A little more than six hours had passed since we’d located Jack’s truck at the beach, but it felt as if it had been years. Sam had taken over my call to the police as we’d stood next to the old Ford, our bodies lashed by the wind and rain. He’d had no choice because after I’d dialed 911, I’d panicked, shouting into the phone, spouting words in no particular order like gone and boyfriend and beach. When I’d become angry because the dispatcher couldn’t string my nonsensical ramblings together, I’d told her, in no uncertain terms, to fucking listen. That’s when Sam gently lifted the phone from my fingers, put his arm around my shoulders and guided me to his car. He opened the door and ushered me inside, all the while explaining the situation to the emergency services, his words making it through my ears and inside my head, where they swirled around in an erratic, confused mess.

I’m not sure how long it took for the police to arrive. Minutes, probably, but it could’ve been hours. Sam and I sat in his car as I called whomever I could think of—Jack’s boss, our few friends and acquaintances—but nobody had seen or heard from him, and by the time I hung up I was no closer to solving the urgent mystery of his whereabouts. I brought my knees to my chest and wrapped my arms around them as Sam talked about his upcoming business trip, and how his daughter had broken her finger rock-climbing. Part of my brain acknowledged he was doing so to keep me from losing it, and so I listened and nodded, listened some more and nodded again, incapable of uttering a single word, but increasingly grateful for his.

When the police car arrived and parked across from us, a male officer in uniform and a woman dressed in a drab gray suit got out. They moved at a brisk pace, and although Sam had managed to keep me calm up to this point, I now scrambled for the door handle, jumped into the rain and ran toward them. The concerned expression on their faces reignited the panic bubbling inside me, everything I’d tried to push down by telling myself Jack was okay, we’d find him, and all this would be over soon. One glance at them made my stomach contract, threatening to empty my guts all over the parking lot. I clenched my fists, willing my food to stay down.