Clouded Rainbow

by Jonathan Sturak

While Roger had embarked on the most disheartening journey of his life, Lois remained comatose inside her secluded hospital room. Although she lay physically inside the confined room filled with the sound of electronic beeps and scheduled blood pressure pumps, she was actually far, far away. Her mind did not think; it did not react; it did not dream. It was simply dark, but not like the darkness of a cloud-covered night or a lightless room. It was more like the darkness of a bottomless hole, deep in the void of a distant part of the universe where all minds traveled when the lights had gone out.

  The door screeched open, adding a new noise to the rhythmic chamber.

  “Here she is, sir,” the soft voice of Nurse Ann said.

  The floor was polished in a high-gloss and, since this particular patient didn’t receive any visitors, it remained that way. Nurse Ann’s dainty, size six shoes walked into the room, but she was not alone. Behind her reflected a pair of black dress shoes worn by only a man’s man. Black dress slacks flowed over the polished shoes and swooshed with each cool glide of the man’s step. Hanging at his knees, the bottom of a matching black trench coat encircled the rest of the man’s outfit like a shield of styled fabric. Above the shoulders of the coat was the handsome face of Detective Ray Cleveland. He was a striking man, aged gracefully to the prime number of forty-three. Slick black hair covered the top of his dark-featured face, and his green eyes expressed a certain air of power. He was the top detective in his precinct and received more than ten awards of law enforcement excellence handed out personally by the city’s mayor. This man knew he wanted to be an officer of law the first moment he could read his father’s badge. He knew the career path for him was a detective, a solitary position that required hours of isolation, meticulous investigation, and an intelligent mind. A run-and-gun street cop or paper pusher was definitely not Det. Cleveland’s style. He worked alone and preferred to solve a case in his mind first, and then call the cavalry to do the grunt work. He was an Ivy League graduate in the top five percent of his graduating class of Engineering Science majors at the University of Pennsylvania. The detective joined his city’s police force following the footsteps of his father and grandfather. He quickly rose to the top of his class at the police academy as his sharp intellectual ability immediately presented itself to his instructors. Det. Cleveland had a logical, mathematical mind and solved his cases by deducing the truth from the facts presented. He didn’t believe in magic or the paranormal and knew that every crime had a criminal. The one thing that would always be ingrained in his mind, spoken from his father on his deathbed, was never to get personal with the case. He was adamant about not mixing emotion with commotion and had said, “Think of a case as an engineering problem and all of the variables involved. The wife of the dead husband or the mother of the slain child was just part of the equation.” Det. Cleveland kept these words at the front of his mind, but he really didn’t need to think about them. They were now instinct, permanently part of his toolbox.

  Det. Cleveland was assigned to the “Jane Doe” case, one of many that stemmed from last night’s horrific accident. He was at the stage in his career where he could pick and choose the cases he worked on, as his captain gave him that luxury. The case of an unknown person was always a mystery to the detective. Some may say it was part of his ego, but he enjoyed the challenge of finding out the identity of someone no one else could figure out. When he had received the details of the case, the first logical stop was to visit the nameless woman.

  Nurse Ann took to Detective Cleveland as soon as he had phoned that he was on his way. She wanted to do whatever she could to help this helpless woman. Nurse Ann found it particularly troubling that someone out there was looking for the fallen angel, and the compassionate nurse had no idea of the emotion consuming that lost individual.

  As Det. Cleveland followed Nurse Ann into Lois’ room, he filled it with confidence and decisiveness. Nurse Ann sensed it from the moment he had stepped off the elevator and asked for her by name. She could tell that he was a genuine man deep down and one that acted with respect and never arrogance. All her subordinate nurses were female and envious of Nurse Ann assisting handsome police officers during an investigation. Then again, they seemed to warm up to anyone whose masculine cologne tickled their senses.

  Det. Cleveland held a notepad and pen as he prepared to takes notes from his commencing investigation. He was old school with certain things. While he used a modern cell phone and laptop to assist his work, he reverted to good old fashioned ink on paper instead of a sometimes-unreliable Personal Digital Assistant. As he walked to Lois’ side, his first request was not to look at her unconsciousness body, but her personal belongings retrieved with her lifeless frame. Nurse Ann’s quick steps, however, were tough to persuade as he followed the nurse to the woman they knew only as Jane Doe.

