“I’m sorry,” Jo said. “If there’s anything I can do . . .” She wished she knew how to offer help without offending Amber’s pride.
Amber turned to her. “You kept me out of jail tonight. That’s the best thing anyone’s done for me in a really long time. And if your friend can find Mandy’s body, that might just help more than anything else. I can’t go anywhere until I know there’s no chance at all that she’s coming home again.”
“What time do you get off work tomorrow?” Jo asked.
“My shift at the Stop & Shop ends at seven,” Amber said.
“Okay,” Jo said. “My friend Nessa and I will pick you up after work.”
Why Amber Craig Turned to Arson
Her sophomore year in high school, Amber Craig, reporter for the Mattauk High Herald, was sent to interview the area’s oldest resident, who’d recently turned 102. The woman lived in what had once been the guesthouse of a gilded-era mansion that her family had erected more than a century earlier. When Amber rang the bell, she expected the door to be answered by a nurse or a housekeeper. Standing there instead was the woman herself, as alert and high-strung as a rat terrier. They spent the better part of an hour chatting about Mattauk over the decades before Amber got to the clichéd question her journalism teacher had insisted she ask.
“So what’s the secret to a good, long life?”
The woman leaned forward as if she’d been waiting for that very question. “You must do whatever you can to rid yourself of bad luck.”
Amber chuckled politely, imagining it was some kind of old-person joke.
“If it finds you, it will stick to you.” The old lady was dead serious, Amber realized, and she believed her advice was urgently needed. “Should that happen, you must not be afraid. You’ll need to fight back with all your strength. Do whatever is necessary to free yourself quickly, or else you will never escape.”
Amber sat there with her mouth wide-open, unable to muster a response.
“I am telling you this because you are a sweet, smart, pretty girl. I was like you once,” the woman informed her. “Bad luck waits for women like us around every corner. When it found me, I dealt with it expeditiously. And that is the only reason we are here talking today.” Then she smiled, as though it were a relief to have unburdened herself of such weighty knowledge. “Now, would you care for some more apple strudel, my dear?”
Six months later, it was this advice that led Amber to set her softball coach’s beloved boat on fire.
Amber’s father had always wanted a boy. Everyone knew it. He didn’t complain, nor did he do anything to hide his disdain for the feminine creature he and his wife had produced. A lobster fisherman, he spent long days offshore. His wife worked full-time as a receptionist at a clinic in town. Every night, she came home to a second shift of cooking, cleaning, and childcare. Amber was expected to help her mom with the housework, while her father sat drinking beer and watching any baseball game that happened to be on TV. After her chores were done, Amber would often sit beside him, cheering for whichever team he seemed to prefer. Unless she was handing him a fresh Budweiser, her father didn’t seem to know she was there.
Looking back on that time, Amber couldn’t recall ever feeling deprived. Her family wasn’t rich, but she had everything she needed. She ate three balanced meals every day. She had clean clothes to lay out at the bottom of her bed every evening. She made good grades and won awards at school. She had plenty of friends and could name no enemies. Then she joined the softball team.
It was only a lark. The guidance counselor had suggested a sport would look good on her college applications. Amber never expected to excel at anything physical. She was as surprised as anyone when she hit a home run her first time at bat. When the coach put her on the mound, she only gave up one hit. She saw him watching from the dugout, arms crossed. As usual, his face gave nothing away. It was the astonishment of the girl sitting beside him that told Amber everything. Jamie Roberts had been the team’s best pitcher for the previous two seasons, and she’d just been blown away. Amber couldn’t help but notice the girl looked thrilled.