Anabel Ray

Kara kept running! It was like she was being chased by a wild beast, but it was just a jogging trail. I was trying my best to keep up and yelled, “Kara, what are you running from? Why go so fast and so hard?” She kept running. My chest was hurting, and I was panting as I struggled for air, “Kara STOP! STOP!” 

She stopped cold in her tracks with her back to me and was silent except for her breath. I could hear her with each labored intake and outtake of air and imagine the rise and fall of her chest. I couldn’t see it, but I could feel something tormenting her with each breath. I walked up behind her slowly, “Kara, talk to me.” She took a couple steps forward, and then she dropped to her knees and began to sob.

She rubbed her hands in the dirt and dropped her forehead to the ground and made these guttural noises of anguish and release.

As soon as she had fallen to her knees and sobbed, she stood up, looked back at me and smiled gently; she then began to run with a slow, steady pace.

“What the Hell was that?” I thought. When we got back to the apartment, Kara downed a cool glass of water and turned to me, “What are your plans for the day darling?” I found the question odd. I did not know what to say at first, but I found the words to muster after witnessing such a display of emotion, “What the hell Kara? You bleeped out on me and were running in a reckless daze and then squatted in the earth with some weird battle cry, and now you act like nothing happened! You don’t find that a bit odd?”

Kara looked at me puzzled, “What? I don’t understand. What are you talking about?” I could tell from looking into her eyes that she had no idea what I was talking about, nor did she have any recollection of what happened on that running trail. Kara and I had only been dating for about 6 months. Everything had been great, almost blissful. None of this made any sense to me. 

Out of nowhere, Kara grabbed my arm aggressively and shook it hard, “I’m only going to tell you this once, Daniel. You need to tell me the truth. Who is standing behind you and why is he whispering in your ear?” I looked behind me and there was nothing standing there, and there was certainly nobody/no one whispering anything in my ear. I turned back around, “Kara?”

Kara ran out the door and jumped into her car and took off speeding down the street. She ran over two mail boxes before she got to the next street. I got in my car to go after her. Someone must have called the police because they sped past me blaring their sirens. I traveled in the direction of sirens as safely as I could and then saw Kara’s car smashed into a fire hydrant. 

Kara always kept a firearm in the console of her car for safety and, as she kicked the side door open, she opened-fired on the police officers who had followed her to the scene of her accident. I was screaming, “Kara NO!” Nothing made sense to me. I was in complete shock. Bullets riddled through the air as law enforcement sought to protect themselves and stop Kara from killing anyone, and with that, Kara, my sweet Kara was gone.

After being questioned by police, I asked the detective in charge of the investigation, “Why would Kara do this? It is like she was demon possessed. This makes no sense. This was not her.“ The detective looked at me quizzically and said her name is not Kara, it’s Anabel Ray.” He turned and walked away. 

“Anabel Ray - Why does that name sound familiar?" I thought to myself. As I was driving home, I remembered something from long ago. My mother had said, “Poor girl - How could anyone hurt someone so young and so innocent?” Anable Ray - I remembered. It was all over the news. A Little girl about 10 years old was found half starved and wandering on a backcountry road in a dirty nightgown. She said she was kept in, what her captor called, a bunker, basically a fortified hole in the ground. I was just a boy myself, but I remembered her name was all over the news, and her captor was never found. 

When I got to my house, I googled Anabel Ray’s name. I wanted to learn more about her, more about Kara, more about the woman I had fallen in love with and lost so tragically just hours before. I wanted to know why this woman changed into someone else right before my eyes.

I read an article written years after Kara was found. She was returned to her mother and father. Apparently, she was abducted from the front yard of her house when she was 5 years old. The author in the article stated Anabel Ray never spoke of what happened to her in that hole in the ground; but after the incident, she was adamant her name was not Anabel; it was Kara. The author also explained Anabel was hospitalized for two years in a state mental hospital and upon his arrival to interview her, he was greeted by a teenage girl. “Awe you must be Anabel?” She said, “No.” He continued, “Then, you must be Kara?” The author, who by the way was also a journalist, said she looked at him and smiled, “No, I’m Tina. Anabel and Kara are much kinder than I am. They often ask me when I take off running fast and hard and without purpose, "'What are you running from?’” 

The author stated that he saw the blood drain from her face and her smile disappear. She turned around and looked at him, “There is someone standing behind you, and he is whispering something in your ear. If you listen close enough, he will tell you where that hole is and what he did to Anabel Ray.