Finding What We Lost [SM BOOK 3]

3. The day after

Song of the chapter: dreaming with a broken heart- John Mayer

I couldn't breathe.
I couldn't. My lungs refused to filter the oxygen and left me for my own. My heart refused to beat. And my legs refused to stand.
I couldn't cope.

It was like, I was watching soft hazel eyes and everything around them was crashing and spinning and burning and slowly the crashing was consuming things closer to the eyes and then everything was this spinning mess except for willows lips.

My ears weren't working. All I could hear was high pitched ringing and the sound of the blood rushing through my head. I managed to read her lips yet I knew what they were saying.

'Shawn, calm down. Calm down, you're gonna be ok.'

Her large lips over annunciating everything. I felt the tight grip of her hands on my shoulders as she repeated the harsh words which just shattered me.

'Hannah is gone.'

My helpless heart gave In.

'We need your help.'

I still couldn't hear or focus, was everything she told me yesterday just nothing to her? Was she telling me that because she knew she wouldn't see me again? Was she telling me that because it would have something to do with where she was? Did she need finding? Did she want finding? Where was she?

Willows dainty fingertips held up a hand written note and my eyes softened at the scruffy loose handwriting that triggered thousands of beautiful, terrific memories in my head. It belonged to Hannah.

'I had to improvise, behind the happiness is sadness to counter act with the happiness... tell Toby I love him. Don't call the police, I'm safe, trust me on that. I'm sorry I had to do this.'

After reading it, my heart steadied and I took a deep breath and looked around, her husband and her friends and her sister were all staring at me as I lead helplessly in a wooden chair in her bar.

Her husband spoke up, his dark brown hair and beard both bushy and unbrushed.
"She disappeared this morning, she doesn't have her phone on her. A ton of her clothes are gone and so is her suitcase. I have reviewed every ounce of this letter and nothing makes sense. We were perfectly fine, we'd had no recent arguments or anything. She's just gone. I called you here because you knew her for a long time and although I have too, there's things I don't know about that you might do.'

"Why is the word improvise underlined?" I asked, squinting closely at the note.

"I have no idea, do you?" He asked, his green eyes staring into my own and it clicked,

Something wasn't right.

I grabbed the paper out of his hand and re studied it. My eyes darting everywhere, everybody else cluelessly staring.

I folded it up and handed it back to him.

"So, do you know where she is?" Willow asked.

I sighed and looked her directly in the eyes, breathing through my nose. I contemplated what to say for a few moments, admiring the control I had over everybody, it was almost psychotic, the way I had everyone in the palm of my hand. No one was talking or occupied, everybody was consumed in me. Me.

"Nope, no clue." I swiftly swizzle around on my heel and walked out.

The harsh wind brushed against my lips, almost as sweet as her kiss did. Yet I brushed it off and tried to focus my mind.

What I didn't tell them was that:

There were the three words written in bold writing.
That letter wasn't written to everybody else, it was written to me, with a code only I can crack.

'I had to improvise, behind the happiness is sadness to counter act with the happiness... tell Toby I love him. Don't call the police, I'm safe, trust me on that. I'm sorry I had to do this.'

I knew exactly where Hannah was, and I was going to find her all on my own. I was going to save her, and I was going to talk to her and confess everything.

But if only I realised sooner how wrong I was.

So, so wrong.