The Passenger - Part 1

Another one of my 365 stories, this is the serial of The Passenger. Again, as with all my stories, I rarely have time to edit so it's more the content and style that I'd love criticism on....



I have a headache. Does that excuse me? Part 2 and 3 will be better, I promise. And longer.



Word count: 691



A fine fog of tobacco was simmering in the cold, dully lit interview room. There was a tender atmosphere as the two detectives flipped out their notepads whilst their pens remained motionless. They were both witnessing an uncomfortable waterfall of emotion splurging forth from the blond, blue eyed girl that sat on the other side of the desk to them. DI Walkers tapped the ashes from his cigarette. DI Fitch inhaled his.



Kate was desperately trying to exhale over all the tears spewing from her eyes. She was dabbing a tissue delicately to her lashes, panicking that her mascara might have bled. Her face was red and blotchy and a shadow of the former beauty she’d been about sixteen hours previously.



It was now four in the morning. Kate hadn’t slept and she had barely eaten. The two detectives were eyeing her up cats at a fish bowl. It was some minutes before either one of them broke the awkward emotional stand-off.



“So let’s start with what you know…” DI Walker began, extracting another cigarette from his inside pocket.



“I – I – I don’t know what happened…. I don’t remember anything…”



“Nothing?” DI Fitch leaned in, skeptically.



Kate surpressed a series of blubbers and whimpers to stare at her detectives as if they were the barrels of a shotgun before saying quite calmly, “It’s all a blur, sir…”



Nineteen hours earlier…..



The city centre. There was a nine o’clock in the morning buzz about the town. Flocks of commuters were pouring from the nearby subway station, all frantically fearing their bosses wrath at being a few minutes late and quickly engineering several plausible excuses for that extra long lie they’d snuck in to their morning routine. Across the street from the subway, the shops were opening their doors to the morning’s early shoppers; taxi’s skidded to abrupt halts to pick up passengers and tear off down the street after a speedy bonus.



“I’ll see you later tonight,” he kissed her on the cheek and smiled longingly back in through the passenger window as he slammed the car door shut.



Kate was dropping off her husband to work and was now setting about her ways to make her own path to the office. She turned the rearview mirror towards her and checked her makeup was perfect.



“Argh,” she exclaimed, seeing a small spec of stray mascara on her cheek. She leaned in closer to inspect.



The passenger door opened again and someone got in.



“Hi honey,” she said absent mindedly.



“Drive.”



The voice was not her husband’s.



Kate jumped back when she saw the strange man sitting beside her, quite relaxed.



“Excuse me?”



“I said drive! Go, go, go! We haven’t got all!”



His hair was wild – he was probably homeless, though his clothes seemed washed and void of lice.



“Who the – who are you? Get out of my car!”



“Yo, lady – just drive!” he was looking shiftily behind him, “Now!”



“No! Get out! I’ll call the police!”



“That’s lovely dear, but just hit the accelerator first, please?”



Kate grabbed her handbag and started to beat him, “Get – out – of – my – car!”



But he quickly flipped her wrist over and flicked her handbag clean out of her grip, “Just – drive – now!”



He whipped something silver out from his jean pocket. Kate panicked. She froze. She was being hijacked. She was going to die. It was all over. Age twenty nine and this was it.



“Please don’t kill me!”



“Kill you, I just want you to – drive!” he threw a leg over to her side and slammed his foot on her accelerator for her.



They were thrown backwards at the acceleration and all that remained of their presence on the side of the road was Kate’s lingering scream.



4.03AM



Kate was still maintaining her Old Western Sundance stare at the two cops who were now rapidly remembering their psychology lessons. Her blond locks were fraudulent. She leant in towards them slightly, stretching the tightness of her pencil skirt, and reached for yet another tissue on the desk.



“Unfortunately,” she dabbed the tissue to her cheeks, “I have no memory of the robbery at all…”