A Birth Announcement

Mac Sullivan turned the card over and scanned the
message. He recognized the scratchy handwriting. Over the past 10 years he’d
received a similar card every December. They had arrived along with the holiday
cards at the police station. But this year was different; the postcard was
addressed care of Sullivan Investigations. Someone’s address book had been
updated.

The picture on the front of the card varied, seemingly
random tourist locations – around the DC and Virginia area. No pattern other
than all depicting famous visitor or vacation spots. The postmarks changed each
year but all came from Virginia.
This year’s card featured the Smithsonian.

The mystery had come full circle–back to where it had
all begun.

The message on the postcard this year was the same as
it always was. Block printing. A simple question. “Where’s Amanda Norman?”

Mac’s first thought; his mental response to the sender
was always, “Dead.” The second was a warning to himself not to ever
say that word aloud. Technically Amanda was only missing. The fourteen-year-old
went on a class trip to the Smithsonian and didn’t come home again. The foster
family didn’t believe the teen was a runaway. There was no ransom demand. No
reports of sightings. No actual body was ever found. He was the first and, as
far as he knew the last detective on the case. He hadn’t solved it.

A decade later, the Amanda Norman disappearance was a
cold case, but not a closed one. The United States Post Office and a very
persistent pen pal saw to that. It was only two months after Amanda went
missing that the postcards had started arriving.

Now that he was retired from the police force and had
his own detective agency, he was thinking that maybe it was time to warm up the
Norman case. His holiday plans had included some quality time with his…He wasn’t
sure what to call Rachel Brenner. His girlfriend? Significant other? Rachel worked
for his best friend Jeff O’Herlihy. At Thanksgiving the O’Herlihy Funeral Home
had burned to the ground. Jeff had kept Rachel busy the last month helping him
set up shop in a leased building and file mountains of insurance claims, but
even workaholic Jeff had arranged for his staff to have a couple of weeks off
from the middle of December until after the New Year. Jeff had kept a skeleton
staff to handle any funerals, but Rachel was for all intents and purposes, on
paid vacation.

Mac had already canceled two dates with Rachel during
her down time. He had a feeling that last-minute trip to visit a distant cousin
was actually her raising the dating white flag in surrender. She was a little
vague on the telephone about when she was returning.

Determined to make a real effort, Mac stepped up his
game. He made dinner reservations for New Year’s at what Jeff had assured him
was the trendiest spot in DC. Meanwhile there were several cases he needed to wrap
up and a security job at a government contractor’s office that started in a
week. His calendar was full.

The timing of the arrival of this latest postcard couldn’t
have been worse. His staff of two was on vacation. He had a payroll to meet and
bills to pay. His concentration was needed on the work in front of him and not
the mistakes of the past.

Still…he hesitated to bury the postcard in the file
with the rest. After all these years, why was this one of the Smithsonian? Was
there a special significance that this year’s card depicted the place where
Amanda had disappeared? Had something changed for the sender?

He must have asked that question aloud, since Whiskey,
his Irish wolfhound sidekick, felt free to vocalize her opinion.