Love and Crime

Detective Mason

I can toss and turn in the thin bed-sheets that lay atop my chest for as long as I want, it won't help me get over this pounding headache, each second feeling like a minute and a minute dragging onto an hour. I throw the sheets off of me and they float down onto the cold, uninviting bed I have, a twin size bed that takes over much of the room. The walls are a bleak white with fading patches and a mahogany bedside drawer having only a simple alarm clock, his pristine condition phone and the what was left of an open chewing gum packet. The door is in poor condition with scratches over it, dent marks still visible and I yank it open, a loud squeaking noise being emitted from it as it drags itself across the floorboards. The noise echoes in my head and I can't help but hold my head in my palms, adjusting to my surroundings with each blink. A yawn reaches past my mouth and I automatically stretch once it happens. It is quite early after all. Half four in the morning with the darkness of the night still present. 

I move around slowly, easing myself into the process of finding an aspirin. I know I have one at least one, but I can't recall for the life of me where I had lay them down. I stumble around the kitchen, opening cabinet after cabinet with little luck. My eyes glaze past my coat, the typical everyday long, light brown jacket which is obligatory as a stereotypical detective. No time for that yet, this headache may be the death of me. I think back through my day, the ins and outs of what I had done, hoping to find something to clue me into where they could be. For gods sake I'm a detective after all and yet in this situation I'm clearly brain-dead and the main suspect. A memory flashes before my eyes, the jacket pocket. One of the many pockets was where I stashed them away and I dashed over, hoping for that moment of relief where my head wouldn't be having a festival of destruction to torture me. 

My hands rifle through the pockets, the noise of keys jingling and the ruffle of paper can be heard. Neither of the outer pockets have the much needed aspirin and up next was the inside pockets and I can feel a small container of plastic, no bigger than the size of chewing gum container as I had previously emptied all the remaining aspirin into it. I have taken a lot of chewing gum in my time but that's not entirely important. Slipping from the pocket and now in my tight grasp, the aspirin container is revealed and I sigh dramatically in satisfaction. Rushing over to the sink with  an old glass positioned on the counter-top which is now in my hand, I fill it up with water and swallow an aspirin without a moment's notice before chugging the water down to follow it. With the pain of the headache easing and clearness setting in, I take a look around and can see the sun begin to rise in its beauty and tranquility. The faint orange tinted glow enters the windows of my eyes and I take a seat at my kitchen table, allowing the aspirin to work its wonders.

As I lay there in peace I think back to how I had gotten this headache in the first place. It was from that case. It was from one of the longest running cases I've been going through and I couldn't seem to figure it out despite the years and years of searching for that serial killer, code name Bits n' Bobs. A ruthless, maniacal and devious killer who had a signature move of leaving the victims in chunks or small pieces of their original form. They were almost never recognisable until a post-mortem examination had been done. The gory scenes would be enough to haunt a person for a lifetime and there was never anything left behind other than those pieces of the victims. Absolutely savage behaviour. 

I rummage through my pockets once again, reaching out a piece of paper that had been crinkled up and ready to be disregarded. Folding it out on the kitchen table, I examined it in its entirety, a recent image of a crime scene. How had they managed to get away with this for so long and without one clue being left behind? How did they always seem to be ten steps ahead of me? Questions I could only ponder on for the time being. I couldn't just focus on this case despite my need to catch them, bring them in and close the case for good after these monotonous few years of searching . I had other pressing cases, cases that would keep with a job. Thank god people looked out for me and allowed me to pursue this. I stuffed the image back into my pocket and left for the office. I felt as if I was close to a breakthrough.