I woke up Sunday morning with the most severe dry mouth I’ve had in a while. Head throbbing, body sore, and brow slightly sweaty from tossing and turning all night I realized I wasn’t in my bed when I had to remove the unfamiliar arm that was lying across my chest.
I inched my way quietly out of the bed, found my shirt on the ground and tip-toed out. When I got to the living room I found my jacket on the couch with my shoes on the floor. After putting on my wool, blue coat I felt around in my pockets for my belongings.
“Keys, wallet, I.D. lipstick… my phone?” I felt around in the deep pockets but my phone wasn’t in there.
My eyes darted around the couch, the coffee table and under both. I then started looking in my tall boots, on their kitchen counter, and in the bathroom. Besides my lace underwear, I found nothing.
And then it hit me; it’s probably under that guy…
Who was he? Do I even know? I cracked the door open to see his face and I did know who he was. It was Kyle from chemistry. Kyle who I was always curious about, but didn’t think I could go through with actually sleeping with.
Well, I guess I could.
I gingerly walked back into the room and started flipping piles of clothes over, moving backpacks around, looking under his bed all while Kyle was loudly snoring.
“Alright, well I have to get him to move I guess.” I thought, but that was going to be harder for my awkward mind to muster.
I sat on the bed and poked at sheets, checked under them and around Kyle. Nothing. I checked under the pillow that I was sleeping on. Nothing. Next was under Kyle.
I started patting Kyle’s back to get him to move, even if it was a little I would be able to see under him and get my phone. It had to be there. There’s no way it couldn’t be because it was nowhere else.
Kyle only moved and inch before I got a chance to check under his own pillow and that’s when he woke up.
“Hey Caroline,” his tired voice muttered.
“Hi… Can you move, I think my phone is under you?” Kyle rolled over a little bit and I saw something under him. I plucked it from under his side only to discover that it was his phone.
“Caroline, don’t you remember we tried finding your phone last night.” Kyle’s eyes winced in the sunlight that poured into the room from the window above his head. His eyes shined a bright blue.
“What do you mean? I don’t remember- oh!” and then it hit me as my memory back. The reason why I remember using a phone in Kyle’s bed wasn’t because it was my phone but because I was trying to call my phone.
“Yeah, I really think you left it in that bar.”
“Which bar? How many did we go to?” I started to panic, I barely remember going to more than one bar…
“There was Cooney’s, Jack’s, Blind Tiger, and Icon… Don’t you remember?”
My eyes were peeled to the bed sheet. How do I not remember going to that many bars and clubs last night? I blacked out easily but not to that extent. I wracked my brain for answers, but none came to me. Kyle sat up, found his shirt next to him and put it on. It was the same shirt as last night; a long sleeved light blue cotton button down. There was a stain on it though, and it looked like-
“We did go to Jack’s!” the stain reminded me of when I tripped on someone’s foot at Jack’s and fell right into Kyles chest. My drink spilled right on his shirt. It was a white Russian.
“Yeah,” Kyle glanced down at his stained shirt that I was now so fixated on. “You were having a pretty rough night after Icon.”
“Who were we with?” I was eager for more answers.
“Some of the Lit department.” he answered. His eyes read my perplexed face. “Do you think you left your phone at one of those bars?”
“Yeah, I have no idea where else it could be.”
“Well we can use find my iPhone if you want,” Kyle took his phone and opened the app. I put in my information, only for it to say my phone was offline. Probably because it was dead. “OK, well… We can just go back to all those bars today if you want? We can definitely find it.”
I pondered on the idea of being with Kyle for the remainder of the day searching for my phone. What was he trying to get out of this? More sex, or whatever we did? I peered into his blue eyes and saw a hint of sincerity though, so I accepted it.
“Yeah, that sounds good. The last time I remember using it was when we were in a car… Did we drive last night?” I remembered being in the back seat of a car at the end of the night staring at a bright screen. That had to be my phone.
