In the first two episodes of Happy Face, we saw how Melissa’s father, who was accused of killing 8 women back in the day, decided to get in touch with his daughter and inform her about a ninth victim, about whom the authorities had no clue. Melissa hadn’t met or talked to her father for years, and she was just not mentally prepared to go through the entire ordeal and face her childhood trauma once again. But Melissa knew that she needed to find the truth, as an innocent man was on death row for murdering the same woman her father claimed to be his ninth victim. So let’s find out if Melissa is able to find any evidence that substantiates her father’s claim or not.
Spoiler Alert
What did Ashton McBride want from Melissa?
In the previous episode of Happy Face, we saw that after Melissa gave her interview, she was on the front page of every newspaper. There was a man, we saw, reading the newspaper, and by the look in his eyes, it was evident that either he knew Melissa personally or he had something to do with Keith Jesperson. That man was actually Ashton McBride, the son of Lousie Nelson, who happened to be Keith’s love interest and supposedly his last victim. After Louise’s murder, the cold-hearted killer had a change of heart and decided to confess to his crime, though I believe that his real motive was entirely different. So Ashton went to Melissa’s house at the time she and her husband had gone over to Dr. Gregg’s place for dinner. Ashton waited for Melissa to arrive as he wanted to ask a certain question. Melissa got scared the moment she saw Ashton, as she felt that he might end up hurting her and her kids. But Ashton didn’t have any intention of hurting Melissa’s family. He was just hurt. He wanted to know why life had been so unfair to him. He had lost his mother, and his life had been ruined after that. He lived in a camper, and he did all sorts of odd jobs to survive. He told Melissa that she was extremely lucky to have gotten married to Ben and brought her life back on track. Ashton felt that Melissa took all the sympathy by telling her sob story, and she treated his mother like she was some transient being who was just a small part of the entire tragedy. Ashton asked her why she said that she knew his mother when she hadn’t even met her. Ashton felt that Melissa just glorified her struggles when in reality she had everything one could ask for. Melissa and Ben called the police, and that’s when Ashton left her house. Ben wanted Melissa to get a restraining order against Ashton, but Melissa didn’t want to do that. She knew that the man had suffered enough, and that he just wanted to make a point. There were times when Melissa felt guilty even though she had no role to play in whatever had happened.
What happened during dinner at Dr. Gregg’s?
Dr. Gregg had called his influential friends to dinner as he wanted them to meet Melissa. The problem that Melissa had with Dr. Gregg’s guests was that they treated her like a zoo animal, fascinated by her story and childhood struggle. They didn’t consider the fact that what was gossip and an intriguing subject matter for them was someone else’s trauma. Melissa was sitting right in front of them, and they couldn’t empathize with her at all. I believe Dr. Gregg’s house help, Hannah, who was serving everybody food, was more empathetic than everybody else combined. That woman was going through a similar ordeal in her life, and she knew how tough it must have been for Melissa to deal with it. Hannah’s brother had killed somebody, and she felt guilty because she felt that if she had taken better care of him, then probably he would not have committed the crime. Melissa told Hannah that it was not her fault and that she could spend her life thinking about what she could have done differently, but it made no difference. Dr. Gregg realized that his guests had made Melissa uncomfortable, which was why he went to have a word with her. Dr. Gregg told Melissa that people’s fascination with her story wasn’t necessarily a bad thing. He told her that she could make use of that fascination and play the cards to her advantage. He said that talking about materialistic things seemed a bit shallow at that moment, but it was a reality that they could use the attention and make a fortune. There were publishers out there who were willing to sign Melissa on her terms. Melissa knew that too, but she was just not in the right frame of mind to think about all those things.
Why did Keith get angry with Melissa?
Keith heard Melissa’s interview, and he got ticked off the moment she said she didn’t love her father. Keith Jesperson called up Melissa and accused her of trying to steal his spotlight. He told her that she had always wanted to be a star, and now that she had an opportunity at his expense, she was trying to make full use of it. Melissa was at Dr. Gregg’s place at that time, and she just wasn’t ready to have that kind of chat. After the call was over, Melissa gave a call to the Oregon penitentiary authority and told them that her father had a phone on him. The guard took Keith’s phone and then put him in solitary confinement. But Keith was no common criminal. He had been there for several years, and he knew people who could help him with anything. Keith once again got a phone, and he gave it to some unknown person, probably asking him to do something for him. I don’t know what was on Keith’s mind, but I believe that Melissa’s mother was right when she told her the man was capable of going to any extreme length to get what he wanted. Keith was hurt after he heard how Melissa stole his thunder, and he was desperate to be in the limelight. He was a narcissist who wanted to be at the center of the biggest true crime story of the year. He wanted the narrative to revolve around him, and I believe he was capable of doing anything to make that happen.
