Sativa.

Epilogue.

The metal bars confining Travis in a miserable four by four cage slide back with a rusty creak. This place is infested with a stench of piss and mold but he endured his night in jail as unresponsively as a coma patient.

Lockup left him with too much time to think. All night he lay atop a lumpy smelly bed, staring up at the ceiling while remembering Blaine with enough clarity to destroy him. Sometimes he swears he can hear her voice echoing between the bars.

Now, as he peers into the too bright opening of freedom, he doesn't know if he deserves it. He glances over at a man in uniform, waving him down the hall, but the agony of losing Blaine dulls his responses. A world without her is grey like a purgatory he's been sentenced to as penance for his sins.

It's strange. Death strikes every day and, somehow, the world keeps turning. Which seems wrong and foreign. As Travis steps outside the police station he takes a deep breath of fresh air unfamiliar to the sun beating down on him.

A man he has the misfortune of recognizing leans against an inconspicuous grey car parked on the curb. Officer Laur has been a thorn in Travis's side for years now. Of course his ugly mug would be the first sight outside the pit.

He attempts to keep walking down the sidewalk but the man isn't about to let him slip by so easily. Travis stands in front of Laur stoically. If he weren't so tired he may have punched that smug smirk off his face just to feel something again.

"They couldn't pin any evidence on you now," he says. "But I'll make sure to nail your ass to the wall one day."

"Whatever helps you sleep at night."

Leaving it that, Travis shoves past making sure to slam his shoulder against his on the way. As far as threats go it's weak but he's too spent to do more. Officer Laur has tried to make him an informant on the Kings for years but he isn't about to snitch. A snitch is a bitch so he's content with whatever fate comes his way as long as his conscience remains in tact.

As he walks familiar roads Travis feels unbearably disconnected. Nothing makes sense anymore. Although he would never resort to working with Officer Laur his motives feel less than pure. They haven't been for awhile. He's kidding himself if he ever believes for a second his conscience could be untarnished.

Twelve hours have wiped clean any traces of Blaine's gruesome murder from the hotel. It's a relief not having to see her blood staining the elevator but the memory is strong enough to be tangible.

He's shaking as he waits for the car to raise him three floors up. A woman vacuums the hall floor and he steps past her, wondering how many times she had to scrub the carpet to make it go back to normal. Thoughts make his heart heavy and his stomach churn with sickness.

Fiddling with his key ring to unlock the door to his room, Travis glances over his shoulder. A neon yellow line of police tape remains strapped across the doorway where Blaine was staying. Curiosity gets the best of him and, without really knowing why, Travis ducks under the tape.

This is what he's been looking for, no matter how much agony it inflicted, is proof that once she did exist. Her blood seeps through the beige carpeting faded to a deep pink as it settles into the floor. He remembers the money strewn around her and contemplates why she had it and where she got it from.

Before Travis can process the gruesome scene in its entirety a voice prompts him to whirl around. "You shouldn't be here."

Not much can leave Travis speechless but it's definitely surprising to see Hooter sitting on the couch at one with the carnage. He even casually sips from a shot glass, having served himself some of the complimentary Scotch from the liquor cabinet.