Tim hated surveillance. Not only was it dull as shit, but you were always cramped up tight with too many people and their smelly lunches, pissing in a cup overnight and generally feeling scuzzy and unshowered, even if you weren't. Setting up outside Sarah Geller's house required a van in the back and a car one block over at the front of the house. Her home was a single story, which he found unsurprising, and when he looked at it, his palms started sweating. The entire front was windows, and she didn't have any curtains. The thought of being that exposed all the time made his neck itch like he was breaking out in hives.
The one good thing about all those windows was that it made it easy for them to see in, especially since there was a vacant lot across the street from her address. They could park the next block over and still have an almost perfect view of much of the house.
The front door sat to the right of the windows, up a couple of steps with no porch. The front room was clearly the main living area, with a plush green couch that looked like she'd stolen it from the Mad Men set and a TV in one corner. If you were inside, you could walk straight through from the front door to the dining area, where there was a small computer desk and chair along the wall. Alternately, you could cross left through the living room and into the kitchen, which connected to the same dining space around the back. The bathroom was situated between the living room and the dining area, but they couldn't see into it because there were no windows that faced the outside. Her bedroom was on the left side of the house at the front, butted up against the small garage. There was a basement, too, and they couldn't see into that either because all the tiny windows were frosted.
The yard in front was little more than a small patch of grass, but the plantings nearest the house provided a bright splash of blue and gold with marigolds and bluebells. The back yard was modest, and she had a small grill stashed back there, though it looked mostly unused. Rachel, Nelson, and resident IT asshat Chris were currently parked in a van along the street behind the house. Their position allowed them to see through the sliding glass doors (the thought of even more floor to ceiling windows made Tim question Kathryn's understanding of security) into the kitchen and the dining room.
Even as he watched Art open his tupperware filled with garlicky pasta Linda had packed for him, Tim had to admit he was glad he wasn't stuck with Chris and Nelson. Poor Rachel. She didn't deserve that.
Tim and Art were currently parked next to the vacant lot across from the front of the house, providing them with a perfect view of the living room, and a slanted view of the kitchen, which looked like it had a nice-sized island and stools set up next to it, though he couldn't see much else. "Anyone take a look in the garage, yet?" he asked.
Art shook his head, shoveling more pasta into his mouth. "No, but we know she has a blue 2008 Volkswagon Eos registered in her name, and I doubt there's room for much more than that in that little thing."
"There's plenty of room for weapons," Tim shot back quickly.
"Well, let's hope she keeps her arsenal in the bathroom or the basement. At least then we'll see it coming."
#
The whole thing felt strange. After he'd returned from his day trip to Daniel Boone, Tim had been dragged into a strategy meeting with Art, Rachel, and the FBI Dick Reed. He had mostly checked out; a stakeout was a stakeout was a stakeout and he didn't understand why it took almost four hours and all of his lunch break to figure out the logistics. He had mostly amused himself by watching Raylan try and pretend not to feel left out while he sat, alone, in the bullpen.
He twirled back and forth in his chair, pretending to listen while he turned over and over everything he knew about Kathryn in his mind. He was curious to see where she lived, to bring the total picture of her into clearer focus and hopefully understand why she was being accused of murdering a crew of human traffickers. Most importantly, Tim wanted to know where the victims from that truck had ended up. Nothing about this smelled right to Tim, and after speaking with Grady, he was concerned about the safety of the people they had saved together. Because no matter what else Kathryn had done, he knew they had done something good that night; he could feel it in his bones. No one he had spoken with at either the Park or from the State Police knew anything about the outcome of that case, and he had the feeling there was a much larger story to be told there.
