Page 18 of The Lake of Lost Girls

Stella:Welcome back true-crime lovers. I’m your host Stella—

Rachel:And I’m Rachel.

Stella:And this isTen Seconds to Vanish: The Unsolved Disappearance of Jessica Fadley.

*Theme music plays*

Stella:Okay, wow, these past few weeks have been nuts, Rach. Were you expecting this cold case to get as popular as it has?

Rachel:Not at all. I’m glad Jessica is finally getting the attention she deserves. Did you see Jimmy Kimmel talking about it on his show?

Stella:And it’s all thanks to you guys. You are what’s keeping the lights on.

Rachel:And we hope you keep listening, because the twists are going to come fast and hard with this one. So, without further ado, let’s dive in.

Stella:Today, we take a left turn and focus on another woman who has never been found.

Rachel:And how it potentially ties in with Jessica’s case. Okay, I’ve got my bag of chips and my favorite salsa. I’m ready, Stel, bring it on.

Stella:Let’s get in our time machine and head back to November 1998 in America, way down south—

Rachel:Ah, the fall of ’98. I can almost hear Shania Twain and Savage Garden blasting from the speakers of my ’87 Buick LeSabre.

Stella:Not a chance. Give me some Oasis or Blur anytime. Though, our next missing coed, Tammy Estep, wouldn’t have been listening to any of that. She was a jam-band girl all the way. According to friends, she spent the summer after high school going to every Phish show on the East Coast. I’ll be honest, I had no idea who Phish were, but from all accounts, this sounds a bit like the festival scene we have in the UK.

Rachel:I know literally nothing about festivals in England, but you can’t have a nineties college girl without a good touring jam band thrown in there. And she also loved the band Widespread Panic and told a bunch of her friends she was thinking about following them around during the summer.

Stella:Which is why the police dismissed her disappearance at first, right?

Rachel:You got it, Stel. They wrote her off as another disaffected youth who had run off. Which, in reality, was so not Tammy. She may like her jam bands and to let her hair down now and then by going to some shows, but she was as straight edge as they came.

Stella:She was straight edgeandsuper reliable. She had a 3.9 GPA and was the Resident Advisor in the Westwood dormitory—

Rachel:Which was Jessica’s dorm. Shit, Stel, the lines are already crossing.

Stella:Exactly. So Tammy and Jess knew each other. and apparently she had a real scandalous streak. I spoke with Tammy’s best friend, Brenda, who said Tammy was involved with an older man. She also says she told the police, but, of course, they did absolutelynothingwith the information.

Rachel:We should rename this podcast “Five Hundred Ways the Police Suck.”

Stella:You’re not wrong, my friend.

Rachel:So, this older man—are we talking about a senior maybe?

Stella:Oh no, Rach. This guy was a professor at Southern State … and married, too.

Rachel:Oh, thatisscandalous! Tsk, tsk, Tammy.

Stella:But does this married, older man have anything to do with her disappearance? Some say yes, but what about the other missing girls? Let’s dig a little deeper …

CHAPTER5

JESSICA

November 1998

THE PHONE RANGand rang. I hung up and sat on my bed, my shoulders slumped, my heart heavy. I couldn’t call him at home. I didn’t want to talk to Mom. I didn’t want her to hear the pain in my voice.

I needed my dad.

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