“Oh Lord, please Jesus,” she pants. Sweat drips from her forehead and the odor of her fear fills the room. Again, she checks the door, then fiddles for a few seconds, winds the camera until it clicks, and rapidly fires off all twenty-four shots of my supine body from twenty-four different angles. Then she shoves the camera into her purse and moves out as fast as her bulk will allow.

Someone was going to do it. It might as well be Flo.

SLOW DISSOLVE TO:

INT. MALIBU COLONY HOME

AFTERNOON

JUNE 1980

In June, Malibu is socked in with fog. It can be sunny everywhere else, even five minutes inland. But on the Pacific Coast Highway, cars drive with their headlights on.

With only a week remaining in sixth grade, class had been dismissed for a half day. The school bus dropped me at the guard gate, and after a few pleasantries with Mr. Jackson, I skipped home through the mist, anticipating whatever afternoon snack of freshly baked cookies or cake Anna would have waiting on the counter.

I turned the knob of the front door and found it, curiously, locked. Detouring around the walkway, I came in through the beach entrance, laid my books on the cluttered dining table (a place reserved for items in limbo), and fished my hidden bobby socks from my bag.

“Hello?” I called out.

The house was oddly quiet. Normally, Anna would be puttering around the kitchen, watching soap operas and practicing her English. Today, there were no sweet smells of her baking. No snacks waited on the counter, save for the usual bowl of fruit. Disappointed, I popped a couple of grapes in my mouth, walked into the living room, sat down on the modular couch, and put my feet up on the coffee table. Blisters had formed where my tennis shoes rubbed against the back of my bare ankles. I bent down to put on my socks when I heard a man’s voice upstairs. Had someone left the television on? And where was Anna? My heart jumped and blood rushed in my ears. Just the week before, Daddy had let me watch The Desperate Hours, the movie where Humphrey Bogart holds a family prisoner. It had given me nightmares.

I crept up the stairs, my breath held, reassuring myself it was probably nothing. Then halfway up, I heard a loud banging. I froze. Something was definitely wrong. Then I heard Anna scream.

I flew downstairs, picked up the kitchen phone, and dialed 911.

“You’ve reached 911.”

“I’m at 46 Malibu Colony Road. Please hurry. Send someone!”

“What is the emergency?”

“Murder maybe. I don’t know. HURRY!”