Girl on Fire - Chapter II: “Amanda”
Rachel was the first person to discover the remains of a girl who’d fallen victim to a heinous murder. As the only eye witness to the tail end of the drama, Rachel knew that she could be in trouble, too. Could the man who’d screeched away in the van that morning have seen her watching? It didn’t help that the press had stupidly published Rachel’s name in connection to the story. For weeks after the murder, as the police continued to call it a hate crime, Rachel lived in a state of fear for her own life. Her nerves were shot from being on constant high alert, so she started eating a ton of CBD gummies to help her cope with her trauma. One day, stoned out of her mind, Rachel made an impulsive decision to buy a house that was priced well below market value. There was no way she could’ve known that this house would inextricably link her forever to the dead girl she’d found on the side of the road, the girl on fire.
This two-part story is fictional. Any resemblance to living people is coincidental.
Chapter 1 | Chapter 2
The day Amanda Stern was notified she had received a significant inheritance from a wealthy and much beloved great aunt, she decided to use part of the money to buy a house in Austin, Texas, where she had come several years ago to study at the university. She’d loved the city from the start – so much that she knew early on she wanted to make it her home. And why not? Other than sizzling summers, when she could escape for a month to somewhere cool, the climate was good, far better than windy Chicago where Amanda had grown up. Austin had interesting people, an abundance of cultural activities and, with its hilly terrain and many bands of greenbelt, was actually quite a pretty city.
Once Amanda made up her mind, she went on Zillow and began to look around. Nothing she saw pulled at her, but she kept looking, tired of the cramped and schlocky apartment near the university where she currently lived. She was so sick of student digs!
At thirty-three years old, she deserved a place of her own that had a garden and modern kitchen and perhaps even a big, wraparound porch where she could put a bird feeder and sit drinking tea.
She was a tall, good-looking girl with bright red curly hair and deep blue pensive eyes that focused inwards and frequently wore a quizzical expression. Her favorite pastime was playing video games, vicious, brutal ones that disengaged young boys and men played for hours in their basements. She knew this was odd for a grown woman, but it was a way of blowing off steam and she loved going to video parlors where she could compete against people she otherwise had nothing in common with.
It seemed there was a dearth of houses on the market, so she decided to work with a broker, someone named Patrick Sullivan whose information she saw on a for sale sign. They agreed to meet at a property on Shoal Creek, and Amanda had to park a block away because the driveway of the house was filled with debris. Otherwise, from the outside at least, the house was just what she was looking for, low slung and charming, small front porch with wicker chairs, big front yard filled with trees and flowers that gave the place a lush, tropical appearance. The broker must have had trouble parking, too, because he showed up on foot, a large burly man in an ill-fitting brown suit and trendy Nike sneakers. He certainly didn’t look like Amanda’s idea of a realtor, and she felt a little uncomfortable standing beside him as he unlocked the front door.
The inside of the house was as perfect as the outside. Sky lights in the roof that made the place bright and airy, a newly built back deck overlooking the greenbelt, fully modernized bathrooms and a good working kitchen with all-new appliances. She wondered why the property was so cheap: $450,000 which she knew from her research was crazy low for the neighborhood. If she wanted she could move in right away.
“How long has it been since anyone lived here?” she asked the broker.
“I’ll have to look that up,” he said, thumbing through his phone.
Save for a glass coffee table and a few chairs, the house was empty. Out the back windows, the land dropped abruptly in a steep decline that ended in a dry creek and a tangle of trees many feet below. “A year and a half,” the broker said. “I have a feeling the owner is quite anxious to sell.” Then he dropped his voice and added in a low whisper, “There’s a rumor that it’s haunted.”
Amanda felt a shiver run down her spine. She stepped further into the master suite, trying to picture herself falling asleep in a bed pushed up beneath one of the windows.
“Haunted how?” she asked.
“I think there was a murder. Maybe a husband who killed his wife.”
“It would be good to know exactly what happened,” Amanda said, wandering into the bathroom.
