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    One for the Road
    One for the Road
    One for the Road
    Ebook111 pages1 hour

    One for the Road

    By Diem Burden

    ()

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    About this ebook

    Having completed his initial training, rookie cop PC 424 Burden has been authorised for solo patrol, and nervously takes to the streets of the beautiful university city of Cambridge, to learn how to police the streets alone, to arrest crooks and to try and make his mark, often with hilarious, sometimes terrifying and occasionally heart-breaking results.

    ONE FOR THE ROAD shows you the highs and lows of patrolling Britain's unpredictable streets, in a short, yet entertaining, read.

    Warning: Contains strong language and graphic descriptions of death and injury. Naturally ...

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherDiem Burden
    Release dateJul 19, 2014
    ISBN9781311994172
    One for the Road
    Author

    Diem Burden

    Award-winning author Diem Burden (DM Burden) grew up the middle of five sons to a working class family in the north Midlands, UK. Childhood was extremely hard and money was scarce.From an early age, he showed an artistic talent in painting and drawing, so much so that one of his drawings mysteriously disappeared from his school foyer (last seen at the home of a teacher, allegedly...)Destined for art college, Diem grew so frustrated with further education that one day he got up and walked out of college, and joined the army for six years. After his military service, he became a police officer in Cambridge, UK. He left that job as a sergeant after 12 years walking the beat.By then, he was on his second marriage, and moved to Spain to teach English in 2002. He helped to set up a highly successful language school in Spain before semi-retiring in 2020 to focus on his new passion: writing.He published five short stories of his time as a cop in Cambridge, and wrote an additional (free) ebook available to people who sign up to his newsletter, which is a humorous look at his tough childhood, and perhaps implies he should never have become a cop all those years later!At the end of the year of Covid (2020), his life was rocked when he suddenly lost his eldest brother to cancer. His marriage ended at the same time and he found himself alone in Spain at 55 years of age.Over the next six months, Diem fell into a deep and dark depression, struggling to get out of bed most days. He just opted out of life, giving up on writing altogether.In mid-2021, a stranger walked into his local café and led him on a three-month journey he could never have expected: the ardent and highly opinionated atheist subsequently found Jesus, who changed his life around instantly.The story of that miracle is told in his book, Come to the Table.Now, unless God has any other plans for him, he is finishing his series of books (Get up and Walk) of his pilgrimage along the Camino de Santiago in Spain, walking each stage with a different action plan with God.

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      Book preview

      One for the Road - Diem Burden

      ONE FOR THE ROAD

      Part three of

      THE ROZZERS

      By Diem Burden

      LEGAL

      Published by Shriven Books

      Copyright 2014 © Diem Burden

      Copy-edited by Jan Marshall

      Cover design © Jan Marshall

      Background: © Peter Clark | Dreamstime.com

      Police Officer/uniform part 1: © Viorel Sima | Dreamstime.com

      Police Officer/uniform part 2: © Camrocker | Dreamstime.com

      Smashwords Edition

      All rights reserved worldwide. No part of this document may be reproduced or transmitted in any form, by any means (electronic, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior written permission of the author.

      DISCLAIMER

      This short story is based, in part, upon actual events and persons. I have tried to recreate events, locales and conversations from my memories of them. In order to maintain their anonymity in all instances, I have changed the names of individuals and places. I may have changed some identifying characteristics and details such as physical properties, occupations and places of residence, as well as other descriptive details. Some of the events and characters are also composites of several individual events or persons.

      DEDICATION

      This book is dedicated to each and every one of you who has single-handedly confronted a hardened criminal in the act of wrongdoing, despite your fears.

      You did what you did because you knew it was the right thing to do.

      ALSO BY DIEM BURDEN

      End of the Road

      Part one of

      THE ROZZERS

      FREE!

