Chapter 8

She was a careful and thoughtful driver, Jim instantly felt safe, and after about ten minutes he felt himself drift off to sleep.

He was lying in bed, something he hadn't had the chance to do in a while. He could smell toast and bacon. He felt happy, not happy in his usual sense of happy, meaning he hadn't made anyone cry. He felt genuine happiness and stretched lazily and pulled himself out of bed. He suddenly became aware he wasn't in his usual t-shirt and PJ bottoms, he was just in his boxers, this dream world Jim didn't seem bothered by this at all and walked into the kitchen bright with morning sunshine streaming through the window.

Dream world Jim walks up to the counter, and wraps his arms around something. A gentle giggle comes from in front of him.

The room turns so Jim could see what's happening.

He was holding Lucy close to him, her wearing his shirt, she stands on her tiptoes to wrap her arms around him and they laugh some more. He kisses her cheek and she returns by kissing his lips.

Jim wakes up with a start banging his head on the roof of the car. He feels himself blushing. The car brakes suddenly.

"Bloody hell! Are you alright?"

He struggles to get his breath back and watches her lips move as she talks,

"I just kissed them" was all he could think of "Jim!" He shakes his head. "Sorry, strange dream freaked me out" he looks out of the window. "Oh, its just here. If you could just park in the car park over there?"

He points to a bleak looking stretch of tarmac where about five other cars were parked. After parking she gets out the car and passes him the keys.

"I saw a taxi firm just down there, so, I'll be seeing you tomorrow." She smiles

"Don't you want a cup of coffee or anything?" immediately regretting how that sounded "I don't mean like that!"

"Bye Jim. Do yourself a favour and get some rest."

As he begins the long walk upstairs to his flat (the lifts broken down) he shakes his head angrily. "Coffee? You asked her if she wanted coffee. You absolute idiot. I hope you realise She's never going to look at you again."

He fumbles for his key and opens the front door, walks to the front room, then to the kitchen, where the image from his dream flashed into his head.

He looks at the dusty flat, littered with note paper, empty take away boxes and wine glasses. He takes off his coat and jacket, rolls up his sleeves and begins to tidy up for the first time in weeks.

Meanwhile back at the office Gene and the rest of the team had finished their lunch. Lucy was two hours late and Gene wasn't impressed.

"And where the bloody hell have you been?"

"Sorry Guv."

"Is that it? Sorry? You might be new here but we've got a case to close tomorrow. This has been dragging on too long and I need everyone on their game, and I need my senior officers to respect my rules. Understand Ginge?"

"I said I'm sorry OK! And don't call me that, surely you could come up with something slightly more imaginative?"

Gene looks impressed by this sudden outburst. "Not so meek and mild then. Good. Get cracking then, You've got two hours to catch up on."

She sits idly flicking through the paperwork on her desk, and her mind drifted off, she had the first chance all day to think about what had happened.

"Me and Mark, had a row, he mocked me, called me inadequate. I broke it off. We got called to a Car bomb, it was a ford Mondeo, wanted to prove Mark wrong. It went off before I could cut the chord. Now I'm here. I must be dead surely."

Gene looks up at her seriously, she catches his gaze and shakes her head softly

"No, no heaven would have someone as pig headed as him in it. So it's a dream world, this is just my minds way of occupying itself"