Plagued

My youngest son, Joseph, became obsessed with the plagues shortly after his tenth Passover Seder. He was at the age where he could lead the entire service, should we need someone to do so. But as usual, my oldest son, Zeke, ran the show as he had done so since my husband Henry disappeared.

Joseph, of course, sang “The Four Questions,” and we all took turns reading the different sections. In the five years since Henry vanished, the Seders had grown shorter and shorter; in fact, the recent one lasted a record of forty-three minutes. We were all tired and there seemed too much to do. Zeke ran off to call his girlfriend, and Joseph helped me in the kitchen cleaning the good china.

“Whenever we open the door for the prophet Elijah, you look disappointed,” I said to him.

He set the stack of clean dishes in the cabinet, paused, then said, “I think Dad will come back when we open the door. But that doesn’t happen.”

I rubbed his soft black hair and gently kissed his nose. He looked like Henry did when we first met at Edison Middle School. Except Henry didn’t have freckles. Joseph’s light brown spray resembled a question mark. “I’m sorry,” I said.

After five years of therapy, the subject came up from time to time: the missing father. No one knew what had happened to him. One night Henry ran out to pick up a bottle of red wine to go with supper.  He didn’t come back. We were hosting a dinner party for...