All the Mornings After

It’s been less than twenty-four hours since my wife’s disappearance from the Speedway in White Rock. There are still no leads. The police tell me to stay put at the hotel in Santa Fe.

With nothing else to do I prowl the building. Unable to sleep. I amble through the empty halls. The lobby. The hotel bar is shuttered but there’s a bottle of añejo in our room that I return to take large mouthfuls from with each loop of the property. Each loop that takes me back to the room still laced with her clothing and the faint scent of her perfume.

I head out into the night. Walk through snowfall on the plaza. I get it into my head that an old Silverado doing slow laps of the streets is surveilling me. I think I hear her voice on the mountain wind. Calling through the bare trees, the string lights, the swaying Ristras of dried red chiles.

The hispanic girl on duty as the night manager asks me how long I’ll be staying.

“Indefinitely.”

I’m a resident now until there’s news.

Until her return.

I’ll haunt the hotel. The plaza. The cafes and bars. A new ghost of the old town. Staying on in search of a great lost love.