29Talena stirred, her senses slowly falling into place. A soothing hush came from all around her, nothing else, just a whispering sound as a violent yet passionate wind pushed and raised waves of water against the side of a ship. There was a smell of lavender incense within the fragranced air. She felt as though something was wrong, but knew instantly what it was; she wasn't breathing. At least, she wasn't doing it herself. Rather the perfumed smell pushed itself into her lungs and seethed forcibly out from every pore in her body.
Only then did she realise she was no longer in her bed. She felt a wooden surface beneath her, but it wasn't hard. Instead she just sank right into it and as she sat up, the wooden planks that moulded to fit her body eased itself back into it's normal horizontal position. She opened her eyes.
An ocean stretched out in front of her. The waves grew until they cut off the horizon, shattered and fell back down. They ran towards where she stood but exploded as they hit the bow of the ship she sat on. The waves crashed around her, leaving behind thousands of sequins glittering beneath a phosphorescent moon. The sky was blacker than a usual star-filled night, but within the endless space they laid in burning, each of them waxed and waned, supported by nothing.
Talena licked her lips. A sweet taste of something inexplicable entered her throat. It wasn't quite like treacle nor nothing like toffee. It was just sweet-tasting. It reminded her of what heaven itself could taste like if she could consume it, and it made her throat burn with kindled desires. She placed a finger in her mouth and caressed her tingling tongue. The saliva on her skin once removed was as if diamonds had melted in her mouth; the fluids sparkled of a hundred spectrums, within each lay a hundred more and within these another hundred. Every tint and every shade passed through her eyes and entered her soul.
She walked to the railing that edged round the ship and she leaned over. Like a fortress upon the sea the ship remained motionless. It neither swayed nor rocked as the waves became a crescendo like fireworks against the steel walls. The untamed sea danced to its own song.
"Talena…"
She turned and saw an empty ship, bare as it stretched off into the distance. Nothing but a concrete room, a lone door pushed open, about fifty feet in front of her, resting like a hut. Through the open door she could see the stairs leading down into the ship's heart.
"Talena…"
She slowly walked towards the door, although she couldn't tell where the summoning came from. There was no sound, only her name playing in her mind; only it wasn't her voice, it was Clive's. As she pursued cautiously after the door, she wore a red dress covering her body that blew back as the wind pushed and penetrated her body, tickling her heart with warm fingers. She continued through the pitch-black corridor of the staircase, but her eyes were not completely incapable of sight for a light from somewhere illuminated the steps beneath her feet. She reached for a wall to feel her way down, but her hands felt nothing, just emptiness expanded all around her.
"Talena…"
The voice came again but with more body than it had before as it flowed into her ears. The stairs disappeared beneath her as she found herself in the doorway of a perfectly square room, empty bar two chairs opposite each other and against a smooth wooden table that stood in the middle, an unlit red candle sitting in the centre of the boxed room. What caught her eye though was that the walls were transparent, made entirely of glass. Beyond there was a forest centred by glistening rocks, a waterfall kissed every pebble that lay there and then disappeared beneath the ground. Talena walked over to the glass pane and pressed her hand against it. Faeries swooped around inside dancing as if entranced.
"It's for you…"
The room was gone as Talena turned around, the door and walls were gone although the table and chairs remained, with the now lit candle as the only light, though it burned and the wax dripped, the candle never liquefied. Every now and then a faerie flew near the candle, casting it's shadow across the forest. Clive sat on the chair on the other side of the table and looked straight into her eyes. Hypnotised by his deep voice and beautiful face she made her way to and sat down at the table. He wore a tuxedo and in his upper left pocket was a ruby rose.
"What do you mean, 'for me'?" she asked as the lavender incense surrounding her pushed into her chest.
"I mean, it's for you. All of this is just a message from me to you." The candle illuminated his face, his dark eyes reflecting the flicker pulsation of the flame. He retracted the rose from his pocket and held it out to her. "It's all for you" he repeated as she took it from him. When he let go a crimson butterfly with heart-shaped wings emerged from the petals and flew in circles around her before turning into a star of light and vanished into the flame of the candle, now held by Clive.
"I'm so glad you're here" Talena said to Clive who gazed into the candle. Talena did the same, however, somehow they both new they were looking into the other's eyes. "I feel so bad what I've done to you. I wish Sanderson had never put us together or that I had never chose to drag you along with me. If I knew then what I know now, I would never have gone after Sako."
"Don't say that. I'm glad we did. In my coma I can see things and feel things so perfect, so beautiful, heaven could not show more beauty." The forest melted into endless fields of calla lilies in every shade of the spectrum, revealing colours no one knew the names of. A brazier sun bleached them with a honey haze of light and dew. "I can take you anywhere. I can give you every desire of your heart."
