I felt as though my soul was being tormented. I was being eaten up by guilt. How could I have been so stupid to have frightened her again?

All I wanted to do was talk to her and show her that I cared about her. How hard can something like that be?

Apparently, it’s pretty fucking hard because I managed to screw it up yet again. I knew I’d ruined my chance and Alexa was never going to be mine again.

Not wanting to go home to my apartment to sit by myself, I drove around the streets of Minnesota with no particular destination in mind. I was just trying to get her off my mind.

Somehow, I ended up at the same seedy strip club Curtis had told me about not long after I was released. I wasn’t interested in watching the girls dance.

Instead, I grabbed a seat at the bar and started downing shots. Typically, it would have taken me a ton of alcohol to get drunk, but I hadn’t drunk since Alexa, and I had gotten together. She wasn’t really into drinking all that much.

The alcohol was quickly doing its job, the buzz making my body feel numb. It wasn’t enough, though.

It was my heart that I wanted to go numb.

I wanted to be able to not care at all. I wanted everything that I was thinking to disappear from my brain. I wanted to forget that Alexa ever existed or, at the very least, not care about her anymore. I wanted to forget about the way she felt when I held her in my arms. I wanted to forget how it felt when she touched me.

No matter how much I wanted to forget, it was impossible to do. Every time I closed my eyes, I could hear the sound of her laughter and see her face smiling at me.

I missed the way she and I could joke around. I wanted that back more than anything.

What was I supposed to do, though? She made it clear that she didn’t want anything to do with me.

“Hey big guy, it’s been a while,” said a throaty voice standing behind me.

I turned slowly on my barstool to see who in the hell was talking to me. It was the girl that I’d hooked up with the last time I was in there.

I didn’t invite her to join me, but she took a seat next to me anyway. She flashed a smile at me while casually grazing my arm with her fingers as she sat.

“Can I get another drink?” I yelled at the bartender.

“I think you’ve had enough. I’m cutting you off,” he replied smugly.

I must have been slurring my words pretty severely at that point because, most of the time, people can’t tell when I’m drunk.

I wanted to argue with him and tell him that I was okay but decided against it. Technically, I wasn’t even supposed to be drinking and I sure as hell wasn’t supposed to be in a strip club.

Both would have violated my parole and could have sent my ass back to prison. Instead, I pulled out my wallet and paid for my drinks.

“You leaving already?” the girl asked as I started making my way towards the door. “I was hoping you’d stick around a little longer. Maybe we could have a repeat of last time.”

She stood up next to me, leaning into me with her hands slowly moving up my chest. The bartender looked over and rolled his eyes. When I looked down at her, all I could see was Alexa.

“We could have a little fun,” I mumbled. “Why don’t we go somewhere we can have a little privacy.”

“Sure thing, sweetheart. You remember where the rooms are, right?”

“Yeah, I know where they are, but that’s not where I want to go. I don’t want to be here at all,” I told her, walking out the door. She followed behind, stopping as soon as she got outside.

“I can’t leave. I’ve gotta work tonight,” she said.

“Look, honey, if it’s money you want, I’ve got it,” I said, pulling my wallet out of my back pocket and holding it up in front of her. “You should probably take me up on my offer.”

The stripper stood in the parking lot, trying to figure out what she should do.

“Okay. Can you hang out for twenty minutes? I’ll meet you back out here then.”

“Fine but try to hurry.”

I waited in my truck before she finally showed up carrying her things. I grabbed her hand while she was getting in, helping her in.

“So where are we headed?”

I didn’t answer her. I just put my truck in gear and drove back to my place. I hated my apartment, but this girl was nothing more than a typical stripper. I wasn’t trying to impress her.

I walked into the apartment, with her right behind me, her high heels clicking loudly with each step she took.

Inside my apartment, I went into my bedroom and opened the closet door. There were some things I wanted to grab before things went any further. I gathered what I needed and arranged them out onto the bed.

“So now that I’m here with you, how much are we talking?” the stripper asked.

“I’m paying you $300, and for that, you’ll do what I ask.”

“Three-hundred bucks? What do I have to do to earn that kind of money.”

