The Lies We Believe

by Eden Rose

  I don’t hear anything more as I realize that I just told her I loved her for the first time over the media. How the hell do I know if she even heard me? I sure hope she did.

  One Month Later

  All I hear are screams as the car is lit up from the fire that is brewing inside. I can see Audrey’s head that is pressed against the glass of the windows and she’s trying to breathe.

  My baby is trying to breathe and she can’t.

  I try to break out from the restraints that are holding me back from running to get her and I can’t. The restraints are too strong and I can’t break them. I rattle them against the concrete and it resonates throughout the whole alley.

  “Let me go! I will fucking kill you if you don’t let me out of these shackles! Stay away from my wife.” I yell and scream. With my feet firmly planted onto the ground, I push up and try to break out of them anyways.

  “Damien! Help me! They are going to take me! Damien!”

  Her yells and screams shake me to my core and it scares me more than anything. “Hold on, my lovely. I’m coming!” I yell back at her.

  I try again to break the cuffs that are holding me back from Audrey and they won’t give.

  “You dumb asshole. You think that you can top me and get away with it? You should have listened when I told you that there is no going back for me. I won’t let you be happy with some daisy maid.”

  My head snaps to the left and I see Liz standing by Audrey. She’s got a gun pointed right at her head and it’s enough to make me grunt out from frustration. “Liz! Let me go!” I demand and feel the shackles break into the skin of my wrists and legs.

  She shakes her blonde hair and then walks over towards Audrey. Once she’s standing to the side of her, she puts her gun back into her pocket and then replaces it with a knife. “You silly boy. This is who you fucking want? She’s a fat ass bitch who could never please you like I could!”

  As she screamed the last word, she stabs Audrey in her stomach. “Damien! Help me, please. Please let me go!” The blood begins to pool out of her stomach and I can feel my own blood as it leaks from my wrists.

  Audrey begging is what makes me violently sick to my stomach. I heave out the contents of it and my wife is still screaming at the top of her lungs. “Help him! Help him! He’s sick!”

  Once my stomach is done revolting on me, I look up and see Audrey staring at the ground with her shoulders curved around her as if it would protect her. “Look, bitch. He won’t like you without all of your pretty hair.”

  The first chunk of her hair that fell to the ground freaked me out. If Liz is willing to do something so petty like cut her hair off, she’s going to wield that knife and do something else.

  The skin around my wrists begins to break off and rip off from my bones. I can feel the blood as it flows from my wrists and it’s an odd feeling. It’s almost as if I can feel each drop that spills from my veins.

  Audrey’s lifeless form slips from Liz’s arms as she slides to the ground with a thud. The sound of her as she drops to the ground is enough to make me throw up. “No! No!”

  I knew that my arms had given out and the whole weight of my body falls to the floor. Even in a vain attempt, I try to crawl over to her. The shackles don’t give and when Liz kicks Audrey in the gut, I scream.

  I’m awoken with a start and I begin screaming. “Why? Where the fuck is my wife?”

  After one month of not hearing from her or seeing anything of her, I’m beginning to lose hope. So is Liz. She’s been over here crying on my shoulder about how she misses her best friend. Of course, I miss Audrey in a different way, but I miss her every heartbeat.

  My blinds are being pushed open and I shelter my eyes in order to stop the sunlight from hitting me. “What the fuck?” I grumble.

  I spent last night drinking myself to sleep so I could actually sleep and it’s given me the worst hangover. My head is pounding something horrible and it feels as if it’s been stuck in a blender.

  “Why are you spending the night getting fucking trashed and not finding Audrey? Did you forget about her or something?”

  I yank my head out from under the pillow that I didn’t even realize I stuffed over my head. Standing in front of me is Liz and Jerry and they have their hands on their hips. “Fuck you, guys. You don’t know what it feels like to have your wife yanked away from you.”

  Liz walks over to me and punches me in the face. I didn’t even register that she was going to do it until the force of her punch cracks against my cheekbone. “What the hell is your problem?” I demand.

  “You’re my problem. My best friend and sister-in-law is out there doing who knows what and you’re getting drunk at night so you can’t help find her.”

  Without even realizing it, I begin to cry. The tears are flowing down my face and I can’t stop them from pouring out of my eyes. Call it the after effects from drinking myself stupid last night, but I can’t help it.

  Jerry comes over towards me and sits on the edge of the bed. “I know what it feels like to miss someone but there’s nothing you can do in order to help us if you’re drunk. I miss Audrey just like you do. My twins miss her, too. We’re going to need to find her soon because it’s getting too late.”

  It was then that I realized that I’m going to need to change my approach on finding Audrey. “Where did she go?” I demand.

