Thursday, September 11, 2008

The Longest Night of My Life

At about 10:30pm on Monday, June 30th I turned to Jeffrey and told him I knew something was wrong and I felt it had to do with dad. I was schedule to be in Redmond the next morning but I felt this couldn't wait. Jeffrey also suggested I do something but at first I didn't know what to do so I tried to call Mike and there was no answer. After awhile I decided to call some friends of ours that I knew would still be up. When I finally reached Reed it was after 11pm. I asked if he would go check on Mike for me. He probably felt a bit silly, but did it anyway. Reed and his wife drove up to the house while talking on the cell phone with me. They said the house was dark and told me what cars where in the driveway. I knew from the cars that Mike was home. I am sure Reed was hoping that I was an over reactive wife and that Mike would be in bed. As they rang the doorbell and knocked I called Mike from a cell phone. I was still on the other phone talking to Reed. When there was no response, I told Reed to go in the house. It was dark and Reed was a bit nervous about being mistaken for a robber. The first place they looked was in the garage, a typical place to start. But it was dark as well. I realized that they were using a flashlight and I told them to go ahead and turn on lights and head upstairs.
I knew at this point that something was terribly wrong. Reed walked upstairs calling Mike's name. With the bedrooom lights off, he could see Mike lying on the bed. He turned on the light while still calling Mike's name. As soon as he could really see Mike, he said to me, "Grace this doesn't look good. I need to call 911." I told him not to hang up but use the phone in the room. His wife came on the cell phone with me and repeated, "Grace this doesn't look good." I handed the phone to Jeffrey and knew it was over. Mike was gone.

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