Romane & Erzählungen
The End - being unforgiven

Prolouge

I thought my world would break on this one day together. It just seemed to me like that. My heart ached and my legs gave way under me. I felt as if the earth under my feet was pulling away. My voice was gone, and my breath too. The pain in my chest covered me with a bright white light. A strange warmth enveloped my body. At that moment I was able to describe the heat as either wonderful or cruel. It both occurred at the same time.
Even the cold rain, which dripped from the sky on the way down, could not heal the pain. The compassion of Mother Nature moved me nowhere. The only thing that it could have been, is that my hair was wet and stuck in several thick, wet strands of hair on my forehead.
I opened my mouth to say something, but immediately afterwards I gasped for air and held myself by the neck. Where am I at this moment? The pain came infinitely heavy into my heart.
I closed my eyes and tried to ignore everything that was happening around me. The screams, the touch, the pain...

The only thing that helped me was the increasingly warmer feeling of pain in my chest. Perhaps it just seemed to me so, but the warmth ran as thick water over my bare chest.

Chapter I

Slowly I opened my eyes. The heavy feelings in my limbs were still there from yesterday. It took me a while to begin to start thinking again.
The warm and pleasant smell of food came into my nose.

I am able to cook, I knew that, but I was not present in the kitchen at this time. That's why I became aware of something. Who else is here?

My view from the right side of my bed was a chest of drawers with an elegant white vase holding beautiful flowers on top of it. My knowledge about flowers was limited, but even I was able to tell that they were freshly picked. Beside the vase was a picture frame. I could not see the photo, the reflection of sunlight hit the position exactly where the photo was. The reflection of the light went straight into my eyes and I winced.

After rubbing my eyes, I stood up. Even the few steps to the dresser felt hard for me. Small round stars appeared before my eyes when I shut them. Carefully, I took the picture in my hand and looked at it. Again, I rubbed my eyes to remove the rest of the sleep from my eyes.
The picture shows a man about 35 years old, standing next to a woman who was barely older than the man. Between them were two children. The boy was clearly bigger and portrayed a character that had a sense of adventure. The girl next to him seemed rather spoiled and yet lost in their small, safe world.
I did not know this family. Even if I did know them, I could not remember ...
I yawned, hoping it to be the last attempt for today to get rid of the tiredness.
The smell of food brought me back to the question of: who was in the kitchen. Then the question was answered on its own as a young woman's voice came up behind the door and asked: "Are you awake?" I didn´t say a word. Did she know that I was awake or was that a guess? Slowly I walked to the door. I was about to reach for the doorknob to open the door, when I saw what I was wearing. Mainly, nothing! My naked and slightly sweaty torso sparkled because of the sunlight .At least I had a pair of pants on. Inquiring, I looked around the room. "This is not my room." I muttered.

"Hello?" The woman's voice made herself present again. Then the handle moved. The well-formed face of a young brunette appeared in the room. She looked directly at my chest. Being pleased at what she saw, she looked up and smiled at me. "You're awake." She said, not to let the awkward silence continue. I looked down at myself and then to her. She was pretty for her age. Approximately 20 not more ...
"My name is Eva Buckley.", my stomach started to turn as I heard her introduce herself. She smiled, and a series of sparkling white teeth were shown to me. I seemed to apparently show no emotion because her smile immediately disappeared and replaced it with a doubtful expression. "Is everything okay? Are you ill? ", being concerned, she put her small hands on my shoulders.
I shook my head, my neck ached, and with a hoarse voice I reluctantly didn’t want to talk. "Let's go eat." She took my hand and pulled me out of the room. I looked back. Above all, I was still half-naked. "Wait ..." I whispered, but apparently my voice was so quiet that Eva had not heard it. "I found you yesterday on the street. You were quite cold ... " with soft movements, she gave me something warm to eat on a plate and put the plate just in front of me. "You were wounded on the head." To illustrate her words, she pointed to her own forehead. "What happened? “ A questioning look was now directed at me, but it was still hard to say something. I looked at the food on the table and was then asked to sit down.
Eva sat down right in front of me. "The days are getting colder ...“  Eva said to me to make a conversation. I took the fork in my hand and began to eat. “With the colder days, it seems to me that the colder thoughts occurred to the people. Cruel what they do to each other...“ Eva shivered, but she smiled when she caught my eye.
"I am ..." her face was clear when she heard my hoarse voice, "looking for Vin Buckley.” On the inevitable twitching limbs of Eva I registered that she apparently knew Vin Buckley. Clearing my throat, I took another bite in my mouth and looked back at Eva. "My name is Raven Cullarham." I extended my hand, maybe she would tell me more, if I would finally introduce myself properly. "Looking for Vin? Why, what has he done? ", Her eyes betrayed her sheer fear. So she knew that Vin Buckley was many times in court. And I nodded to her resignation, looked into her brown eyes to tell her eventually: "Your brother is wanted for murder. “ Her hands trembled and she literally lost the fork out of her hand. “My brother would not do such things! You cannot assume he would! "I sighed, how can I be able to get some information from her when she is so upset.