Just then they heard voices coming from the front door. The broker put a stubby finger to his lips, indicating she should keep quiet.
Amanda wondered why that was important. She studied the broker more closely, noticing he looked a little rough with small, expressionless blue eyes and a down-turning, thin-lipped mouth. Frowning, he bounced on his sneakered feet and pushed the door closed as if to keep their presence a secret. Before she could ask him what was going on, a male voice with an accent she couldn’t identify said: “Okay, so we’re agreed?” The voice sounded as if it was just outside the door.
There was a cough and then another man said, “But wouldn't the solvent be traceable?”
“That’s not the way it’s gonna happen!” the first man snapped. “I told you. We’ll move some homeless people in and that’s how the fire will start.”
“So it’ll be staged?”
“Yes!” the first man hissed impatiently. “That’s what I told you. Whoosh and it’ll go up in smoke. No one will ever know.”
Amanda glanced at the broker, who shook his head and shrugged as if he had no idea what the men were talking about.
The expression on his face – closed and frozen over, brow tightly knit, thoughts a million miles away – made Amanda understand he might not be a safe person to be with, not when a crime was being plotted within earshot.
She pretended to look at her watch. “I have to be somewhere,” she whispered.
The broker shook his head, signaling they’d have to wait a minute.
“Now!” she said impatiently.
For a moment the broker studied her out of his squinty blue eyes. Then he said, “I don’t think so,” and grabbed her roughly, planting a large calloused hand over her mouth.
Amanda kicked at him and tried desperately to sink her teeth into his palm, but he tightened his grip till she thought she would suffocate. They heard the front door slam as the two men left the premises. Amanda squirmed and gasped, but to no avail: she was like a little toy in the broker’s fat hands. He let out a high-pitched girly laugh and said, “You’re not going anywhere, bitch. Pattie’s gonna make sure of that.”
Who the hell was Pattie?” she wondered dimly, and then realized it was him, this horrible man who she realized was some sort of thug. She continued writhing and twisting, summoning up all the strength she had, but the guy laughed again, as if he was enjoying this, and began to drag her from the bathroom. “Noooo!” she shrieked, and that was the last sound she made because Pattie punched her hard in the head and then there was a bruised kind of darkness she’d never experienced before.
She woke up hours later, groggy and confused, wondering where the hell she was — a plain white room that she realized was a utility room because of the washing machine whose smooth white surface rose up next to her. She was in that house! The one she’d been looking at with the scary fat man whose name was Pattie.
Totally freaked, she tried to cry out, but her mouth was stuck and she understood she was gagged, probably with duct tape. She couldn’t move her body either – she was tied up! – and her head hurt like crazy, so bad she couldn’t form thoughts, everything was swimming.
She had to get out of here! That was her one thought. She struggled weakly against the rope or whatever it was that bound her, but she couldn’t even budge an inch. Why had he done this to her? And then, slowly, she remembered the conversation she’d overheard about setting the house on fire. Use your brain, use your brain! she told herself. They were going to set fire to the house – why? For insurance money of course. Yes! The house wouldn’t sell because there’d been a murder in it and no one wanted a house with that kind of history. The irony was that she would have bought it, murder or no murder, because she wasn’t stupidly superstitious and she loved the house with its tropical feel and many trees and clean modern interior and the sense that it practically merged into the greenbelt behind it.
She felt tears flood her eyes. She’d been in the wrong place at the wrong time, simple as that, and now she was paying for it.
