by Gregg Olsen
There will be no appeal.
The next one was from a blog called Live & Learn. It was written by a consortium of mommy bloggers who took on the minutiae of life (how to make dryer sheets from scented paper towels, and a recipe for making fat-free tortilla chips with tortillas, cooking spray, and a microwave oven). Moms, Kendall knew, were always busy, and while she didn’t need to know how to do either of those things, she didn’t feel sorry for or superior to those who did.
The entry that led her there had nothing to do with any of those things at all. It was nothing about household tips, how to fix a daughter’s broken heart, or how to ask for a raise from a skinflint boss.
Instead, the piece that provided the hit was written by a woman named Missy Moore Thanever from Nova Scotia, Canada:
I have no one to blame but myself for this debacle. I was stupid enough to believe the producers when they told me they were truth seekers and they believed that the washed-up cop and the psychic were really going to help. Stupid me. I dabbled with the tarot. I’ve had my palm read a time or two . . . and honestly, the things I learned were spot-on. That’s my full disclosure.
Here’s what happened. My little boy and his uncle went fishing two years ago. Charlie was six at the time. His uncle was a good guy and my husband and I trusted him—he’s my brother so why wouldn’t I trust Mickey? They went at first light to catch the tide out at the lighthouse not far from our house. I got up and gave them both a hug (and a kiss for Charlie), and off they went. Five hours later, my brother turned up on our doorstep. He was a complete wreck, shaking, crying, everything. I didn’t have to ask. I knew something was wrong. I knew it. Sometimes I think I’m psychic because I had a little bad feeling that morning too. He told us what happened and, of course, our world was shattered. He said that Charlie was fishing from the bow when a rogue wave looped over the top of him and pulled him into the Atlantic. Mickey dove in and went after him, but he couldn’t find him. No one ever did.
If you’ve lost a baby, then you know how I felt then and how I feel now. It just doesn’t go away.
That was six years ago. After Charlie disappeared in the sea, people reported strange goings-on at the lighthouse. The lamp would go off and have to be started over and over. It got so bad that the lighthouse keeper who stayed there for sixteen years, because it was such an easy job with cool living spaces, up and quit. He told friends that he thought the place was haunted and he said all the trouble started a few weeks after Charlie’s accident.
Enter Spirit Hunters. I wrote to them, so the fault for what followed, I guess, is mine. They make you feel that way, that’s for sure. At first they act so nice and so sincere that you really do believe that they have your best interests at heart. I knew the cop on the show had some trouble in the past, but that made me like him even more. It was like he had something to prove and that was going to make him work harder. And about Pandora. What can I say that others who have written to me haven’t? Besides, contractually, you can’t say much of anything at all. You don’t even get to meet her until after the sit-down at the end when they give you the big reveal—which incidentally was held in the cramped quarters of the lighthouse for what I presume was for maximum drama. Nothing better than a lighthouse in the middle of the night—or in this case early, early morning.
Okay, so it was me and my husband, my brother, and our eight-year-old daughter. Since I can’t say much I hope you can read between the lines here. I’m considering this a warning to any of you. If you watch the clip, I can recap what aired. Basically Pandora told me that my daughter (leaving her name out here, for obvious reasons) was behind everything. She was only a two-year-old at the time, but according to Pandora, her jealousy of her brother getting to go fishing fueled a dark rage inside of her.
My daughter has no dark rage, though now she’s in therapy for what happened and how some bloggers have called her the Bad Seed of Nova Scotia. I am crying now as I type this because I hurt so much for her. She didn’t deserve any of this. I brought it on because I missed Charlie so much.
On the show, Pandora turned to my daughter and screamed at her that she “knew what evil lives inside” of her. In shock, my eight-year-old ran from the table crying to her bedroom.
Pandora smiled. My husband and I were stunned. But with the cameras rolling, there was some kind of weird control over us. It was like we didn’t want to ruin their TV show because the producers had been so nice, the cop seemed to care, and the medium flat out said to me that her abilities at ferreting out the truth were the greatest the world had ever known.
“The girl needs therapy. She has to get help. Her envy manifested itself into that rogue wave.”
We just sat there.
The producer, Juliana, pulled out a drawing that a forensic artist somewhere in town had completed under Pandora’s direction. I wondered who that artist was. I didn’t know we had any in NS. The drawing was a picture of my boy on the bow of that boat; the wave had morphed into a claw-like hand and was ready to grab him and pull him under.
We didn’t say a word. At least my husband and I didn’t. Mickey spoke up, saying this was the biggest piece of crap he’d ever been a part of, but they didn’t air that bit. Instead they closed the show with Pandora’s response.
“The truth is painful sometimes. Now you can go on with your lives. Get your daughter some help, or any one of you could be next.”
I finally found my voice and yelled at them about taking advantage of people, putting something so nasty on the shoulders of a little girl who had done nothing to deserve it, but they cut that out too.
They’ll probably look very closely at this site. So I had my lawyer look at it. He says I’m good. Here’s the final tidbit and I’ll not comment on it but instead link to it. This is a video clip taken by the lighthouse’s security camera that night. It shows Pandora, a producer, and the cop Wyatt Ogilvie standing around smoking by the lighthouse door.
