"I made a rookie mistake and ruined two lives because of it. It most definitely is my fault." Time hasn't been as kind to her as it might have been.
Firstly, this takes place many years in the future, when Sammy is way out of high school. I honestly don't think it likely that Sammy and Casey would stay together, and I like to speculate on where her life, both professional and romantic, could go.
I'm writing this as a oneshot, because I have a tendency to not follow through with my stories. Depending on how people feel about this, I might write a companion story, but won't post until the whole thing is written.
My OC is inspired by Rick Castle, who's totally fabulous. I named him Vince Rasdell, because my cousin (family friend, but whatever) was just in the musical Motel Rasdell, I was too tired to think of anything much more creative, and I thought it sounded cool. This story isn't quite romance, but if you squint hard enough it is.
I don't own Sammy Keyes. Obviously.
Rated T for language, and mentions of violent events that may be distressing to younger readers
He's an asshole screenwriter who really doesn't know jack about the Police world. But times like this, times when he acts more than a little bit human, it takes a little too much willpower to stop myself from maybe, just maybe, falling a little bit in love with him.
He notices things, things other people don't, things I'm damn glad other people don't.
"You hesitated," he had said. That was it, two words, two words and four solid seconds of eye contact. Eye contact that I really couldn't break until my partner had to talk to me.
Sitting at my desk that night, I wasn't all that surprised when I head him pull his chair over to me. By this time it was only us in the precinct, me filling out paperwork, him brainstorming what to include in his next episode.
"You hesitated today," he said, "I saw you hesitate, don't deny it." I shot him an incredulous look from my pile of forms.
"Yeah, so I could avoid doing all of this," I said, gesturing to the paper on my desk. "You've seen too many cop shows. Just putting a hand on my gun is two hours of paperwork," let it be enough. He cast me a serious look, something rather unusual for him.
"You've pulled your gun before, for situations much less desperate. I've seen you," he said, voice even and calm. Setting down my pen, I looked at him.
"Why do you want to know?'' I said bitterly.
"This is staying out of the script," he said honestly, and continued slowly "I just want to know, you don't have to tell me, but I just want to know."
I took a few moments to decide, and finally, stupidly, broke down and told him. Rasdell had a weird effect on people, he made them want to talk to them. It tended to be pretty damn infuriating. Turning my chair to face him, I looked at him quietly then averted my eyes.
"I'm from a small town. It wasn't the best, not many good neighborhoods, not the best schools, and not that many opportunities. As a cop, our interesting days were the drug busts. As a homicide detective, it was hit and runs. And one day, a case file got thrown across my desk, it was one of those cases no one wanted, and shoved to the rookie. But it was big," I paused for a moment, thinking back to all those years ago.
"How big?" he asked. Looking up at him, I sighed and said,
"Big enough for the LAPD to notice. They called me, after it made the news. And offered me a job there. I accepted." pursing my lips, I continued, "Two months into the job, I'd solved 6 murder cases, and was still the 'rookie from nowhere,' and I had the stupid urge to prove myself to them. Pride's a bitch, you know?" I added as an after thought. After a few moments of silence, he asked the inevitable,
"What happened?"
"A case got thrown across my desk again. And I thought, 'this is it, this is the case that will get them to accept me,' and it did. Just not the way I would have liked," wetting my lips, I looked up at him, "Her name was Eve Sullivan, the wife of Robert Sullivan and mother of nine year old Tommy Sullivan. She was found strangled with one of her own scarves in her room while her husband and son were out,
"In cases like these, the husband is usually the first and the last person we investigate, but we found out that she had a lover early on in the investigation. Every shred of evidence we found pointed to him. A half-empty coffee cup with his prints. Her wedding ring missing. No solid alibi. It seemed open and shut," I paused again.
"However.." he hinted.
"There were... discrepancies. Things we missed. Things I missed. The coffee cup was a few days old. Little things, minor things, things that just didn't add up. But I was so desperate, so desperate for them to see me as more than the small-town cop, that I ignored it, and went after him. He pulled a gun, when we got to his apartment, I didn't want to, I really didn't want to, but I had to shoot him. It was him or me, and I acted without thinking.
"We found out, two days later, that it was the husband. He managed to sneak out of his office, via fire escape, and get into his apartment, again, via fire escape.
"Sam..." I looked up, he never used my first name, "You can't possibly blame yourself for that."
"I can, actually. I made a rookie mistake, I rushed the investigation, and I ruined two lives because of it. The son, Tommy, doesn't have any living relatives, he's going to spend the rest of his childhood being bounced around in the system. I know the system, I've seen to much of it in this job, it isn't pretty.
"That boy lost two parents, and an innocent man lost his life, because I had to prove myself. Today, when we corned that guy, the expression on his face... it mirrored his, exactly. They even looked similar."
"I've spent years going over it in my mind, what I could have done to change it. I still come up with something new at least once a month."
As an after thought, I added, "I suppose this adds some new depth to your character." He looked at me gently, and said,
"I meant what I said. This won't be appearing in the script, Keyes," before rising from his chair, grabbing his coat, and turning towards the door.
"Rasdell," I choked out.
"Yeah?" he said, turning to face me.
"Thank you," I let a small smile cross my face, before turning
Written while listening to:
Wild and Untamed thing from Rocky Horror Picture show
Ghost Ship by Neverending white lights
Still by Daughter
I will Follow you into the Dark by death Cab for Cutie
Just in case you wondered why this was so weird.