Unbelievable! She was a person who’d never had bad luck, who’d grown up in a well-to-do family and always had access to the things she wanted. She might go around in jeans and sweatshirts, but she could have bought designer clothes if she wished, could have had regular facials and expensive haircuts and trips to Europe and meals in top restaurants. She’d gone to Williams College for god’s sake, and before that, Walter Payton College Prep in Chicago where she’d been a diligent student, all A’s and she was worldly and sophisticated and her parents had bought her a Lexus for high school graduation and a gold and diamond Tiffany bracelet when she graduated college – thank god she didn’t have it on now. She might live in a schlocky apartment but she could have lived in something deluxe and that was her problem: she wanted to be like everyone else and not stand out, not be seen as a rich Jewish girl even though she wore a Star of David around her neck and lit candles every Friday night and put a menorah in her window during Hanukkah and felt more comfortable around Jewish people, though she didn’t like to admit that. Perhaps that was why she liked going to game parlors so much – those places were exotic to her and no one really knew who she was.
A door banged and suddenly there were people in the house, voices she could hear talking about … her death.
Yes, they were planning how they would kill her, and all because of a stupid conversation she’d overheard and didn’t give a damn about. “We can’t set the fucking house on fire, not with the girl’s disappearance – too suspicious, and it would lead right back to us since we’re the ones selling it.”
“So what do we do?” another man – Pattie? – said.
“We pray that she didn’t tell anyone where she was going this morning.”
“That’s pretty risky,” the man who sounded like Pattie said.
“It’s a risk we have to take,” the first man said. “And you know what? We’ll put that Jewish star she’s wearing next to her body, make it look like a hate crime.”
Oh noooo, Amanda thought. She heard footsteps and quickly closed her eyes. Someone peered at her, she could sense their presence and fought to keep her eyes languidly shut as if she were truly unconscious.
“Great idea,” said Pattie.
“We’ll kill her here in the house and then take her to another neighborhood and set her on fire. She’ll be so badly burnt no one will even recognize her.”
“I always knew you were smart,” Pattie said with his creepy laugh.
“We’ll do it tonight and move her body early tomorrow before daybreak. Easy peasy.”
The footsteps moved away. Amanda felt her heart beating so fast she thought she’d choke. What to do? What to do?
There had to be a way to get out of here. The worst part was she hadn’t told anyone where she was going this morning; no one would know she was missing, not for hours or maybe even days. And then – her heart sank – it would be too late.
But she was smart, she ought to be able to figure something out. Perhaps she could reason with these guys? Explain that she would never share their ugly plan and actually wanted to buy the house. Who cared if there’d been a murder here? The thought almost made her want to laugh: now there would be two murders which would make the house truly haunted. Hah! She’d come back as a ghost and hound and torment them the rest of their days. That was an idea that gave her pleasure and she’d better hang onto it.
A few minutes later she heard footsteps and jammed her eyes closed. One of the guys came in and leaned over her. She could smell his sour breath and fought to keep her face still. Then she thought, No! This is the time to try reason with him and she opened her eyes and attempted a loud snort but the guy, who she could see was dark-haired and cold-faced and mean-looking, kicked her so hard in the head that she practically lost consciousness again. As he left the room she heard him say, “We’ve gotta do it now, Pattie. We’ll use a pillow, that’s the easiest way.”
A pillow! They were going to smother her! She was going to die in a few minutes, lose her life.
A strange peacefulness fell over her. She knew suddenly that her one means of victory was to let her mind separate from her body so she could float free and think anything she wanted. In that very moment, her consciousness rose up out of her till it seemed to be hovering just beneath the ceiling. Her mother was in the room! Yes, she could feel her soothing presence, and the words she whispered went straight into her ear: “You're going to a good place, darling! Have no fear! Everything’s going be okay.” Now she felt many presences in the room, her father, her brother, the beloved aunt who’d left her money, a guy she knew from her many visits to game parlors and all of them seemed to be saying, “You’re fine, you’ll always be fine, we love you.”
That word “love” had the power of rocket fuel. When Pattie and the dark-haired man came in with the pillow, she was on fire with love, and as they lowered it over her face she felt her spirit explode in a whoosh from her flesh-and-blood body and fly up over the rooftops in a fiery ball of light. She was transcendent.
She was here watching over her loved ones and she was also someplace else, a misty beautiful magical place she didn’t yet have words for. Above all, she was happy – joyous! – and that made her the biggest winner of all.