The only bit of information he found even mildly interesting from their meeting was that the house Kathryn lived in belonged to Stephanie Riley, LLC and was rented out to her as Sarah Geller. The information listed for that real estate company was a dead end except for a phone number, which simply looped them through to the same voicemail message each time they called. Someone was going to get sent on a wild goose chase trying to find whoever was behind the pretty little website, and Tim was glad that for once it wouldn't be him. It seemed his previous work with Kathryn truly was valued, so he was almost guaranteed to be sitting on the house as much as possible. It also helped that if their man Dawson did arrive, everyone else involved would feel safer with him there to take the shot.
Still, he tucked the Stephanie Riley name away for safe keeping because had a feeling it might become important later. Kathryn, Sarah, Stephanie... he was losing track of what to call her even in his own thoughts. For simplicity, he decided on Kathryn in his head and Ms. Geller in his mouth, in order to avoid strange looks from his colleagues. He didn't think it would do him much good to try and explain why he was calling their suspect by an unlisted alias would do much for his already tenuous relationship with SA Reed.
#
Once the geniuses in the conference room had meticulously strategized how on Earth to park two vehicles at either end of a suspect's house, Tim watched in fascination and delight as Art gave Raylan the order to stay at the office—"Do not move your skinny ass from this office, do you hear me?"—and hold down the fort while he joined his officers in the field. The confusion and disgust on Raylan's face would have made a beautiful photo for Tim's fridge, if only he'd thought to capture it on camera.
They'd pulled in separately over the course of a day. Tim was sure that Kathryn would make at least the van behind her house relatively quickly, but Reed had insisted that a robust presence was the only way to bring in Dawson. Tim found it ludicrous that they were just waiting and hoping for a skilled murderer to magically appear at the house of someone he'd been contracted by. In Tim's opinion, a systematic manhunt would be much more suited to the task before them. However, he couldn't say he wasn't intrigued by the prospect of watching Kathryn in her daily life. He was honestly hoping to discover something supremely flawed about her personality during the course of the investigation, so it would make it easier for him to press the remnants of her from his mind, especially now.
The night after they pulled in, Tim took the early morning shift while Art napped quietly next to him. He was not at all surprised to hear that Rachel was taking the same shift for the back of the house. A breath before 5AM, he watched as the light switched on in the bedroom. A few minutes later the windows were dark again and Kathryn appeared in the living room in workout clothes. He watched as she setup a yoga mat and began flowing through complicated shapes in the dark. He remembered she had said she did yoga nearly every morning and he found himself surprised that she had told the truth. What really caught his attention, though, was the fact that she spent most of the practice with her eyes closed in a room without a light on.
After her yoga session, he watched as she tugged on a pair of sneakers and stepped out of the house before setting off down the street in a jog. Unsure of her route, Tim was glad for the expertly tinted windows on the car he was sitting in. A few moments after Kathryn rounded the corner, he heard a van door slide closed and he just caught a glimpse of Rachel as she casually jogged off in the same direction.
This time in the morning, Tim soon learned, was the only time that Kathryn's house was quiet. From the time she returned to her run to the time she walked into the bathroom at eleven, there was always something on. Music or the television, or god forbid, sometimes both. He remembered how she had hummed to herself in the woods, how she'd even had music playing that Saturday morning in her motel room when he'd walked in. The thought of noise all the time gave him a headache; he needed silence, and he found himself increasingly glad they hadn't managed to get any listening devices into her house, yet.
Each morning that followed was exactly the same, and according to Rachel, Kathryn had run the exact same 3.5 mile route each morning, never wavering even one footstep out of line. By the third day, Tim was sure she knew she was being watched. Even people of a meticulous nature didn't do the exact same thing every single morning. She was trying to establish an unbreakable alibi; either for a crime she'd already committed or one she was planning to. Rachel agreed with him when they briefly crossed paths at the office on Friday afternoon. Raylan leaned obviously over the partition between his desk and Rachel's, desperate to be included in the investigation. Tim made sure to be as obtuse as possible whenever Raylan asked after their subject.