  “She arrived in the E.R. last night badly injured from the crash on the bridge. It was about ten o’clock. The interesting thing is we don’t know who she is. No identification. She was pulled out of the water. Must have been thrown over the bridge from impact,” Nurse Ann explained as the detective gravitated to her side.

  Her last words made her quiver, as startling flashes of speculative terror on the bridge filled her mind. Det. Cleveland remained detached and aloof. He jotted some keywords down in his notepad, “E.R. ten o’clock” and “No identification.” He underlined the latter because it was a troublesome fact of the case. He momentarily pondered his ability to solve the case, but images of his many detective awards quickly reassured him.

  If I can solve a missing child’s case, surely I can figure out who this woman is and where she belongs, he reasoned.

  Confidence was the number one asset any good detective needed and Det. Cleveland was full of it, but in a pure, respectful way—never to the point of pretentiousness.

  “What was the subject wearing when you brought her in?” Det. Cleveland asked.

  “Just what was left of her black dress. We have it with her personal items…” Nurse Ann responded, but ended the sentence short. She tried to think if Jane Doe had arrived with anything as most unknown patients were admitted with at least some identifiable items—usually enough to jumpstart a pursuing officer. However, she realized this sleeping woman entered the hospital with nothing—as if she were from an unknown world.

  Nurse Ann finished her sentence, “…actually that’s all we have for her. She had nothing else on her.”

  Det. Cleveland lifted his pen, as he had nothing to write down. He hoped the dainty nurse would’ve said that Jane Doe arrived with a purse filled with unique perfume, a movie ticket stub, or even a dry cleaning receipt. Unfortunately, she didn’t mention any such items that could possibly have shed light on the dark situation. Det. Cleveland tried to turn the bad news around and use the lack of clues as a clue itself.

  “Hmm, must have been at a party…or nice restaurant for dinner. She probably was with a date,” he deduced aloud.

  Det. Cleveland took another moment to formulate his thoughts. “A fancy dress would certainly not have pockets, which therefore only allowed a handbag for her personal belongings,” he added.

  With the jarring accident on the bridge, who knew where the small item was in the rubbish or even the water? The one thing his gut told him was that she was most likely not alone in the traveling car, as her slimming dress would most probably be to delight the senses of a date. With statistics in favor of a heterosexual relationship, he calculated the person accompanying her was male, a boyfriend or husband, and this person was most likely her chauffeur. This was his first piece to the freshly cut jigsaw puzzle.

  “Okay, thank you for the information. I have enough for some leads,” he said.

  Det. Cleveland jotted down some of his conjectures into his notepad as Nurse Ann focused on Lois. She took her warm hand and compassionately caressed the skin of Lois’ cheek. It was cold at first, but the heat from Nurse Ann quickly heated the spot. Det. Cleveland clicked his pen and put his notepad and writing u
tensil into his trench coat. He knew that Nurse Ann was having a moment, and he didn’t want to make eye contact. In fact, he couldn’t because he knew that keeping the nameless woman a variable in the overall equation was the best way to maintain his success at detecting. Having no emotional involvement would be the best approach to solving the case, and he knew this was going to be a much harder one to crack. This mentality kept the brazen man fresh and probably explained why he rarely had any time to date, let alone find someone who could put up with his particular way of thinking.

  Nurse Ann didn’t let up from her empathy, which made Det. Cleveland uncomfortable. He wanted to end the conversation, but was respectful enough not to simply walk away. He knew he had to say something.

  “Will the woman be okay?” he finally said, ending the silence.

  “I guess you could say the worst is behind her. She just needs to pull through this coma.”

  Nurse Ann turned as Det. Cleveland grinned at her, not looking at the sleeping beauty. Finally, she led him out of the room as he eagerly followed. They stepped into the hall as the door to Lois’ lair closed, sealing her inside until another visitor.

  “Thank you, again. Please let me know if her status changes. Here is my card with my direct cell number. I hope she awakens to solve this conundrum,” Det. Cleveland said as he handed the nurse his business card.

  Nurse Ann graciously accepted it. She trusted Det. Cleveland even though he showed no emotion, the way one trusted a surgeon to remove a brain tumor.

  A focused man is a man who gets things done, she thought. The thing that needed to be done needed to be done quickly, accurately, and brazenly.

  “You’re welcome, sir. I am the fifth floor head nurse. Please let me know how I can help,” she responded as she offered her hand.

  “I will certainly let you know of any updates,” Det. Cleveland replied cordially.