Talena's emotions swirled in a frenzy inside her, a feeling greater than love throbbed it's way through her veins. "Show me what love is" she pleaded.
"Hold out your index finger" he replied, and so she did. With his free hand he wrapped his index finger around hers and held the candle over their entwined fingers, the flame of which held a chimerical sun about it. "This shouldn't hurt" he assured, and droplets of wax dripped onto their skin. He moved their hands so that their fingers were covered by the drops. Stalactites of wax formed from their entangled fingers dripping down like icicles. Soon, the heat from the wax died down, cooling and solidifying around the connection sealing their fingers together, their eyes sealed on each other.
"Is this love to you?" she asked curiously.
"This is how the angels make love." The wax bound their fingers in a warm weave, too benevolent to comprehend, too passionate to ignore. Clive moved the candle away and they waited as the warmth cooled away. For what seemed like an eternity of tranquil serenity, Clive gently peeled off the wax from their fingers and pressed it into her hand. She looked at the crimson form that once shelled their fingers together. Clive softly squeezed her fingers.
"I know you're falling in love with me" he whispered in a velvet-textured voice "because I can see it in your eyes. I know you can see it in mine too."
"Yes…" she replied, the lavender incense escaping her lungs and leaving her breathless.
"That's why you need to do something for me, please" he begged.
"Anything."
Clive leaned over to kiss her, but as their lips came close to touch, he paused. "You need to wake up".
Talena awoke suddenly with a nauseous feeling in her stomach. The past week had been nothing short of rough and her emotions were jumping all over the place. Work started again with a few simple shift working the streets and would continue in like manner with her now sorting paperwork. That was all well and good but since her last boyfriend Talena never really thought about anyone else, most certainly not from her workplace. The only logical hypothesis she could formulate was the complete mix of anxieties she had suffered in the past few days alone. When Clive would come out of the coma, it would be okay; the burning guilt she felt would be gone, the incident where they fell through the window would become nothing more than scars and a scuttling away into memory. Then of course, she could get back to doing the top profile work she was cut out for, even enjoyed. 'Now is no time to fall in love with someone' she thought as she rubbed the yellow dust from her yawning eyes, 'especially when that someone is stuck in a coma and in your own bloody dreams'. She tried to convince herself, not foolishly though, that she wasn't falling for him, but still had the queasy pain.
She moaned slightly at how weak and out-of-control she felt. She wanted to do something but couldn't. As she decided to get up, she shrugged it off, bemusing to herself that should something happen it'll happen. Once Clive was there she'd remember why feelings for him hadn't started before. There was sleep in her eyes so she moved her hand up to wipe away the yellow dust. In her palm though she felt something. Hard and cold, yet soft and greasy. She held it up and saw a red piece of wax, twisted in a peculiar way. 'Clive?' she whispered and a total befuddlement of thoughts increased in her. They were quickly dismissed though as she saw through the twisted wax something else red. On her bedside clock fuzzed bright red digital lines.
"Twenty minutes?" she screamed, startled at the time and half angry at herself for sleeping so late. "Shit" was her immediate response after double-checking the time on the hanging clock by the kitchen. She shot out of bed, dropping the wax on the covers and skipped the shower but splashed water on her face while rinsing her mouth out with mouthwash at the same time. She flicked open her phone and rang Sanderson who was indifferent to her waking up so late.
"Just get yourself down here and we can discuss it."
In the blink of an eye she stripped herself of clothes and pushed on her uniform and bolted for the door, stopping only to delicately pick up the wax and put it in her small purse. She leapt into her car when outside, almost ripping the door off when she forgot to unlock it and drove off leaving behind two thick black tyre marks. Her speed didn't drop any as she hurtled her car towards the station and into the police gates, braking in time to not damage them or her car too much, at least there were no dents. She entered the police building.
"Just on time" Sanderson smiled, his rouged face seeming almost human as it paled into a mauve shade of peach. Talena looked at the clock, and sure enough she was only just under a minute late, nothing to worry about. "The girl's not here yet" Sanderson continued "so grab yourself a coffee or something and take it easy. Get started on the paperwork for that murder enquiry if you want, it's been piling up, more and more letters are coming in and more and more need to be sent out. We need more organisation here that's what we need." He mumbled repeating himself like a broken record. Talena just phased out after the coffee suggestion and managed to reply with "Yeah a coffee will do me good" while completely ignoring Sanderson's suggestions for work.