“You can start but shutting the fuck up and putting this stuff on,” I told her, pointing to the bed.

She looked confused when she took a closer look. On the bed, I had sat out a red sweater and a bottle of perfume.

“So you’re going to pay me $300 to wear some clothes and perfume? What’s the catch man?” she asked as she pulled the sweater over the dress she was wearing, followed by a couple of squirts of the perfume.

“The catch is that you have to do things exactly as I tell you to. You got it?”

My voice was hard and cold as I was telling her what she had to do and I didn’t even care. She looked at me like I was some sort of creep and, at the time, maybe that’s what I was being. It didn’t matter, though. This wasn’t about her. It was all about me.

“So who do you want me to be tonight?” she asked as I sat down on the edge of the bed.

“Your name is Alexa, just like last time,” I responded.

“Alright, sweetheart. If that’s what you want, that’s what you’re going to get.”

“Don’t call me sweetheart. She isn’t into shit like that. You have to talk like her. She only calls me Nick. None of that sweetheart or honey bullshit. Nick and nothing else.”

“Fine Nick, that’s what I’ll call you.”

“Your voice is too deep. She doesn’t have all that bass in her voice. Her voice is higher and more feminine. Just make your voice higher and get over here.”

I spent the next hour going over the rules and telling her all the things she needed to say and do. She protested a bit, telling me that she wasn’t going to remember everything I was telling her to do.

If she wanted my money, she was going to do everything exactly as I told her.

“You know, this isn’t going to be a one-time thing, right?” I asked, drawing a look of concern from her. “I want you to come over to my apartment every single night this week. As soon as you get off work, I want you over here. I want you here wearing this exact outfit and wearing this exact perfume. I want you to act the way she acted. I want you to talk the way she talked. I want you to be here.”

“Don’t you think this is a little weird, Nick?”

“No Alexa, I don’t,” I replied, oblivious to the fact that I was losing my mind. “You don’t even have to knock when you get here. Just walk in and ask me about my day and tell me about yours. I don’t want to hear about any of that stripper shit. I want to know how your day working at the gas station was. If you do these things, you’ll get paid every time.”

She nodded her head in agreement.

“Good. Now turn around,” I said once I was done telling her everything she needed to know.

She did exactly as I asked without hesitation. She faced the wall while I stood up and turned off the lights, leaving nothing but the faint moonlight coming through the windows.

The lights being off allowed me to forget who I was actually in the room with, giving me a more authentic experience.

I crept up behind her and wrapped my arms around her waist. She didn’t have the same curvy shape that Alexa had, but it would have to do. I rested my head on her shoulder, breathing in the smell of the perfume from her neck.

“Thank you, Alexa. Thank you so much for giving me one more chance.”

“You don’t have to thank me,” she said as she made her voice higher as I had requested. “I’m yours, Nick. I’m not going anywhere. I love you.”

“I love you too, Alexa. I love you so much.”

I pushed her hair to the side and began kissing her neck. It must have tickled because she laughed and tried pulling away from me. I wasn’t going to let her go, though. Not this time. I held her right where I wanted her.

Before she could say another word, I reached up under her dress, grabbed her panties and pulled them down before plunging my fingers into her pussy. There was just one problem. She wasn’t the slightest bit wet.

This wasn’t right.

Alexa was always wet anytime I touched her. It seemed that just being in my presence was enough to have her ready to go. This bitch was bone dry.

She was ruining everything!

That was the moment I snapped out of it. What the hell was I thinking? There was nobody who was going to be able to take Alexa’s place, especially not some second-rate stripper.

“You need to get out,” I yelled, catching her by surprise.

“What? Get out? What do you mean get out?”

“I mean get out of my apartment. This was a mistake.”

“How in the fuck am I supposed to get home?”

“Take the money. I don’t want it. Just leave!”

I hurried her to the door, locking it behind her before I jumped into the shower. I felt like I had to cleanse myself of what I’d just done. It was stupid of me to think that my loneliness could be cured by creating some kind of clone of Alexa.

She was irreplaceable.

I needed the real thing. I needed my Alexa back. I needed to show her that I loved her and let her know that, no matter what, I was going to fight for her because she was worth it.