Teal is Her Favorite Color

The field is radiant, illuminated by large spotlights that separate it from the black and cold contrast of the late October sky. It’s Friday night in the small town of Bishop, California. Two teams line up on the line of scrimmage for the last play of the game as the scoreboard clocks down to 00:00. The booming voice of the announcer peeks up over the field speakers:

“AND THAT WILL DO IT, YOUR BISHOP BRONCOS, 59-24 OVER THE ROSAMOND ROADRUNNERS! THANK YOU FOLKS FOR COMING AND SUPPORTING YOUR BOYS IN BLUE! UNTIL NEXT TIME, SAFE TRAVELS AND GOD BLESS.”

The local crowd begins packing up and clearing the bleachers. Half are moving towards the field to congratulate their kids on a crushing victory over Bishop’s rivalry, and the other half are walking towards the parking lot. Children run rampant, laughing and chasing each other across the grassy field, and the high schoolers conspire together to plan their late night activities. It is Friday night after all.

But missing among the lights is a young girl named Karlie Lain Guse. A 16-year-old sophomore who attends Bishop Union High School. A girl that should be there, with her friends, like most of the other high schoolers, enjoying the clean, social environment high school football games provide, and supporting her school, but she’s not.

As the clock ticked down to double zero, halfway across our small town where the field lights are still visible, Karlie ticks down the moments the drugs begin to take effect. She is with her boyfriend, and several others who decided to ditch the football game that night and get high instead. Typical of high schoolers. I did that too.

Under the darkness of the high desert sky, it’s not long before the drugs begin to warp Karlie’s mind into a state of intense paranoia and panic. As anyone who has ever been high would know, this is not an atypical feeling after one pollutes their mind with the Devil’s Lettuce. However, typically, this schizophrenic state is followed next by uncontrollable fits of laughter, red eyes, and then of course, the munchies.

But something is different for Karlie. She isn’t finding things funny, nor is she having a bad case of the munchies. Her mind is racing, fast, and her panic turns into delusions. The world around her twists and turns into shapes and faces as her trip down horror lane goes from bad to worse. She begins feeling unsafe at the small kick back. Her paranoia intensifies over the mind-altering music playing in the background. In his stoned state, Karlie’s boyfriend tries his best to pacify her; maybe offering her a bag of chips and telling her to “Just relax babe.”

She is terrified of him, and out of irrational fear, she sprints out the door, alone, and into the ominous void beyond, leaving the others dazed and confused. She calls her step-mother as she walks through the cold, open air. The darkness creeping in around her from all sides.

Melissa Guse, who has been Karlie’s step-mother for nine years, answers the phone to a frantic and panicking Karlie. In jumbled words, she tries explaining her situation, and asks to be picked up from behind Highlands. Overwhelmed by her fear, Karlie pleads with Melissa to stay on the phone until she arrives and brings her home.

Distressed for her step-daughter’s safety, Melissa asks over the phone;

“Karlie, what are you so afraid of?!”

She responds with shaking paranoia in her voice; “I don’t know…”

****************

The sunlight slips through my window adjacent to my bed, filling my room with the warm, October Hawaiian rays. It’s Sunday afternoon, and I’m being lazy the morning after a late night of work. I’m laying in bed, and my drug of choice these days is the mind-numbing effects of social media. They say it’s more addictive than cocaine, and as I scroll through the virtual dopamine garbage like a programmed drone, I begin to think maybe there is some truth to that statement. I’m on Instagram, or “Gram,” as the young kids are calling it. How else am I going to get my fix of big sweaty meatheads doing workouts and inspirational yoga/vegan quotes for the day? Several minutes go by and I’m about to put down the addicting syringe of technology, as I just about had enough of that poison for the day, but bad habits die hard. I scroll once more through my feed when I come across the first post.

