WORK-LIFE BALANCE, Part A

Setting: after S10/E08 To The Boy In The Blue Knit Cap

I was already dazed from my counseling session with Doctor Geisen. Another tremor ran through me when I stepped out of the doctor's office and saw my partner, Alex Eames, waiting for me. Talk about kismet!

It couldn't be a setup, could it? I resisted the urge to turn back toward the window of Doctor Geisen's office to see if she was watching.

Could there really be hope for me?

Over the years I've conditioned myself to expect the worst – both from the criminals we pursued and in my private life. In order to have hope, a person needs to see some possibility of success, even if it's the tiniest prospect. I've been living without hope for years.

But just a few minutes ago my outlook had suddenly improved: two huge burdens had been lightened. First, Doctor Geisen told me she'd approved me fully with the NYPD. Then, even better, she'd given me hope of progress in my personal life. Honestly, even to comprehend that I have a personal life is a sign of progress.

There may be hope after all.

And now here was a third positive sign: Eames stood in the sunshine on a beautiful spring day, waiting for me beside the department SUV. She'd never met me there before, so it was too much of a coincidence to ignore. She represented the closest thing I had to a social, personal, human relationship. I suddenly had a new ambition to develop that relationship, even though I'd repeatedly screwed it up over the years.

Eames seemed wired beyond her usual eagerness for a new investigation. Maybe she was responding to my jazzed state. Maybe it was all on my side. Whatever the cause, our conversation felt a little off. She left me a couple openings, but I was mentally stuttering, and the opportunities passed before I caught up. I fell back on our comfortable "let's get to work" habit.

As we drove through Manhattan I tried to bring my racing thoughts into order.

Earlier, on my way into the counseling session – the final one required by the police department – I'd focused only on the question of whether Doctor Geisen would clear me for duty. In her usual technique, she kept me off balance throughout.

Once I knew my job was safe, I surprised myself. Instead of wanting to bolt out the door forever, I realized I needed to continue counseling.

I'm used to figuring out people immediately, and then getting them to tell me what I need to know. From the first session I knew that Doctor Geisen was using the same maneuver against me. However, even knowing that, I was never able to counter her tactics. The best ploy I could come up with was an outburst of anger, which in the end served her purposes better than mine.

It took most of our seven sessions to get to a point where I trusted the doctor enough to tell her more than peripheral, safe truths about myself. I couldn't stomach the thought of going through it all again with a different counselor, so I was relieved she agreed to keep seeing me, to keep building on our progress.

Now, as we neared the bank that was the murder scene, it occurred to me that if I wanted to continue to improve myself, I had to involve Eames.

Of course, she was already involved – after being my partner for twelve years how could she not be involved? – but I'd leave it up to her whether she wanted a more intimate relationship or whether she was satisfied where we were. Either way, she deserved to know what was going on with me.

No more delay.

"Eames," I said, "Can you pull over for a minute?"

She was concentrating on the traffic, which was heavy for a Sunday. She spared me a quick, curious glance. "What, right here?"

"I, I, I should tell you about my session with the, uh…"

She didn't pull over. "Did she give you an assignment or something?"

"No," I said, feeling an urgency to have this discussion before I lost my nerve. "No, I mean I want to tell you… about... Please, Eames–"

Her phone rang, and I sighed loudly in frustration. Without looking away from the road, she took the phone out of her pocket and held it out to me.

It was Captain Hannah. "Yeah, Goren," I said as I answered the call and put it on speakerphone.

"Are you at the bank yet?" he asked. "Because our friends at the FBI called me three times in four minutes to threaten hell-fire, brimstone and parking ticket duty if you so much as touch a deposit slip at the scene."

"But..." I checked a street sign as we passed. "We're only a block away, Joe…"

"No," the captain said, "I don't want to get into a pissing contest with these territorial pinheads. I'll save it for another time when it's more clearly in our domain."

Eames said, "Captain, the only other vehicles here are NYPD cruisers and an ambulance – no feds."

"I hear you," he said. "The order stands. If you're into the humiliation, feel free to stand outside the yellow tape and watch, but I'm officially handing this over to the feds."

I hung up and dropped the phone into the cup-holder near Eames. She parked across the street from the cruisers, but didn't turn off the engine.

"Not even a deposit slip, huh? Guess I'm not surprised," she said with a shrug. "It's not worth the trouble."

"With the FBI?" I asked. Eames was never one to back down from confrontation.

"No, with the captain. Now that you're cleared for duty, it's not worth getting into hot water right away." She was grinning now. "We should wait at least a couple hours before we challenge his authority."

I smiled and looked across the street, where a uniformed officer was stringing crime scene tape. I couldn't help myself: I observed. One officer talked to what must have been a witness, a woman in running gear; another officer talked to a woman dressed in a business suit – she was probably a bank employee.

"Bank branches aren't open on Sundays," I said. "This must be a main office or headquarters."

"This bank advertises itself as worldwide," Eames said. She was focused on the action across the street, too. "It's already Monday in Asia, so..."

"Could be. Do you see a security guard?" I asked, still scanning the scene.

"Nope, but it's not our problem. So," Eames said, "I pulled over like you asked. What was it you needed to tell me? Or wanted to tell me?"

"Yeah..." I'd been right about losing my nerve – I had no idea what to say to her now. "It was..." I tried to pull up the feelings and thoughts I'd had when I came out of the doctor's office. All I could remember was that riddle about the two doors. Doctor Geisen probably did an internet search for the answer – why else would it have taken her so long? The first time I heard it, I knew right away that the correct answer had to include a double negative, so it had only taken me a little while to-

"Changed your mind?" Eames asked.

This was the wrong time to let my thoughts wander. "No," I said, turning in my seat to face her. "You know this was my last session with her – with Doctor Giesen."

Eames nodded. She reached out to shut off the engine.

"But I, I'm, I decided to keep going... for more counseling," I said. "For a while, at least."

Her eyebrows quirked up and she asked, "Because...?"

"Because I think I can change my life, or... begin to change – to improve."

"That's good." She nodded again. "Improve what, exactly, if you don't mind me asking."

I had to smile. Was there anything about me that didn't need improvement?

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