Sadie

This section includes the last chapters told from Sadie’s point of view. Her suspicions about Keith are finally confirmed. Sadie feels sickened that Keith kept “trophies” of his horrible acts and feels a sense of responsibility to all the little girls whose names are written on the tags. She can’t stand having Keith’s licenses and the tags in the same bag. She explains, “It feels wrong to have them together. I separate his faces from their names” (235). This is a symbolic way for Sadie to “save” the girls from Keith.

In her final chapter, Sadie arrives at the place the reader knew she would eventually end up. Farfield is where readers know, from West’s podcast, that Sadie car was found with no trace of her. Sadie instinctively knows this will be her confrontation with Keith. This drive is the most painful part of her travels, physically and emotionally. She says, “The pain of holding the same position for hours, the way the joints in my fingers have started to seize from gripping the wheel so tight that when I finally stop the car, I know I’ll still feel it there in my hands” (252). All of Sadie’s suffering is concentrated as she pulls up to Keith’s house.

When Sadie sees a little girl on the porch, she is overwhelmed by how both unexpected and expected this is. Sadie concentrates on killing Keith for what he did in the past, but here is fresh evidence that his crimes continue. Sadie relates to the little girl, seeing all the signs that Nell is suffering as Sadie had. She wishes she could tell Nell that things are going to be okay, recalling, “She’s never heard those words before, I’m sure of it, like I never heard them, and I know she has to be starved for them, just like I was” (255). Sadie wants to save Nell, like she couldn’t save Mattie and like she couldn’t save the other girls on the name tags. Sadie briefly fantasizes about picking up Nell and leaving, but she is a stranger. Nell is too young to understand Sadie’s intentions and history. The best Sadie can do is bribe Nell to leave, so she will not have to see Keith die.

Sadie’s revenge plan does not go anything like she anticipated. As she looks through Nell’s bedroom, she grieves for her own lost childhood and for all the things that killing Keith will not undo. Sadie misses her chance at the element of surprise, and Keith calmly greets her. She knows she’s failed before she turns around. Seeing him in person after having thought so much about him for years, Sadie is struck by his ordinary appearance. She says, “I wish his darkness lived outside of him, because you have to know it’s there to see it. Like all real monsters, he hides in plain sight” (259). Like Silas, Keith looks “normal,” yet there is malevolent abuser underneath.

Ultimately, Sadie leaves herself wide open to Keith’s blow to her head. She sees a tiny light as she loses consciousness: “And then: a pinprick of light, a single star reappears on the horizon to keep time with my heartbeat, pulsing faintly, alive” (260). Her last, incomplete thoughts are of Mattie: her light in the darkness.

Once Sadie’s chapters end, her absence is felt by the continuation of the podcast-focused chapters. These chronicle West’s continued search for the truth of what happened to Sadie. In doing so, West reveals much more about the people his listeners have come to know.

West discovers Sadie’s ability to influence and elicit help from strangers. Javi explains to West that he always took a passive role in his relationships; Noah called him a “benchwarmer” because he never inserted himself into situations. Something about Sadie and her desperation speaks to Javi, and he feels a pull to help her. This is difficult, for even after Sadie shows him Silas’ horrific photographs, Javi resists calling the police. Javi knows doing so would turn his world upside down, explaining, “And that’s why I couldn’t call the cops at first … Kendall and Noah were my best friends, and Mr. Baker—I’d known Mr. Baker since I was a kid and it didn’t—none of it made sense” (246). Sadie’s obvious suffering and quiet determination convince Javi to step out of his comfort zone and call 911.

Sadie’s determination also convinces Ellis to help her, even while she holds a knife to his throat. Normally Ellis would not side with a stranger threatening to kill him over a man who has been a generous friend. However, there is something in Sadie that makes Ellis believe her. He says, “I mean, when someone comes at you with a knife and they’re not trying to shake you down for money or something like that, and the first words out of their mouth are askin’ if you mess with little kids … there’s got to be something to that, right?” (283-284). Ellis tends to Sadie’s wounds and tells her where she can find Keith, a major leap of trust that Sadie brought out.

One of the biggest revelations in these chapters involves the reader’s view of Claire. West finds that Claire is not the monster that May Beth—and Sadie, in her personal account—made her out to be. Claire genuinely breaks down when West mentions Mattie’s death and Sadie’s disappearance. West says, “That grief should remind us Claire Southern is more than the sum of her failures. She’s not a perfect person—but she is a person. A mother” (261). Claire returns to Cold Creek hoping for some reconciliation with Sadie. She thought she would have time for this to happen, but Mattie’s sudden death showed Claire that there is not always time.

Claire has some fond memories of young Sadie. She tells West, “But she went through this phase where she wanted me to tuck her in at night real bad, begged me to do it [...] this one time… she looks up at me and she says, You made me” (264). This explains Sadie’s earlier recollection of Claire whispering in her ear, “I made you.” Sadie had not understood that this was a callback to the love between them that existed. Sadie didn’t remember, but Claire did.

When Claire tells West that she lived close by all these years, West comes to a startling realization: The postcard that prompted Mattie to get into her murderer’s truck was sent by Sadie. West explains, “When Claire left, Sadie saw Mattie sink into a deep, unreachable depression and threw out one desperate lifeline—a postcard in her mother’s handwriting—and it worked” (265). This brings West new understanding of why a guilt-stricken Sadie felt compelled to hunt for Keith.

West’s engagement and commitment to this story greatly increase in the final chapters, especially when he returns to New York from Cold Creek. He explains, “I felt as restless and reckless as I imagined Sadie was back then, like I had a need to run, to get back on the road, to drive until I fulfilled my purpose” (300).

West also realizes his motivations for first rejecting and then pursuing this story. He tells Claire that he is searching for Sadie because he has a daughter himself. Claire calls him out as a liar, saying that he has more selfish motives: “I’ve been used by men my whole life, and if you want the truth, I don’t think you’re going to be any different” (268). Claire believes that West wants to use their tragic story as entertainment for his listeners. Later, Claire takes a less harsh view of West, but he recognizes she was right: He lied to himself when he used his daughter as an excuse for investigating the suffering in the world.