Belinda Cabbotry: Lost in the Dust (PART 13)

The sheets were beige and unfamiliar. Belinda almost didn't know where she was, but then they smelled soapy like David's shampoo. She rubbed her eyes, wondering how on earth she had let David talk her into this.

His room was unnaturally neat, or rather not dirty. He had a small ordinary looking dresser and night stand with a small lamp, an alarm clock, and a Douglas Addams book. Save for the bed which Belinda had slept in, the room looked unlived in.

It was only 4:54 in the morning when she woke up, but she didn't want to over stay her welcome, so she slid over to the bathroom and brushed her hair.

When she was at home she never really looked at herself in the mirror, but now it was the only thing to do. She hated how her hair was so straight and dark, and how her nose looked in profile, and that her skin was the color of skim milk. That's how she usually felt, but this ungodly hour of the morning, her skin didn't look quite so bleak, her nose didn't matter, and her hair had just the slightest curl to it.

The thing about David was that she knew he never looked for that stuff, and yet she always felt like she had to be that way. The way he was, with his stunning good looks and striking intelligence, he was perfect on paper. In every single way, he was perfect.

He was kind where Belinda would rather run away. He was smart in a way that she would never understand. He was charming, a quality Belinda would never have. He could have any girl in the world, in fact his ex was any girl in the world. She was pretty and smart and fit and popular. She was a supermodel from all angles.

And for some reason he liked Belinda. There were some days she wondered why. And some days she wished he never wondered why. Today, she wondered why she even bothered with romance at all.

***

Daniel did not know what time it was, nor did he want to. He knew it was light and cold when he woke up in a puddle of his own vomit and urine. That was the reality of awakening. He had blood on his hand from where he had bit it in his fit. His scalp itched from where he had scratched it over and over again. His back and arms ached from fatigue and bruises. He could barely see.

It was not the moment his withdrawal ended, it was the moment he had scrambled up enough strength and willpower to get up. As he crawled out of his funky puddle, dizziness and pain stabbed every cell of his body. After he reached the opposite wall of the ally he stopped for a breath. He leaned himself against the wall and waited.

When he opened his eyes again it was night.

In the minimal glow of the street lamps he could see vomit rubbed against his jeans. And even if he couldn't see it he could smell and feel it. It was beginning to itch where his clothes were wet. He couldn't even imagine what he looked like, even if he wanted to.

He pulled himself up against the wall and followed it home.

***

David was awake already when Belinda walked into the living room. He was watching the early, early news programs on the television, in his pajama bottoms and a gray T-shirt.

"Morning." He yawned when Belinda came in.

"You're up early." She informed him.

"You're one to talk." He retorted, "Come, sit."

Belinda cautiously took a seat next to him on the couch. He put his arm around her shoulder, noticing only when it was too late to stop, what he was doing.

"Whicha-" Belinda coughed, "Whatcha watching?"

"I've been following the Anderson Gremer trial."

"Oh yeah! He was that cart-t-t-t...hmmm..." Belinda paused to swallow, "That cartel downtown." Belinda looked at David again, who was glaring at the screen, "How's that working out?"

"Oh it's just lovely to hear them look over all the evidence I took months collecting and throw it out one by one." David bit the inside of his cheek.

"So it looks like he'll be equitted?"

David nodded. "What we need are his cronies. If we could get them all in the station, we could cut the lowest member a deal to give us something irrefutable on this as-"

"That would be that witness statement right?" Belinda interrupted.

"Yep, if he was right, we were two feet from catching Anderson's supposed partner. A little son of a-" Belinda chose not to hear that next word, "-Jacque Merrian."

"You don't know that." Belinda said.

"Don't know what?"

"He's mother could have been a very nice, but assertive woman."

David smiled, but it didn't go to his eyes.

"I know," Belinda continued, "This was your career making case, and none of those idiotic, annoyed jurors believe you."

"Is this supposed to be making me feel better?"

"Who said I was?" Belinda touched the collar of his shirt. "Civilians don't always understand what kind of hardworking, intelligent, beautiful men have done to put these jerks away."

"Should I feel jealous?" David asked, wrapping an arm around Belinda's waist.

"Only if you think Officer Waters is interested in me."

"Ummm...No." David kissed Belinda, and she kissed him back. Her arms wrapped around his neck and she was suddenly aware of how much and how little she was aware of in this moment. Until his fingertips touched some of the skin under the hem of her shirt, she wouldn't have considered stopping. Her heart was beating fast and her skin burned, and for some reason she didn't want to leave him.

He kissed her, and her heart beat fast. And that's where she left.

Her kiss slowed for a second, her eyes opened, and then she threw herself against him. David barely noticed this change physically, only that it didn't feel right. He stopped again, and she pulled her hair behind her ears.

"Whoa." Melanie said softly.

"Um..." David pulled his arm away.

"What?" She sat up, "Oh, sorry, I just..."

"Uh..." David scooted a bit away.

"It's not like I had the choice to appear now."

David looked back to the TV.

"But if I did have the choice...that was pretty good."

David continued to stare at the TV. He looked shocked and nervous, like he was suddenly reconsidering bringing her here.

