The cabin creaks with every step as I pace the burnished old fir floors. It’s after eight thirty, and the sun still illuminates the water out the window. An ancient Seth Thomas in the kitchen ticks like a metronome, reminding me that I’m alone, while I need no reminder. I’ve never been one to pace before. On this evening, however, I have a lot to process. I pass by the room with the bunk beds where Aubrey slept the night before. I wonder how she’s coping with her grandparents. She’s three, but she’s smart. She knows that her grandpa hates her father. And I know, without a bit of doubt, that in the battle for her affection, I will always beat him. It might be the only thing even he’d concede. Helen is probably running a bath now, filling the tub with bubbles and making sure that the water isn’t too hot. She’s decent. Sometimes I see traces of Helen in Sophie, the parts of her personality that I have always detested. Sometimes, when something she disdains or disagrees with gets pointed in her direction, she pretends to not hear. She always says fine when she’s anything but. Sophie disappears into the bedroom and drops the blinds to create a dark fortress so she doesn’t have to face what disturbs her. I didn’t know that when I married her. I saw her as she showed herself to the world: fun, smart, sexy. Funny how those things are often a smoke screen from one’s true self. It’s easy to act all those things. Up for adventure. Head nods at complex scenarios when she’s not really listening. Ready for bedroom play even when there is no bedroom. In the beginning, Sophie was all those things. I didn’t know they were a construct. I thought they were key parts of who she was.

Service is lousy, but my phone blows up anyway. I slump onto the big blue sofa in the living room and scroll through the texts that started coming in around six and haven’t let up.

Dude, heard about Sophie.

Need me to come up?

What the hell!

She’s going to be found.

You coming back tonight?

Aubrey’s OK. Right?

Holy fuck.

What happened?

Are you OK?

The texts are from friends and family who caught the drama from the news and social media. I respond the best that I can, but I don’t know how to really answer. Obviously, I’m not fine. Yes, she’s going to be found. No, I don’t need anyone right now. What could they do anyway? Words and heartfelt concern won’t do me any good at the moment. I could pretend that they would. I could lie. The truth is far more complicated than that. I love my wife. I hate her too. I loved the idea of us. But—and this is hard to admit to myself—that was a while ago. Before Aubrey. After she was born, our life pivoted away from us to become something else. I’d become a father. Sophie, a mother. I learned that mother is more than father. Mother trumps everything. Father is a role. Father is biology. Mother is sacred. Motherhood consumes every bit of a marriage. Every last crumb.