Jay and Hailey had just arrived in front of the military base. There was still time for the appointment.
Jay decided he had to give an explanation to his colleague. She had to know, but the way she was she would never ask.
- Hailey I ... - Jay began
- You don't have to explain to me,- she said
- No, it's right that you know why I do this. I want to tell you what's going on. -
Hailey then stood quietly ready to hear what Jay wanted to tell him.
- We've been in Afghanistan for a long time now. The locals loved us. We tried to protect them as much as possible, they were not to blame.
In the village there was a family, it was made up of a mother and a daughter who lived with their grandmother.
The little girl was called Keyla - the detective continued to tell with a trembling voice and tears that forcefully made their way into his eyes. - She was a curly little girl with dark hair and dark skin. She gladdened our days. She jumped around it, enjoyed it. It seemed that the war did not affect her, she did not let herself be beaten down by anything. One day she told me "life is beautiful, she deserves to be lived to the last."
When she was more little she had seen her father die hit by a grenade. She was a great little girl. -
At this point Jay was sobbing in despair. What had happened to his little girl had really marked him in the depths of his soul.
Hailey also suffered from seeing her colleague in those conditions.
-Jay ..- she called him, without adding anything else.
She tried to cheer him up by standing near him, stroking his shoulder.
After taking a huge sigh she continued.
-That day, she like so many others, she had come to greet us. Jeff, I and other colleagues were standing in front of the military base and she was smiling at us and joyfully jumping around us.
At one point though ... I saw a shadow of her ... I was running towards her to try to protect her. I was almost close when .. - the detective stopped, now he was crying like a fountain and panting, but he kept telling.
He needed to let off steam, to talk about this story that had been kept there for too long in her heart.
- I almost got it, but that man ... That shadow was faster than me.
He fired two shots and for the little girl there was nothing to do.
She fell there in the dust. In front of me, a stone's throw away was that little creature now lifeless. He had killed her instantly. So in cold blood, with no remorse. - said that he turned to her and continued looking straight into her eyes, while until then he had continued to look in front of him - Hailey was a child. She had a life ahead of her. She will never grow up. She always said she wanted to go to school and learn a lot of things. She will never do any of this. -
Upton could not help but pull him to herself and hold him tightly.
Jay was shaking like a leaf, his gaze lost in the void, as if he wasn't really there right now.
Images of that day passed through his mind.
His breathing was rapid, but at the same time shallow, as if the detective was struggling to breathe. His heart rate was also high.
The colleague could hear it distinctly as Jay was leaning against her body.
His hands were as if crossed by numerous ants. Hailey could feel them being cold.
It was as if her colleague was no longer with her right now. He was stuck in a flashback.
Suddenly Jay pulled a hand away from Hailey's body and brought it to her chest, hunching a little. He said he was in a lot of pain.
The detective had to help him and she calmly started talking to him:
- Jay, listen to my voice. We are in Chicago, everything is fine.- she said she continued to caress him with circles on his back.