Every year, on my birthday, I set the table for three—me, my husband (or, more accurately, my ex-husband), and Karen. Her seat always stays empty, a constant, aching reminder of what I’ve lost. This year I turned 47. All I wanted, all I’ve wanted for years, is for my daughter to come home. But no. She hadn’t spoken to me since I divorced her dad, Mark. In her eyes, I was the villain, the destroyer of her perfect family. She didn’t just pull away—she vanished. Changed her number, deleted social media, gone. I couldn’t remember the last time I truly *saw* her, not just a fleeting glimpse in a photograph or a forced smile at a holiday gathering before the storm of our family’s fracturing truly hit. This year, something in me broke. The carefully constructed façade of strength and acceptance crumbled. I couldn’t wait anymore, couldn’t bear another year of empty chairs and unanswered prayers.
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I drove straight to my ex’s house, a place I hadn’t been in years, a place filled with memories both sweet and bitter. Mark looked like he hadn’t slept in months, his face etched with worry lines I hadn’t seen before. He was still handsome, in a worn sort of way, but the spark in his eyes was gone, replaced by a dull ache that mirrored my own. Still, he let me in, his shoulders slumping as he ushered me into the dimly lit living room.
“Where’s Karen? Is she okay?” I blurted out, the words tumbling from my mouth in a rush of desperation. I hadn’t planned what I would say, hadn’t rehearsed a carefully worded speech. All I knew was that I needed to see her, needed to know that she was safe, needed to bridge the chasm that had grown between us.
Mark sighed, running a hand through his thinning hair. He looked at me, his eyes filled with a mixture of pity and pain. “Oh God, Don’t you know?” he asked, his voice barely a whisper. My heart pounded in my chest, a frantic drumbeat against my ribs. Know what? What didn’t I know? A cold dread began to creep into my bones, a premonition of something terrible.
He hesitated, as if searching for the right words, the right way to break the news. Finally, he spoke, his voice heavy with sorrow. “Listen… your daughter…Karen is gone. She disappeared years ago. Ran off. Eloped, actually. With someone we knew nothing about. We haven’t heard from her since.”
The room spun. My legs buckled. The floor rushed up to meet me. Karen was gone. Not just distant, not just estranged, but *gone*. Vanished into thin air. And I hadn’t even known.