Kendall clicked on the link. A grainy black-and-white video started to roll.
OGILVIE: Which way you gonna go here, Pandy?
PANDORA: (laughing as she exhales on her cigarette) I have two drawings. One with the uncle molesting the boy, but legal says that’s a tough one. I really pushed for it. The other is the kid being at fault.
OGILVIE: F me. Not the old Bad Seed deal. This is season two and we’re running out of ideas already. You did that two episodes ago in New Mexico. When we did the haunted Farmington barn.
The producer, a middle-aged male, spoke next.
PRODUCER: We go with what works. And honestly that Farmington show scored us our best ratings this year. People love a bad seed. We all want to make this show a success. I mean, that’s why we’re doing this, right?
OGILVIE: You mean it isn’t about helping people get rid of their hauntings?
All three laughed.
Pandora crushed out her cigarette butt with the pointy end of one of her Manolos.
PANDORA: We’re helping people, all right. I have no doubt that any direction I go is the right direction. You might laugh at my guides, but I can’t help that I’m gifted. Tortured by them. Whatever you want to call it.
OGILVIE: How long will this be until we wrap? I need a drink.
PANDORA: We all do. Bad seeds can be so boring.
The tape ended and Kendall felt a wave of nausea roll to her stomach. How could anyone believe this crap? How could the Fraziers invite these people into their home to dissect their family tragedy? She scrolled though the hundreds of comments and there were only a very small handful of people who seemed to feel the same that she did. By far and away, the clip viewers were completely supportive of Pandora.
. . . this mom is a hater and I’m glad she got some tough love at the table from Pandora . . .
. . . people will say anything when they don’t get their way . . .
. . . that kid had the eyes of a shark. Soulless. I think Pandora was spot-on as usual ...
. . . did you notice how that dad and brothe
r just sat there like they didn’t even care about what happened to Charlie? If I were them, I’d watch out. I bet that daughter will drown one of them when she gets the chance . . .
. . . it was so cruel of the mom to put up this obviously edited video. It’s no wonder that her daughter is evil. The apple never falls very far from the tree, you know . . .
Kendall had read enough. She knew that her first stop after taking Cody to the Cascade School the next morning would be Brit Frazier’s coffee shop.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Brenda Nevins hated the idea of cutting her hair. She loathed coloring, chopping, or changing her signature look more than anything she’d ever endured. More than being locked up in prison, which she considered to be the worst thing that had ever happened to her. She knew that she needed to alter her appearance, but at what cost? If she couldn’t be the person the world expected her to be, what was the point of anything she was about to do?
She applied the black hair dye she’d found in the homeowner’s medicine cabinet. She looked at the glint of the scissors and the knife and shook her head. There were a million uses for sharp objects, but cutting her hair was not one of them. She put her wet, black hair up in a clip, turned on the shower, and surveyed the scene.
It wasn’t the Four Seasons, but she had stayed in far worse places than the one that was her refuge at that moment. She let the water from the shower pour over her, sending some inky blackness down the drain. She lifted her head back and let the spray of the showerhead run over her teeth. She missed her Waterpik. The prison rule-makers considered the device that sent a needle-sharp stream of water a potential weapon. Brenda had hated rules. Sonicare toothbrushes were allowed for “dental use only” but half the women in her unit at the prison used them as vibrators.
As the water caressed her body she ran her hands over her breasts and marveled that they felt so real, so unencumbered by scar tissue, as she’d read other women had supposedly endured. Her heart was beating slowly just then. She had that part of her personality that allowed her to compartmentalize her trauma and drama into separate spaces in which no part would touch the other. No overload. No crossed circuits. For how she lived her life, she needed more than anything to stay focused. Keep control. Aim high. Get what she wanted.
Brenda was free at the moment and she intended to stay that way.
She turned off the water, pulled back the shower curtain, which made a slightly melodic scraping noise, and stepped out. She reached for a towel and applied its softness to her face. So much better than those nearly crisp towels at the prison. Though it indeed wasn’t the Four Seasons, she thought the towels smelled just like spring.
The mirror was fogged and she rubbed a washcloth over it.
She looked good with black hair. Her skin didn’t fight with the change. It looked natural. She finger-combed it a little, considering one last time whether she should cut it or just leave it. Long hair was sexy. She was sexy right then.
She needed to stay that way too.
“I’ll be out in a minute, babe,” she called out.
Brenda didn’t like to be rushed. Not when she was thinking about what to do next. She knew she had to think fast. Not move fast. Moving fast could get her caught. It was better to synthesize a plan that used her best attributes and left the excess baggage behind. Be nimble. Be ready.
Be cunning.
She tucked the towel around her body and wrapped another over her still damp hair. One last glance at herself in the mirror and she went toward the bed.
“You look scared,” Brenda said.
No answer.
“Don’t worry. It will all be over soon. I promise.”
Janie Thomas didn’t say a word. She looked at Brenda with the kind of haunted eyes of a fox caught in a leg trap. Tears oozed from her eyes.
Brenda produced a knife.
