Sins of Red #5: Awakenings, Anomalies and Inquiries
To many people we must have seemed an odd couple — Me, the gregarious barmaid and Clive the quiet bookworm
Recap: After being abducted & released by her 1st boyfriend Clive, Rose ‘Red’ Redman had to reveal the identity & background of the notorious noirette serial killer — at large for a few years. With her interview with the police looming, Red returns home & thinks back to when she first moved in with Clive.
Finally, I fell into a deep sleep until a noise — shrill and intrusive — abruptly pulled me back to reality.
I took a moment to assess what was my life. It seemed vastly different from two weeks ago. I thought the harsh noise was maybe some kind of alarm, probably triggered by a car outside.
Pushing my head into the pillow, I willed it to stop. But no. Eventually, I couldn’t lay there any longer. I got up, looked out of my bedroom window and saw a different surveillance vehicle had now taken the place of Wilkins and Collins. In the dim light from the street lamps, I vaguely caught the outline of a woman in the passenger seat, reading. Looked like a Kindle. How could she concentrate with this infernal ringing? Then I realised the racket was actually coming from the other room.
Pulling a baggy orange jumper over my pyjamas, I marched out to the kitchen and wasn’t surprised when I saw my sister, Marie, cloth in hand, waving at the smoke alarm. Burnt toast waiting to be removed from the toaster.
She looked at me, then glanced back at the task in hand. Finally, the noise halted, and we sat down at the kitchen table.
“What are you doing? Don’t you know, it’s the middle of the night?” I exclaimed.
“Well, it’s not nighttime any more. I do have a schedule, you know. Breakfast at five am, which is now. Then, shower at half past. To be at my desk… I mean your desk, by six. It’s not easy following in your footsteps, particularly your A’level grades!” Marie ended by scowling at me.
“Right.” I didn’t know what else to say. My sister was a routine freak. Product of my mother. “I don’t have to be at the police station until nine thirty.”
“Let me make you a coffee.” It was clear she suddenly felt sorry for me.
We sipped our drinks in silence until she finally succumbed to curiosity.
“Rosie.” She whined in a sickly sweet tone. “When you moved in with him, was he — Clive, I mean — well, a perv? Back then. When you were together. I’ve read the newspapers, and it seems like he picks up dark-haired girls because that’s, like, his kink. It’s a wonder he went out with you with your hair as red as sin!”
She did seem genuinely interested, and I thought it may help me get events straight in my head for the police, to think about the olden days. So once again I looked back nine years and launched into a monologue of my younger times with Clive, the notorious serial killer, while Marie sat opposite listening, totally absorbed.
At first, he was a real gentle guy — treated me well. With respect.
Shortly after I moved in and started work at Weatherspoons, he got a job with the library, of all places. I laughed when he told me, as it was the same one where he’d been rescued as a baby. Working with books suited him down to the ground, and the council soon had him training part-time as a librarian.
To many observers, we must have seemed an odd couple. Me, the gregarious barmaid, and Clive the quiet bookworm. We didn’t often socialise with friends as a couple. Clive didn’t have any. Not one. And mine were simply too outgoing for him. I would have a Friday night out after work with my mates, and that was it. The rest of the evenings, Clive and I would cook, watch movies or read — always together.
It was at this point that Marie said, “Yes, that’s all very well, but… sex. What about the sex?”
That was certainly something I had pondered over…
Part six next weekend.
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'Awakenings, Anomalies and Inquiries: Sins of Red #5' - Fiction by May MoreSubscribe
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Never trust a bookworm-- especially if they keep all their books down in the basement with a lotta knives and chains and saws and stuff... 😬💦
Working at a library would be such fun. I wonder if the books come alive at night. 😁