A/N this was written over the course of a workday, on my phone, so forgive any fragmented feelings it has since I was...writing it at work and had to take lots of breaks from it to actually, y'know work. Also forgive any typos...phone and all, no spellcheck on thinkfree.
"I shot him." The words are quiet, almost lost in the soft sounds of indie hipster college rock streaming from a phone through the stereo, and now is not the time to be thankful for smartphones returning her to a member-supported station full of memories of a wild(er, in comparison to how she is now) youth and two years in her mid twenties spent several states away.
Now is not the time to prattle on about her love of Hellen Leicht's programmong taste. Instead she quietly points the car away from the hustle of Massachusettes Avenue, and towards the quiet, staid calm of understated New England affluence. expecting a protest at not even being offered a chance to wallow alone. She gets none, only a quiet refrain. "I shot him."
"Yes." She doesn't offer an arguement. There is none to offer.
"I shot him."
"You did" she doesn't refute it, it is futile. There is no changing the events of the day. There is no magic button to push and bring them back to twelve hours prior, with the knowledge they had now. What's done is done, and they are left with the simple remains of the day. The facts, truths and realities.
Fact: Reginald Johnson had been dealing crack out of an abandoned apartment for over a year.
Fact: Reginald Johnson had been wanted for the murders of two rival drug dealers.
Fact: Reginald Johnson had been facing a forensically airtight case against him.
Fact: Reginald Johnson had been prepared to not go away quietly.
Fact: Reginald Johnson had been fatally wounded after a nearly hour long standoff.
Fact: Reginald Johnson had been thirteen years old.
"You should eat something." Is all she says as she unlocks the front door, stepping aside to let Jane in.
"Not hungry." Its an expected response, but she busies herself in the kitchen anyway. Its easier than looking out at where her friend is slumped heavily into the couch. This is the part she hates the most, and at least keeping her hands busy is a way of delaying through the initial shock.
"At least part of a sanwich." She coaxes, finally coming to rest on the other end of the furnishing.
"Naw, I'd probably pull a Frost. Did you see him yesterday? that was -"
"An impressive showing of the force with which the gastointestinal tract can expel its contents." She plays into what she knows Jane desperately wants. A distraction. Something to think about to hide the guilt, doubt, self hatred that comes from gunning down a thirteen year old, justified as it was. This was a familiar dance - familiar enough that the line between who follows and who leads has long since blurred.
"I didn't know barf could come in so many colors."
"He had admitted to consuming more than one jelly donut with multi-colored sprinkles that morning."
"Yeah, but I've never seen someone actually puke rainbows before." This is what she used to. Humor, jokes, deflection. "It was epic."
"He picked an inopportune part of the autopsy to walk in on."
"What was up with that one, anyway? Dude ate how many roaches?"
"Twenty six, per witness accounts. Some of which were already partially digested, so an accurate count based on stomach contents alone was difficult."
"And what, did they decided they wanted to escape so badly that they killed him?"
"Hardly. He died from anaphylaxis. Cockroaches are actually very closely related to many shellfish such as shrimp and lobster."
"I'm never eating seafood again. Seriously, the things people do for money. Couldn't pay me enough to eat even one of the fuckers." She smiles slightly as she watches Jane take a bite of the sandwich, despite their gruesome topic of discussion. Its enough to put most off their appetites, but this is normal for them.
And she really wants to hate that. That this is normal. That sitting here, joking about particularly interesting bodies to come through the morgue in lieu of actually dealing with traumatic events is normal. But this is what they do. This is the same thing they've done more times than she can - wants - to count.
This is the same way she's sat here and laughed after derranged bakers. After her biological family rejected her. After an apartment was swept clean of the debris of a my pretty pony birthday party after a serial killer nearly took both of their lives. They sit here and laugh, because it is easier. Because to dwell on it would surely drive them mad. Perhaps they already had been.
She can't help her flinch as she turns the television on to sports, and the careless, thoughtless anouncer ratlles off and he rifles that in there, and DiPietro must be happy for all that padding after that shot - a line that means nothing to the millions of other viewers but that hits too close to home for them right now. The sandwich is set down, forgotten about as a thousand yard stare takes its hold.
She's known this was coming. It always does. Usually, its much later in the evening after the blackness and emptiness of the night creeps in. They joke and laugh in daylight hours, and pretend that they are okay. But there's only so many blows a facade, no matter if it is simple stucco or reinforced concrete can take before it begins to crack. "How the hell does a thirteen year old kid become a murderer?"
Its a rhetorical question, she knows that. It isn't intended to have an answer. She speaks anyway. "There are a number of socioeconomic factors..." and she does what she does best. Recite statistics and studies. She should feel guilty about the systemic injustices she is talking about, but she's long since learned how to divorce her emotions from the statistics. Instead, she offers a calming voice as she talks about this sociologist and that one, knowingg that the details of the studies she's researched are going unlistened to. But this is who she is, this is what she does. She is a scientist, she deals in facts, truths, realities.
Truth: She knows the world is a cruel, viscious bitch.
Truth: She knows what lies behind the jokes and sarcasm
Truth: She knows from first hand expirence the mental toll it takes to live in the world
Truth: She knows that it is impossible to face the world alone.
She does what she can to be supportive, because she has no other option. She puts on a brave face and laughs and jokes and pretends to be just as fine as she claims. She likens herself, in moments like this, to Charles George Gordon, preparing for a seige that is eventually hopeless, but she will not go down without a fight. She will not give in to the cruelty and indifference that surrounds her, not yet. And she will do what she can to protect others, protect Jane, just as Gordon protected the innocent lives in Khartoum. She will be -she is - an emotional rock for the detective to cling to to avoid being swept away in a storming sea of emotions.
She is steady, a constant, something that can depended upon. She's been accused of not even having emotions before, by others. Sometimes, in the blackness and emptiness of night, she wonders if the others are correct. So adept has she become at compartmentalizing, putting unwanted thoughts and sray feelings aside like the so many shoeboxes in her closet that she considers the last time she gave in to something as base as simple emotion. It seemed long ago, like it was a lifetime ago, like she was a different person then. But she knows calm and stability and quiet strength are what are being asked of her now, and she will provide it. She has no other option.
The breaking point is coming, like it always does on days like this, once darkness falls. Where the facde will crumble and jokes, deflection, sarcasm will fall flat on deaf ears. She cannot change what is coming, though now, she can predict it. The thousand yard stare will eventually fall away into whimpers that pierce the silence of the night. Just as she cannot change the past, just as there is no magic buttom to push to wipe away guilt, self hatred, doubt and fear, she cannot control the future. What will come is a simple fact, a truth, a reality.
Reality: This is the way they deal with a cruel, viscious, world.
Reality: This is the way they end far too many nights.
Reality: This is the way that she knows will eventually break them.
Reality: This is the way she shows her love, now, while she can, in the only way she knows how.