Proof of Life

PROOF OF LIFE

A true story about crime shows, imagination, and two spectacularly unqualified investigators

Send proof of life.

The text went through at 6:03 a.m.

Three dots appeared almost immediately.

Alive.

Good.

One potential homicide avoided before breakfast.

My friend and I lived several states apart, which ordinarily would have made us spectacularly unqualified to investigate crimes together. We had no badges, no investigative training, no access to criminal databases and—perhaps most importantly—no actual evidence that a crime had occurred.

What we did have was an unreasonable amount of Dateline experience.

Between the two of us, we had watched enough true crime to understand how these things worked.

A person disappears.

A neighbor remembers something strange.

Someone saw a vehicle they couldn’t identify.

Everyone says it was a quiet neighborhood.

And inevitably somebody says the sentence that should have been humanity’s first warning:

“You’re imagining things.”

Or its equally dangerous cousin:

“You’re lying.”

We took both statements seriously.

Possibly too seriously.

My friend’s investigation began while he was housesitting.

Mine began several states away, at three in the morning, when my blind dog started growling at my front door.

Neither of us knew yet whether anything was actually happening.

That was the problem.

His started with a van.

White. Unmarked.

It was parked near a house down the street from the home where he was staying.

There was nothing particularly remarkable about an unmarked white van.

Except it was late.

The next time, there was a black van.

Different night.

Same house.

Then another vehicle.

Always after dark.

Always coming or going from the same property.

At first we tried to be reasonable.

Maybe somebody worked nights.

Maybe there were contractors.

Maybe people simply owned vans and had the audacity to drive them after sunset.

Then it happened again.

And again.

Eventually my friend stopped mentioning the vehicles casually and started reporting them.

“Another van.”

“What time?”

“Late.”

“Same house?”

“Yep.”

This was when our investigation became official.

Not police official.

There were no police.

Calling them would have required explaining what we had witnessed, and at that point what we had witnessed was essentially vehicles existing after dark.

Still, something felt strange.

“Take a picture,” I told him.

“No.”

“Why not?”

“Because what if they see me taking it?”

I stopped.

That was an excellent point.

“Okay. Don’t take a picture.”

“You just told me to take one.”

“I’ve reassessed.”

“Based on what?”

“Personal safety.”

There was a pause.

“You’re imagining things.”

“Maybe. Send proof of life tomorrow.”

So we did.

Proof of life?

Alive.

Good.

Another morning. Nobody murdered.

Then came the cleaning ladies.

Four of them.

They were scheduled.

That detail matters.

The homeowners had arranged for them to come. My friend knew they were coming. Four women were supposed to arrive at the house that day, clean it and leave.

Perfectly normal.

Except by then, we had the vans.

“They’re here,” he texted.

My response was immediate.

DON’T SAY ANYTHING ABOUT THE VANS.

He assured me he wasn’t planning to.

Then he noticed something.

They moved fast.

Very fast.

Four women moving swiftly from room to room, working around him while he tried to stay out of their way.

And they kept looking at him.

Maybe because he wasn’t the homeowner.

Maybe because he was standing around acting strange.

Maybe because his friend several states away was sending him messages that were making it increasingly difficult for him to behave like a normal human being.

Or maybe—

No.

We weren’t doing that.

Not yet.

My phone lit up again.

They keep looking at me.

Oh, hell.

I started typing.

DON’T APPEAR WEIRD OR SCARED.

Then, after careful consideration:

AND DO NOT MAKE EYE CONTACT.

Because apparently the best way to make a man appear completely normal was to instruct him to avoid eye contact with four women while deliberately trying not to look frightened.

Nothing suspicious about that.

Just a man in a house he doesn’t own staring intensely at anything except the people cleaning rapidly around him.

Blend in.

Be casual.

Most importantly:

Do. Not. Mention. The. Vans.

I was several states away.

There was absolutely nothing I could do to help him.

I didn’t know these women.

I didn’t know who lived down the road.

I didn’t know why the vans kept appearing after dark.

I didn’t know whether any of these things had anything whatsoever to do with one another.

But somehow I had appointed myself remote tactical command.

Then he stopped responding.

I waited.

Nothing.

I looked at my phone.

Still nothing.

Four women.

A house down the road.

Unmarked vans.

A friend who had noticed them.

And now radio silence.

I sent another message.

Please send proof of life.

Nothing.

Then the three dots appeared.

Alive.

I exhaled.

Good.

Whatever was happening, he had survived the cleaning ladies.

For now.

Several states away, I had my own problem.

It was 3:00 a.m.

My dog Luci was growling at the front door.

Luci is blind.

That matters.

She couldn’t see someone standing outside.

But she could hear them.

She could smell them.

And right now, she was facing the front of my house and producing the low, deliberate growl dogs make when they know something you don’t.

I sat up.

“Luci?”

She didn’t turn toward me.

Her attention stayed on the door.

Growling.

I reached for my phone and opened the outside cameras.

Driveway.

Nothing.

Front of the house.

Nothing.

Garage.

Nothing.

I checked again.

Not a person.

Not a car.

Not a shadow moving across the screen.

Nothing.

Which somehow made it worse.

If there had been a person standing outside, at least I would have known what we were dealing with.

Instead, my blind dog was telling me something was at my front door while every camera surrounding my house was telling me there was nothing there.