“We took an Uber back to my place. You don’t think you left it in there do you?” Kyle questioned.
“Well we also got pizza after that down the street. Maybe it’s there?” Kyle was scrolling through his phone while I was talking. “Kyle?”
“Actually it has to be,” he showed me his screen, he was on my Snap Story. It was a video of me and him taking a bite of the same slice of pizza.
“So lets go there? When do they open?” I asked him looking at the clock on his wall.
“In an hour, it’s ten o’ clock now. I’m going to shower, and in the meantime you can make something to eat if you want. We’ll go together after.”
While Kyle showered and I munched on some cereal in his kitchen, I couldn’t help but to go through his phone again to look at my Snap story one more time. We were eating the same slice of pepperoni pizza, there were lots of people in the background. However, there was something odd about the crowd behind us. Among a sea of college students there was only one older man there sitting in the corner of the pizzeria by himself at three thirty in the morning.
On our way to the pizzeria down the street, Kyle and I started talking about class. It wasn’t until a block later did I see the same man from my Snap story kicking a can in an empty parking lot across the street of the pizzeria.
Kyle noticed my fixation, “That’s a homeless guy that stays somewhere around here. He’s harmless though, doesn’t talk much.”
When said homeless man saw us he stopped to stare at us, and then started briskly moving the opposite direction. I brushed it off, there was no way that guy remembered us from last night.
There was no luck with the pizzeria, and I was beginning to lose all hope until one of the delivery boys told us that he did see something strange.
“Yeah, there was some old guy here last night while we were closing. I thought it was a little weird that he had a sparkly phone case, but to be honest with you I wouldn’t be surprised if it was yours. He steals stuff all of the time. He mostly hangs around here so that he gets the free pizza we give out at the end of the night that we don’t sell. My best bet would be with him.”
I was furious. How could someone steal your phone? He probably was going to sell it for cash.
Kyle noticed my frustration and patted my shoulder, “We can just confront him about it, it should be fine.”
But in the pit of my stomach, I knew it wouldn’t be. I just had this strange gut feeling that we were getting into something that we shouldn’t be. So when Kyle and I went hunting for the homeless man (we ended up joking around and naming him Steve in our five-hour search party) it was already getting dark. The short fall days had the sun setting behind the trees and a dim orange light was our only source of warmth. It was freezing, so Kyle and I decided to stop for the day. I could live without my phone for the night and we both didn’t think Steve could have sold it yet anyway. Kyle walked me to my car, and told me that after his class tomorrow he would help me find Steve again.
“He can’t go far, he sleeps around here somewhere. He always gets food from the local shops around here too so… we’ll find him, Caroline.” Kyle gave me a swift hug and walked away.
Kyle was a nice guy, had really soft blue eyes, and was over six feet tall with dark, thick locks of hair. He was a real catch. However, I don’t think I was a catch for him. I usually wasn’t a catch for anyone, so I shrugged off whatever slight feeling I had for him and got into my car.
The parking lot I was in was right next to a few abandoned train cars. They were really old and you could tell they haven’t been used in a while. Once I saw a train roll by on this track, but that was a few years ago.
That’s when I saw him. It had to be him: Steve. Peeking his head out from one of the train cars.
I got out of my car and started moving toward the train. My gut started turning, what if this was a mistake? What if I’m not supposed to go into there by myself? I needed Kyle.
I rushed across the street to Kyle’s apartment and knocked. No answer. He must have been showering or something. Well, now I know where Steve lives at least. We could go there tomorrow and wait for him to come out, or return if he’s not there. Maybe with some of our other friends too, just to be safe.
I got back into my car and started the engine. It wasn’t until I put my seat belt on did I realize that someone was breathing heavily into my ear.
Soon there was a hard metallic barrel pressed against my right temple, a hand grasped firmly on my left shoulder, the breathing was right down my neck now. A deep voice croaked only one word.
“Drive.”
To be continued next week!
