Note: Six people are playing a fanfic version of MFMM Cluedo. Murdoch Foyle has been murdered in Miss Fisher's House. We must discover the name of the murderer, the weapon and in which room the murder was committed. Every player must 'investigate' by writing a fic (100-1000 words). Each round, more and more clues can be crossed off their list. The first person to solve the mystery will write the story of Foyle's death and earn great praise for their cleverness. If you would like to play your own game please PM GameMaster19 for the rules and instructions.
HEY ALL! This is a much more serious fic than the last one I wrote. Honestly, it's been in my head exactly like this for months, but the prompt gave me an excuse to write it. Reviews would be appreciated, as always. Be gentle.
Jack Robinson had missed dinner again. In the five or so years since the war, he'd done that with increasing frequency. There were always more criminals to lock up, more paperwork to do, and more excuses to avoid the battleground his home had become.
The house was dark as Jack cracked the door and slid inside. He hoped Rosie had gone to bed. She would have locked herself into the master bedroom as an angry gesture, but Jack slept in the spare room anyway, if he came home at all. Jack preferred his wife pretending he didn't exist to the shouting that ensued when she acknowledged his presence.
As Jack threw the bolt, the light in the entryway clicked on. Rosie stood there with one fist on her hip, still fully dressed in an elaborate maroon evening gown, despite the hour.
"We missed you at dinner," she said, voice deadly quiet.
"I was caught up at the station," Jack said. He had been, but he wished he'd thought of another excuse. That one was brittle with overuse.
"You must be overworked. Father tells me you didn't even turn in your application for promotion. No time for that either?"
Turning away from Rosie, Jack hung his hat and coat carefully, as his revolver was still in his pocket. His eyes caught on the packed suitcase that had lived in their entry since their last big row.
"I came straight from a raid," Jack said, ignoring the barb.
"Luckily, I convinced father to wait for your application," Rosie said, ignoring that he'd ignored her mention of the promotion.
Jack looked back at his wife. She was statuesque in the light of the single overhead fixture, her features stark and twisted with bitterness. Jack could hardly believe it now, but thoughts of Rosie's warm arms had once sustained him, through years of mud and blood. He wondered if her embrace had gone cold in his absence, or if he'd brought the ice back with him.
Rosie's foot began to tap.
"I don't want a promotion," Jack said.
"Why?" Rosie snapped.
It was too much effort, all of it. Jack didn't have the energy for a politically motivated position or for a fight with Rosie about it. He didn't even have enough to attempt an explanation. Rosie wouldn't understand anyway and it would end in an argument, as all their conversations did these days.
"I like the job I have," Jack said lamely, but it was true. He liked crime solving. Seeing the hidden patterns beneath the obvious gave him a glimmer of satisfaction. He especially liked that the world more or less left him alone with his puzzles.
"You'll never support a family on your salary," Rosie said with forced calm.
Jack didn't point out that starting a family would require Rosie to come closer to him than the ten pace minimum distance she'd adopted. She would say she was waiting for him to provide a more secure future for them. Jack didn't really want to try, anyway. He'd rather sleep alone, forgoing intimacy entirely, than have an unwilling partner.
Some of what Jack was thinking must have shown on his face. Rosie's lip curled up, disgust radiating off her in waves.
"I don't know you anymore," Rose said in a tone that indicated she didn't like what she did know.
I don't know you anymore, either. That was Jack's line in this escalating drama. But Rosie was exactly the same as ever. It had once been a comfort to him; he'd clung to her sameness when his world was turned upside down and then shaken. In some ways, Rosie was the only thing he still knew. So he didn't say otherwise. He didn't say anything at all.
Rosie snorted. Jack half expected her to spit on the floor in revulsion. Instead, she brushed passed him to where his coat hung. She rooted around in his pockets and stepped away with his revolver in her hands. Interesting, Jack thought. I seem to have underestimated the dire importance of dinner parties.
Jack met his wife's eyes. The scorn there was familiar as her face, and an echo of the scorn he felt for himself, when he felt anything at all.
"If you weren't going to come home to our life together, you shouldn't have returned at all," she said. She offered the gun to Jack grip first. He reached for it slowly. His arms suddenly felt very heavy, as if he were swimming through mud. Rosie jammed the revolver into his hands.
Jack was vaguely aware that his wife had collected her suitcase and left, the slamming of the door echoing through the empty house. He stared down at the gun.
The metal was cold, dark in the poor light. Jack popped open the barrel and checked the bullets, but it was an empty gesture. He knew it was fully loaded. With a click, he readied it again. Jack slid his fingers into place around the grip, as comfortable as an old friend's handshake.
The telephone began to ring, but it stopped eventually. Jack didn't look up from his contemplation of the revolver. Jack hadn't needed Rosie to tell him he should have died, like so many of his mates. It didn't seem fair that he had survived, not fair to them or to him.
The telephone rang again. Jack frowned. The station would be in an uproar; the raid had raised more questions than it had answered.
Forcing air into his lungs, Jack returned his revolver to the pocket of his coat and went to answer the telephone. He had mountains of paperwork to do and half a dozen new cases to solve. The world wasn't fair, but he did what he could to change it.