Girl Lost

Thank you to my readers, without you, my dream would be dead.

To my father, I miss you so very much, I wish you were here to guide me. I love you.

When I met Callie, she was fifteen, almost sixteen, and I was seventeen. She was a sweet girl with a big heart, but I knew something wasn’t quite right about her as well. Alas she would never confide in me.

Sure, she’d tell me about her daily struggles, but nothing more. I knew it ran deep because even though I grew close to Callie’s family, not one of them would say a word.

No matter how deep I dug, I couldn’t find anything, not online, or through

those friends closest to her.

Callie was the girl I loved, the girl I thought I’d spend the rest of my life with, but one day, she was gone. She left me, and my heart was broken. I tried to move on. I went through copious amounts of women trying to find one to build a life with, but it was next to impossible.

Each time I thought I was close to falling in love, I would sabotage the relationship without realising I was doing it.

By the time I was twenty-three and had just ruined another relationship, Blake, my best friend, sat me down and told me what I was doing to myself, and it all became crystal clear.

No one would ever measure up to Callie. I’d compare each woman I dated to her, and although that wasn’t fair, it didn’t stop me from trying because I was convinced I’d never see her again. Until one day she showed up out of thin air.

My childhood was a mess. My mother was self-absorbed and my father was always ‘working,’ but my brother was my protector. Well, he tried to be, but he didn’t know that our uncle, who used to come and babysit us, had been molesting me from the time I was just four years old.

At first, it was just him touching me over my clothes, but it soon turned into something that scarred me for life. I kept quiet and never told a soul while it was happening, but it got so much worse when my father up and left us.

For years, I hated him for leaving. I hated him for leaving Casey (my brother who was only a year older than me) and me behind. And then there was the kicker. He introduced us to a woman named Whitney.

At the time, I couldn’t tell who frustrated me more when it came to Whitney and my mother. First up, there was my mum, who always badmouthed our father to us. Then there was Whitney, who was only ever kind to us when our father was around. She was an utter bitch when his back was turned, and as the years went on, she became crueller and crueller to us.

One night, when I was just thirteen years old, and my father arrived to pick us up so we could stay with him for the first week of the school holidays, I locked myself in my bedroom and refused to come out.

As I sat on my bed, crying, my father began knocking on my door. Callie, why won’t you come out? What’s going on? he asked.

I can’t do it anymore. Sniff. I can’t go to your house anymore. And the tears kept coming.

I’m sorry, baby, but I need all of the information. Please, can I come in so we can talk?

Knowing he wouldn’t leave without me explaining myself, I stood from my bed and opened the door, where my six foot–three father stood before me.

Giving me a sad smile, he leaned in and gave me a hug. Come on, princess. Let’s talk. So, we sat down on the edge of my bed, facing one another.

Looking up at him, I couldn’t help but feel loved. Even though my father looked like a bikie, with his long strawberry-blond hair and matching long beard, he had a heart of gold. Well, except for the whole ‘leaving us’ part, but as I grew older, I began to understand why he’d had to leave. My mother was nuts, and she treated him as her punching bag.

Are you going to tell me what’s going on? he questions.

I will, but I want Casey here, too, so that you know what I tell you isn’t a lie and that I’m not just being a brat, I explain. Although my father had never accused me of lying to him before, I wasn’t sure how the conversation would go, considering the fact that Whitney let him do unspeakable things to her. Eww. The thought of either of my parents doing it, made me feel ill.

I’d never think that, but if you want Casey here, then he should be here.

Smiling, he called my brother’s name and just moment later, my father’s younger doppelganger (minus the beard) entered the room. What’s going on? Why aren’t we leaving? Is everything okay? he asked in a rush, clearly worried about me.

I don’t want to go to dad’s for the week and he wants to know why, I started, and Casey’s eyes widened.

Umm, okay then. So, we’re really doing this? he asked as he took a seat on the ground, crossing his legs under him.

Yes.

Okay, can someone start talking, now? I need to know why my kids don’t want to come and spend time with me, dad questions, raising his voice.

"Fine. Just remember that we love you and we want to keep seeing you. There’s a problem you don’t know about, one that has me up at night crying, and that’s the fact that when you aren’t around Whitney is beyond cruel to us. She screams, calls us names, and makes us do all of the housework while she watches us. The last time we were there for the weekend and you went to the shops, she told me I was a stupid bitch and that you secretly hated both me and Casey." When the words came out, I felt as if a weight had been lifted from me.

