, Miami, or Nairobi; a young pretty woman goes missing and all the locals freak out. A fable that has been spoken all around the globe.
Your Grandma has never cried in front of anyone since the age of sixteen. And it doesnât look like she will break that tradition today. But she is eating a bar of American chocolate, which seems to be an action that surprises your balding father. The stress is getting to both of them. Imagine having to hold in all this terrible news – before the bombastic sound of police sirens arrives.
        Yesterday, a young woman was reported missing by the police departed. She is twenty-one years of age but is described by friends as looking older. Has curly brown hair, or possibly bleached blonde. She was last scene around the Bakerâs Woods. Her family would greatly appreciate anyone with information to contact the officials.
There, can we all at least agree on this paragraph?
Your co-worker raises his hand in objectionâŠ
Fuck me. This feels like wartime censorship.
Iâm going mad with frustration and itâs turning my wrinkly face maroon red.
Itâs going to be a long day at the midtown office.