That Blue Gibson: Another Round

twenty-five

"You okay, babe?" she called over the water.

He opened his mouth to reply just as his board received another bump, this time on the nose, and a strange, brief buzzing sound emanated from the dark water.

"Dave? Are you okay?"

He wanted to stop her, scream at her to stay where she was, but whatever was in the water hit his board much harder and the same buzzing noise filled his ears. Looking up to make sure she was far enough away, he froze when he saw her board was empty, floating peacefully on the calm surface of the ocean as if it had drifted out there by itself. The buzzing sound came again, urgent and relentless when he tossed his paddle into the water and dove in after her.

His eyes sprang open and it took him a moment to understand that the cold he felt wasn't the Pacific, but waves of fear. He sleepily shook off the dream and reached for his phone only to let it be when he saw the screen was still dark.

"Babe, answer your phone."

The phone buzzed twice more before he begrudgingly pulled himself up and reached across her to silence it himself.

Coffee. He needed coffee.

He was just building up the motivation to leave the warm sheets when he noticed her standing beside the bed. Butterflies exploded in his chest when he realized she had come home early, an entire day early just to be with him and if he'd had the energy, he would have crawled across the bed and pulled her in with him. But... she was already in bed. He had just leaned over her to shut off her obnoxious phone, so who...

By the time he looked back up, Liz was gone. She'd taken off like a startled deer and the loud thud that came from the steps made his heart sink. Calliope whined when he scrambled to follow Liz, his mind reeling over what she had just seen. She'd come home from her most favorite place in the world a full day early to surprise him and found him in bed with...

"Get the fuck up," he barked, storming back into the bedroom and heading for his closet.

"But Davey," she whined, rolling around lazily in the sheets. "I don't feel good."

He had to focus on getting dressed to prevent himself from running out there and snapping her neck. She was in Liz's place, the one place that was just for them and them alone, and now it was tainted by-

"Davey, just come back to bed!"

No, he was definitely going to snap her neck.

Still struggling with his white shirt, he snatched up an errant piece of clothing next to a pair of ridiculous lucite heels and flung it at her face. "Get dressed. Now."

"But-"

The second she protested he pounced on her, harshly grabbing her upper arm and hauling her to her feet. "You're going to get dressed and then you're going to tell my wife exactly what happened here. Do you understand?"

He gave her a total of two seconds before shaking her. "Do you understand?"

"Y- yeah. Yes," she stammered and began to pull on her clothes, shaking her hips far more than what Dave would consider necessary, even for a skin-tight dress.

As soon as she was somewhat decent, he clamped his hand over her arm again and dragged her behind him until he was shoving her into the front seat of his truck. He was seething with rage at that point, sure that Liz was either halfway back to the airport or Malibu by now.

He took a deep breath before starting the truck, worried he'd end up killing them both if he tried to drive at that moment. "How long were you there?"