It's a school picture of a young girl, maybe 15 or 16-years-old, with rosy red cheeks and lips that accent her petite features and makes her thin, pale, skin shine. She has long, straight, dark blond hair that sits well below her shoulders. The sky blue backdrop is accenting her bright blue eyes, and she is smiling. Smiling like she might actually be happy to be going back to school. The caption beneath it reads:

“Gucciguse760: My baby sister has been missing about 34 hours now last seen walking toward highway 6 near Chalfant Valley just past bishop. I’m asking for the biggest favor in the universe and for everyone to share and get this out there. Highway 6 goes all the way from Cali to Massachusetts . It’s the biggest highway in the US. Please share and post! PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE. I WANNA SEE MY SISTER AGAIN! She is my best friend. #BringKarlieHome”

“Karlie missing? I haven’t seen Karlie in years… Wow, she has grown up…” I say aloud, but stunned.

I think back to when I last saw Kane Guse, Karlie’s older brother and the one who posted the shocking news. It has been close to three years, since 2016 when we graduated high school, that I’d last seen him. I probably saw Karlie at graduation come to think of it, but I don’t remember. My last memory of her is when Kane and I played little league together, and Karlie was there with Melissa, their step-mother, and Zac Guse, their biological father. She was only six or seven at the time and though I recognize her now, ten years has made a difference.

Missing? From Bishop? No way, that is just plain crazy! I mean... it’s Bishop…

Bishop is a rural town located in the Owens Valley. Tucked away between the captivating Eastern Sierra Nevada Mountain Range to the West and the dirt covered mountains to the East, known ironically as the Whites. “A small town with a big backyard,” is how locals describe it. The high desert landscape spreads on for miles, and is peppered with sagebrush, and salted with dirt and rocks of all types. Bishop is most widely known for two things; Schat's famous Bakery and Mule Days, making it in the literal sense, stuck in the ‘ass’ end of nowhere. What Bishop is not known for is “Missing Juvenile,” type things. Bishop is one of those small towns you read about. The one where things are safe. Where things are a bit more about the old fashion family values. More about the good ol’ country and praying before dinner. A place where everyone knows everyone. Nobody, and I mean nobody, can hide without someone sniffing them out.

How can someone be missing from a place like Bishop?

It doesn’t take long before more posts follow, and in a few hours, my entire newsfeed becomes endless photos of Karlie’s smiling school picture, and the missing person poster that comes along with it describing the last bit of information known about Karlie. It reads:

Mono County Sheriff’s Office:

Missing Person

Karlie Guse

White Female

Age:16

Hair: Dark Blond

Eyes: Blue

Height: 5’7”

Weight: 110lbs

Clothing: Possibly wearing white t-shirt and gray sweatpants

Has a nose piercing on the left side.

Karlie Guse has been missing since approximately 7:30 a.m. on October 13th 2018 from her home in CA.

After I finish reading the posts, I feel a deeper connection to the situation. Maybe I’m wrong to say that. Maybe it’s human nature to want to be a part of something bigger than one’s self and I fell into it. Though I live in Hawaiʻi now, Bishop is and forever will be my hometown. The place where I sprouted from and grew into who I am now. Karlie and her family are people I know through this great common vine that we all come from. I may not be close to them, but Bishop is a community that when something as devastating as this happens, it is felt throughout its entirety of this metaphorical tree, and trickles through the branches and the leaves. It can be a good thing, but if a fire starts, it can be more than troublesome. And now after learning the news, I can feel the intense heat of the situation, even from 2,600 watery miles away, and one question floods my mind:

What happened?

****************

Melissa speeds the eleven miles from her home in White Mountain Estates off Highway 6, and towards the North side of Bishop. Around ten minutes later, she turns down a dark neighborhood street at the very edge of Bishop known as Dixon Lane. In the distance, Melissa sees a faint light swinging around the pit-black road. She realizes that the person holding the light is Karlie, and it’s her phone screen that is disrupting the darkness. Karlie is about a mile away from Highlands when Melissa pulls over and Karlie gets into the vehicle. Karlie, disoriented and still scared out of her mind, apologizes profusely for lying for not going to the game. Melissa spends fifteen minutes calming her down and getting control of the situation. Karlie admits to Melissa she had not gone to the football game but instead got high with her friend, but now, all she wants is nothing but to go home.

