He stood on a mound of sand formed from the deep pit he had just dug. There was no one around. No one knew what he was doing. No one had seen him––just as he had planned.
It was nearly three in the morning, and the homes lining the beach were just a row of shadows, dark and silent. They were the vacation homes of the wealthy, used to escape the fast-paced city life for days of tranquility. People were resting their weary heads, only to awake and rest some more under the sun and atop the sand. Little would they know what would be buried nearby or that they would soon hear another girl went missing.
He smiled at the thought of their concerned faces glued to the news as they stepped into their vacation homes for lunch the next day, unaware that they sunbathed so close to her body that very morning—that their children played right where he had carried her in a trash bag.
He could picture them in a panic as they questioned their own safety and gathered their things. It was the type of town where crime was rare. A person going missing was not supposed to happen here, but it would now be the second time. His eyes drifted down the dunes, along the row of houses, to where he had buried Alyssa White just about a year ago. She was still there; she still had not been found. He smiled at the memory—at the panic her search had caused—and at the realization that it was now going to happen again.
The town was just starting to get back to normal, but he couldn’t let them get too comfortable. It would be a huge news story, he could feel it, and it sent a flurry of excitement through his body.
He stared back into the hole he had just dug. It’s deep enough, he concluded as a gust of wind swirled around him, scooping up the fragments of sand until they struck the beach grass like shattered glass.
His forehead glistened with sweat in the moonlight as he sliced his shovel one last time into the walls of the sand, making the hole wide enough.
He was done now, but not completely, and a sudden tinge of excitement flowed through his body once more at the thought of what lay in his car. He was ready to bury her, and he knew he was so close to getting away with it. This had all gone so perfectly to plan.
He had already backed his car up onto the sand, and he quietly walked toward it. The trunk was cracked slightly, and he opened it wider. He had already disabled the light, but he could still see the outline of her body––curled unnaturally within the trash bag he had stuffed her in.
He stared at the bag for a moment. He had envisioned this for weeks, each time he watched her walk to and from work, each time he interacted with her. Every time, his mind wandered to this very outcome. At first, it was just a fantasy, but then it became a need as it seeped into his mind during everything he did. It became an urge so strong that he felt there was no other choice. He wanted all of her. He needed her. But it wasn’t for his own enjoyment. What he wanted was indirectly associated with her. She was a flame that attracted anything in her path. She was polite. She was smart and beautiful. She would smile and blush at the slightest compliment. She was innocent. She was perfect.
And that was when he knew she was the flame that would spark a fire.
He reached for her with his gloved hands and cradled her in his arms as he turned back toward the beach and walked across the sand. When close enough, he kneeled before the hole he had just dug and placed her body deep into the earth.
He reached for the shovel and pierced the mound of sand with it, tossing what he scooped on top of her. He did this over and over again as her body slowly disappeared into the sand.
And when done, he took a step back, staring at his work as a whole.
He smiled again. She was nowhere in sight, and he was certain no one would ever find her.