I looked at my food and gave thanks, as I left it. Eva seemed to calm down. I had a feeling that she knew where Vin Buckley might be. "I need to know his whereabouts." I advised her with an extravagant movement and stood up. Eva winced again, her wide-open brown eyes looked at me in horror. "I ... I must say that I do not know where he is." I believed her. Her eyes told the truth, and it would be pointless to extort something from her."Can I get my T-shirt?" I asked as my eyes fell on my naked torso. Eva looked at the table and showed me where she had put my things. "Thanks for your help. If you remember more about Vin Buckley ... Let me know. "I pulled on my shirt and turned my collar in front of the mirror, in the room where I had woken up.

I gave her my number and she brought me out of the house. Before I could ask her where I was, Eva had closed the door. Now I am lost on a road, outside a house without any understanding of my whereabouts.
“Well done,  Cullarham."I sighed and then ran off the road heading north; some where there should be a bus stop.
That was very stupid of me, I now realized after half an hour. Suddenly my phone rang, I startled and looked at the flickering screen. "Cullarham here.", A dark and smoky voice talked to me at the other end of the call. The person seemed to cover his mouth to not expose who he was.

 

 

“I´m glad we could find you.”, Mary just smiled and held my hands. I nodded and looked towards the beach.

It was cold and I rubbed my hands. It was strange when I was informed about the death in Miami. It was clear to me. It was a murder. I sighed when Mary started to talk about how the corpse looked like, when they got it out of the water. “What do you think, Mary?” I looked to her and smiled lightly, she looked to the beach and sighed: “Why don’t you think it was suicide?”, her questionable face was depressing. “I have no idea…”

 

It took me a while to wake up. It was early in the night and I tried to gasp for air but it didn’t work, somehow I felt like someone tried to kill me in this moment.

“Damn it…” someone was here! I was shocked and jumped out of my bed, looked around and took a big breath. “Hello? Is anybody there?” I looked around again and subtly I walked out of my room. I reached for my coat on the floor and took the gun out of it. I was severely shocked, too much happened in the last time I was in Miami, too much work for one detective.

 Someone was in my living room.  

The light wasn’t on, but it looked like someone was searching for something…

Who is there? I looked at myself and touched my torso. I didn’t feel well. I started to breathe faster.  

Suddenly everything was quiet. I walked to the door of the living room, carefully I pushed it.

My heart started to beat faster than before. After taking a deep breath I decided to jump as fast as I could into the room and put the light on. As soon as I was in the room, I looked for someone who could have been in this room. But my living room was empty…My window was open and the fresh night air entered the living room. I smiled, somehow I was relieved. Maybe I just pretended to smell something but it smelled like blood. Somehow…

 I went back to my bed, fell on my bed and slept till my doorbell woke me up out of my dream.

When I opened my eyes I felt like I was still asleep. “Let me sleep…holy crap!” I swore. When I reached the door I looked through the peep hole.  A person was standing there with her face to the ground. I recognized that it was a woman. Her body language told me that she had a problem. A brunette, with wide brown eyes. I opened the door when she rang again. I was a nice man; I was nice to everyone but this time god didn´t want me to survive. Somehow I knew this would happen…