They arrive home and Karlie's derangement continues, shifting between “You’re scaring me,” to “I love you so much...” All through the night, Karlie goes on tangents, never truly becoming coherent. The lingering fear follows Karlie like a shadow, watching from the corners of the house. Her wide and dilated eyes move around the house in a transient motion, following the dark shapes. Melissa and Karlie’s father Zac, speculate that whatever she smoked, may have been laced with some other type of drug. They deem her condition as someone not high on just marijuana, but what exactly, they have no idea. Karlie is attached to Melissa’s hip for the entirety of the night, never wanting her step-mother to leave her side, even in the bathroom. Into the early hours of the morning, Melissa comforts Karlie as they paint their toenails together, watch movies, color, and talk until Melissa tries to get Karlie to bed. Karlie asks if Melissa would stay and sleep with her. Crawling into bed, they hold hands and look at each other. Around 5:45 a.m an exhausted Melissa dozes off and falls asleep. The last thing she sees is Karlie, laying next to her. Safe. Sound. Secure.

Melissa awakes a little after 7:15 a.m. Karlie is not beside her anymore. She calls out to the cold and early morning air.

“Karlie?... KARLIE?...”

The words bouncing off deaf defiant walls and falling flat to the floor. An eerie feeling creeps over Melissa as her words are answered with an anxiety inducing silence. Deep down, Melissa can feel in her mother’s intuition that something is wrong. She gets out of bed and searches the house. Nothing. Melissa tries to call Karlie’s cell phone but finds it sitting on the kitchen counter where Karlie left it last.

Anxiously, Melissa goes to Zac; “Karlie's gone, Zac,” her voice carrying a shocking and serious tone as she awakens her husband.

“What do you mean?” Zac asks, still drowsy from sleep.

“I mean she’s not here, in the house, or anywhere,” she says again, this time truly feeling the impact of the words as they roll off her tongue.

“Maybe she went on a walk to clear her head, ” Zac says, “because of what happened last night.”

Due to this, they decide to go searching for Karlie. A few minutes of looking around their small, isolated neighborhood, turns into two intense, heart-thumping hours of worry. They search feverishly across the high desert floor until returning home. Their empty back seats confirming Melissa and Zac’s worst nightmare.

Karlie, is missing.

****************

Later the same day I came across the post of Karlie missing, my grandmother who lives in Hawaiʻi as well, asks if I know who Karlie is, the girl she had just read about on Facebook.

“This is so tragic! I can’t imagine what the situation back home must be like… especially for that poor girl’s sweet family...” She says to me. I nod.

I become increasingly curious about the topic of missing children after discovering Karlie’s story. I do what everyone does when they have burning questions about anything; I hit the web.

Tap, tap, tap…. Click.

The first line I come across leaves me speechless: “Every 40 seconds, a child goes missing in the United States.” My quick search on google leads me to another statement: “800,000 children go missing a year, that is 2,000 per day.”

These numbers don’t make sense... this can’t be the facts…

I engulf myself into two days of intense research, finding myself on the dark side of the Internet. I finally come across the real facts: Statistical data gathered by the National Crime Information Center’s (NCIC) who works in incorporation with the FBI on missing person cases, states 612,846 people in total (not solely children) were reported missing in 2018. The number of reported children missing from 2018 is 424,066, a staggering 69% of the data. However, many of these cases are resolved or cancelled within a short amount of time, but still end up being filed as reported. Of those 612,000 reported total cases, only 85,459 are still active missing person cases. During my search I note that many missing person entries are recycled each year. These are considered “cold cases,” by the FBI, and remain in the database for up to 7 years until a missing person becomes labeled “legally dead.”

Of those 85,000 active entries, a still unfathomable number of around 33,000, are children under the age of 18 who are still reported missing by the year’s end. As much as it pains me to comprehend, Karlie is now one of these cases.