  Both departed, going separate ways on the floor. A sudden silence engulfed the hallway. Faintly, the sound of Lois’ beating heart resonated through her room’s closed door.

  After a few minutes, Det. Cleveland walked off the busy elevator into the lobby. Thoughts of his best approach to the case were racing through his logical mind. He was trying to sort things out like a computer sorting a jumbled array. Det. Cleveland knew the first step was to check for Jane Doe’s potential mate from the accident. Hopefully, he thought, the man was alive and could shed light on the puzzling situation. Det. Cleveland stopped in the hallway on his way to his parked car. He was anxious to check with his research assistant back at his precinct. The young man’s name was Charlie, and he was a great tool in Det. Cleveland’s toolbox, providing wonders with database query searches and cross-department interviews. When Det. Cleveland tasked Charlie with an action item, the researcher gave his heart to accomplish the task, and above all, was loyal to the venerable detective. Det. Cleveland lived by the adage “actions speak louder than words” and this proved Charlie’s trustworthiness during the early part of their relationship. In the middle of a heated murder investigation, the precinct’s captain grilled the entire office about Det. Cleveland’s methods of interrogating a murder suspect. Det. Cleveland knew the man was the culprit and pressed him during the heated examination. Charlie had been taking notes through the one-way glass and, when asked by the captain, he covered for Det. Cleveland and simply said, “I didn’t see anything against policy.”

  The side hallway was secluded as Det. Cleveland speed dialed Charlie.

  “Yello,” Charlie slanged as he sat at his desk consumed with mountains of paperwork.

  “Hey, Charlie. I stopped by Southern General to follow up on that Jane Doe. She’s still in a coma and unconscious. Uh, can you pull up all cars involved in yesterday’s crash? I’m looking for a man involved. Could be her boyfriend or husband,” the detective asked as he glanced in his notepad.

  The police station buzzed with the evening shift holding down the fort. The night seemed to bring out the worst in a city; the petty criminals, drunks, and hoodlums all crawled out of the woodwork. Being low on the totem pole, Charlie sat near the front of the building, which was a frequently traveled path for entry by the front line police force to the rear of the cramped station. This was where the leadership hung their hats, but even their offices were not much bigger than a poor family’s broom closet.

  Charlie leaned in to the seclusion of his desk and confided, “Actually, we had the strangest thing happen. Saint Peters North had a Roger Belkin who was injured in the crash. He had some pretty bad head trauma. Well apparently, he just got up and walked right out of the hospital, nobody even stopped him. He stole a car from the lot, and was last seen at his home.”

  Det. Cleveland widened his eyes as his heart rate incited.

  “Oh, really. What’s his address?”

  Charlie knew Det. Cleveland was anxious to trek forward on the case. He focused on his computer screen and managed the mouse and keyboard like an artist using a brush and palette to paint his masterpiece. An incident report popped up on the screen with a plethora of investigative data. The title of the screen read “Belkin, Roger – Incident.” Charlie scrolled toward the bottom to find the needle in the haystack.

  “One Thirty Three Dietrich Road,” Charlie replied.

  Det. Cleveland marked the information in his notepad, and then thanked Charlie.

  Just as he was ready to close his phone, Charlie quickly interjected, “Anything for you, man. Mr. Workaholic. We gotta get you out on the town and hit the bar district.”

  The twenty-seven-year-old was always trying to break the focused detective’s seemingly impenetrable shell. Det. Cleveland thought about having a few drinks with Charlie and the crew from time to time. Maybe it would do him good. However, when he had finished a case or even part of a case, something else always arose which kept the detective incapable of finding any time to socialize, even if he contrived this something else.

  “Bye, Charlie,” Det. Cleveland responded as he shook his head smugly.

  “Call if you need anything,” Charlie responded.

  Det. Cleveland closed his cell phone and took a moment to collect his thoughts. He thought about this man named Roger Belkin, a man who just walked out of a hospital and took matters into his own hands to get home.

  Why did he do such a thing? he thought. Was it out of disregard for the law, complete arrogance, or a repercussion from the accident on the Pleasant Place Bridge? Det. Cleveland could not fathom how it must have been to experience the turmoil from the fiery crash last night. He could not answer these questions, even with all of his focused skills as a detective. The next step was clear to him—find the man with some answers.

  I wonder what this Belkin is up to, he pondered before he exited the hospital.

  Chapter 10