Water, Water, Everywhere Pt. II

Jeff trudged along the verge by the side of the road, his black leather boots squelching in the mud and crushing the fallen autumn leaves as he headed towards the address in Harbour Hill. The rain lashed him; flying at him horizontally and making him squint in the dark to avoid it going into his eyes. Jamming the earpiece attachment of his radio into his ear just that little bit further, he tried to hear any updates from the control room but the sound was lost in the howling wind, despite the radio being at maximum volume.

Jeff’s clipboard kept catching on his trouser pocket as he walked slowly but surely towards the address. Jeff wondered to himself why this stretch of road was the only one the council deemed unimportant enough to install a pavement and some street lighting. And they wonder why crime rates are up in the area? Sighing once again, Jeff willed himself to remember that at least he had a nice warm home to go to once the shift was over, and if he was really lucky then he may even get to cuddle up to his frigid wife. Smiling ironically to the rain-filled night, he decided that was a stark improbability seeing as ever since she had given birth to their two children, all she was interested in doing was eating, sleeping and Facebook. No doubt she was already fast asleep in the spare room.

11 Harbour Hill. Jeff chewed his lip thoughtfully as he looked at the house which was all in darkness. A small wrought iron gate swung in the wind on rusty hinges, screeching back at the wind like a hoarse, indignant banshee. Jeff spoke into his personal radio to indicate he had arrived, heard nothing back and shrugged, assuming they had heard him. That or the reception was being as badly affected by the elements as Jeff himself was. Jeff hoped he wouldn’t have to sit down once in the property because he knew that his boxer shorts were as damp as they would be if he had pissed himself. Jeff couldn’t decide which the more preferable option was because at least the urine would be warm. Then again, the smell would be far more noticeable. Realising his thoughts were wandering; Jeff walked through the gate and tried to shut it behind him, but then found that the gate didn’t even have a latch and was just free to swing open at will. Utterly pointless.

He spotted the attempt at crazy paving stepping stones running through an overgrown lawn towards the front door of the house and stepped from stone to stone obligingly before arriving at the front door where he could now get a better look at the property. It was pretty much a standard house, probably two or three bedrooms with pebble-dash concrete on the exterior, indicative of awful 1960’s design creating a very grey and depressing outlook. The windows had obviously seen better days with heavily peeling, off-white paint over rotting wooden frames that contained the single pane of glass. Weatherproof, they certainly weren’t. The front door was wooden as well, with old glass panes at the top buried in the wood like cheap afterthoughts. Jeff knocked on the front door and waited in the rain, the droplets drumming a tattoo on his flat hat that Jeff fancied sounded not unlike "Pomp & Circumstance" and he found himself smiling ever so slightly when the door was finally answered seconds later, not by a person, but opened by a sudden gust of wind revealing an interior shrouded completely in darkness and littered with scattered newspapers.

“Shit.”, said Jeff.

Despite the lack of lighting, Jeff could already make out the faint outline of someone lying on the floor in the hallway at the bottom of a set of rickety-looking stairs that headed up into the gloom of the 1^st floor. Pressing the talk button on his radio, Jeff was rewarded with a sound indicating he had no reception where he was stood. Cursing again, Jeff fished out his mobile phone and suddenly remembered he hadn’t charged the bloody thing and the battery had died before his shift had even started. He would have to go into the house and find a landline or head back to the car. Unfortunately, Jeff knew he had to make the place secure before he could go and get any help and he had a duty to see if he could assist the occupants. Duty called. Duty sucks.

“Oh bloody hell! Here goes nothing then...” Jeff walked through the front door, his heavy boots immediately shedding mud, mulch and water all over the carpet in front of the door. Trying his best to remember to try and preserve the scene, Jeff chose the least likely approach path to the person lying on the shoddy carpet by the stairs; keeping a wary eye on the rest of the premises, his Police baton held in his hand and his clipboard in the other. Jeff fully extended the telescopic baton with a sharp flick of the wrist, the metallic "shunk" of the baton sounding oddly comforting to Jeff. Using a damp sleeve, he switched on a light switch on the wall but no illumination sprang forth and Jeff sighed to himself, wondering if his run of bad luck was going to stick with him throughout the shift.

“Hello, Police...” Jeff called into the premises in a loud, if slightly high-pitched voice, hoping he sounded more confident than he felt. He got no response from upstairs and no sound came from the figure who was now clearly face-down on the carpet and not moving. As if in mocking answer to his call, the rusty gate swung on its hinge with a horrid wrenching noise, sending a shiver up Jeff’s spine that he told himself was just the rainwater running down his back.

From stooping over the person on the carpet, Jeff could see that the figure was that of a man with heavily tattooed forearms, wearing a polo-style shirt and sensible, if dirty-looking trousers and that he was barefoot. Jeff ditched his clipboard and reached his free hand towards the shoulder of the man in order to shake him and try and get some kind of response from the man and found that the arm he touched was cold and stiff. Jeff reached into the pocket of his high visibility jacket and pulled forth a mangled pair of blue latex gloves and pulled them on, swearing under his breath as he struggled to find the correct finger-holes whilst tucking his baton under one arm. He then quickly turned the man over onto his back to get a better look at him and see if there were any other signs of life and then immediately recoiled in abject horror, falling backwards onto his backside and gasping for breath, the baton under his arm falling free to land with a clanging sound against the bottom of the stairs.

The man Jeff had rolled over had no face.

(c) James Batty 2010