Answered That Call… And I’m Still Alive Today (as told by Königin Bienenwabe Rasenhof)
My name is Königin Bienenwabe Rasenhof, I was born in America when my parents immigrated here from Germany. They gave me a German name and kept theirs as well refusing to simulate into Anglo dominated American society. It’s been thirteen years since the night that could have ended my life. Thirteen — an unlucky number, they say. But I feel incredibly lucky.
I’ve always been predictable. I go to bed early, usually just after dusk. My friends call me an old soul, a creature of habit, but that predictability nearly cost me my life.
It was October 20th, 2012.
A few weeks before, I’d been watching a promo for the TV show Fatal Encounters on Investigation Discovery. One scene stuck with me more than the others: a woman’s phone rings in the night, she ignores it, and a narrator’s voice says, chillingly:
“If I hadn’t missed that call… I might be alive today.”
The narrator added something else, something that lodged itself in my head like a warning: fateful decisions can have fatal consequences.
That night, I had gone to bed early. Hours later, my cell phone buzzed. 11:42 p.m. — eighteen minutes to midnight.
I almost ignored it. Almost did exactly what that woman in the promo had done.
But that line rang in my mind, sharper than any alarm: fateful decisions can have fatal consequences.
I answered.
It was Marie, my childhood friend. She and Jocelyn were still at the beach, tipsy, laughing, stranded.
“Königin, please, we can’t drive. Can you come get us?”
I sighed, but I didn’t hesitate. I got dressed, slid into my car, and drove to the beach parking lot.
They were waiting, barefoot, frozen from the night air, leaning against the hood of their car.
“Don’t worry,” Jocelyn said. “We left the car. Too drunk to risk it. You’re the hero tonight.”
They insisted I stay at their apartment — a wide, white-walled floor in a skyscraper downtown, almost as big as my house’s front and back yard combined.
“Sleep on the aero bed,” Marie said. “Make yourself at home. Shower’s yours in the morning. We’ll be up a while — movies, games, whatever.”
They stayed up laughing, playing video games and watching TV, while I fell asleep on that small inflatable bed, exhausted but alive.
When I woke up in the morning, I showered, dressed, and quietly left to head home.
When I pulled into my driveway, I froze.
My front door was open.
Not forced — no splintered wood, no broken lock. Just slightly ajar.
Outside, the metal ring around my power console had been cut, and all the electricity inside was off. No alarms, no sounds, nothing. Whoever had done this was careful — deliberate.
I didn’t step inside. My hands were shaking. I called the police immediately.
They arrived within minutes, four officers moving through my house, checking every room and even the attic.
When they came back outside, the lead officer said softly,
“Ma’am… nothing’s missing.”
Everything of value — my jewelry, my coins, my cash — untouched.
“Then whoever broke in wasn’t here to steal,” he said.
The thought hit me harder than I expected. If I hadn’t answered Marie’s call, I would’ve been home. Asleep. And I might not be here to tell you this.
Marie and Jocelyn were horrified when I told them.
“Oh my God, Königin — if we hadn’t called you…”
“…you might’ve been killed,” Marie finished, her voice trembling.
Their call saved my life. Their decision to ask me for help spared me from being the woman in that promo.
Years later, I learned the man had been arrested in Bangkok, Thailand after breaking into another woman’s apartment. Her name was Nanaya — a light sleeper, legally armed, and fearless. She caught him in her hallway and forced him at gunpoint to the police station.
I traveled to Thailand to meet him in the police detention cell. Not a courtroom — a cell. He was seated, hands folded, expression unreadable. No smirk. No twitch of guilt. Just a cold, blank stare.
I swallowed, my chest tight, and stepped closer.
“Why did you break into my home?” I asked, voice steady, though my fingers shook.
He blinked slowly, not meeting my eyes.
“I just… wanted to talk. To have some female company,” he said evenly, as if rehearsed. No emotion. No apology.
Those words — “female company” — were a coded threat. I knew instantly what he intended: sexual assault, followed, if he’d succeeded, by murder.
At his trial in Thailand, I testified. I told the court exactly what he had done to me: how he destroyed my sense of safety in my own home, left me paranoid, jumping at shadows and creaks, terrified of men, constantly second-guessing every sound.
Through my testimony, he remained stone-faced, cold, and unapologetic. My words did not reach him at all. That emptiness — the absence of remorse or empathy — was worse than any words I could have spoken.
After the trial, I finally met Nanaya. She was calm, collected, but there was a quiet intensity in her eyes — the same intensity that had saved her life.
I hesitated, then asked,
“You… you were alone when he tried to break in?”
Nanaya nodded, jaw tight.
“I was. I had a shotgun. He didn’t know what hit him. I forced him to the police.”
I swallowed, remembering my own night.
“Thirteen years ago… he came into my house while I was gone. Nothing was taken. He… he wasn’t after money. That line he gave the Thai police — ‘to enjoy some female company’ — that… that meant assault. Followed, if he’d succeeded, by murder.”
Nanaya’s eyes softened. “I understand. Even now, sometimes, I feel his presence. But we survived. That’s what matters.”
I nodded, letting the tension ease slightly. “It’s… strange, isn’t it? Two women, separated by oceans, but caught by the same monster.”
She gave a tight smile. “Fate, maybe. Or luck. Or both.”
Thirteen years after that fateful night, I still jump at every creak, every shadow, every stranger. I still lock my doors twice.
Sometimes, when a well-meaning man notices how tense or terrified I seem and asks me what’s wrong, I tell him everything: the beach call, the break-in, the Thai arrest, the trial, the paranoia. I explain why I appear terrified — and that surviving that night was not luck. It was fate, and it saved me.
“If I hadn’t missed that call… I might be alive today.”