  “We are going to find her! You need to get your shit together because Audrey wouldn’t want you to be getting drunk every night and not looking for her,” Liz snaps at me.

  I place my hands over my face and take a deep breath. “Every time I close my eyes, I see horrible images I can’t handle it anymore.”

  “Which is more of a reason to sober up and get your crap together,” Jerry exclaims.

  Even though Liz and Jerry both have a point on how I’ve been acting, I still storm off to the shower and try to wash away the booze and the stench of not giving a shit.

  Audrey wouldn’t want me to be drinking my life away while waiting for her to come home. She would want me burning bridges and setting fires while looking for her.

  After my shower, I towel off and enter my bedroom again. Audrey’s side of the bed is still made up and is waiting for her to come back. I’ve washed the sheets only twice since her disappearance but I’ve sprayed her pillow with perfume to make it smell like her.

  Two Months Later

  “Pack your shit up. They think they’ve found her!”

  I jerk my head out of the mouth of my patient and see Garrett standing in front of me as he’s pacing. “What the fuck are you talking about?”

  I give zero shits to the fact that I’m cursing in front of a patient. I’m more eager to figure out why he’s coming here and talking about how he found my wife.

  For the past two months, I have done nothing more than search for her. I’ve slept for a total of two hours a night and I won’t stop until I have Audrey back home.

  What I can tell you is that I’ve turned one of the spare bedrooms into a gym. When I can’t sleep at night, I work out until I pass out. It seems to be working as much as it can but my body is getting tired and not my mind.

  “Lock it up. Come on, Alexander. They think they’ve found Audrey!”

  “I’m sorry, Kevin,” I say to my patient in my chair.

  When he pats me on the shoulder and then scooches out from under my hands, I know that he understands. “Go get your girl. My cavities will be here when you get back!”

  I laugh mirthlessly, and then pull off my gloves. “You wouldn’t have cavities if you would floss.”

  Kevin shoos me away and then climbs off the table.

  Since Audrey has disappeared, I have completely changed the table in the main room. I’ve moved the one that we last made love on into my office and I won’t lie to you when I say, I sometimes sleep on it. It makes me feel closer to my wife and I don’t give a shit if you call me a pansy.

  By the time Kevin has left my office, I’m ready to go. “Let me
just shut down the lights and we can go.”

  Garrett nods and then begins walking around the office. I watch him from the corner of my eye as he stops in front of one of the small windows towards the top of the room.

  “How long has this window been open?” He asks me.

  I walk over towards him and then look up at the window. “I didn’t open it. I have everything shut and locked when I leave here. A lot of my patients don’t like the fresh air.”

  He leans over and pulls a piece of paper from the floor and holds it up for me to see. It’s a piece of pink paper that is shaped like a pair of shoes. I know instantly where it’s from.

  “Fuck me. When did she send this?” I demand and take two steps over towards Garrett.

  Damien and Garrett:

  Now that you have known that I’m not playing games anymore. I want my money and you can have Audrey back. I will take something away from you and you won’t like it. Give me what I want or I will kill her and it will be on your head. Also, give me that extra drive. If you do not leave it in your office, under the porch, tomorrow morning, I will make you regret it. Don’t make me angry.

  Liz

  “She’s insane! She came to my fucking office to threaten me and then have the nerve to leave me a note like that’s going to make everything alright? Fuck her!” I yell at Garrett.

  “Fuck off. This is insane. If this is what she wanted to do, then the sightings of Audrey are false. She wanted us in the same room so we could both here and look at the note. Liz got exactly what she wanted.”

  I hang my head in shame and anger. “When did she slide this through my window?” I demand.

  He shakes his head and then shrugs. “I don’t know, man.”

  “We have to go to the police.”

  Garrett nods his head and then looks up at me with incredulous eyes. “I am the police! Let me call my new partner and have them sweep for prints.”

  For the past hour and a half, I have sat in my office and tried hard to not stomp on all of their feet as they go through my shit. I know that they are trying to be thorough in their search, but I don’t see why going through my papers and documents is going to help them.

  My brother in law comes out of the main room with his head down and he looks pissed off about something. “We found nothing.”

  “No sign of Liz?” I demand.

  “Nothing. She’s a ghost. The most important thing about this whole entire thing is now she’s got a warrant against her.”

  I place my head in my hands and take a deep breath. For the first time in my whole life, I actually cry. There are tears rolling down my face and I do nothing to check them. I miss her so much and I can’t believe that she’s been gone this long.

  “Garrett…” I murmur and then swallow back my emotions. “What happens if we don’t find her?”

  He walks over to me and then punches me in the side of the face. The blunt force of his punch is enough to make my head jerk back from the impact. “What the fuck was that for?” I demand.