****************

John Walsh once said, “One missing child is one too many,” and after looking at the data, I find myself with a new understanding of these words. To me, Karlie is not some statistical number in a database. Nor is she just another name on the news that someone watches, or reads about. Not to the community of Bishop. And definitely not to her friends and family who wish and pray for her safe return every single day.

She is a real teenage girl with little quirks that make her unique. Online I read something Lindsay, Karlie’s birth mother, says describing her as being a funny little thing, always joking around with family, and friends, before looking at you with her big blue eyes and smiling face. Their bond is special. Even though Lindsey lives several hours away, they see each other often and have a wonderful mother-daughter relationship.

I scroll across Karlie’s Facebook profile, curious about her likes and interests. She is a girl who loves John Travolta (and his performance in Grease), and other classic romantic comedies, whilst also being a horror flicks enthusiast. She likes the typical music kids listen to these days; rap and hip-hop, that sort of thing, but she also has a taste for the classics and country that make up her core. She is a country girl inside and out, just like the town that she has grown up in. The only bad thing about her I find is she’s a Green Bay Packers fan, when clearly the Dallas Cowboys are the best.

I feel the urge to reach out and I get in contact with Kane for the first time in years.

“I’m dying inside,” he tells me.

His words hit me harder than I expected. My heart becomes heavy and aches over his pain. I’m surprised by his willingness to open up to me, even though it’s been a long time.

“My friends don’t wanna bring it up and I feel I been holding it in for a while. I wanted to talk to someone,” he explains, then telling me, “She was amazing… We just had a great connection together… It’s been too long and I want her home bro.”

He goes on to describe what this has been doing to him and his family. I realize now, how little I really know about what this feels like, and the serious repercussions it brings.

****************

The high desert horizon stretches far in all directions as the sun peeks high in the gray and gloomy fall sky. The clouds are frozen in place like time has forever stopped since the day Karlie went missing. A helicopter flying in the distance breaks the painful stillness that hangs in the air. The helicopter is searching Bishop’s backyard for Karlie. Right now, I’m sure they wished it wasn’t so enormous… Hovering around the Chalfant area just off Highway 6 at low altitude, they hope of seeing something, anything, that gives them a hint about what happened to Karlie only two days prior.

On the Saturday morning of Karlie’s disappearance, October 13th, three eye-witness accounts confirm seeing a girl dressed in a white tee-shirt and grey sweatpants walking towards U.S. Highway 6, the second longest highway in the United States that starts in Bishop, California and ends in Provincetown, Massachusetts. The first account is by a neighbor, who places her at 6:30 a.m walking South down their street and oddly looking up at the morning stars. Maybe she is still feeling the effects of the drug and this could be why she left home in the first place, but one can only speculate.

On the ground below the roving helicopter, over 60 law enforcement agents walk the sandy desert in their combat boots and scent dogs. The search continues throughout the day and into the next. Again, nothing. Not a clue, not even a dirt outline of a small adolescent shoe.

The second eye-witness states he saw the same previously described figure walking towards the highway, mentioning she was aware of his presence and kept looking back at him.

Several days of failed search parties go by until the FBI gets involved and takes over the case. Over the next few weeks, they investigate every shredded piece of evidence and information. Some deem her another typical “runaway case,” but to friends and family who know her feel that there is something more, something else, or something missing that they just can’t get their finger around.

The last eye-witness is a morning wooder who told authorities he saw a girl at the corner of White Mountain Estates Road and Highway 6 inside the barbed wire fence that runs along the road at 7:30 a.m. This is the last known account and sighting of Karlie Guse, the 16-year-old sophomore, who disappeared without a trace, leaving the world to wonder the one, simple and haunting question:

“What really happened to Karlie?”

