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The phone buzzes. And buzzes again. The same notification popping up over and over until I feel dizzy, like my feet don’t quite connect with the ground. I jam my thumb over the power button. The phone keeps buzzing, quick staccato pulses that writhe into the bones of my hand until the power shuts off at last.
My heart beats quick as a hummingbird’s. The skin on my arms prickles with goose bumps, and I shake myself a little, trying to pull free of my one, endlessly looped thought—this is impossible, this is impossible.
I take a deep breath. It was just some quirk of technology. A coincidence. A fluke.
I turn the phone back on. For a moment I brace myself, certain the buzzing is going to start up again. Nothing. And then—
I’m here.
Not from Becca. From Anthony. He’s waiting.
I let out a sound more like a sob than I want to admit and stuff a hand against my mouth. He’s waiting for me. It’s time to go.
I bury my phone deep in the duffel, where I can’t hear it if it buzzes again, and set off at a jog.
EXHIBIT D
Transcript of 911 call
Placed from unknown number, 10:23 p.m., April 18, 2017
Briar Glen, Massachusetts
OPERATOR: 911, what’s the address of your emergency?
UNKNOWN CALLER: [Indistinct]
OPERATOR: Hello? What’s your emergency?
UNKNOWN CALLER: [Indistinct] him [indistinct] not moving.*
OPERATOR: Hello, ma’am? Are you hurt?
UNKNOWN CALLER: No. Not me.
OPERATOR: Is someone hurt?
UNKNOWN CALLER: I think you need to send someone. I think he’s dead. I think I...
OPERATOR: What is your address, ma’am? Where are you located?
UNKNOWN CALLER: I think...
VIDEO EVIDENCE
Retrieved from the cell phone of Kyle Jeffries
Recorded April 18, 2017, 11:37 p.m.
For a few seconds, the scenery is shadowy and indistinct, only the sound of footsteps trampling through the brush audible. Then the phone’s flashlight comes on, and the camera tilts up, steadying. Trina Jeffries walks ahead, bobbing in and out of the edge of the frame. She looks down at her phone as she walks. The light from the phone washes her out and gives her a pallid cast. She stops, staring at the map on her phone, and doesn’t move for nearly ten seconds.
KYLE: Hey. Trina.
She doesn’t respond at first.
KYLE: Trina, you okay?
