Missing by Foust

Listen to a podcast of Foust’s “Missing.”

The best photograph of my sister is the one on the milk carton. My mother has a shoebox under her bed, packed tight with pictures of Elena. The one they used on the milk carton is definitely the best. In it, she’s holding a plaid throw pillow across her chest, gripping it tight. Her hair is fizzing in wild curls and her eyes are shining—she’s laughing so hard she’s on the verge of crying. No one has ever been able to remember what was so funny.
    According to my grandmother, Elena ran away. “Something to do with a boy,” she told me, frowning and shaking her head. My mother believes she was kidnapped, then murdered. My father refuses to speculate. One morning, they opened her bedroom door and no one was there. The bed was neatly made. Her suitcase was on the closet shelf. She didn’t take anything with her, as far as anyone could tell. There’s still a missing persons file open for her at the police station. There were never any leads for them to follow.
    It’s odd, having a sister I’ve never met. She disappeared nearly three years before I was born. I always knew there was a daughter who came before me and that no one knew where she was, but when I was growing up, they rarely mentioned her. Still, I felt her presence. My father would begin to talk about something and abruptly change the subject. My mother would stop mid-sentence and look away. That’s when I knew my sister was there.
    Her bedroom is my bedroom. After my mother found out she was pregnant with me, she took down the posters, stripped off the wallpaper, threw out the bedspread and matching curtains. Turned Elena’s room into mine.
    When she disappeared, my sister was sixteen. These days she would probably look a lot like my mother did nineteen years ago—the year her daughter disappeared.
    At night, shadows slip across the ceiling, blurring and blending in the dark. Sometimes, I imagine Elena resting next to me on the bed. Her curly hair is a soft brown cloud underneath her head. She has a low voice with a raspy edge. Maybe she sneaks a cigarette now and then. In the darkness, I lie very still. And my sister shares her secrets.

About the author

Foust is a writer and printmaker who lives in Richmond VA. Her stories have been in Minnetonka Review, Smokelong Quarterly, Wrong Tree Review, and Moon Milk Review, among others. She received an MFA in fiction from Spalding University. Her sporadically maintained website can be found at www.foustart.com. She continues to embrace her inner brevity.