****************

The clues lead to dead ends and the searching comes to a stop like a bouncing ball. I begin thinking of my own ideas of what might have happened. Sitting on an island in the Pacific, I think about home and where Karlie was last seen. Considering Highway 6 is one of the longest stretching roads in the country and is a main trading route for drug cartels and other illegal trafficking, it isn’t a stretch to think maybe Karlie was abducted. She may still be out there, somewhere, waiting to be found and finally brought home. An absolutely dreadful possibility, but one that has a glimmer of hope. I search online again for my own clues when I come across The National Center For Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC) web-page. An organization that helps assist law enforcement and families with missing children cases. In 2018, they helped with over 25,000 out of the 33,000 national missing children cases. From their data I discover 1,000 of these cases are family abductions; and 750 are people from 18–20-years-old. 150 are children abducted by a stranger and another 250 are lost, injured, or just plain missing. These last numbers make up only a mere 2% of the data; but the 2% I believe Karlie falls under. The other 91% is the 23,500 runaways reported to the NCMEC in 2018. The worst part is 1 out of 7 of these runaway cases will likely become victims of child sex trafficking. The average age of these victims: 15-years-old. I sit back from my computer screen baffled by the information. I think of how I never realized how many people across the country are affected by similar tragedies. As I look for more answers, I read a statement from Sergeant Seth Clark with the Mono County Sheriff’s department who told an interviewer: “The biggest clue in this case is that there’s no clue. We think Karlie may still be out there.”

In the end, nobody can rule out anything.

****************

I continue to follow Karlie’s story for the months that follow with the powers of the Internet, observing from my little screen with intrigue.

In a matter of thirty-six hours, through social media and technology, Karlie’s face spreads far and wide and the awareness of her disappearance reaches thousands. I come across a Facebook page created by her family with their search slogan: “OFFICIAL: Bring Karlie Guse Home!,” where new updates and details about Karlie's case are posted. Within the first few days of Karlie’s disappearance, over 4,000 people joined the Facebook page, which is impressive considering the town limits of Bishop has around 3,800 residents. #BringKarlieHome becomes Bishop’s number one priority. I watch as the community comes together in support for the Guse family: forming large search parties, providing donations, meal trains, and printing flyers of the latest description and picture of Karlie. People all across town pinning them in store windows, on telephone polls, fence posts, car windows and almost overnight, Karlie’s face is on every surface possible in town.

I watch as Karlie’s case spreads like a California wildfire, even getting national attention. From local news outlets, to broadcasters, new stations, and popular missing children associations such as: Crime Stories with Nancy Grace, NBC Dateline, ABC News, Live PD, and even getting a segment on Dr. Phil, all dedicated to Karlie and the particulars of the story that follows her.

I see around 16,000 people have now joined the group and the search for Karlie. Most are women and other mothers who hate seeing a family go through such a tragic experience alone and continually post ideas to help bring Karlie home, never giving up optimism. They offer their deepest sorrows, support, and hopeful prayers for the Guse family. People spanning from Nevada, Utah, Texas, Florida, New York, and even to places like Alaska, Canada, South Africa and the UK, all spread Karlie's story and flyer. I scroll through the page and read some of the comments for a while. One sticks out to me as I read it:

“Gina: I hear Karlie's favorite color is teal, so I'll get some ribbon that color as well as the yellow ribbon I just bought. The tune ʻTie a yellow ribbon around the old oak tree’ keeps popping up in my thoughts. So, today I'll be making yellow bows to tie around everything and pins to wear too. Let me know if you'd like to help or plan to pick one up tomorrow at Manor Market!!”

The amount of love and support that I see from my little glowing screen in the dark has been amazing and heart touching. Truly highlighting what a great community, like Bishop, can be when one of their own is in need.

But then, there is the other side of social media.

****************

The publicity comes at a price for Melissa and Zac, as well as Lindsay. I watch as in exchange for getting their daughter’s face across the world for people to see, they have to stand back and endure the tremendous amount of hostile comments from complete strangers, as well as people they know. Accusations have been made that Melissa and Zac murdered their own daughter and hid the body on the morning of her disappearance. Others speculate that “they know more than they’re telling.” I read another person shouting from their keyboard saying, “If my child was disoriented from drugs I would take them to the ER or call 911 immediately! These two are suspects and need to be investigated.”