Leah turned up about ten minutes later and Talena decided to see her immediately, and they reclined to a private interview room. She tried to make the girl feel more relaxed and comfortable by offering her a drink and making jokes about the decorations of the interview room that looked more like a tacky hotel than an informal police room. Leah however, remained completely impassive towards her failing attempts. She wore the same dress she had on last time they met. Leah's chestnut hair, usually naturally straight was curled up in a bun at the back of her head, unusually fussed over. Her eyes darted about the place never fixing her gaze on anything longer than a few seconds other than when on Talena herself. She sat herself down saying nothing but a quiet 'thank you' as Talena slid a chair over to her. She could tell instantly that something wasn't quite right, but for the sake of figuring out what without causing Leah to leave, decided not to bring the matter to light. Leah turned down the offer for the drink.
"So…" Talena began as she sat down opposite Leah and pulled out a rather business-like notepad, "I believe you want to talk to me about your Auntie, Stella?"
"Friend" Leah said correcting her.
"Of course" Talena replied and scribbled down 'Stella - auntie/friend ?' in the notepad. "Why don't you tell me about your relationship with her" she asked looking directly at Leah who sat rather unassumingly across from her.
"Her name's not Stella" she began after a slight hesitation. "I've never called her it or known anyone else to call her it, including herself. I don't know why she lied to you but it must be because you were a cop." Talena scribbled in her notepad while Leah continued on speaking as if trying hard to recite what it was she came to say. "Her real name is Celeste and she owns the bar across the road from where I live. She often allows me to come round before hours as I have no family. She takes care of me and looks after me but…"
"Sorry, you say her name's Celeste, not Stella?"
"Yes"
"So what do you think she's wanting hidden from the police?"
"I'm not sure, maybe her bar is unlicensed or there's something illegal going in there, you can check it out if you want, I'm sure there's not." Just as Celeste had told her to say, even Leah started to marvel at her own memory. Talena nodded as her pen scribbled away. "The thing is, I'm worried I won't get the same protection from her as I used to, and that's why I came to you. I think she's with someone who could really destroy her and her business. If she is then sooner or later she's going to stop seeing me and helping me, I know this because of the type of guy he is. He's cold and callous and a drugs dealer, I'm pretty sure he's a smuggler too." She continued on with the script. "She'll definitely stop…
"What else can you tell me about this guy?"
Leah froze at the unexpected question. Her mind reeled with answers and stammered as she tried to feed one of them out through her mouth, "I… I, I… don't… I don't know his name or anything. I've only seen him. In the bar, Celeste's bar, I've only seen him in there. I don't know him." And then she went silent waiting for Talena's reply to see whether or not she became suspicious.
"Carry on…"
Her eyes rolled in her head, half relieved that she allowed her to continue, and half trying to remember where she was. "She'll definitely stop protecting me if he takes control of her, it's already started happening. He's a bad influence on her, I'm almost sure she's been stealing jewellery, or at least taking jewellery from him that he's stolen."
Talena looked up. "Oh?"
"There was one she had that looked expensive, very expensive."
'Sako' Talena thought as she listened attentively to the young girl.
"It was silver with loads of purple stones. I've never seen something that looked so expensive. I don't know what it is but I think she called it a night-time necklace."
"The Night-Sky Necklace?" she quickly responded.
"Yes, maybe" the girl said and shrugged. She tried to control her breathing, though her heart in her chest, her skin resting beneath the very same pendant they spoke of. "Is it expensive?"
"Very… it was recently stolen from a museum and needs to be returned" she answered lying to the innocent that should've been none the wiser. It was unlucky for Talena that she knew more about the necklace's whereabouts than she let on. Leah smiled, though it was more to the fact that she knew she had her trapped, hook line and sinker, than knowing she was lying. Talena tried to move the focus off of that necklace, though the desire to leave the station and hunt for it now was overwhelming her. "So you say, she has other jewellery? Do you know how much?"
She shrugged. "Drawers full, probably worth thousands of pounds."
"And do you know where she stores them?"
"Yes, in my house, the floor below my room in the door with the number '66' on it."
Talena carried on the inquisition, asking random questions that came to mind, although she was never interested in any of the answers. After about ten minutes she thanked Leah for seeing her and gracefully saw her out of the station. She ran and told Sanderson the news who just saw it as another opportunity for her to go out and screw up her job.
"I'll tell you what" said Talena, speaking calmly and as if she was about to get the raw end of a deal. "Send me back out on the street work with Cameron again tomorrow. Send us to the Whitfield area again and then while I'm doing my duties I can just nip in and take a look. It'll give me a chance to check out that bombing too, not to mention…" but that was enough for Sanderson. To get her out of his hair (or at least his toupee) he agreed, providing she sort through the amount of paperwork given to her. Talena happily accepted this, although it meant skipping lunch and working a couple of hours over.