Page 4 of A Midlife Vanishing Trick

It began with a simple argument, one of many they’d had over the course of their marriage. Allison couldn’t remember what it was even about. All she knew was that four years ago, Stanley had disappeared while riding his horse on the ranch property as he often did to clear his mind.

He never returned to the house that night or even the next day. By the second day, she was beside herself with worry. Stanley hadn’t even called or sent a text. It wasn’t like him. She struggled not to dwell on the thought that something might have happened to him.

As the days passed, she found herself unable to keep waiting in the hope he would return and decided to alert the police. They organized a search party, and for days—or was it weeks—they scoured the entire town looking for any sign of Stanley Reyes. They had no luck. It was almost as if he’d vanished into thin air.

Or skipped town.

Whatever the case, Allison grew more uneasy. If he’d been murdered or had an accident and died, there would’ve been some trace of him in Torpe. But there had been no sign of Stanleyorthe horse he’d been riding the last time she saw him. The only plausible explanation for his disappearance wasthat he’d taken off, but no one in town had seen anyone riding through the streets on a horse.

He was simply ... gone.

Allison had to admit that she’d been a complete mess when he first vanished. For two years, she experienced a deep melancholy and seldom left Reyes Ranch. At times, she would find herself sitting on the front porch and staring out at the barns and the expanse of grassy field, half-expecting her long-lost husband to magically appear with open arms, gleaming blue eyes, and a big smile on that face she loved to gaze at so much.

It had taken support from Celine and a few of the townsfolk for Allison to pull herself together. And even now, after four years since Stanley’s disappearance, it still hurt to think about what had happened.

Allison supposed it wouldn’t have been so terrible if she’d at least gotten the closure of understanding why he’d disappeared. There were so many possible reasons, none of which she wished to entertain for too long. She wasn’t sure which had pierced her heart more: the fact that he’d vanished out of the blue or that he hadn’t bothered to reach out to her, not even once.

“Ihavemoved on,” she told Celine, feeling fairly foolish even as she said the words and knowing her friend would roll her eyes at her.

“Allison, you still use his last name. You need toreallymove on, turn your life around, find someone new to talk to.”

Allison sighed. “I guess you’re right. But where do I even begin?”

“Well,” Celine said, “coming to the bar was a good start, although being on your phone the whole time doesn’t exactly screamavailableto the guys there.”

“Being on my phone is probably the only reason I’m still sitting here,” Allison countered. “This isn’t my style. I’m not exactly one for bars.”

“You’d rather sit alone in that old ranch house?”

“Well ... it’s peaceful there. Not much going on.”

“To be fair, there’s not much going on in this town anyway.See why I asked you to come to New Hampshire last year?”

Allison pressed the phone harder against her ear. “You’ve always been the more outgoing one. I like it here.”

“I’m sure you’llloveit over here.”

Allison raised her cocktail to her lips and took a sip. “The city life’s too chaotic for my liking.”

“And Torpe’s too ... boring for mine. I’m just a girl, you know.”

She frowned. “Celine, you’re a forty-two-year-old woman with two degrees working as a software engineer for one of the biggest companies in the US.”

Her friend snickered. “Jeez, you small-town folk don’t keep up much with social media references, do you?”

“I mean, it’s not like we ...” Alison trailed off, peering over the rim of her glass at the man sauntering across the bar to meet her. “Uh, we have a problem.”

“What is it?”

“I think there’s a man headed my way.”

She wasn’t wrong. The man’s eyes were on her. There was no mistaking what that meant. The man was medium height—perhaps slightly taller than she was. He wore a checkered shirt, jeans, and boots and had a red hat pulled over a shock of hair. When she met his gaze, he grinned in a way that made her stomach squirm.

“A man?” Celine’s voice had risen an octave. “That’s perfect! I’ll leave you two to talk. I’m going to hang up now. Next time you call me, you’d better have secured a date—”

“Wait, Celine—”

“—or a one-night stand.”

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