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1
TRISTAN HALL
There werea couple of different kinds of phone calls. Some were pleasant, like the calls from an old friend checking in on you. Some were unforgettable, like the FaceTimes that showed off engagement rings or baby bumps.
Then there were the bad calls. The ones in the middle of the night, the sad “hellos,” and the tearful “goodbyes.” Bad news always ended up being a bitter pill to swallow.
But some calls were downright traumatic. Like the one I had gotten when I was supposed to be in the “happiest place on Earth.” A private detective I had reached out to was on the other line, and he was breaking the worst news of my entire life:
I had become the target of a serial killer.
Ever since then, my life changed. Fear commanded my every move. Anxiety gnawed away at me like a living force, feeding off my sleepless nights and restless days. I couldn’t write a single word, and for an author staring down the barrel of a hard deadline for a book he’d barely even started—thatwas the stuff of nightmares.
And I was living it.
I must have walked under five ladders, broken ten mirrors, and crossed thirteen black cats because I felt like the unluckiest man in the world.
I dragged myself out of bed and managed to shower and brush my teeth, something that had seemed nearly impossible over the last week. All I wanted to do was stay in bed with the covers over my head, like a turtle tucked away in his shell. I didn’t want to deal with anything. Why would I when I could get abducted and killed at any moment?
That was always quite a sobering thought.
Steam still filled the bathroom as I opened the door, the cloud of vapor escaping into the hall. There was a small crack in the mirror that came from the medicine cabinet that was half on the wall and half on the counter. I couldn’t really bring myself to fix it, not that I was ever a handyman in the first place. I didn’t even want to call someone to fix it.
In fact, I didn’t want to make or receive a single phone call for the rest of my (possibly short) life. If it was important, then they could send an email.
My phone started to buzz in my gym shorts. I rolled my eyes and chuckled to myself, taking it out and wondering who was calling me so early in the—
Shit, I thought as I read the time on the screen.How is it already past noon?
I answered the call, walking barefoot down the carpeted hall that was in desperate need of a vacuum. Dust bunnies seemed to dance with every step I took. “Hey, Noah, what’s up?”
“Did you just wake up?”
“Maybe.”
“Tristan, it’s almost one o’clock in the afternoon.”
“I know, I know. I slept through my alarms.” As if I had set any in the first place.
“That’s okay. I was just calling to make sure book club was still on for tonight?”
Damn it, that’s tonight.“Yes, yup. It’s still on. I’ll see you guys at seven.”
“Okay, and like I said before, my place is still open to host. Jake and I just spent the morning cleaning up, so it’s all ready.”
I walked into my cluttered living room, a pizza box left open on the coffee table with a couple of crusts still sitting there. Clothes were thrown on the back of the couch, and a pile of unorganized sneakers clustered up next to the door. I stuffed down the sigh that threatened to escape.
“No, it’s fine. It gives me an excuse to get things in order over here.”
I nearly tripped on an empty Amazon box. I hung up the call and looked around the disaster that was my living room. The curtains were drawn, but the bright late-afternoon sun still managed to shine through, throwing a warm orange filter over the messy space. I pulled open the curtains and looked out to the overgrown front yard.
I couldn’t blame all of this on my recent “issue” of being hunted by a psychotic serial killer, although that definitely was a factor.
But if I did someactualintrospection, I’d realize that this had been building up over the past few years. It was a general sense of unhappiness, a dark and heavy cloud that slowly crept in from the horizon, settling directly above my head and casting everything around me in shadow. I didn’t know what had triggered it, nor did I know how to fight it, and it was really fucking my shit up. Not only was the house in a state of disrepair, but I felt my own life falling apart all around me.
My last couple of books didn’t do well, my agent dropped me five days before Christmas, leaving me scrambling over the holidays trying to find a new one, my love life was completely and utterly devoid of any joy, and now I couldn’t even open up a dating app without being terrified about the faceless person on the other end.
It was shitty. And no one really knew how shitty it actually was. I kept up appearances in front of my friends. I knew none of them had the answers to my problems, and the last thing I wanted to do was worry them, so I kept a smile plastered on and shared whatever shreds of positive news I could find, choosing to ignore the immense sadness that had made residence inside my chest, leeching my hope and creativity with every second that ticked by.