"Hey, I have some thoughts on that fire." Melanie said in an effort to change the conversation.

"Oh yeah?"

"Yeah." Melanie crossed her arms around her chest and pulled her feet up onto the couch to create a comfortable barrier between them. "I think we should talk to the witnesses again."

"On what grounds? We already questioned them."

"Well, think about it, if we assume that there was a killer, then he had to have scoped this place out. And he would have had to have lit the fire inside so it looked like the victim started it. Which means he was there when the fire was reported. And since we didn't get any reports of guys running around during the fire, he would have had to be one of the witnesses."

"So we have to call all the house owners back for statements? That'll take forever!" David yawned.

"Well, I could help, that might speed things up a bit." Melanie looked at him with a smile on her face.

"Ugh..." David shrugged, "Sure, I don't see why not."

***

When Daniel got home, he ripped his soggy clothes off and rushed as fast as he could to his small, unsanitary, bathroom to puke. After which he set his mouth under his sink faucet and drank all he could. His mouth was dry and tasted atrocious even after he lapped up all the sink water he could.

It made him dizzy to stand up, so he turned the faucet off and collapsed on the floor again. The bathroom was cold and dark, it made him think back to a time when he was afraid of the dark. Before he had thrown himself into it with his first sniff of pot. It made him cry.

And that's where he lay for the next day, naked, cold, and scared of the dark, in more ways than one.

***

Melanie was beginning to regret her decision to help interrogate the witnesses. There was like a million of them, and they all sounded the same.

"I was, like, tired, and, like, I couldn't see a thing in all the dark." Says a teenager obnoxiously named Emily with, like, three "E"s so it sounded like "Emileee"

"I saw this dark man with a scar across his face and a cartoon villain goatee." Said an obese housewife nervously, "I saw him smile at the fire, like he was happy to see someone die."

"Ma'am we already interviewed your neighbor Mr. Matherne." David informed her drowsily.

And it went on and on like this, until they all started to blur together.

"Haven't you found this jerk yet? What do we pay you for?"

"Why are you asking me? I didn't see nothing!"

"Is this going to take long? I have a kid to pick up from school."

"You should talk to that black guy with the scar, he's pretty sus."

"Is this a joke?"

"Did you already talk to that midnight jogger?"

"I just want to go HOME!"

"I heard Malery's husband was out that night. Maybe he did it."

"Seriously? Me? I was asleep!"

Wait, Melanie thought, what was that about a midnight jogger?

Melanie shook herself from her day dreams. A large woman in a loud purple shirt and even louder red hair was sitting on the other side of the table. Renee, Melanie thought she remembered her name was.

"What jogger?" David asked.

She smiled, her lips a deep dark red that contrasted with her pale skin. "Every night around 12, there was this jogger in a reflective vest just running down the street. Kept tripping off my floodlights, the jerk. Natasha, down the street, could tell you the same thing, he kept scaring her dog. I haven't heard him set off her dog since the fire, so that may be what your looking for."

David looked over at Melanie with a realization in his grin. "That would explain why we found a reflective vest amongst the carnage. We thought it was one of the construction crew's, but if this jogger thing is right, then he might have been one of our witnesses from the beginning."

"You mean he drove down in his vest, left it there in the fire, and hid amongst the crowd instead of running away?" Melanie asked. "That's brilliant, we probably looked right over him."

"This is so exciting." Renee smiled.

"Do you think you could give an accurate description?" David asked.

Renee shook her head, "Just saw him the once, I know he's a guy, maybe white, maybe black. Sorry."

David gave Melanie the "this close" motion with his forefingers.

"The Midnight Jogger." Melanie said softly, "It's got a nice ring to it."

***

"Well, that was a dead end." David told Melanie.

"Hey, but now we have our first serial killer." She said optimistically over the corpse of a middle-aged woman.

"Not officially." David said.

"Really?" Emily said as she inspected the bruises on her scalp. "After all that, they're ruling it a suicide?"

"Really." David told her.

Emily shook her head, "That's just not right." And then after looking at the smear of purple beneath the black hair. "This isn't even close enough to being the cause of death. Clearly not blunt trauma to the head."

"True dat." Melanie agreed. "So even after finding a possible candidate for murder, they're just going to tell us it's a waste of time to go forward?" Melanie inspected the ear of the victim.

"I know, and we don't have any evidence of him actually ever buying accelerants or having any knowledge of the construction site!"

"You know what they say David," Emily started, "Accident until proven murder... Now that had to be post-mortem."

"Looks like Carbon Monoxide poisoning." Melanie told her.

"Which is weird since we found her in the wide open desert." David told them.

Melanie frowned. "Murder then..."

"What?" David asked, watching her grab a sharpie and pack of post-it's

"Were there any foot prints next to the body?"

"Yeah and some tire-tracks, they're running the print identification down the hall."

"Get me a copy, now!" Melanie wrote on her post-its as Emily rushed down the hall to grab a photo. When Emily rushed back, Melanie was writing down an estimate on the time of death.

"Here." Emily handed her the photo and Melanie's eyes widened.

"What?" David asked.

"I know who murdered her." She laughed.