A moment to think
"Where is she?" James asked one of the officers near Jean's as he tried to open her office door only to find it locked.
"I don't know, she had a meeting this morning with the chief super, maybe it ran over."
"No, I saw her after that."
"Well then no ones seen her since."
"Thanks."
Jean had disappeared, she had seen upset when he briefly saw her after her meeting and as he was walking out with Robbie, he'd tried to text her but had gotten no reply. It was completely unlike her to abandon work half way through a day but by the looks of it she had. So after telling Robbie he didn't feel well he left in search of Jean. At first he'd arrived at her front door only to find her car wasn't there and therefore she wouldn't be either. He was now faced with the problem of trying to find her and when he did so, to figure what was wrong and fix it.
For a while he drove round and round searching everywhere he could think of, until he found her car quite a whole out of town in the car park for a country park. As he dumped his next to hers, he set about his mission to find her. The map in front of him told him that the site lay on 4 acres of grounds, something he'd be prepared to search all of if it meant finding her.
"Jean, I know you're in the park somewhere as I'm by your car. Just tell me where you are baby and I'll come and get you." James said after the beep as he once again was only successful in reaching her voicemail. He began wondering until his eyes caught sight of a figure sat down on the edge of the river bank sat just between a small clearing in the trees. The figure although sat down was also slumped over as if their head was in their hands. They sat scarily still as they seemingly watched straight on in front of them.
"Jean?" James shouted and the figure turned it's head only to discover it wasn't Jean. "Excuse me, have you seen a woman about your height with a brown bob dressed in a smart blue dress?" James asked as he ran over to the woman.
"Yeah, she was in the manor house earlier having a cuppa."
"Did you see where she went?"
"She said something about a bandstand near a willow tree but I don't know if she was going there or just waffling."
"She never waffles, thanks." James said as he once again set off but this time to the bandstand in the middle of the grounds.
"Jean?"
"How'd you find me?" Jean said as she wiped her tears away.
"I asked in the office in anyone had seen you and when they hadn't I told Robbie I was ill so I could find you. I drove around until I saw your car and then asked around if anyone had seen you. Why are you here?"
"It's my favourite place to come, I'm not here often but just when I need to get a way from reality and think, to gather my thoughts."
"And what made you decide to do it today?" James asked as he sat down beside her.
"It's getting too much."
"What is?"
"Us..."
"I'm sorry if I'm putting too much pressure on you, I'll back of a bit."
"Let me finish James, you don't need to change. In fact nothing between us needs to change it's just what the consequences are. I'm married James, I've broken all my wedding vows..."
"He broke them way before you did." James pointed out.
"Yes I know but I was trying to make some decisions on my marriage."
"You aren't going to give your marriage another go are you?"
"God no. I think it's time I ended that, officially ended it. But then other peoples opinions and work comes into play, James this is all so hard."
"I know it is baby, but just because your marriage ends doesn't mean we need to tell everyone and then both problems are solved."
"Yeah but it's not solved is it because we still can't be a normal couple."
"Jean why don't you let me do the thinking and I'll fix all of this for you and you just enjoy life together."
"I can't do that James."
"Okay well how about we go back to mine, where Robbie can't find out I'm not sick and no one can see us and we can try and sort this and come up with a plan." James asked as he saw the goosebumps on her arms.
"Okay."