EPISODE 8
[THE GIRLS THEME]
ANNOUNCER:
The Girls is brought to you by Macmillan Publishers.
WEST McCRAY:
It’s been a year since I turned up on Amanda’s doorstep and she told me Keith was dead. The next words out of my mouth were, “I think we should call the police.” In the time since, I’ve been collecting the pieces of everything that’s left, trying to put them together in a way I can understand. Amanda agrees to meet me to go over what happened that day. She’s a white, thirty-year-old mother of one. She has asked me not to use her last name.
AMANDA:
I don’t know where to start.
WEST McCRAY:
How did you meet him?
AMANDA:
He came to the place I worked at the time.
WEST McCRAY [STUDIO]:
Amanda no longer lives in Farfield. She lives in a new town, a different state. She’s trying to put her relationship with Christopher—the name Keith was going by at the time—behind her. It hasn’t been easy. She is haunted by everything that happened then. She’s finding it hard to cope.
WEST McCRAY:
You worked at a bar.
AMANDA:
Yes. He showed up one night, and then another. He was nice, attentive. He didn’t drink, he just ate there. He kept coming back. There was something about him—I felt like I could talk to him, and I felt whatever I said, he understood. I’m a single mom and it’s difficult to find people—I found it difficult to find people willing to listen.
WEST McCRAY:
You have a daughter.
AMANDA:
[PAUSE] Yes.
WEST McCRAY:
How old was she at that time?
AMANDA:
She’d just turned ten.
WEST McCRAY:
How long did you know him, before he moved in?
AMANDA:
About a month and a half. He was there for every one of my shifts, and every one of my breaks. My days off. I was—I thought I was in love with him. I remember thinking that was ridiculous, to feel that way, but at the same time, why couldn’t one good thing happen to me?
If I had known that bringing him home … if I had known what I was bringing home … my daughter never said a word to me. She never told me something was wrong. You’d think, as her mother, I would’ve known. You think that I—
WEST McCRAY:
He targeted single mothers of young girls, women who were alone and had to look after more than their fair share. He preyed on them as much as their children. You can’t blame yourself.
AMANDA:
I know that, but knowing it and …
Knowing it and believing it, those are two different things. [PAUSE] He didn’t have a job. Any other time, that’d be a red flag for me. But he was so nice and so good with my girl that I thought having someone around more often, someone who, at the time, she seemed to like—I thought that would be good for her.
WEST McCRAY [STUDIO]:
Amanda’s daughter is in therapy now. Twice a week.
AMANDA:
So I’d be working and he’d be home. With her.
WEST McCRAY:
Tell me how he died.
AMANDA:
One of the girls at the bar asked to switch shifts with me, so I went in a little earlier than I usually do, and came home a little earlier than I usually did. When I got home, my daughter was there and he wasn’t. She told me she’d been at the bookstore and when she got back, he was gone. I was absolutely furious because I didn’t want her home alone because I didn’t think that was … [LAUGHS] I didn’t think it was sa—
I’m sorry.
WEST McCRAY:
Take as long as you need.
AMANDA:
Anyway, he came in around nine o’clock that night. He looked awful. He was … dirty. Just filthy. He was pale, he was trembling, favoring his left side. I was horrified. Couldn’t believe my eyes.
WEST McCRAY:
What did he say happened?
AMANDA:
He told me he got mugged. He said, how did he put it … “I got jumped, they took all my money, they took me for a ride.” But he never said who they were and when I asked, he got real vague about it. He was in pain, though, and something had happened to him—that much was true.
WEST McCRAY:
You didn’t go to the police.
AMANDA:
I wanted to. I begged him to. He refused. I told him we should at least go to the hospital and get him checked out, because he was clearly hurting, but he was adamant that he was fine, he was just a little sore, he just needed to sleep it off. And, as if he was trying to prove his point, he sat down and he had a late dinner with me. Then he took a shower. He went to bed. He was alive. The next morning, I checked on him, he said he was fine, he just wanted to sleep. So I let him sleep. I sent my daughter to a friend’s house, to stay the day and night, so he wouldn’t be disturbed. I went to work. When I came back home, around midnight, he was unresponsive, still in bed. I called 911.
WEST McCRAY:
He had tried, unsuccessfully, to treat a stab wound in his left side. It became infected. He died in the hospital of sepsis a few days later.
AMANDA:
When he died, I was devastated and completely out of my depth. I had no idea who to contact. I couldn’t afford a funeral. He didn’t really mention a family … so I went through his things. I found … in his wallet—he had money in it. That tripped me up because he told me “they” had taken it. His muggers. In his truck, I found an ID. It had a different name on it. It wasn’t Christopher.
WEST McCRAY:
Jack Hersh.
