Our daughter vanished.
The woman looked pretty normal. She had long hair even though she was over forty. She had a brittle voice that made you listen carefully in case you dropped it.
She was a beautiful, healthy girl. And she vanished.
The whole time she spoke to us she didn’t blink. The trick to not crying might be to dry out your eyes.
She was a prostitute. She got into hard drugs.
I have to admit that made her less angelic in my book. I was picturing Little Dorrit or something. I’m pretty judgmental.
We found her in the Parliamentary Gardens. In a rose bush. Bleeding. They were actually white roses.
Even my teacher swallowed hard. I stared at her like, Where do you find these people? She stared at a square on the floor.
My daughter is an angel. She speaks to me. She hovers above me, and guides me. She forgives me. She loves me.
Without really realizing it, I think the whole class looked up at the ceiling. All I could see was the curved mirror they put in after the shootings. In her warped back reflection the woman’s shoulders were a bit like folded-back wings.
I looked at my teacher again. She started clapping.
I guess it was over.
This Year, The Walrus Turns 20
Jennifer Hollet
Executive Director
