Saruti

It's so horrific.

Like, even the larger chamber, if you will, is just a tiny fucking hole that he's dug.

And then within that, she's kept trapped within a box.

I mean, yeah, it's mind-boggling.

Once in there, the first thing John did was to pull out a tape recorder and get Katie to recite the lines that he'd prepared in advance for the fake answer phone message about Katie being chased by a man with a knife.

At just nine years old, Katie already knew that this was no ordinary playdate that she'd be home in time for dinner from.

She asked John how long he planned to keep her there, and his response was, forever.

John told Katie that this was her home now, and for the next 17 days, it was.

Katie's new living conditions were like something out of an actual horror movie Halloween nightmare.

She slept inside the box, in nothing but 101 Dalmatians 90, and just a thin blanket and a tiny pillow.

In the corner of what we called the larger chamber, there was a disconnected toilet that had been filled with a black bin bag for Katie to use.

And while somehow, I do not know how she managed this, but Katie had actually managed to find and hide from John a spare key to the coffin that she was locked in.

She somehow managed to get her hands on that and she hides it in her blanket, which did give her access to the larger room at any time, even when John was out of the house.

But, and this just shows you how intelligent Katie is at just 10 years old, barely 10.

She's nine when she's abducted.

Her birthday hasn't happened yet.

Because she knows that even though she lets herself out of that coffin box and into the larger chamber, she doesn't use the toilet when he's not there.

Because she knows that if she does, he'll come back and realize that she's somehow getting out.

So she would actually soil herself in her coffin space, which obviously filled her, as she talks about in her own book that she's written since, an intense feeling of shame and absolutely just adding layer upon layer upon layer to the nightmarish situation that she's already in.

But I really marveled at that, thinking about how she logically thought about how to survive in this situation.