My mother has been missing for nine days now. Not dead, but missing.

I first found out six days ago, when her tennis instructor, Bart something-or-other, called me around dinner time, asking if I knew why she hadn’t shown up to her lesson.

BECAUSE PEOPLE NEVER VISIT BY MADELEINE HARRINGTON 34THPARALLEL MAGAZINE ISSUE 19

The last conversation I had with my mother was about silverware. She called me in a fuss while I was at work and about to enter a meeting, fretting over the price of a spoon as if I had been the one to write out the price tag.

“I can’t believe this, twelve goddamn dollars. This is ludicrous.” Her voice hardly stood out against the noisy street or crowded room behind her, wherever she might have been.

“I guess that is expensive,” I tried to keep this sort of exchange brief. My mother would have had the same interactions with her doorman had he been around, she simply needed a channel for her anger, and on this occasion she’d chosen me as the source.

“I tried to argue with the guy, but he wouldn’t budge. He almost called security on me too. Pe…