Katie Beers by Buried Memories: Katie Beers' Story Read Free Book Online Page B

really good kid. The family though, I do not like them,” he said, gesturing to the Inghilleri house.
    “Screaming, yelling all hours of the night. It’s like constant; cops are here all the time.” Such bluntness is rare on camera. People usually don’t like to offend their neighbors, but rules of civility did not seem to apply in this neighborhood.
    What do you think happened to Katie?
    “I don’t know—I thought she had run away at first too, but I heard about the phone call so I have doubts. Katie,” he added, gazing directly into the camera lens, “I hope you are alright.”
    You think she’d want to run away from this family?
    He didn’t hesitate, “ I would.”
    Did Sal abuse her?
    “She’s real quiet when we discuss Sal. I just hope they find Katie—I really do.”
    The still images of Katie, provided by Linda, defied the picture that was being painted by those who knew her. In the photographs, Katie looked neat, clean, happy. In one, she wore a black dress with a floral patterned collar. The smile looked authentic. Where in the world could this little girl be? I felt it gnawing at me like few stories ever had. Each day that passed without a sign of a missing child was another day closer to an anguished ending I didn’t want to have to write.

SUBMISSION
    Big John came down to my cage regularly to see how I was doing. It seemed like once a day. But without a window, without a clock, without sleep, I just couldn’t keep track of time.
    “Is there anything I can do to make you more comfortable?”
    At these moments, he was the gentleman I had known my whole life. I asked him for another blanket. I was shivering.
    “You are going to have to get back up in here,” he said sheepishly, tapping his dirty nails on the coffin-sized box on the wall.
    “Pleeezzee Big John,” I begged, “let me stay in here so I can move!” I could just barely sit up in the coffin-box, and I couldn’t stand up without crouching over.
    When I was in there earlier, I noticed that there was a chain attached to the wall with a padlock on it. There was also some sort of contraption in the area my head would go. It seemed to me that it might be some sort of soundproofing box with a hole on one side for a neck. It was terrifying. What could that possibly be for?
    There were also handcuffs attached to the walls where my hands would lay. When Big John was gone, and I was certain he was gone, I scanned my surroundings for any way out. A television monitor in the corner of the room showed video of the outside of John’s house; it was aimed at the driveway. Some keys sat on the shelf to the right of the monitor. I stood on a milk crate and reached for the key, then climbed up into the coffin-box and hid the key under my pillow. That’s when I heard the drill again. I knew I had seconds to jump down out of the box and appear as if I hadn’t moved. He dropped a blanket along with a change of clothes in the box.
    “Ever have sex before?” he blurted out.
    I tried to hide my concern about why he wanted to know, but told him a little of what happened with Sal. I had never told him before.
    “Oh, so you are experienced!” He seemed excited by the notion.
    At first, I didn’t know if I had said the wrong thing, and then, I was sure I had. Big John told me to undress and change into the clothes hebought for me—a nightgown with boy’s underwear.
    “I’ll change later,” I said.
    Big John didn’t like that, and he wasn’t about to argue. He grabbed me by the arm and took my clothes off for me and told me he was going to “pleasure” me.
    He ordered me to stand up on the milk crate. I don’t know why. Maybe he wanted to elevate me. He pulled down my underwear and I remember feeling pain when his finger nail scraped inside of me. I remember thinking how disgusting he was for then putting his finger in his mouth with a very happy look on his face. After a few minutes of John “pleasuring” me, he announced as if he had