I texted my friend.

Luci is growling at my front door.

At 3am?

YES.

I checked the cameras again.

Nothing.

Then Luci growled harder.

I stared toward the front of the house.

She stared toward something she couldn’t see.

Then—

THUMP.

I froze.

Luci’s head moved.

THUMP.

That wasn’t outside.

That was inside my house.

I texted again.

I HEARD SOMETHING.

What?

Something inside the house.

Nothing moved on my cameras.

Nothing moved outside.

But Luci was still growling.

And whatever had just made that sound—

was already inside.

A few days later, another house joined the investigation.

My neighbor was out of town, and I was collecting his mail.

I knew he wasn’t home.

That is why hearing what sounded like his door opening and slamming shut caught my attention.

I looked toward the house.

Nothing.

I waited.

Nobody came outside.

Maybe someone was checking on the property.

Maybe another neighbor had a key.

Maybe I had mistaken another sound for the door.

All reasonable possibilities.

Except later, I heard it again.

And now I was watching the house.

Nothing.

No person.

No car.

No movement behind the windows.

Just an empty house that suddenly didn’t feel quite as empty.

Then came the scream.

It was nighttime.

Loud.

High.

Bloodcurdling.

Human.

At least I thought it was human.

I froze.

Another scream tore through the darkness.

I grabbed my phone.

Someone just screamed outside.

You’re lying.

I AM NOT LYING.

Are you sure?

YES.

I listened.

Another sound, farther away now.

My brain began doing what brains do after you have given them several hundred hours of murder television as educational material.

Someone was hurt.

Someone was being attacked.

Someone needed help.

Or maybe there was nobody out there at all.

Maybe the noises inside my house weren’t an intruder.

Maybe my neighbor’s empty house wasn’t empty.

Maybe my friend hadn’t been watching random vehicles.

Maybe four scheduled cleaning ladies were simply four scheduled cleaning ladies.

Or maybe somewhere between Arizona and several states away, two people had stumbled into completely unrelated crimes and were too busy accusing one another of overreacting to notice.

There was also one other possibility.

My house was haunted.

At this point, I was keeping all investigative avenues open.

Then the housesitting ended.

My friend waited until the homeowners returned.

Eventually the subject of the house down the road came up.

The vans.

The nighttime traffic.

The different vehicles arriving and leaving.

Their answer?

They had never seen it.

Any of it.

They didn’t know what he was talking about.

That should have made us feel better.

It did not.

Because that is exactly the sort of sentence somebody says right before Dateline goes to commercial.

So what actually happened?

Now I can tell you.

At least some of it.

The terrifying THUMP inside my house?

My air-conditioning filter.

Pressure from the system was moving it just enough to make the sound.

THUMP.

Not an intruder.

HVAC.

My friend handled this discovery with tremendous compassion.

“You thought your air filter was breaking into your house.”

“That has nothing to do with your vans.”

“It has everything to do with my vans.”

“It does not.”

“You’re imagining things.”

“STOP TALKING ABOUT THE FILTER.”

The bloodcurdling scream outside?

Coyote.

Apparently coyotes are capable of producing sounds that suggest a Victorian woman has just discovered a body in the drawing room.

No murder.

No victim.

Just Arizona wildlife making sure nobody sleeps comfortably.

The neighbor’s house?

Nothing ever happened.

No body was discovered.

No criminal emerged.

No evidence appeared.

As far as I know, it was simply a house belonging to a man who was out of town.

And Luci growling at my front door at three in the morning?

I still don’t know.

The cameras never showed me a damn thing.

Maybe she heard an animal.

Maybe she smelled something outside.

Maybe there was a perfectly ordinary explanation that never introduced itself.

Or maybe my house is haunted.

I’m not closing that file.

So let’s review my investigative record.

Intruder: air filter.

Murder: coyote.

Possible crime scene: neighbor’s apparently normal house.

Haunting: unresolved.

My record was not strong.

Which brings us back to my friend.

The vans.

Because here is the irritating part.

We never figured those out.

The homeowners really did say they had never noticed them.

My friend really did see different vans around the same property at strange hours.

He really was too uncomfortable to take a photograph because he didn’t want anyone seeing him do it.

The four cleaning ladies really were scheduled to be there.

Were they simply efficient professional cleaners wondering why the strange housesitter refused to make eye contact with them?

Almost certainly.

Probably.

Presumably.

Look, I’m willing to close most of the files.

But I’m keeping that one in a drawer.

Because this is what happens when two friends binge-watch entirely too much true crime.

An air filter becomes an intruder.

A coyote becomes a homicide.

Four cleaning ladies briefly become possible members of organized crime.

A blind dog growling at a door becomes evidence of either an intruder or the paranormal.

And two people living states apart begin every morning with a ritual normally reserved for hostage negotiations.

We weren’t solving crimes.

We were solving our own imaginations.

Mostly.

Because even after all this time, there are still two questions I cannot answer.

What was Luci growling at?

And what the hell were those vans doing there?

So yes.

Maybe we overreacted.

Maybe we connected dots that were never connected.

Maybe we have watched entirely too much Dateline.

But if my phone ever lights up early in the morning with those three words, I’m answering.

And if I don’t hear from him?

I’ll text first.

Please send proof of life.

Alive.

Good.

One potential homicide avoided before breakfast.