The Lost Fisherman (Fisherman 2)

That made me cry.

I wasn’t friends with Angie on Instagram, but her account wasn’t private, so I had the opportunity to drive myself fucking insane for the next two days.

Rory and Reese attended some family fun event at the school. So on Saturday, I spent the day stalking Angie hard on Instagram. Looking at every picture she’d ever posted and reading every caption. Had I known about it or looked for her account earlier, I’m not sure things would have progressed as far between Fisher and me.

I mean … I knew social media rarely portrayed the real stories of people’s lives, but it was easy to get caught in the trap of believing it. A picture was worth a thousand words, right? Take that times another thousand because I swear Angie had nearly a thousand pictures on her page.

A lot before the accident.

Some since his accident.

All of them said she and Fisher were in love.

My Saturday would have been less destructive and less tragic had I spent it overdosing on pills or slitting my wrists. Seriously, Angie’s Instagram page was a dark hole of death for me.

Kissing.

Laughing.

Big smiles.

Photos in the mountains.

A ton of photos of Fisher with his shirt off. MY naked fisherman.

His family.

Some outing on a boat.

Kiss. Kiss. Smile. Smile.

She even posted photos of them in bed! Not porn, but definitely a little racy. Him sleeping with the sheets low, obviously naked beneath the sheets. A weird-angled photo of his arms around her waist and his legs scissored with hers. The sheets covered the right areas, and she captioned it: soul mates.

What was that acronym everyone used? Oh yeah, FML. Really … fuck my life.

Recent photos included the shot that Rose showed me of Fisher getting his fill of alcohol, but also of their room in Costa Rica confirming that they only had one bed. An hour earlier, she’d posted a shot of her reflection in the mirror of the hotel room. She was in the bathroom with a towel wrapped around her body and another one wrapped around her head, and Fisher was already dressed in his suit for the wedding, looking out the window with his hands casually slid into the front pockets of his pants.

My heart cracked again and again, barely hanging on.

Her caption was: My Future Husband. With a heart emoji.

My level of obsession hit the most destructive low when I heard Rory and Rose pull into the garage. I grabbed a bottle of wine and an opener and ran to my room and closed the door. When one of them knocked and opened the door a crack, I remained perfectly still on my bed, with my back to the door, so they thought I was taking a nap. When the door softly clicked shut again, I sat up, pulled the hidden bottle of wine out from under the blanket, and opened it.

Over the next hour, Angie documented the wedding in her Instagram story with a nice mix of still photos and short videos.

The venue on the beach.

Clips from the ceremony.

Her and Fisher holding hands, posing next to the bride and groom.

“We’re going to dinner. Pizza? You coming?” Rory knocked on my door. I quickly set the bottle of wine on the floor where she couldn’t see it, nearly falling out of bed onto my butt. Then I grabbed a book from my nightstand and buried my nose into it just as she opened my door.

“I’m uh … good.” I couldn’t tell if my words were slurred, so I yawned to hide anything that might make her suspicious. It was incredibly hard to pretend you weren’t drunk when you were.

“Sure you don’t need a break? Or you can bring your book.”

“Good.” Another yawn. “Totally good.”

“You sound exhausted. Might want to go to bed early and get more sleep, in case you get called for a delivery.”

Oh my gosh …

She was right. I was on call and drunk. Only Rory didn’t know I was drunk.

“Okay,” I managed.

Once I heard the back door to the garage close, I stumbled out of bed and drank a hundred gallons of water to flush out the alcohol … give or take ninety-nine gallons. Then I spent the next hour on the toilet peeing out all the water, eating chips from the bag, and monitoring Angie’s Instagram page.

Kill me now.

I’d always felt like saying “yes” to Brendon, and then losing my virginity with him when I knew I wasn’t going to marry him, was my lowest of lows.

Wrong.

My self-destructive drunk ass on the toilet, stalking Fisher and Angie in Costa Rica was my new low. I should have deleted the app and gone to dinner with Rory and Rose. When my bladder gave me a break, I took my pathetic self to my bedroom, and I deleted the Instagram app. Then I prayed, on-my-knees-hands-folded prayed, for God to make it stop. I left it up to Him to determine what that meant. I just wanted something … anything … everything to stop.