  “If you ever say that shit again, I will kill you. I know she’s your wife but she’s my baby sister.”

  Three Months Later

  My mother in law and father in law have been staying at the house that I shared with Audrey for a week. Why? I’m pretty fucking positive they are trying to make sure that I’m not lying about the fact that I don’t know where my wife is.

  Katherine is thumbing through the photos in our wedding album and she keeps making these sobbing like noises as if she’s trying to choke down a sob. “Such a beautiful wedding you had, Damien.”

  Like the emotional terrorist that I’ve become, I look over her shoulder and look at the photo that she’s talking about. It’s the one of our first dance and Audrey’s looking up at me with her beautiful lips upturned in a smile. By far, the more I look at these pictures, the more I wonder if I told her how beautiful she was to me.

  “She was the beautiful one, Katherine,” I murmur to her.

  My fingers slide around my wedding band and I twist it around on my finger. The funny thing about this, the ring finger is believed to be in direct contact to your heart. It’s funny because every time I look down at my ring, all I seem to think about is the fact that my heart is fucking broken.

  We are sitting on the couch, all eight of us, and we are trying to figure something out. The twins, adorable and hyper things that they are, are sitting with us and are acting like grown ups. I can definitely see Barron in the two of them. They each have his temperment of being calm and funny at the same time. I know that they must miss their dad, and to be honest, I miss that asshole as well.

  For three months, we have looked over everything of Audrey’s. All of her files, bank statements, assets. Not one thing is out of place or makes us wonder what’s going on.

  The only thing that I do know is, the longer Audrey’s missing… The more likely we aren’t going to be able to find her.

  That was until the phone rang.

  Quickly, I jump off of the couch and run towards my phone that is plugged into the charger in the dining room. Once I have it in my hands, I notice that the area code is in Los Angeles. “Hello?”

  There’s a rustle in the background until I hear a little voice. “Damien?”

  “Oh, holy shit! Audrey?” I yell into the phone.

  Her whole family is jumping off the couch and is running over to where I’m standing with my back resting on the wall. I’m worried that if I’m not leaning against something, I’m liable to fall to the ground.

  Liz is the first one that tries to yank the phone out of my hands and I don’t let her. “Let me talk to her!”

  “Listen, I don’t have a lot of time. Liz will be back any moment. I need you to not give her the money. She has no intentions on letting me go. Do not give her that file.”

  Before any of us can ask her any questions, she’s hung up the phone and we are all stuck looking at it.

  “How long was that call?” Garrett asks and begins punching in numbers on his phone. “If it was long enough, we can trace the damn call and find her that way.”

  I don’t even hesitate and I’m pulling up the call logs to see that we were on the phone for approximately thirty-five seconds. “Not long. How long do you need?”

  Jim, Audrey’s dad, is pacing back and forth in the dining room with his hands on the top of his head. I can see his chest moving up and down as he’s trying to calm himself down.

  “Don’t start panicking now!” Jerry calls out to him. “We’re going to find her and kill this bitch once and for all!”

  Liz places her hand on Garrett’s shoulder and squeezes. “Don’t you need like ten seconds?”

  “Give me a minute and I will see what I can do!”

  Twenty minutes later, there’s a knock on the door and I begin to panic all over again. “Who’s there?” I ask.

  “Dr. Damien Alexander?” Is called through the door.

  I hover over the peephole in the door and then open it when I see a badge standing out for me to look at. “What can I help you with?”

  “We’ve come to discuss with you the fact that your wife’s case has been turned over to a different agency.”

  Those words pissed off Garrett because he comes charging in from the dining room. “How fucking dare you?”

  “What’s going on?” Katherine asks. Behind her, is Liz, Jerry and the twins.

  I can’t tell the twins apart to save my life and I get their names wrong constantly. Probably by now they are used to being called the twins.

  “They just gave up on Audrey’s case. They don’t think she’s alive anymore and they need to be focused on other cases. Isn’t that right?”

  The two officers that are standing in my door have the nerve to look upset about the revelation, but they nod. “It’s been three months and we haven’t heard or seen anything. I’m sorry but the likelyhood of you seeing her alive… Is not there.”

  For a matter of one second, I actually consider
ed what it meant that they were giving up on Audrey and then I remembered. She called me and we spoke on the phone. A dead person can’t call someone and talk to them on the phone.

  Boasting, I wave my phone in the air. “That’s why she just called me and we are tracing her line right now.”

  “How do you propose you do that? You don’t have a warrant,” the female officer states and places her hands on her hips.

  “My warrant is the fact that my sister is missing and the local police don’t give a shit,” Garrett fires back.