That couldn't happen to me.
Laci Delilah Whitlock.
The now only child of Sean and Denise Whitlock.
Well, they didn't know that yet. And by they, she means the police. The Police don't know that yet. She had always wondered why the Morgans hated the cops and then chalked it up to rebelliousness or trying to be special. But now, she understood. Her parents didn't share that sentiment, though. 'Trust the police, honey, they know what they're doing.' or 'They're doing all they can with what they have.' That's all she heard from her parents that week she was stuck at home, that week she was stuck at home sick with worry and sick of her parents pestering her about prayer, or church, and she was especially sick with her parents just.. blindly trusting the police. They'd barely lifted a finger to check on her family or even form a search party. They did those things, sure. But only when they were forced to. Like they were lazy herds of cattle that constantly needed to be shocked by a cattle prod.
The only thing Laci had felt bad being angry about was not wanting to go to church. You see, her family is Catholic. Not just any Catholic. Irish Catholic. Which means they silently judged everyone else and assumed everyone else did the same. So, when Sandra was taken straight from their home, they expected judgment for shitty parenting or whatever. But that didn't come. No, it came later. It came with the lack of leads from the police and the sudden, not so subtle involvement of Matthews Detective Agency. Then shortly afterward, the blaming started, but not just of Sandra and hers parents, of Sandra herself. 'Maybe if she dressed nicer, this would have happened.' 'Well, did she provoke it? What had she been doing that day?' Or pushing it onto God. 'This is all part of God's plan.'
This is all part of God's plan, they say. Like it's supposed to make her feel.. better??? Like the idea that God would rather take a 13 year old girl from her home than fix ANY of the problems in the world is supposed to make her feel.. Better. Well, it doesn't. It doesn't make her feel better. It makes her feel worse. What's even worse than that is the two different boxes that people fall into. There's the first, where it's parents, like the Denzys, or the McCains, or even the Averys, all huddling around their children like penguins, trying to keep them safe. Like that's supposed to help. Like fending for yourself is going to fix everything.
And then there's the second box. The box where the people a few towns over, maybe a city over, or sometimes, even right next door to you think, 'That couldn't happen to me'. Which, to be fair, Heathen also noticed. She noticed it when the Mead case was still fresher than like.. 6 weeks. She said, "There's this trend of some people getting cocky. It happens usually when you're like, a couple states over, right? It also happens when it's a couple towns over. Maybe that's actually more common.. Anyway, people start to get really cocky. They start thinking, "Well, that couldn't happen to us! We're two states over, two towns over!" Whatever, right? Which, I mean, it sometimes, is true. Sometimes nothing happens, and sometimes you get lucky. But most of the time, it could happen to you. Almost like you jinxed it."
'There's a trend of people getting cocky.' Like how her parents had gotten cocky, like how She had gotten cocky. 'That couldn't happen to us.' Like how she overheard her mom saying one night in the kitchen, trying to soothe her paranoid nerves while she sipped on a glass of white wine as her husband sat in his armchair, lazily replying 'Yes, honey. Nothing bad will happen to us. It was all the way in Colorado.' 'It's almost like you jinxed it.' Like how her fucking rock of a father jinxed it. You know what separates Iowa from Colorado? Nebraska separates Iowa from Colorado. If you go straight, that is. But you could also go down through Kansas and Missouri or up through Wyoming and South Dakota. There is literally nothing. Keeping anyone in one state but a hope and a prayer and maybe a border. But that is it. And it is infuriating. Laci hates having to sit around, and wait for something else to happen, and not knowing, but assuming, praying, if you will, that Sandra's okay.
Laci needs to do something. Because, clearly, everyone else didn't care, at least not as much as she did.