“Why a squid?” I finally asked Hunt that evening, because he was finally all there.  He must’ve found me so annoying after awhile because I talked to him nonstop on days that he was totally sober.  Most of the times, it was because I had been holding in conversation for too long and there were frequent streaks when Shanna was totally unreachable because she was going through some episode, so I had no one and nothing.  Except Hunt.

“Giant squid,” he corrected.  “It’s the biggest mystery in the ocean.  Like me.”

“Do explain.”

Hunt finished his beer.  He was quiet for another minute, like he was charging up to speak another whole sentence or two.  “Scientists can’t study the giant squid because it lives it fucked up waters that no one’s gonna try to dip in.  You don’t know nothing about them till they’re dead and washed up on the beach.  And that’s the same with me.  You won’t ever know what’s going on in here.”  He jabbed his finger to his head.  “Only God will.  You’ll just see me when I’m dead and wonder what kind of life I lived and how I got there.”

I didn’t understand it so when he asked me a question for once – if I had any tattoos – I was happy to answer.

“I ain’t gonna be a girl and ask for the story,” Hunt said when I lifted my shirt just enough to show him the rib with Callum’s name on it.  “Christ.  I definitely won’t ask,” Hunt sat back in his chair to distance himself from me when he saw that I’d started crying.  Callum was twenty-two and it was the time of night that he’d probably be celebrating hard, drinking and kissing as many girls as he could till he’d fully forgotten about me.

I sat out there with Hunt for another hour or so but when I knew my tears weren’t going to stop coming, going and coming back again, I went inside and crawled under my sheets on the grainy couch.  I fell asleep with a cold puddle of tears on my pillowcase, right under my cheek.  I couldn’t tell how many hours had passed by the time I stirred from my dream about Callum, to the sound of the door swinging open because Hunt was finally coming in.  But he didn’t go straight to his room like I always heard him do.  He shuffled over to me and before I knew it, the weight of his body was on top of mine.  I gasped and opened my eyes and moved to push him off but he was just lying there on top of me.  I thought he was asleep till he said, “You’re so pretty.  I’m sorry for the things I do.  It just feels like you’re not a real person sometimes.”

I had no idea what he was talking about.  I just froze there.  I’d never heard words like that out of his mouth before.  Shanna never believed me that Hunt hadn’t tried anything on me yet.  He’d tried on all the “halfway decent” girls in the park.  But I insisted repeatedly, no.  Save for whipping out his dick while he was high off his ass, he never had.  “Hunt, what are you doing?” I asked when he lifted the blanket off my body.  I knew I’d officially lost my mind when my throat tightened over the way he looked at me, and the tears came back.  His eyes were a darker green in the night and he didn’t look at me in a sleazy way like everyone else there did.  He just looked at me with surprise and admiration and it made me think of Callum and the night he took my virginity.  Hunt was nothing like Callum but of course I was thinking of him.  I dreamt about him even when it wasn’t his birthday.

I stared into space that night, letting Hunt push my shirt up past my breasts.  He didn’t touch them for a good minute, just stared.  “Goddamn, Lake.”  I wished he wouldn’t talk.  It made it impossible to pretend he was Callum.

My stare was totally vacant as he rubbed on my body, kissed my cheeks and my neck.  I felt him rock-hard on my leg but with a sudden flinch and a grunt, he was done and off to his room, and I was lying there, gazing at the ceiling, remembering how many times I’d forced Callum to do this same sleepless dance.  The only difference was he probably hadn’t felt dirty or hated himself and I was glad for that.  I was glad that he never did or would feel this kind of self-hatred because it was the most confounding misery.  And I didn’t even know at the time that it was just the beginning.

Chapter Twenty-Four

Callum

Lake never returned to the hotel last night.

I called her but there was never an answer.  I asked around the hotel, the front desk.  No leads.  But I shut off my insides the second I felt the panic.  I didn’t need that shit.  I was hollow for the next ten hours I looked for her.  Oz held onto the suspicion that she’d gone drinking to blow off steam.  He’d keep a lookout for her.  He was taking Ana on a pub crawl to do damage control and get her in good enough spirits to keep our article positive.

By sunrise, he stumbled in from wherever they’d been at all night, carrying a pair of heels and a giggling blonde on his back.  But his smile fell fast when he saw me in the lobby.  I don’t know how I looked.  Not great, probably.  I told him that I hadn’t found Lake and he immediately put the girl down.  He covered his drunk eyes with his hands, dragged them hard down his face and then sobered right up.  It was like a fucking magic trick.  “Alright, so what’s the next step?” he asked as the blonde moaned that she couldn’t walk anymore in her heels.  He tossed her the keys to his room without looking.  It was at this point that Ana came in behind them with the camera crew.  She looked fairly drunk but walked perfectly straight.  “Where have you already looked for her?” Oz asked.

“Everywhere.  I mean it.  Everywhere.  I had everyone here on the lookout for me, bunch of bar and shop owners doing the same.  But I don’t know when she left and we were doing the shoot for four, five hours.  She could be anywhere at this point.”  My voice was calm despite the fury raising hell on my insides.  It ran around like a madman and clawed everything raw.

“And she’s not answering her phone?” Whatever look I gave Oz made him hold up his hands.  “I know.  Obvious question.  I just had to ask.”

“I don’t know where to look anymore.”

“Then maybe you should stop.”  We both looked at Ana.  Her hair was down, wavy, flipped to the side.  Her eyes were bleary from the drinking but there was ease and confidence in her voice that had me irrationally annoyed.  I needed a break from her so I went off to the bathroom where I thought she wouldn’t follow.

Wrong about that.

“I need a minute.”  I was leaning against the sink when she came in.

“Do you? I don’t see you needing this bathroom at all,” she contested playfully.  “Considering your fly’s still up.  Womp, womp.”  I paused at her speech.  It was the only other sign of her having had a few more drinks than usual.

“Right.  Well, in that vein, I see you needing this bathroom even less.  Women’s is across the hall.”

“Don’t play with me, Callum, you know why I’m here,” she rolled her eyes and fluffed her hair in the mirror.  “Lake’s a grown woman.  She left so let her leave.  She’s finally doing you a favor.”  I met her eyes through the reflection, dazed and glassy from keeping up with Oz but so certain in the words she had to say.  I looked away when she reached into her neckline and pulled her tits up in her bra.  “You should honestly be relieved.”

“I’m not.”

“You will be when you let this all go,” Ana exhaled drunkenly, kicking off her heels and leaning barefoot against the sink.  I grimaced.

“Dirty floor.”

“Dirty girl,” she countered suggestively.  I must’ve rolled my eyes because she groaned and caught me by the arm on my way out the door.  “God, Callum, she’s dead weight.  She.  Is.  Bad for you.  And she made a decision tonight.  Now you make one.  It’s time for you to start making the right decisions again.”  Ana held me in place and cast that sultry look of hers on me.  With three neat snaps of her fingers, she undid the top buttons on her shirt, till I could see her round, pushed-up tits.  “Do you know what to do or do I need to spell it out for you?” She undid my belt in a flash.  Her hand slid into my jeans and palmed my dick till it grew reflexively hard.  She pouted.  “Poor baby.  I know you’re stressed so I don’t mind doing all the work tonight,” she murmured, running her tongue along the contour of her parted lips.  I watched it make a full, wet round before placing my hand over hers.  She moaned, squeezed a handful of my package.