AMANDA:
I didn’t understand it, but I managed to get in touch with his parents, Marcia and Tyler. They’d been estranged since Chris—Jack was eighteen. They came down and identified and claimed the body after the police released it and I was left with this … grief for a man I thought I knew and this utter shock of not really knowing him at all.
WEST McCRAY [STUDIO]:
Before Jack Hersh was Keith, Darren or Christopher, he lived in Allensberg, Kansas. After high school, he moved on, like many often do. No one there ever saw him again. But they remembered.
Residents of Allensberg described Jack as a loner, creepy. His parents were devout Christians who often kept to themselves. There were rumors, though, that things weren’t great at home, that Jack’s father drank too much and had a temper.
His parents refuse to talk to me.
There was an incident when Jack was twelve; he exposed himself to a group of girls at the elementary school.
Marlee Singer was ten years old when her brother, Silas Baker, became best friends with Jack. They were both seventeen. It happened suddenly, seemingly without explanation.
MARLEE SINGER [PHONE]:
I think it was that they probably recognized themselves in each other.
WEST McCRAY:
Marlee has finally agree to talk to me.
WEST McCRAY [PHONE]:
You knew Jack long before you were romantically involved with him. You sent Sadie to your brother, to find this man, and you knew or at least suspected both of them shared the same predilection, didn’t you? So my only question for you now, Marlee, is why? Why did you send her to them and why did you lie to me?
MARLEE SINGER [PHONE]:
Because if you’d seen the look in her eyes, you would’ve known absolutely nothing was going to stop her. And I never … I’ve never been able to stand against my brother. And I didn’t tell you, when you came, because I was afraid and I felt like I had something to lose.
[TODDLER CRYING IN BACKGROUND]
AMANDA:
When Jack died, my daughter—I had this thought she wasn’t upset enough about it but I reasoned that kids work through those kinds of things differently. Now I know.
She was relieved.
WEST McCRAY:
What happened after I came to your house?
AMANDA:
We called the police.
WEST McCRAY:
While we waited, I showed you a picture of Sadie, in case you had been in contact with her without realizing it.
AMANDA:
My daughter was there, between us, and she said, “I saw her.”
WEST McCRAY [STUDIO]:
Amanda’s daughter told us that Sadie had appeared the same afternoon that Jack said he was mugged, as best as she could remember. What she related of their encounter was unsettling.
AMANDA:
My daughter said Sadie tried to … take her? She had my daughter’s arm, and wanted her to come with her and when my daughter wouldn’t, Sadie gave her money to buy books. My daughter was reading voraciously then, she was always down at the used bookstore. You said you think Sadie might have been trying to remove my daughter from the house. To save her.
WEST McCRAY:
That’s what I choose to believe.
AMANDA:
When I asked my daughter why she didn’t tell me about Sadie, she broke down. She said I had enough to worry about, that she didn’t want to upset me. I found out later that was something Jack said to her a lot, to keep her quiet. That if she came to me, and told me anything was wrong, that I would be furious with her …
I’m glad he’s dead.
WEST McCRAY [STUDIO]:
Amanda’s daughter’s account put Sadie in the area at the time Jack Hersh was killed. I called Danny that night.
DANNY GILCHRIST [PHONE]:
How are you doing?
WEST McCRAY [PHONE]:
I just told a mother there was a high possibility her daughter was being sexually abused by the man she let into her house. She … screamed, Danny. I can’t even describe to you the sound.
DANNY GILCHRIST [PHONE]:
I’m sorry, man.
WEST McCRAY [PHONE]:
I’ve told the Farfield PD what I know. They want to review all my material—I’ve got copies, but …
DANNY GILCHRIST [PHONE]:
Give them what they want, and take the time you need.
WEST McCRAY [PHONE]:
I just—where is she, Danny? If they met, and he walked away from it—until it caught up with him, at least—where is she?
WEST McCRAY [STUDIO]:
After I was interviewed by the Farfield PD, I headed back to Cold Creek to explain to May Beth and Claire all that had happened—what I knew, and everything I didn’t.
MAY BETH FOSTER:
Oh, Sadie. Oh, my girl.
CLAIRE SOUTHERN:
So where is she?
WEST McCRAY:
I don’t know, Claire.
CLAIRE SOUTHERN:
That’s not good enough.
WEST McCRAY:
I don’t know what happened to her after she arrived at Jack’s house. I don’t know where she went. Jack was there when she arrived. I think it’s safe to assume they met each other. I don’t know what happened after that. They must have left the house at some point. Jack returned. Sadie didn’t. Her car was found on a dirt road. He died. She’s still missing. The police are looking into it. That’s all I know.
CLAIRE SOUTHERN:
No. May Beth said you’d find her. May Beth said that’s the whole point of this—that’s why you’re here. You’re supposed to find her—
WEST McCRAY:
I’ve tried.
