Silent Witness belongs to BBC.

Dead for having a heart too big

She was not here anymore. Rational part of me was aware of that. She was gone.

Like so many others.

Most of the people I meet in my everyday life, most of the people whose names I know, are exactly what she is.

Dead.

I keep wondering around empty rooms of our office in the Lyell Centre, imagining her there, sensing her smell, seeing the two of us on every corner. Yes! Right there, if I close my eyes she will be there. Some higher power may choose to work for me just this one time. It will change everything in a nanosecond and when I open my eyes she'll be there. Her eyes, her warm, big, childlike eyes will look at me and I'll know she's fine. Higher power will reverse things, or do whatever needs to be done, so that bullet will never get there. Never. It will go up or down, left or right, it will go wherever it needs to miss her, or she'll move warned by some cosmic justice that will work for me just once.

That scared little girl that shot my Nikki was never raped. She never stole her rapist's gun and ran away in the woods. My Nikki never decided to go and look for her even though it was the middle of the night. Poor girl never got so scared that she shot her in the chest. She was afraid, because she didn't know it was Nikki. My Nikki. Who only wanted to help, to give her whole heart or more if she could. No. The little girl didn't run away leaving my Nikki alone, in agony. Alone in the wood. Alone in the cold and dark.

My Nikki died alone. Just like she lived alone.

Because of me.

I should've been there, I should've taken that bullet for her, I should've at least kept her safe in her last moments.

I should've made sure that she was home now. That she was breathing now. In warm, maybe even reading a bedtime story to our child. My vision is blurred so I move forward.

Another room that smells of her. Sets of cups. My red cup, Nikki's purple cup. I wonder if she'll miss our coffees.

I turn around and see her again. That's her! My heart knows it. That's her holding folders under her arm, but still she manages to carry three cups for all three of us.

I look at my desk, and funny thing… the cup is on my desk.

She knew I'll be late but she made me a coffee and it's waiting for me on my desk. I smile. It's Nikki. My Nikki. God, maybe it's time I let her have the bloody desk!

I inhale deeply, closing my eyes and looking for her smell and the panic rises in my stomach because I can't find her anymore. I have to go; I grab my jacket from the floor, and run out of the lab.

The last look at our office discovers the truth, but I don't let it reach my brain.

No I didn't see empty rooms, only traces on the walls where shelves were, only empty space where the tables were, for a moment I think I saw her earning on the floor, the one that she lost when she was…

in South Africa…

I run away like being chased, like an addict looking for his drug. I need to find her again.

I drive in some delusional state, with only one image in front of my eyes. I have to get there. Soon I do.

I find myself in front of her building.

Yes, it's okay. I can feel her again. I look at that door, a very few people pass in and out as it's late. Every time door opens my whole being puts all of his hope, all of his faith in it being her. But it isn't. Because she is not here anymore.

She's buried deep down, to never see the light of day again.

It's excruciating pain to know what happens when you die. When your body refuses to serve you anymore. It's excruciating to imagine my Nikki, that cold, white, decomposing… My vision blurs again so I do what I do every night.

I take the key out of my pocket; I take the bottle from my backseat.

I enter her apartment slowly, quietly, as not wanting to wake her up. As if she's here.

I see her bed, images fly in front of my eyes. I remember just months earlier when she pressed her soft lips almost on my own. I was never more touched by a simple kiss. If I kissed her then, if I told her how I felt, she would never get out looking for a girl.

Not alone.

I would be sleeping by her side when she would get the call and I would come with her.

She would never die.

Not alone, not that bizarrely.

Not killed by an innocent girl.

Two lives were destroyed now. But my Nikki's dead was pointless. She died for having heart too big, for caring too much, for having no one to have any of that for her…

I sit in the corner of her room and it's cold. It's December. I realize that all furniture is gone, and the electricity is out. I take another big gulp of scotch, the only thing I've been drinking since that night, two months ago. I dig something from my pocket. Something that's almost always in my hand, like rosary of a kind. Her golden necklace with a butterfly. I press it to my face and I can almost hear her heart beating. I smile. She's still here. In every fibre of my body, in my every thought she still lives.

My vision blurs again as my eyelids get heavier.

I see two shadows running and giggling, getting out of her kitchen and out of the apartment. I have to follow them. I follow the giggles outside, and catch the side of the golden curls running to my car. But when I get there I can't see two shadows anymore. But I know where to find them.

So I drive again. Delusional.

I park on my usual place in front of my building and indeed they are there. They wave at me, smiling.

I smile. I know them, of course.

They are waiting for me to open the door. So I run. I don't want them to catch the cold in this weather. She wouldn't have wanted it.

I open the door and stop for a moment admiring them. Black headed boy and a girl with green eyes and golden hair, they are six, I remember. "Dad!" I hear again.

I see Nikki's smile on both of their faces, so I close the door and follow them in.

I honestly have no idea where this came from, but it was torturing me till I've put it down.

Please, please, please, let me know what you think!