Clearly shocked, my father looks to Casey for confirmation, so my brother nods. "Everything she just said is true. Since the minute you began dating her, we’ve copped nothing but shit, and it’s too much for Callie. Me, I can take it, but it’s why neither of us are ever thrilled about coming to see you. We love you dad, but at the same time, we also deserve to be treated with at least some respect." I couldn’t have said it better myself.

After my father left, he called me, assuring me he would face that bitch of a wife of his. My hopes were shattered later that night when he called to tell us that Whitney was pregnant with his child and we all had to work harder to keep our family together. But he didn’t hold up his end of the bargain. From the moment our half-sister, Valarie, yeah, you read that right, they named her Valarie, arrived my father was MIA from our lives. He went from calling us a couple of times a week, to once a month, and then the visits completely stopped. My father cut us completely out of his life and that’s when my secret drug addiction began.

At first, I was taking up to

sixteen Panadol at a time, but soon there was no effect so I hit the cold and flu tablets and then the antihistamines but nothing helped my inner pain. I never turned to intravenous drugs, but I did snort a lot of coke, and I drank a lot of alcohol mixed with over the counter pills. They did the job, just fine.

I’ll never forget the first time I laid my eyes on Callie Montgomery. She was just fifteen and I was seventeen. She was resting against the counter in a bookstore close to my home in Melbourne, Australia, and although I used to be shy, I managed to get up the courage to go over and talk to her.

Her blond hair was long and

she was wearing skinny jeans, a pair of Black Element skate shoes, and a black hoodie that had a Heartagram on the front along with big letters spelling out BAM. I assumed it was Bam Margera’s new logo, and when I checked later on, I found I was right. Hell, I wasn’t going to look like a loser and ask her what brand the hoodie was, I wanted to come across as cool, in front of this stunner.

With her face in the book she was holding, I casually strolled up to her. I reached over and picked up a bookmark. Excuse me, I said in a polite tone.

At first, she didn’t look up, but then I realised she was in another world as she read the contents of the book, so again, I reached over and picked up another bookmark. This time, I lightly brushed my arm across hers, causing her to jump.

Shit, I’m sorry. I was just trying to reach the bookmarks, I manage to say.

With one hand holding the book and the other now holding her chest, she begins to laugh. No, I should be the one that’s sorry. As soon as I get a book in my hand, I become a zombie.

All good. I’m Danny, and you are? I question, hoping she won’t run away.

Callie. I haven’t seen you around, are you new to the area?

Sure am. I’ve only been here a month and finding new people that aren’t assholes to talk to, is next to impossible, I confess. Most of my fellow students at the local high school are assholes, but I have managed to make one friend.

Blake is a pain in my ass, but he’s also loyal. The guy’s mouth has no filter, which has him in trouble most of the time, but it does give me a great laugh.

Looking up at me, Callie blindly places the book down on the counter. There are so many assholes out there. There are only two people on this planet that I trust with my secrets, my best friend Ellie and my brother Casey, but that’s it, she shrugs.

Her blue eyes are mesmerising, I could drown in them if she’d let me. Fair enough. So, what high school do you attend? Is it close by? Please be mine.

Shaking her head, she answers, I pulled out a couple months ago. School wasn’t for me. I work here at the bookstore where I get my fix of books for a discount.

Sounds like a great deal to me.

It is.

And that was how we met. From that moment forward, Callie and I were inseparable. We spent every single day together, and our love for one another was so strong. Never did I think she’d just up and leave me, but she did, and when she did, I didn’t think I’d be able to recover.

Leading up to Callie’s disappearance, things with her seemed off, like she had the world on her shoulders, but no matter how hard I tried to get it out of her, she wouldn’t confide in me. She wouldn’t tell me why she was suddenly loaded with cash either. At the time, she wasn’t working but she showed up driving her dream car, a brand new, white, Holden VF Clubsport. A car I knew cost well over seventy thousand dollars.

All I wanted to do was care for her, but two days after she’d showed up at her house driving that new car, the girl I loved with everything I had, disappeared into thin air.

On that very morning, I tried calling her as I lay back in my bed, staring at the white ceiling above me. When she didn’t pick up, I knew something was wrong. Callie had been trying to avoid me since I’d last seen her a couple of days before, but when I managed to get her on the phone and asked her why she hadn’t wanted to see me, she said, ‘I love you. I love you so much, but I need a little time to myself. That’s all, it’s nothing you’ve done.’ I knew she was being sincere, but the last kiss we’d shared as we stood on the front porch of her home, felt like she was kissing me for the last time. The passion and love behind her touch conveyed just how