The Con Artist (completed)

Part 7

7.9k words

this is the final part xoxo

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"Then I said goodnight and tucked you away inside a place called Nostalgia, where you'll always remain unspoiled, somewhere between my lungs that used to breathe ocean air and my belly that fluttered with hope." ― Victoria Erickson

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"Harry?!" You just heard him say something, his voice was clear in your ears and you swear he was just in the bedroom but maybe he was in the garden? You walked to the back of the house and opened the door. Stepping down into the grass you looked around. He wasn't there either. You suddenly had an awful feeling in your gut. Had he been taken? Was he kidnapped? Where could he be? Had he left you already without saying goodbye?

"Haarrry!" You shouted again as you walked through the garden to the stiff bushes with the orange flowers. You peered behind the thick part of the leaves and you saw one of his rings on the ground.

You quickly picked it up and put it into your pocket. But now you were feeling anxious. Nauseated. Confused. Terrified.

Harry was gone.

You ran back into the house and shouted for him again but this time you were answered with the sound of thunder clanking at the windows and shaking the large tree at the front of the house. You yelped at the noise and felt your panic rise until you couldn't stand on your feet any longer when your limbs became heavy and filled with sand. The sky was suddenly dark as the rain clouds moved in. Your knees and your hips ached in terror.

Harry was gone.

Another crack of lightning clanged and you gasped and shouted and reached into the air and felt your sheets twisted around your body. You were sweating and your heart was pounding.

"Harrry..." you whispered into the room as you rolled over and realized where you were and what this was. It was worse than your nightmare. The same one you'd been having for nearly a month. Every time you woke up you realized it was all real. At least in your nightmare, Harry had just been there. But when your mind slowly wove its way back into reality when the dream cleared from the space behind your eyes you realized Harry had not just been there.

Harry was gone.

The day you realized that Harry had been gone from you longer than you'd even known him was the day you began having nightmares about him being gone. They varied a little but all were dark and sad and scary. This one was no different except that you were woken by the sound of thunder.

It was rainy season. You didn't realize how rainy it would get. The skies were cloudy with peeks of blue in the middle of the day every day, but like clockwork, toward the evening, there would be rain and thunder and wind and you were all alone in the cute casita del sol. But you sure did miss el sol and you sure did miss Harry.

It had been nearly a month and a half. You hadn't heard from him since the day he arrived in LA. He texted you with his new number on your new phone. You both got those burner phones to use for the time being. It didn't have internet. In fact, you had no internet whatsoever. There was no wifi where you were. There was a TV but it was all in Spanish. And while you were attempting to learn as much as you could your heart was progressively disintegrating into nothing and so your thoughts were haunted, completely taken over by what could have happened to Harry. By the idea that you were probably never going to see him again. You hadn't realized how much you really liked Harry. How deep your feelings ran. You didn't realize how desperately you'd miss him. You didn't realize the physical toll it would take on you and now if you ever saw him again you'd never allow him to leave like he did. You'd fight him. Handcuff him to make him stay. You'd slash his tires. Anything to keep him from leaving. Because he disappeared into thin air.