I ran as fast as I could.
I ran all the way back to the apartment, to Della, to fix this.
* * * * *
She wasn’t there.
For two weeks, I stalked the street where we used to live, returning to the dilapidated shed Della and I had slept in when we first arrived in town, watching for any sign of her.
No one entered our apartment.
No landlord or new tenant.
No Della.
Rain or shine, I’d leave my temporary shack and travel into the congested suburbs and find a place in the shadows to watch.
And every day, my heart would sink a little more.
I’d focused on the wrong questions.
I hadn’t stopped to ask the most important one.
If Della had moved on and left…where had she gone, and how could I find her? Would it be as simple as turning on my cell-phone and calling her? Would she talk to me? Or had she changed her number?
I’d left every dollar I had on the coffee table when I’d gone, so I had no funds to purchase credit for my phone. And for now, I had no intention of finding a job. I could hunt what I needed to eat or I’d steal if long hours in the city meant game was scarce. Not that I had an appetite these days.
I ran purely on confusion and regret.
Money didn’t matter to me, and besides, I couldn’t stop watching the apartment, hoping against hope that someday, some hour, she’d turn up.
On the fourteenth day, when she still didn’t show, and no one else entered the space, I crossed the street, checked I went unnoticed, and descended the stairs to the claustrophobic basement apartment.
It took fifteen minutes, but I managed to pick the lock with the two knives from my boot, and my steps sounded criminal as I crossed over the threshold for the first time since saying goodbye to the love of my life.
The first thing that hit me was the smell.
Must and un-use and un-want. Dust bunnies sat together in corners as if the unsealed windows had encouraged a breeze to enter and do some cleaning. The kitchen tap dripped like it always did into an empty sink. Dishes sat on the rack waiting to be put into the paint-chipped cupboards.
After living so free in the forest where nature decorated with sunsets and moonlight, the space was abysmal and poky.
How had we lived so long in this small place?
Then again, everywhere seemed better when Della was around. We were happy in a garden shed or under the stars as long as we were together.
Rubbing at the sudden blistering burn where my heart lived, I strode through the tiny home. My hands clenched as my eyes fell on the coffee table where the note I’d scribbled Della still sat unfinished.
She hadn’t moved it.
The cash was missing but that was the only thing changed in the entire room from its faded brown couch to its ugly striped curtains.
No noise came from the bathroom or Della’s bedroom, but I couldn’t stop myself from following the corridor—memories of Della naked haunting my every step.
I sucked in a painful breath as I pushed open the partially cracked door to her bedroom. Her bed was unmade, like usual. Her bedside table droplet-stained from glasses sipped sleepily in the night.
Prowling to her wardrobe, I wrenched it open. Sucking back another pained breath, I noticed the clothes she favoured and often wore were no longer there.
One of the only signs that she no longer lived here.
Her toiletries in the grout-stained bathroom were gone. Her subtle scent of petals and flowers from working at the florist no longer noticeable in the stale air.
She hadn’t been here in a while.
Yet she still paid rent; otherwise, our furniture would’ve been evicted and a new tenant living in our home.
Why?
And if she still paid rent but didn’t live here, where was she?
My boots echoed off the corridor walls as I headed back toward the living room, and my eyes fell on the front door.
A sequence of events unfolded in rapid fire.
Of Tom arriving that Halloween to take Della to the dance.
Of her kissing him in the dark amongst witches and vampires.
Of my jealousy finally starting to make me notice my feelings for Della were changing.
Of yet more jealousy and absolute excruciating heartbreak as she called me the night she lost her virginity.
Of me storming over there, snatching her as if she were mine to snatch, and beating up the guy she’d chosen over me.
I couldn’t remember his name. I couldn’t remember much about that night other than my roaring agony.
I didn’t know what I’d do if I saw him again.
Wait…
Something inside me bellowed with possession. Something that whispered the answers to my questions.
Where is she?
I knew.
I didn’t know how.
I didn’t know why.
But I knew where to start looking.
I bolted out the door.