Outsiders looking in think they know better than the FBI and local authorities who have intensively investigated the case, not realizing that this is their job to discover the truth in situations like this. And they do their job well. Their comments only bring a sense of ignorance that makes me sad about the world we live in sometimes. I scroll by a few comments online and read their outlandish claims, disheartened for a family that already has so much on their plate, only to see others adding more.

Most of these negative comments are judging people and a community they have never met, and most likely never will. This realization enlightens me, helping me see that when I myself come across a story on the news, what right do I have in making accusations of what actually happened, or who’s to blame? The facts are, I don’t know all the little details that could change my outlook on the situation. I watch as the spread of misinformation on the case leads to only more hurtful and negative online bickering that is hurting real people. It makes me think that sometimes, it’s better just to shut-up.

****************

“I believe my daughter had a freaking drug overdose…” I watch Lindsay say on the Dr. Phil segment as she breaks down into tears, nearly six months after her daughter’s disappearance, “ … And I believe in the early morning Melissa saw her with her eyes open and that’s when my daughter passed… I believe they know more than they are saying...”

I’m not surprised by her reaction. A family dealing with something as traumatic as a missing child, it is understandable that emotions are running high. Maybe another part of human nature is that we want all the answers. So when there are none, nothing to go off besides Melissa and Zac’s story, and three shady eyewitness accounts, people start speculating the rest. Dr. Phil asks a similar question as to why Zac and Melissa didn’t rush Karlie to hospital on the eve of her disappearance. I watch as both of them, weeping in their seats as they wish everyday they made this decision playing the dangerous mind-game of “if only...”

It’s heartbreaking to watch a family being pulled apart virtually, as well as physically. To see people choosing sides between the parents. Even in a case like this, where there should be no sides at all, only one #TeamKarlie, there is still a divide. I sit here hoping that all parties can come together to help with what is truly important so that when Karlie does come home, it is to warm and loving arms all connected shoulder to shoulder, not to the division of her family and friends.

I come across a personal letter Zac writes to his daughter one afternoon. It was published in the Inyo Register, a local newspaper in Bishop. I feel the impact of his words down to my core, and it reminds me of the simple and humanistic aspect of the situation. A father’s note to his beloved and missing daughter:

“I and many others have not stopped looking for you since that morning, we will never give up faith in finding you. I pray every second of the day to hold on to hope. I pray that you are warm and fed. I will never give up hope Karlie. Ever. I love you my baby girl.”

The last few lines resonate with me long after I finish reading them. I close my computer, and head to bed.

That’s enough Internet for me.

****************

Karlie still pops into my head every once in a while. When I’m sitting in my car, or walking next to the shoreline and looking off into the distance. Looking towards Bishop. The pain of not knowing, is something no family should ever have to experience. As the days turned into weeks, and the weeks into months, and months into years, it has become hard to not lose faith. Faith in the system. Faith in each other, and above all faith in a high power. It’s moments like this, when one questions the world at large, and rightfully so. The weight of mountains stacking on top of each other can feel like the world is too much to bear alone. And it is. Only with the help of others and coming together over differences, becoming one single team with one common goal in mind, can then people then overcome these mountains. United by an unseeable force for one common objective, no matter what the odds are telling us is powerful. Common sense of the reality isn’t needed to have faith that Karlie is still alive, and out there, waiting for us to come together and bring her home. This is all we hold on to in these days of tribulation.

Looking at the waves lapping up on the shore, a quote from the 1947 film, Miracle on 34th Street comes to mind.

"Faith is believing in things when common sense tells you not to." —-Doris Walker.

Faith is all you need sometimes.

****************

In the town of Bishop there is a teal ribbon tied to a light pole that flutters in the breeze. Teal is Karlie’s favorite color. It is a reminder to everyone that Karlie is still out there. A reminder that she is loved by many, and that we are waiting for her return home one day. The day she comes home, she will see the valley and her home painted with her favorite color. The sun begins to set, and darkness swings across the valley floor. As night settles in and covers the small sleeping town like a blanket, the street lights turn on. There, still swaying under the light, is the radiant, teal ribbon. A light that shines hope through the darkness; to guide and bring a beautiful young girl back home safe, and to her family.