Chapter 2 - Empty Spaces

(Lorei's POV)

Sunlight is stabbing straight into my eyeballs and my head feels like it's been hit with a bat.

Oh my god. Ow. Ow, ow, ow.

I squint one eye open. White sheets. A ceiling that is definitely not my ceiling. A room the size of my entire apartment, with floor-to-ceiling windows and furniture that looks like it costs more than my yearly rent.

Wait. What?!!

I sit straight up, and the room tilts sideways for a second before it settles. I'm not wearing my dress. I'm not wearing anything. The sheet's the only thing between me and whoever's….

I look to my left, it's empty. The other side of the bed is cold, like whoever was there left a while ago.

Okay. Okay okay okay. Think, Lorei. Think.

I try to remember, but nothing solid comes up, just flashes. Pink drinks, loud music, Priya's laugh…. and then nothing. My head’s totally blank. It's as if someone reached in and scooped a whole chunk of my brain out with a spoon.

Did I… oh my god, did I sleep with someone? Who? WHO?!!

I look around and I see a note on the pillow next to me. 

“Had to leave. Lock the door on your way out.”

No name. Great. Fantastic. Exactly what I needed today.

I scramble out of bed, and my whole body immediately regrets it. My head’s pounding, stomach grumbling hard. Fuck. I find my dress crumpled by the door, one shoe under the couch. The other one’s nowhere to be found. I don't even care. I just need to get out of here before whoever this is comes back and I have to have a conversation with a stranger while my brain is still trying to reboot.

Phone. Where is my phone. Where is my…. there.

It's dead on the nightstand, and I don't have a charger, fuck.  I don't have time to look for one. I shove it in my bag and half-run out of the suite in one shoe, praying nobody's in the hallway to see me looking like this.

The elevator ride down feels like it takes a year. I catch my reflection in the mirrored wall and flinch, because what the hell?!!! My mascara is smeared, my hair’s everywhere, and there's a mark on my neck I definitely didn't have yesterday. 

The fuck happened last night?

I get a cab outside, plug my phone into the little charging cord hanging off the console, and the second it come back to life, it starts buzzing. And buzzing. And buzzing.

Eleven missed calls from Priya. Six texts, each one more panicked than the last.

where ARE you

lorei answer your phone

im actually about to call the police im not kidding

IF YOU ARE DEAD I WILL KILL YOU

Oh no. Oh no, she's going to murder me.

I call her the second we hit a red light. She picks up before the first ring even finishes.

"WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN?" Her voice comes through so loud the driver actually glances at me in the mirror. "I leave you for like two minutes at the bar and then you just… you vanished, Lorei, I called you like a hundred times, I almost called your mom…."

"I'm okay, I'm okay, I'm in a cab right now…"

"Where did you SLEEP?"

"I don't know." My voice cracks a little, and saying it out loud makes it worse somehow. "Priya, I don't remember anything. Like, at all. I remember the drinks, and then it's just… blank. I woke up in some hotel room and there was nobody there and I don't even know his name."

There's a beat of silence on the other end.

"Okay," she says, quieter now, "okay, that's… are you hurt? Do you need to go to a hospital, do you need…."

"No, I'm fine, I think, I just…." I press my fingers into my temple, trying to physically push the headache out through my skull. "I feel disgusting. And I have zero memory of the last however-many hours, and I have no idea who I

…"

My phone buzzes against my ear. Call waiting. Mom.

Fuck!

"Priya, hold on, it's my mom, let me just…"

"Wait, don't hang…."

I switch over before she finishes. "Mom, hey, I'm sorry I didn't call back last night, I was…"

"Lorei."

That one word stops me cold. My mom's voice doesn't sound like my mom's voice. It sounds wrecked, like she's been crying.

Something is wrong. Something is really, really wrong.

"Mom? Mom, what happened, what's going on…"

"It's your father." 

“Oh… okay… what’s up with him?”

 "There was an accident. Last night. On the coast road, near the marina…"

"Okay, is he…. is he in the hospital, is he going to be okay…."

"Lorei." She says and her voice just… breaks. "He's gone. He didn't make it."

The world tips sideways, worse than the room did when I first woke up. I don't even register that I've dropped my phone until I hear it hit the floor of the cab, my mom's broken voice still coming through the speaker.

"Ma'am?" The driver's looking at me in the mirror, alarmed. "You okay back there?"

I can't answer him. I can't even do anything except sit there. My… my dad’s gone. Just like that. 

I fumble the phone back up off the floor. "Mom. Mom, I'm coming, I'm coming right now, don't… just stay where you are, okay? I'm coming."

"They said it was the brakes," she says, voice shredded, barely holding together. "That he lost control on the coast road. But Lorei… his car was found parked. Not crashed. It was parked neatly at the marina lot, driver's door locked, and they found him on the rocks below the seawall." A ragged breath. "The police keep saying it's an accident. I don't understand how a man loses control of a car that was never moving."

I don't say anything because I can't think of anything. It's like my brain has gone dry. Nothing’s coming to my mind. 

"I have to go," she says. "I have to go, there are people here, I…"

"I'm coming," I tell her again, and the line goes dead before I even finish saying it.

I sit there in the back of the cab, one shoe on, mascara down my face, a stranger's mark on my neck, a blank space where half of last night should be. And underneath all of it, my mother's voice keeps looping in my head; “It was parked neatly at the marina lot, driver's door locked, and they found him on the rocks below the seawall."

That's definitely not sounding anything like an accident, or am I going crazy?  I don't even know what any of it means yet. I just know I can't stop hearing it.