CLAIRE SOUTHERN:
What does that mean? You’re just—you’re just giving up? You think there’s no one out there to look for, is that it?
WEST McCRAY [STUDIO]:
At that point, my mind was circling the state Jack was described as returning home in; dirty, pained, injured and then dead. I believed an altercation occurred between him and Sadie.
I wanted to believe Sadie survived it.
But I couldn’t say for sure.
WEST McCRAY [TO CLAIRE]:
I’ve got to review everything I have and figure out where that leaves us. I’m headed back to New York.
CLAIRE SOUTHERN:
Of course you are.
WEST McCRAY [STUDIO]:
The trip back to the city was heavy.
I spent the weekend with my daughter and she could tell something was wrong. I didn’t want to let her out of my sight, but at the same time, I almost couldn’t bear to look at her. I felt as restless and reckless as I imagined Sadie was back then, like I had a need to run, to get back on the road, to drive until I fulfilled my purpose. I was supposed to find her, and bring her home to May Beth and her mother. I could barely cope with the failure stopping seemed to symbolize. It was too final. But I was in a position where the only thing I was able to do was go over what I had and wait for the next something—anything.
DANNY GILCHRIST:
Okay, assuming they did finally encounter each other, what do you think happened between them?
WEST McCRAY:
I think they met. Sadie was about to blow the lid off on Jack’s life and it went badly from there. The way Amanda described Jack to me when he returned, it didn’t sound like their encounter went down without a fight. I think his stab wound was an act of self-defense—for Sadie. Amanda didn’t say there was anything out of place at the house, no suggestion of violence. I think wherever Jack came back from, that’s where it happened.
DANNY GILCHRIST:
Maybe where they found the car?
WEST McCRAY:
Possibly. If Sadie didn’t drive it there herself, Jack could have.
DANNY GILCHRIST:
Where do you think that leaves Sadie, if Jack did drive it?
WEST McCRAY:
Are you asking me if I think he killed Sadie, ditched her car on a dirt road and managed to get himself back home before dying?
DANNY GILCHRIST:
Yeah, I guess I am.
WEST McCRAY:
Ask me something else.
DANNY GILCHRIST:
You think he killed Mattie, don’t you?
WEST McCRAY [STUDIO]:
If I’ve learned anything about Sadie Hunter, it was that she was almost a secondary player in her own life. She lived for Mattie, lived to love, care for and protect her little sister, with every breath.
It seems likely now, that Jack abused Sadie, but I have a hard time accepting that this alone would inspire her to relentlessly pursue him the way that she did. And I don’t know how she knew that Jack was responsible for Mattie’s death, but, as she told Ellis at the Bluebird, “He did something to my sister.”
And if that is the case, why did Jack come back to Cold Creek? And was it always in his plan to return, years later, to find Mattie there, to steal her away from her family—forever?
These are the questions that keep me up at night.
[PHONE RINGING]
WEST McCRAY [PHONE]:
West McCray.
MAY BETH FOSTER [PHONE]:
It’s May Beth.
WEST McCRAY [PHONE]:
It’s good to hear your voice. What’s going on?
MAY BETH FOSTER [PHONE]:
They matched the DNA from Mattie’s crime scene to Jack.
DETECTIVE SHEILA GUTIERREZ:
The Farfield PD, in conjunction with the Allensberg PD and the help of the FBI were able to match the DNA evidence from Mattie’s crime scene with a sample we had on file from Jack, from a previous felony, a burglary. It was in the state database. Norah Stackett also confirmed the truck she saw Mattie get into was his. We’re still looking for Ms. Hunter. Our investigation is ongoing, so if anyone has any information regarding either Jack Hersh or Sadie Hunter, we ask them to please call us at 555-3592.
WEST McCRAY [PHONE]:
I’m coming down there.
MAY BETH FOSTER [PHONE]:
No … no. It’s okay. Please don’t.
WEST McCRAY [PHONE]:
I’d really like to talk to you—
MAY BETH FOSTER [PHONE]:
I’m sure we’ll talk again. But right now, right now, we just need some time.
WEST McCRAY [STUDIO]:
So I give them time.
A lot of time. I spend the winter and spring working on the show, and when I’m not doing that, I continue my work for Always Out There. Sadie’s story starts coming together, building toward—well, that’s the problem. I still don’t know to what end. I ask May Beth if she and Claire would be willing to talk to me to figure that out. By then, it’s June.
She agrees.
It’s a bit poetic, arriving in Cold Creek a year after Sadie first left. This must have been what it looked like when she stepped out of her trailer and said good-bye to what remained of her life without Mattie. The flower beds are in full bloom and surprisingly, Claire still lives with May Beth. She helps manage Sparkling River Estates in exchange for the room and she’s clean, still.
