Smoke and Glory

•18•

We pull up at Nola's house as she locks the car and fiddles with her keys trying to find the right one to fit in the lock. She opens the door and enters followed by me as I slam the door closed and remove my shoes placing them next to hers in the cabinet that is very clean in comparison to mine. She removed her coat and holds out her hand as I pass her one of my lab coats as I didn't bring any other coat to work today and Nola hangs then up in the cabinet as we venture into her living room. "So what do you want to drink? I've got this great 5 year old scotch if you're up for it." She says placing two glasses on the wooden table in front of me, "bring it on" I say as she reaches up on one of the 3 bookshelves and grabs a black bottle from the big collection of bottles in all
Different shapes, colours and sizes which I'm assuming are all alcohol. She pours it carefully into the glasses before sitting down next to me on the sofa, I take a sip and it's delicious, just the right hint of fruitiness and the ageing just makes the subtle taste of alcohol stronger and more beautiful. "So what did you think of my family?" I ask referencing to Nola's earlier meeting with my brother his husband and my niece, "it was really nice they seem wonderful and your niece, Mia right? She seemed a lot like you which is amazing." She says and I nod my head confirming that my niece's name is indeed Mia. "You don't ever mention your family, what are they like?" I ask interested as I think for a second about the things I've told Nola but the things she's never mentioned about herself. "Did I ever tell you what it was like for me growing up as a gay woman?" Nola says and I shake my head, and it makes me think for a moment that I've told her many things about myself and my life but she hasn't really told me a single thing, I basically know nothing about her background or her family or friends, and then again I guess I never really asked those type of questions but it just seems a little weird. "No you've never really told me anything about you" I say as I move slightly closer to her on the sofa and notice a few tears forming in her eyes, "I was 14 when I came out to my parents, and my dad was fine with it, he was a little disappointed but to him my life was my life but my mother, well she was a different story. She told me that being gay was sin and unacceptable and that only bad woman are gay, that when people are gay they should be locked up and beaten until the devil leaves their body and they no longer have the urge to be gay. She thought that I was bad. That I was wrong. And she believed so strongly in these views that she kicked me out of the house. She told me to fend for my own and that she wasn't going to associate with any gay person even if that was her own daughter. She wanted nothing from me, to her I was the gay child who completely ruined the family. I was 14 Lucy, 14. A afraid 14 year old girl who didn't understand it, who didn't under why she would be seen as different by someone she thought loved her just because of the way she sexually identifies herself and I didn't understand just how cruel that world is and just how twisted some peoples minds truly are And that was a real awakening for me that I was going to have to work 5 times as hard as everybody else just to get even the slightest bit of the same amount appreciation not just because I am a woman but because I am gay and well completely alone in the world. You know I ended up in a foster home and when I was 18 I left moving to New York because my dad has secretly been sending me money, he wanted to help me because he still loved me but mum wouldn't hear of it so we kept it a secret. But he sent me enough money so much so I could rent a small apartment and get into the New York Police Academy where I found where I belong." She says crying her eyes out as I open my mouth in shock, no woman should ever have to go through an experience like that because of how the sexually identify and you wouldn't think that Nola went through anything like it from the way she behaves and presents herself, she acts like she's a badass but inside I can see it, she's afraid of being truthful because she's afraid of being pushed away, that's not right. "Nola I'm so sorry... I can't imagine what that is like, and I'm sorry that I didn't realise but you know that you can be honest with me don't you? Because no matter what you tell me... i will....I will still... love you" I say admitting out loud and directly to her the face the single thing I've been struggling with now since the moment I first laid eyes on the esteemed Detective Nola Griffin at that crime scene that seems to have changed my life in multiple ways, "I know that and one day I will trust you with everything because keeping it inside is so hard and when I'm struggling with it means im so lonely and I'm so glad I met you and I love you, I love you so much too and I don't want anything to happen to you because I don't think I'd ever be able to deal with that because I love you So much" she says as we kiss once again, before we being to once again make love, rolling over each other as we continue to kiss with a roaring fashion before she removes my top and I remove here's as we run quickly up the stairs jumping on one another as we keep having Sex while going up the stairs. We fall into the door that's leads in Nola bedroom as we fall on top of one another continuing to make love while laying on nolas bed and we kiss more and more, the desire for one another uncaged as it simply gets more passionnante, I've shut down these urges long enough and I can't help but want her, I love her and she loves me, but it doesn't feel as if we can be for the simple reason that we work together and don't want to seem unprofessional due to society's ideas and the troubles both of us have previously faced due to our sexuality and gender. We fall asleep rather quickly each of us rather tired as the general loss of sleep finally catches up to us as we hug warm and close together in the bed. But I have a nightmare, well not a nightmare it's actually a memory, I was a medical examiner and I had been in New York for around 1 year at this point and I was the only medical examiner on call at this time and I don't remember why or where everyone else was but i do remember it being weird. I got called down to the scene of a arson where 3 people died of smoke Inhalation, a family, the mother, father and daughter died and ill never forgot there faces as they flash once again through my mind and remind me of the reality behind the kind of struggles we face, but it was the officer on the scene who greeted me that i was really interested in. He was a white male about 6,3 and looked about 40 maybe reaching 45 and he was the first person to see me and the bodies on the scene. "We extinguished the fire Doctor snow" I remember him saying to me as I remember looking up at the burnt house the smoke still rising but the fire out, "so we dealt with smoke and glory and all today" the man said and I wake up throwing myself up in nolas bed upon realising it, I knew I had heard it before, smoke and glory and all, and I couldn't remember where but now I do, he was an officer could that man be the killer, I don't remember his name but his face now imprinted on my mind is one I won't be able to forget as I grab a piece of paper from Nola's dressing table as I turn on a light and using the best of pretty awful drawing skills I draw his face, "hey what you doing it's 1am in the morning" Nola asks sitting up, I'm assuming awoken by the bright light of the bedside lamp that I've switched on in order to see what I'm doing. "I just had a nightmare well a memory flashback thingy and you remember how the killer said smoke and glory and all to me on one of those calls I recognised that line and I thought that I had heard it before and now I remember where I heard it before and who said it to me I was at a crime scene and it was this man, this police officer or detective, and i know this sounds weird but in my gut I know that this is him, this is the killer." I say as detective griffin looks at me in shock as she looks at the image I've drawn and you can see a face but we will either need an actually professional sketch artist to draw it or we will need to run one hell of a lot of faucial recognition softwares in order to tell who this man is and if it's possible that he may be the killer. "We can look through the PDOAPO and see if this image matches any of them." She says refusing to the Police Database Of All Police Officers that is used to identify all police officers that have been or still are in the force. We scroll through on Nola's laptop, both of us not wearing anything too excited over this sudden lead to bother redressing unless we find something worth while then of which we will get as much attention as possible for a potential answer to find anything about whoever this may be. And we can't find anything and are getting to the point of considering to give up, I start to believe that maybe I am going mad desperate for a answer into the killer and I'm just scrambling at straws when we see it. It looks exactly like him. The picture of an officer as we read through it, "Detective Micheal Thames who was dishonourably discharged for and wait for It brutalising a woman one a night out when high on meth, sadly that's all there is but that sounds like it could be our killer" Nola says and I look at it, the image of the person with deep eyes that are staring back at us as we breathe a sigh. "Hey wait there's a last known address there" I say pointing out something written in a little box, 44 Nughmalli street, "we have to get there and we have to get there now" she says and I nod my head taking one more look at the person, Micheal Thames... are you truly the killer?