When I reach the living room, I don’t see anyone. I look toward the bathroom and see that it’s empty as well. Then I notice the front door is cracked open. I head back into the bedroom and put on warm clothes. Once I’m outside, I see Cal standing in front of the house, his hands clasped on his head.
“Cal, what’s wrong?” I ask him as I approach. When he turns around, his expression lost, eyes watery, frustration and confusion evident on his face.
“Oh no,” I sigh.
“What happened? Where are we?” he asks painfully. My stomach drops and I feel my throat tighten. I try to think of what to say to him, how to answer his questions, how to assure him that everything is okay. I need to be strong but I feel weak. I’m confused myself and overwhelmed. I try to say something but as soon as my mouth opens, I feel as if I’m going to vomit.
“Are you okay?” he says, concern replacing his puzzled expression.
“I—I don’t know.” I chuckle and begin to laugh as tears begin to fall down my cheeks.
He doesn’t remember anything.
Nothing important at least.
The last thing he remembers is being at the hotel room back in Detroit and talking to me through the bathroom door. Which means he doesn’t remember us making love or telling me that he loves me, which makes this entire situation that much more complicated. He’s trying to comfort me but he’s shaken himself and he should be. He’s lost and sullen, just like I am, and now I have to explain to him what happened. I don’t even know now if it was even him that said those things or whether it was Cal all along. That thought alone makes my blood boil. If it was Cal then that means that moment between Chris and me hadn’t actually been a moment between Chris and me at all and was nothing more than a trick, a test, a sick, twisted game…
“I’m so tired of this!” he says grimly. Frustration is radiating from his entire body. I want to comfort him, to tell him everything is going to be okay, but I don’t know if anything is okay. Cal was just here last night in this house and now Chris stands before me with not a clue about what’s happened. I don’t know what to think or how I should feel. I’m at a loss. I feel more lost than before I knew about Cal’s…or Chris’s condition.
“Going back and forth. Why does he do this? Why am I doing this?” he says, his voice rising slightly in panic. “How do we do this if he can come and go whenever he feels like it?”
“I—I thought that this would be okay. That everything would be fine, Chris, but I can’t even tell you how I feel right now. I don’t know how to feel. This is so…” My voice breaks. I stand up and try to make my way to the bathroom when Chris stops me, gently touching both my shoulders. My eyes meet his warm, greenish-grey ones and it makes me feel sick that the man looking at me doesn’t remember what he said to me, how he touched me.
“Lauren, what’s wrong? I know I missed something. Tell me what,” he asks looking me in the eyes.
“It’s not important,” I say, trying to plaster the fake smile I’d perfected in the weeks prior but am having a hard time even mustering right now.
“No, it has to be.”
I shake my head, denying it. “You should probably call your mom,” I say, quickly trying to hold my emotions together as best I can before they pour out of me. Crying in the bathroom has become such a pathetic routine but routines are comforting and safe.
Once I reach my safe haven I try to catch the breath that keeps trying to escape me. I’m shaking. I have to make myself calm down. This isn’t the end of the world. It’s just split my world in two, that’s all. I have to get it together.
I can’t be weak. I don’t even have the luxury to choose to be weak. One of us has to be the strong one and I can’t depend on it being Chris or Cal, or anyone besides myself. Everyone can’t be a basket case. Someone has to hold it together for Caylen. The thought of her makes anxiety course through my veins. The good thing is this doesn’t affect her yet. She’s only one but what happens when she older? How is she supposed to understand? Understand that daddy isn’t exactly the same daddy every day. How do I get my child to comprehend and understand when Mommy can’t?
That’s what Raven meant about protecting her from all this. But how do I protect her from the man who helped create her, who loves her. I know for a fact both Cal and Chris love her. It’s the one thing they have in common. Cal came back and broke through whatever haze he was in to see her. Chris has fallen in love with her but how do I not worry? Am I doing the right thing for her? Are they doing the right thing for her? It’s like they’re both at war, locked in a battle against one another and it’s not helping anyone, not even themselves. It’s destroying everyone around them. I can’t believe Cal. I wonder if he knew that when he woke up, Chris would be back. I think back to his words. Describing his absences as dreams. It makes me so mad. He gets to go away and dream while leaving me in this nightmare. He’s a selfish asshole and a smart one. He had to have known that this was going to happen. That’s why he fed me that bullshit last night, barely telling me anything, asking if it could be enough. I should have said ‘Fuck no! I need to know everything!’ but, of course, Cal plays me like a violin. No, not a violin. I won’t even compare this disaster to a classical instrument. He plays me like a three year old plays with a toy, without thought or compassion, and I’m the toy without a brain.
7
May 10th 2008
A bust. A fucking bust! Why does everyone I hire have to be such a fucking idiot? It’s better to do things yourself than to depend on anyone else. The dunce detectives I hired lost him. How the hell do you lose a 50 year old alcoholic with a limp? Fucking dummies. I should have gone as soon as they told me they found him. I should have hopped on the jet and went straight there.
“We’ll be landing in five minutes Mr. Scott,” the attendant on the jet tells me, looking at the glass on the floor from one of the bottles I threw across the cabin.
“I will be back in to clean that up for you,” she says. I wave her off.
“I’ll do it, don’t worry about it,” I say, frustrated.
“Fuck!” I say aloud. I almost had him. Right in my grasp. I was going to be able to break his fucking neck, and they lose him. I lean back into whatever foreign material seats Dexter probably paid a million fucking dollars for. Thinking of him pisses me off even more. He thinks he’s so slick, saying he can’t find Clay, to give him time while he sits back twiddling his damn thumbs. It’s fine though. Maybe it’s time to twiddle my own thumbs for a while. He thinks he's the only one that can play that game? Fuck Dexter Crestfield, I’ve been too nice, too calm, too relaxed. I’ve learned that doesn’t get you anywhere. My phone vibrates and I see it’s a text message from my driver Byron, letting me know they’ve arrived at the landing site. It surprises me that I feel my anger and frustration dissipating, as I think of the package he’s bringing me.
Lauren Brooks, hopefully wrapped in a nice tight little bow, just for me. This definitely isn’t a good night for me to see her. I’m frustrated and need a release. I haven’t had sex in almost 3 weeks which is a record, for me at least, and after this shit today I need a girl I can have climbing walls tonight. I try to push aside the image of how she’d look as I make her cum.