Did Keith actually murder Heather?
There were a lot of revelations made in Happy Face episode 3 that made Ivy and Melissa doubt their hypothesis. Now according to Ivy and Melissa, Elijah was framed for the murder of his girlfriend, Heather, and in reality, it was Keith who had raped and murdered her while he was traveling through Texas. But then Ivy got a call from a person named Barbara who told her that she had some evidence against the perpetrator in Heather’s case. Ivy thought that Barbara might give her information about Keith, but to her surprise, she wanted to submit evidence that proved Elijah’s guilt. Now back in the day, Elijah attended a prison arts program where he sang a song. The lyrics of that song seemed like a confession, with lines like “the truth is I did it” and “I took the devil’s bid.” Ivy and Melissa decided to go see Barbara, and that’s when they met Harold, Barbara’s brother, who conducted those art therapy classes. Ivy and Melissa didn’t understand why Elijah would implicate himself and write a song if he was actually innocent. Dr. Gregg pulled some strings that allowed both women to go to meet Elijah. In the first meet, Elijah got triggered the moment Melissa spoke about that song, and he shouted that it was Heather’s song and not his. The mystery got even more complicated, because if Heather had written the lyrics, it meant that she was describing the perspective of the killer even before he had committed the crime. Nothing made sense after that, so Ivy and Melissa decided to meet certain people who’d shared a close bond with Heather. Melissa and Ivy met Heather’s mother, who was pretty sure that it was Elijah who had murdered her daughter. She told Ivy and Melissa that she had seen the bruises on her daughter’s body, and she knew that Elijah was hurting her.
Ivy and Melissa also met Heather’s best friend, Jackie, but unfortunately they didn’t have any evidence that could substantiate their claims. Ivy and Melissa met Elijah another time, and the man confirmed to them that he’d plagiarized Heather’s song when he was in the art therapy session, as he didn’t know how else to contribute. He said that Heather was into music and that he had made her meet a man, Lucius, who was trying to be a producer in the music industry. Ivy, after talking to everybody, got a bit stressed, and why wouldn’t she? She was running a story based on certain information, and now she had doubts about the credibility of whatever she knew. She was aware of the fact that if anybody got their hands on the lyrics of that song, it would be impossible for them to prove Elijah’s innocence.
Ivy and Melissa were sitting in a bar when Calloway came to have a chat with them and tell them the blunder they were committing by believing what Keith told them. Calloway told them that back in the day, Keith had decided to take the blame for murdering a person in exchange for money. Calloway wanted to tell Ivy and Melissa that it was not the first time the sociopath had confessed to murdering somebody, just so that he could stay in the limelight. At the end of “Happy Face” episode 3, Melissa was horrified to know that an op-ed had been printed about her, where the author had revealed the fact that she’d had an abortion when she was 15. The motive behind that op-ed was to tarnish Melissa’s image and convince the public that the apple hadn’t fallen far from the tree. Melissa didn’t understand how that information could have leaked when nobody else other than her ex-boyfriend Brendon, who was possibly the biological father of the child, knew about it. Maybe Melissa’s presumptions were right, but I feel that Keith could be the one who got it published so that he could teach her a lesson and make her aware of who was in charge.
Another revelation was made at the end of Happy Face episode 3, when Ivy and Melissa decided to meet the pastor of a church Keith had once visited back in the summer of ’95. That pastor told Ivy and Melissa that he remembered Keith not because of what he said or did, but because, unlike other truckers, he had a young boy with him. The pastor said that a lot of truckers stopped at the church, but nobody ever brought a kid with them. Melissa figured out from the description that it was none other than her brother, Shane. Ivy and Melissa had no clue how Shane was related to everything that had happened, but I believe they would go and pay him a visit and hear what he had to say about everything. I believe Shane could have some information that would help Ivy and Melissa make that much-needed breakthrough and find evidence to substantiate their claims.