      "Such a well written short … I wished it wouldn’t end … I’m happy to support such a wonderful writer. I hope the next few books or shorts are as great!" Vinny Vino

      "I was right to pick this well-written, short read, the author made the story come alive and left me wanting more." Nutty Helen

      "This was just a great short story. The biography of the author [on Amazon] is funny too … [the story] is well-written and just flies along. It’s gritty and graphic and will make your heart pound. I can’t wait to see what is next." Dara Kovachev

      Cops Don’t Run

      Part two of

      THE ROZZERS

      0.99 (+ taxes)

      "Brilliant. This is the second in what promises to be a great series of short stories based on the author’s time as a police officer. This instalment details his experiences whilst going through training both at training school and out on the beat, learning from real incidents. Some of these are very funny and some incredibly sad. A true reflection of a copper’s rollercoaster day. I highly recommend this if you are in any way interested in the police." Si 1790

      "…Like the first, it has been well written, with humour. A true reflection of the majority of policemen who work hard with, in my opinion, very little thanks …" Nutty Helen

      TABLE OF CONTENTS

      Title page

      Legal

      Dedication

      Also by Diem

      Chapter 1

      Chapter 2

      Chapter 3

      Chapter 4

      Chapter 5

      Chapter 6

      Chapter 7

      Chapter 8

      Chapter 9

      Chapter 10

      Chapter 11

      Thief Taker

      About the Author

      Acknowledgements

      CHAPTER ONE

      Being a new cop in a new city makes you doubly disadvantaged. Not only do you have to quickly learn the street craft needed to survive as a uniformed cop out on Britain’s violent streets, but you also have to learn to find your way around unaided. Unfortunately, patrolling on foot in police uniform whilst completely alone means there is far more urgency in learning the names of the roads than there is for the numerous tourists ambling around Cambridge. After all, they could just ask a policeman. But who can a cop ask?

      The street called Parkside was easy enough for me to remember. Not only was it the name of the road that I was walking along but it was also the name of the police station: that’s how I remembered it so easily. Parkside Police Station was on Parkside – I got that.

      At the end of Parkside I stopped dead. Parkside had finished and I was now standing in another street and I had no idea of the name of it. It was unlikely, but if I had needed help at that moment in time I wouldn’t have been able to state where I was. There was only one thing I could do: I walked back along Parkside searching for a street sign. Yes, I had a map in my pocket but one of the reasons I didn’t want to walk along the road staring at a map is that it doesn’t really fill the public with much confidence. Secondly, there was only one way to learn every street name in a city and that was to commit them to memory: maps just made you lazy.

      Drummer Street. I continued to walk along Drummer Street repeating the name aloud. I noticed the bus station that I had failed to direct a member of the public to during my first exhilarating venture outside in uniform.

      At the end of Drummer Street came another junction. I looked for a street name, found it and walked along the street, repeating the name over and over. I continued with this odd behaviour until I found myself in the centre of town on Market Hill. That was easy to remember: it was where the daily market was held, although – bizarrely – it lacked any evidence of a hill, not even the hint of a slight gradient.

      That walk, despite being no more than three hundred yards long, had been quite momentous for me. I was in police uniform and, for the first time since joining the police, I was patrolling alone. I’d just walked from the relative safety of the police station to the heart of the troubles. If anything happened in front of me or if somebody needed help, I’d be expected to deal with it and to deal with it professionally and without any guidance.

      I needed to catch my breath so I stepped into the shadows of the empty market stalls, becoming instantly invisible in my black uniform. There, I no longer felt every pair of eyes on me and I even managed to relax slightly.

      It was 11.30pm on a busy Friday night and every pub in Cambridge was in the process of turfing out thousands of drunken revellers onto the streets. Back then, all pubs had to do this at that time. Whose idea was that? The place where I was would soon be thronging with people out to fill their bellies at the numerous fast food outlets in and around the square, before heading off home alone to sleep off their excesses.

      On my way into town I’d noticed how small groups of drunks would suddenly become quiet once they’d seen my uniform walking towards them. It left me in no doubt that a visible police presence had an effect on the behaviour of late-night revellers. However, from my shadowy position, I was able to see the world behaving as if there were no cops around at all.

      A noisy group of men were approaching my hidden position from an adjoining street, maybe six in total, late-teens and clearly drunk. One was kicking a traffic cone along the road like a football. I could see them but of course they couldn’t see me.

      I stepped out of the shadows, appearing before them like some dark apparition. To say they were surprised was an understatement. The cone-kicker immediately forgot all about the cone and put his hands in his pockets and his head down, walking on as if nothing was amiss.

      A word, please, I said, in my best authoritative voice.

      Um, yeah, sorry, he said. The cone. I’ll put it back. His accent told me he

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