Janie turned away. Her heart was racing and she was all but certain that this was the way she was going to die.
“Don’t worry, babe,” she said. “I’m just going to cut a little hole in the tape so you can take a drink.”
Brenda sat on the edge of the bed, admiring the sturdiness of the knots she’d made of the cut pillowcase—again the handiwork of the knife. She learned the skill of slicing and dicing with precision from Edna Hale, a woman imprisoned at the Washington Corrections Center for Women for attacking a boyfriend and making certain that he’d never cheat on her again. Lorena Bobbitt had become a quasi-celebrity when she’d sliced off her husband’s penis for similar reasons, but not Edna. Slicing it off in a fit of rage, a bloody payback for betrayal was one thing.
Feeding it to the family’s dog was something entirely too disgusting for mass appeal.
“Never hesitate,” Edna had instructed Brenda when they were on kitchen duty one time, early in her incarceration. “That’s the key. Go fast, go deep, and never look back.”
“Good advice,” Brenda said. “But you forgot one thing.”
Edna wiped the sweat off her hairy upper lip.
“What’s that?” she asked.
Brenda knew she’d made the same error. They were there together, pulling kitchen duty. Nevertheless Edna was too dumb to get it.
“Never get caught,” Brenda said.
Janie Thomas started wriggling. It made Brenda think of one of those “Magic Fingers” beds she’d slept on when she was a child in a place two levels below the house that she and Janie were hiding out in.
Brenda let out a loud sigh.
“Look,” she said, her tone suddenly sharp. “You want me to cut your lips? No one wants to kiss bloody lips. Hold still.”
Janie shut her eyes.
Brenda repositioned herself over Janie to ensure that she didn’t move so much and ran the blade down the center of the silvery duct tape and a sliver of red dripped down.
“Look what you made me do, you stupid bitch!”
Janie let out a muffled cry.
“I swear that you are almost more trouble than you’re worth. If I didn’t love you so much I’d cut your head off right now, babe,” she said.
She knew she could do that. But not now. Not when she needed Janie. Useful Janie. Puppy dog Janie. The prison superintendent who had been her ticket out from the razor wire into the world of fresh air, quiet nights, men she could pick up, beguile, ride in the backseat of a car, and then . . . do what she did best.
Second best.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Second Cup, Second Chance was located on Bay Street in what had once been an antique shop and before that, a waterfront warehouse. Inside, it had been stripped of the doilies, old tables, and other questionable antiques and was outfitted with a distinctly modern vibe. It was as if Apple Computer had come in and taken over the space. The mix of the old wood with the brushed steel finishes of the tabletops and the Eames-style chairs (all white, with one turquoise one for a tasteful quirk) made it modern, fresh, and very teen friendly. In the back corner was the espresso bar. In the opposite corner, a gigantic flat screen showed teenagers’ artwork on a rotating basis. Kendall Stark had never been inside before, and she was impressed.
Brit Frazier was talking to a teen.
“We have rules, Sammie, and they are simple. You can spend all day here if you like, but you cannot sleep here. The city won’t allow that. You can take a shower. I do have meals at nine, eleven, and four. More than anything, I want you to work with a mentor to help you find your way out of your situation and on to your ‘Second Chance.’ That’s what we’re all about.”
She looked up, caught Kendall’s gaze, and nodded. She mouthed the words “just a minute” and motioned for Kendall to take a seat across the room.
A moment later, she came over with two cups of coffee.
“It’s about the show, Detective Stark. Isn’t it?” she said, sitting down.
Her directness surprised Kendall. She was probably adept at reading people; her history as a guidance counselor was a strong indicator of that. Also, in that moment with the gir
l Sammie, Kendall could tell that being direct, kind, and honest was probably the course Brit Frazier had always chosen.
“Yes. How did you know?” Kendall asked anyway.
Brit poured a packet of blue sweetener into her cup and swirled its contents with a spoon.
“Small town,” she said, almost with a sigh. “Everyone’s been talking about it. I know your sheriff had reservations about participating, but I convinced him. It isn’t like we have anything to lose. It’s been four years, you know.”
Kendall sipped the coffee. It was a very dark roast, the kind she wanted and needed after a night of tossing and turning over what she’d read about Spirit Hunters.
“Mrs. Frazier, do you know anything about these producers, their tactics?”
Brit Frazier pulled a loose strand of her red hair and rested it on her shoulder. Her expression was hard to read and she didn’t jump to answer right away.
“Do you?” Kendall asked.
“I heard you the first time, Detective. I have read the posts by those who are less than happy with the results of the show. There are an equal number if not more who feel that their circumstances shifted into something more bearable after Spirit Hunters came to town.”
“More bearable? How do you mean?”
Brit drank more coffee. “You couldn’t possibly understand and that’s fine. I remember when I was counseling kids at South and telling them that I understood, I was lying. I wanted to understand. I said so. But you can’t. You can’t ever know how another person feels when the unthinkable occurs.”
Kendall nodded. Brit didn’t know all that much about her, but she was right about that. She’d interviewed countless people who’d undergone tragedy of immense magnitude and she held their hands, cried with them, told them that everything would be all right. That they’d survive.