Fateful decisions can indeed have fatal consequences. But that night, mine saved my life.
Even now, I know the police will monitor him after he serves his sentence in Thailand. Old people can be evil. If they ever take their eyes off him, even for a second… who knows what he could do.
I’ve always been predictable. I go to bed early, usually just after dusk. My friends call me an old soul, a creature of habit, but that predictability nearly cost me my life.
It was October 20th, 2012.
A few weeks before, I’d been watching a promo for the TV show Fatal Encounters on Investigation Discovery. One scene stuck with me more than the others: a woman’s phone rings in the night, she ignores it, and a narrator’s voice says, chillingly:
“If I hadn’t missed that call… I might be alive today.”
The narrator added something else, something that lodged itself in my head like a warning: fateful decisions can have fatal consequences.
That night, I had gone to bed early. Hours later, my cell phone buzzed. 11:42 p.m. — eighteen minutes to midnight.
I almost ignored it. Almost did exactly what that woman in the promo had done.
But that line rang in my mind, sharper than any alarm: fateful decisions can have fatal consequences.
I answered.
It was Marie, my childhood friend. She and Jocelyn were still at the beach, tipsy, laughing, stranded.
“Königin, please, we can’t drive. Can you come get us?”
I sighed, but I didn’t hesitate. I got dressed, slid into my car, and drove to the beach parking lot.
They were waiting, barefoot, frozen from the night air, leaning against the hood of their car.
“Don’t worry,” Jocelyn said. “We left the car. Too drunk to risk it. You’re the hero tonight.”
They insisted I stay at their apartment — a wide, white-walled floor in a skyscraper downtown, almost as big as my house’s front and back yard combined.
“Sleep on the aero bed,” Marie said. “Make yourself at home. Shower’s yours in the morning. We’ll be up a while — movies, games, whatever.”
They stayed up laughing, playing video games and watching TV, while I fell asleep on that small inflatable bed, exhausted but alive.
When I woke up in the morning, I showered, dressed, and quietly left to head home.
When I pulled into my driveway, I froze.
My front door was open.
Not forced — no splintered wood, no broken lock. Just slightly ajar.
Outside, the metal ring around my power console had been cut, and all the electricity inside was off. No alarms, no sounds, nothing. Whoever had done this was careful — deliberate.
I didn’t step inside. My hands were shaking. I called the police immediately.
They arrived within minutes, four officers moving through my house, checking every room and even the attic.
When they came back outside, the lead officer said softly,
“Ma’am… nothing’s missing.”
Everything of value — my jewelry, my coins, my cash — untouched.
“Then whoever broke in wasn’t here to steal,” he said.
The thought hit me harder than I expected. If I hadn’t answered Marie’s call, I would’ve been home. Asleep. And I might not be here to tell you this.
Marie and Jocelyn were horrified when I told them.
“Oh my God, Königin — if we hadn’t called you…”
“…you might’ve been killed,” Marie finished, her voice trembling.
Their call saved my life. Their decision to ask me for help spared me from being the woman in that promo.
Years later, I learned the man had been arrested in Bangkok, Thailand after breaking into another woman’s apartment. Her name was Nanaya — a light sleeper, legally armed, and fearless. She caught him in her hallway and forced him at gunpoint to the police station.
I traveled to Thailand to meet him in the police detention cell. Not a courtroom — a cell. He was seated, hands folded, expression unreadable. No smirk. No twitch of guilt. Just a cold, blank stare.
I swallowed, my chest tight, and stepped closer.
“Why did you break into my home?” I asked, voice steady, though my fingers shook.
He blinked slowly, not meeting my eyes.
“I just… wanted to talk. To have some female company,” he said evenly, as if rehearsed. No emotion. No apology.
Those words — “female company” — were a coded threat. I knew instantly what he intended: sexual assault, followed, if he’d succeeded, by murder.
At his trial in Thailand, I testified. I told the court exactly what he had done to me: how he destroyed my sense of safety in my own home, left me paranoid, jumping at shadows and creaks, terrified of men, constantly second-guessing every sound.
Through my testimony, he remained stone-faced, cold, and unapologetic. My words did not reach him at all. That emptiness — the absence of remorse or empathy — was worse than any words I could have spoken.
After the trial, I finally met Nanaya. She was calm, collected, but there was a quiet intensity in her eyes — the same intensity that had saved her life.
I hesitated, then asked,
“You… you were alone when he tried to break in?”
Nanaya nodded, jaw tight.
“I was. I had a shotgun. He didn’t know what hit him. I forced him to the police.”
I swallowed, remembering my own night.
“Thirteen years ago… he came into my house while I was gone. Nothing was taken. He… he wasn’t after money. That line he gave the Thai police — ‘to enjoy some female company’ — that… that meant assault. Followed, if he’d succeeded, by murder.”
Nanaya’s eyes softened. “I understand. Even now, sometimes, I feel his presence. But we survived. That’s what matters.”
I nodded, letting the tension ease slightly. “It’s… strange, isn’t it? Two women, separated by oceans, but caught by the same monster.”
She gave a tight smile. “Fate, maybe. Or luck. Or both.”
Thirteen years after that fateful night, I still jump at every creak, every shadow, every stranger. I still lock my doors twice.
Sometimes, when a well-meaning man notices how tense or terrified I seem and asks me what’s wrong, I tell him everything: the beach call, the break-in, the Thai arrest, the trial, the paranoia. I explain why I appear terrified — and that surviving that night was not luck. It was fate, and it saved me.
“If I hadn’t missed that call… I might be alive today.”
Fateful decisions can indeed have fatal consequences. But that night, mine saved my life.
Even now, I know the police will monitor him after he serves his sentence in Thailand. Old people can be evil. If they ever take their eyes off him, even for a second… who knows what he could do.
31-35, M