MAY BETH FOSTER:
I don’t know. It’s not always been easy—sometimes I just wanna … sometimes, I just can’t stand her and I know sometimes, she can’t stand me. But it feels like the right thing to do. If she wants to stay, I guess I want to let her.
WEST McCRAY:
How are you doing?
MAY BETH FOSTER:
Depends on the hour. [PAUSE] I’m angry. I’m angry at a lot of people, for a lot of reasons—most of all myself and what I failed to see—and sometimes that’s the only thing that gets me out of bed.
WEST McCRAY:
I’m sorry.
MAY BETH FOSTER:
And you’re winding everything up? I guess that’s it, huh?
WEST McCRAY:
Not entirely. But I think if not much new is happening, the next step is getting Sadie’s story told. I’d like to privilege the world with knowing her, the way you did for me.
WEST McCRAY [STUDIO]:
May Beth tries, and ultimately fails, to hold back tears.
MAY BETH FOSTER:
Claire’s inside. She’ll talk to you.
WEST McCRAY [STUDIO]:
May Beth insists on having me for dinner and heads to Stackett’s for groceries, leaving Claire and me alone to talk.
The inside of May Beth’s place looks exactly like it did, when I was first here, all those many, many months ago. It’s like stepping back through time, to our first meeting, poring over the photo album of Sadie and Mattie before reaching the page with the missing picture.
Claire stands at the kitchen sink with her arms crossed, looking more and less sure of herself since we last talked. We’re silent for a while, as though we’re both holding out hope Sadie will miraculously show up, will appear, walking up the drive, disrupting the narrative one final time.
WEST McCRAY:
Where do you think she is?
CLAIRE SOUTHERN:
L.A.
That’s a joke.
WEST McCRAY:
I’m surprised you’ve stuck around.
CLAIRE SOUTHERN:
Me too.
But you know what I keep thinking about?
WEST McCRAY:
What’s that?
CLAIRE SOUTHERN:
She dyed her hair blond.
Sadie had naturally brown hair. She looked just like my mother, and I had a hard time with that. It was too much for me.
Sometimes I think I’d like nothing better than to get out of this place, and that I’m the last person in the world that’d deserve to see her if she came back. But then I think, she dyed her hair blond and that’s Mattie’s color, but it’s mine too. And if any part of her doing that had even a little bit to do with me, I feel like I should stay here, just in case.
Just in case she wants to come home to me.
Just in case she’s able to.
WEST McCRAY:
I hope …
WEST McCRAY [STUDIO]:
I hope.
CLAIRE SOUTHERN:
Have you thought about what you’re gonna call the show?
WEST MCCRAY:
I was thinking maybe Sadie & Mattie. Did you have a different idea?
CLAIRE SOUTHERN:
I think you should call it The Girls. I think you should call it that for every girl I figure Sadie must have saved.
You call it The Girls and you make sure the people who hear it, you make sure they know Sadie loved Mattie with everything she had. You let them know that she loved Mattie so much, that’s what she turned her love into. You let them know.
WEST McCRAY [STUDIO]:
I often think about what Claire said to me in the apple orchard in Cold Creek. How when she asked me why I was looking for Sadie, I told her I had a daughter of my own because it felt like the most noble thing I could offer her at the time. Claire got mad at me, rightfully, for using my daughter as a reason to see the pain and suffering in her world, and as an excuse for my fumbling attempt to fix it.
But I was lying at the time.
I told Danny I didn’t want this story because I didn’t think it was one, and that was a lie too. I don’t know that the truth is much better. Girls go missing all the time. And ignorance is bliss. I didn’t want this story because I was afraid. I was afraid of what I wouldn’t find and I was afraid of what I would.
I still am.
I never got to meet Sadie Hunter, but I feel in some small though significant way, I’ve gotten to know her. Twenty years ago, she was born and placed in her mother’s arms, and six years after that her sister Mattie was placed in hers, and her whole world came alive.
In Mattie, Sadie found a sense of purpose, a place to put her love. But love is complicated, it’s messy. It can inspire selflessness, selfishness, our greatest accomplishments and our hardest mistakes. It brings us together and it can just as easily drive us apart.
It can drive us.
When Sadie lost Mattie, it drove her to leave her home in Cold Creek, to take on the loneliness and pain of thousands of miles, just to find her little sister’s murderer and make the world right again, even, possibly, at the expense of herself.
We may never know what, exactly, happened between Sadie and Jack, but I know what I want to believe. And in this aftermath, it’s Sadie’s love for Mattie that remains, to fill in those gaps until—if, when—Sadie returns to tells us in her own words.
And Sadie, if you’re out there, please let me know.
Because I can’t take another dead girl.