I will need to start running surveillance on the school. I turn the steering wheel, and I look closely around the yard as I park the car in front of my modest home.
It is a nice place, one that is often overflowing with flowers and a green garden. Gardening is a way that I unwind along with fishing. Really, it’s nature that gets me, and I don’t know how anyone manages to go an entire day without sniffing the fresh air or feeling the wind on their face.
Reaching for my briefcase, I ascend the stone steps. There is a small comfort when I arrive home at the end of the day. Especially after nights like this that drag on forever, I virtually pull an all-nighter. I don’t spend as much time here as I used to though. After Charlie left for college, the house just feels so empty. Empty nest syndrome is a real thing, and apparently, it’s for men and women, mothers and fathers.
Unlocking my front door, I imagine what life could be like with a wife, and the baby here. The idea seems foreign, but there was a time long ago when I had those things in my life, and I was happy. I am happy now I think as I reach my bedroom and strip off my sweaty clothes. I know that I could be happier though if I had a woman like Lucy here in my home. Lucy is so sweet and thoughtful. She is funny and hardheaded and exciting all at the same time.
I wonder if Lucy ever feels lonely in her home. She’s all alone too, no longer living with her sister or her father, I don’t think she even has a pet. Maybe I could bring her something like a dog? Yes a dog would be good. Something loud and yippy like that would be annoying, but it would scare off potential intruders.
Maybe I should get one for myself too? I smile to myself now. I place my dirty clothes carefully in the hamper. Perhaps we can get a pet together. That would be really big for our relationship I think. Getting a pet together that we take care of together is kind of like practice for the real thing isn’t it?
I don’t know if Lucy is ready for the real thing. She is so much younger than I am, and that’s something that I forget about a lot. There are times when she seems so mature, and other times where she seems like the nineteen-year-old child that she is. We really are a lifetime apart from each other. Worlds apart and at very different places on the lifeline spectrum. Regardless of us, I am still drawn to her in a way that I have never been drawn to anyone else, including my ex-wife.
Yes, I will definitely get her a dog this week. With so much going on in the town today, I don’t want to have to worry about Lucy any more than I already do. And Noah might be regaining his strength, so there could be a drug war in the future… and I may be a target. I only hope that he would not allow his daughter to be targeted because she is my weakness. Perhaps this situation will protect her and keep our love a secret for as long as possible. I don’t want anyone to hurt her. I think it would kill me.
Finding myself in bed, now I lay back. I think I see Lucy and her father. It makes me angry that her father would be so careless with something as precious as Lucy. I remember the day I had to arrest Lucy’s father for drug charges specifically for the sale and distribution of narcotics. It broke Lucy and Abbie’s heart, and to this day kills me to think that I had to be a part of it, even though my job specifically puts criminals behind bars.
What kind of man can disregard the emotional well-being of another in such a way? What kind of man doesn’t care about his child crying as he is in jail? I lay in bed and rub my hands up and down my face feeling the stubble against my palms. I need to see it again I think absently. Also, I need to make sure the age is better for Lucy. I need to give her more than anyone has ever given her. She needs to know that she is safe with me, and that I will not let any harm come to her. Not even from her father.
I fall asleep with angry thoughts of Noah in my head.
Suddenly, I am surro
unded by darkness and running. The darkness creeps in closer until I feel like I’m suffocating as its cold fingers reach up and cloak my skin. There’s someone ahead of me, not too far, but not close enough for me to reach them. It’s a female I can tell that much.
As I race forward my feet slap against the hard concrete. God it’s getting harder to breathe as I stretch my hand out desperately wishing that I could reach her and tell who she is.
Suddenly, I find myself in a room. It’s big and open and the sky seems to jet highly above me forever with only darkness and stars. And from the darkness a single glowing ball drops down in the center, trained over the floor, illuminating a very small circle.
Stopping my chase, I turn and look at a package on another floor. I need to go to it, it’s important, but I can’t remember why. As I get closer to it a figure darts from the shadows, scoops up the package, and races in the opposite direction.
I am running again. I don’t know how much longer I can do this. Blood is rushing in my ears and I can hear every hard thump of my heart as it goes faster and faster. Every pounding step I take has my blood pumping violently and forces it to move faster and faster.
Now I am running down a long, angular corridor with no windows or lights. Somehow, despite the darkness, I can still make out the silhouette of a woman running ahead of me, her feet slapping lightly on the concrete.
She’s only inches away now. I can feel the cotton hoodie under my hand. I clinch the hood, grabbing a fist full of hair in the process of turning her around to face me. Before I can pull back the hood I feel like I know her, as I stare at the long locks of brown hair. Forcing back the hood, I see it’s Lucy!
Gasping for air, I find myself sitting up in my bed sweating and searching next to me frantically for the woman whose hair I just had in my fingers. But where there should be a hoodie and hair, there is only the sheet twisted around my hands.
That was one hell of a nightmare.
I look around me waiting for my heart rate to slow down. I can’t come down. My heart is beating so quickly, and I find myself longing for a woman on the other side of town. I need to see her now. I need her in my arms to hold her, to touch her, to love her.
I run down the stairs of my quiet home, not bothering to lock the front door or even check to make sure it’s closed all the way, as I slip on my shoes and race to my cruiser. I know I shouldn’t be using it for personal business but the nightmare fighting my mind for reality tells me I need to get to Lucy. All I need her to do is listen.
I turn on the sirens on my cruiser as I head towards her neighborhood. Running through stop lights is completely unnecessary at four in the morning in Oak Valley, Wyoming. Nonetheless, I keep my lights on only for the safety of others in the off chance of someone being up and out at this time of night. I need to see her.
I’m on autopilot. My hands shake as if I’m going through withdrawals from a nightmare straight from my heart. I don’t know what is running through my mind. I don’t know why I would see her face in my nightmares like that.
Perhaps it’s because I’m terrified of losing her or maybe a part of me is afraid she is like her father. Maybe she knows something about him and she isn’t telling me? Either way, it isn’t good, and it isn’t true. My Lucy is good and would never betray me like this.
Turning sharply onto her street, I impatiently get out and open the gate so that I can pull into the dirt driveway. After I pull forward, I shut off my sirens and lights and race to her door, pounding frantically. My only thought is the image of her face in my dreams.
“Lucy! Lucy!” I call, not bothering to notice if the neighbors heard my pulling up, or if there were dogs in the neighborhood.
In an instant, Lucy opens her door.
“What’s going on? What’s wrong?” she asks. Her eyes look red and tired, and her body is shivering. Something isn’t right.