Page 49 of Lake Hollow Curses

Charlie’s face, his words… the version of him that I fell in love with, haunts me. Just as much as Katie did. The effect of his betrayal does terrible things to my mind. I believed every word he had told me. Every kiss, every touch,everyword. Even reflecting, I have no ‘ah ha’ moments when I can see where I’d been blind to his deceit. None.

I want to hate him. I beg myself to let go of any of the love I had for him. Because I loved someone that didn’t exist. The pain of not being able to is excruciating.

I remind myself that he tried to kill me. He did the very thing he’d done eight times before. But my stupid brain has succeeded in thinking of him in two ways…myCharlie, and Charlie Gibson, who is being termed ‘The Lake Hollow Killer’.

The man who showed me tenderness, protectiveness, and held me when I cried. Versus the man that showed no regard for me, blank faced and strong, pulling me into the lake water with the heirloom necklace, whispering nonsensical words while my life started to slip away. Prophetic… the last words“Let go.”I want that badly. I just don’t know how.

Droolius licks my face, as I lay on the bed of Uncle Skip’s new rental in St. James. My belongings are still packed in the corner, as I decide if I’m leaving. I pushed my flight back a week, but I can’t leave Wilder, Cal, and Grady. Not after all the revelations in the last few days.

The rental became available two days after Charlie’s arrest. We couldn’t pack and leave fast enough. The following day the cabin burned to the ground. Not one other cabin caught fire.

Ceily’s church group blames the devil or demons, I think it was faulty wiring, Wilder thinks arson, and Grady wonders if the strange dark energy was Daniel, that he managed to burn it down.

I’m hoping Katie is at rest finally.

Wilder whistles for Droolius from the next room. “Come here, boy. I’ve got bacon. Bacoooonnn.” He whistles again. He appears in my doorway shirtless, his gray sweatpants low on his waist. Sweat dripping off him from the run he took with Cal. “Ready to go?”

Do I look like it? I groan, flopping to my back. I still have the oversized old baseball T-shirt on, a pair of Grady’s boxer briefs, my hair sticking up all over, unbrushed for two days. “Uh huh. I’ll go like this.”

Grady is leaving us. He needs to get his affairs in order, before he comes back. The Romantic Ruin tour is being pushed back three months. Returning to Minnesota, he’ll stay in Hancock with Wilder. Cal is making plans to move there, also. Where they will keep a home ready for me to return from art school. But Idon’t want that anymore. My initial excitement over it dwindled as the time drew close. The day my entire life shifted; school became a chore I didn’t want any longer.

Besides, the mural is opening doors that art school never could’ve.

Cal comes to stand next to Wilder in the doorway, they’ve been staying on couches, the spare bed, in my room since we moved in. “We can help you get dressed if you want?” His soft attempt at teasing is met with a weak smile.

“Anyone else feel like they have a brain eating amoeba? No?” I slowly stand, shaking my limbs out. “Just me?”

They squish me in a hug, while I accept, I’m not going anywhere. A day without them will only make this gaping hole in my heart unlivable.

“You’re sure? You don’t want to think about it longer?” Cal asks, his hand running through my tragic hair.

Oh, but Iam. I’m completely done thinking about it.

I’m also officially done pretending that secrets are okay. That they do anything other than perpetuate fear, that they cause us to feel cursed. I was forced to keep Relia’s secrets when I was growing up, I was blindsided by Skip’s secrets about Relia, and the secrets kept by all the men I loved almost destroyed me. Those secrets did prove deadly for eight people.

Not ever again.

Openly and loudly, I’ll live my life. No secrets. No uncertainty.

With purpose. My art has always been about beautiful interpretations of everyday life, seeing symbolism in the animals I’ve always taken comfort in. Wilder tells me that the art I create gives him hope, Grady sees inspiration, and Cal finds a measure of peace. For me, it’s a way to understand what’s happened.

The birds and the frogs. The adapting and surviving like Cal has pointed out to me. I once thought Charlie was my bird understander, but I was wrong.

It’s always been me. I need to reclaim that.

Epilogue

10 Months Later

Cal Truitt

Each day I make an intentional effort to talk about how I’m feeling.

It’s hard as fuck.

Pushing the terrible feelings down inside of me, for years has become a coping mechanism.

In the blink of an eye my world became a nightmare. One that I couldn’t wake up from. All the times I played into Charlie’s manipulations putting people I cared about in danger, all the times I called him ‘brother’, ‘best friend’, and ‘family’ never stop coming to mind. The disgust over it is corrosive.

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