Deep Dark by G.D. Bowlin

Author:G.D. Bowlin [Bowlin, G.D.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Severed Press
Published: 2023-06-28T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 14

Caw fumbled with the card and almost dropped it before jamming it into his back pocket. He prayed she hadn’t seen it as the words, “Oh, um, sorry, um,” tumbled out of his mouth.

Finally, he looked at her and said, “Hi.”

She gave him a long, hard look and said, “Hi.”

“I was just uh, looking for the bathroom. The lavatory or, loo, as you may call it.”

“Caw, I’m from Osh Kosh. My dad called it a shitter.”

He nodded at the carpet. “Osh Kosh. Yeah. Right. Anyway, I’m looking for the, uh, shitter.”

“Come with me,” she nodded her head up the hallway behind her. “We’ll stop on the way.”

Caw followed behind her, sure he was a dead man walking.

***

Half an hour later, Caw found himself sitting on a Jet Ski in the lake, floating next to Vaha, not fifteen feet away from the boat he had last seen his father on.

As soon as she’d suggested the Jet Skis, he’d told her no. He had protested like crazy. The lake is dangerous, he had said for the millionth time and, for the millionth time, Vaha had insisted. That Gier guy had laughed at him, terse barks through his scarred throat. Vaha had been polite but started to lose her patience. Even Deirdre was looking at him a bit funny.

“I know you don’t like the water, but you’ll be on a Jet Ski,” Deirdre had said.

Eventually, Caw realized that he wouldn’t be able to avoid it without making everyone think he was crazy. Seeing monsters. Or worse, seeing ghosts.

And so, he had found himself on a Jet Ski floating next to Vaha, in a giant bowl of monster soup carved into the earth.

She’d raced out to the middle of the lake. Full steam. Caw had puttered nervously behind her. She’d found her place, near the boat, and stopped. And waited for him.

“You know Jet Ski is actually a proprietary name,” Caw said, nervously scanning the lake for any disturbance. He pulled his feet up out of the water, getting them as high up on the craft as he could. “The proper name is actually personal watercraft. Even though-” He checked the logos on the side of the machine between his legs. “Huh. This actually is a Jet Ski brand.”

“Why are you so uncomfortable around me, Caw?” she asked.

Her gaze felt like it was boring into him, her eyes twin drills, cutting deep. He found a point on the horizon and stared at it. Anything to keep her eyes off of his.

“Your guard is so… up.”

He shrugged. Stared. Shrugged again.

“Is it because you don’t trust me?” she asked.

Then, he couldn’t help but look at her. “...yes,” he said, surprised at himself.

“Because you know I’ve been lying to you?”

He hadn’t known for sure, but he felt now he had her on a hook. He leaned in and said, “I had suspected that.” Why was this person born to be a political and business powerhouse being so vulnerable, so open, with him? He couldn’t believe it any more than he could believe it when she accepted his lie about breaking into her room.

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