It's when he sees Crosetti and Felton sitting there that he realizes for the first time that he's actually gone. That he's neither murder police nor politician, neither lieutenant nor respected friend. The room he's just entered resembles the squad room somewhat…the break room part of it. There's the same old coffee machine, the same television, refrigerator…it is as he's never left. But he has.
He lost Felton and Crosetti years ago. But he never forgot them. Never forgot the sight of Frank Pembleton standing on the headquarters steps in his dress uniform when the brass refused Crosetti an honor guard. Never forgot the stunned look on Kay Howard's face when she found out that her partner had been brutally murdered, the angry looks the entire squad had given Paul Falsone when he first showed up, making accusations.
No, he has not forgotten. And he doubts that he ever will, even now. Felton and Crosetti notice him, and motion for him to join them. So he does, sitting in one of the two empty chairs that are left around the table. They're playing cards. Both of them look happy. He wonders if he looks the same way. After all, the horrors they all saw over their years serving as members of Baltimore's police department have gone away. They'll never have to see them again. Part of him is relieved. The other part of him wants to go back in time.
The empty chair is bothering him. So he turns, so that he is facing both of his detectives at once, and ask. The two of them exchange glances and then shrug before answering. They don't know, they say, who the last chair belongs to. They didn't even know who the chair that he's now sitting in belonged to, until he showed up. He mulls this over for a long moment before returning to the card game, knowing that it is one of those things that they'll never figure out.
One of those things to which, like so many of their cases, the answers to questions asked will always be unknown.