Watching Kathryn turned out to be somewhat difficult as he was attempting to conceal the extent of their relationship. He and Art were often both watching her during the day, and he had to be sure not to stare too hard or bite his thumb while they watched her go about her day. Art liked to play at doddery sometimes so people would underestimate him, but he was just as observant and smart as he'd ever been, even if he'd physically lost a step.
The first time Tim had nearly stepped in it was that very first day. He'd taken the early AM and then he and Art had taken turns stretching their legs. It was about 11PM and Tim was reading chapter seven of The Two Towers when Art mentioned that she was heading into the bathroom. They'd been calling out her location all day to one another, so it wasn't anything particularly striking, but Tim glanced up and watched as, indeed, she filed into the bathroom holding a folded towel over her arm. Fifteen minutes later, when Art said she was coming out, Tim looked up again and had to struggle not to drop his book.
There was Kathryn, wet hair piled on top of her head, brushing her teeth. And wearing his shirt.
If Art noticed any change in Tim's breathing or posture, he was smart enough not to mention it, yet. Tim felt his body go absolutely still as his eyes remained firmly fixed on the Grizzlies t-shirt, wondering what it meant. Maybe she just hadn't done laundry lately and it was the last big shirt she had, or maybe she was just too practical to let a good shirt go to waste. Maybe she had somehow made him in the car already and was wearing it to taunt him.
Maybe she'd been thinking of him just as much as he'd thought about her since they parted ways.
After a few moments, Kathryn disappeared into her bedroom and the light flicked off just after midnight. Tim flipped the pages of his book, knowing he would have to go back and re-read them because retaining information was not something he was capable of at the moment.
The same time the following night, Tim made sure to have his book tucked away so he could observe Kathryn without hindrance. Once again, she had entered the bathroom around 11PM and emerged wearing the Grizzlies shirt. She'd done the same the next night and the next, too.
She'd worn the shirt to bed every night so far, and she'd done laundry twice since they'd begun observing her.
#
Tim got to go home early that Friday to freshen up, get some sleep, and return fresh as a daisy, so he didn't know for sure whether she'd worn the shirt that night, but he was willing to bet money that she had.
As he stood in the shower, massaging shampoo vigorously into his hair, he attempted to quiet his anxious inner voice by reminding himself that the shirt probably meant nothing. After all, it had meant nothing to him when he'd given it to her; it was just a free shirt he kept as a spare in his bag that he hadn't needed at the time. There was no reason that Kathryn might have attached meaning to an article of clothing he had literally thrown at her from across dingy motel room.
Saturday began much the same as every day that week had, but rather than settling in at the computer in her dining room, Kathryn dressed in comfortable clothes and spent the day cleaning her house.
"Who woulda thought her outfit at the office was actually her dressed up?" Art asked. Tim gave an exaggerated chuckle, but he would be lying if he said he didn't like the way she looked now, wearing a tank top and sweatpants that rode low because they were at least two sizes too large for her.
Watching her clean was hypnotic. Tim liked to think of himself as a relatively clean and tidy person, but she put his weekly vacuuming routine to shame. A few hours in to her disinfecting marathon, Art picked up the radio. "Rachel?" he said.
"Yeah?"
"Is this how all women clean?" he asked, the bare ghost of a smile dancing across his lips. Tim could feel the sigh through the dead air of the walkie.
"No, Art, that's how a crazy person cleans."
Art put the walkie back down and watched as Kathryn pulled out her couch to scrub the baseboard behind it.
"Maybe she's trying to get rid of DNA evidence," he said, leaned back against his seat and chewing a large wad of tobacco.
"No, I think she's just a clean freak," Tim said without thinking. Art looked over at him, curiosity piqued. "When we first met in her motel room to go over that case, she had a caddy of her own cleaning supplies with her. Said she liked a cleaner space than the motel could offer."
Art wrinkled his face. "Then why not stay at a better motel?"
"'Budgetary restrictions,'" Tim said, putting his air quotes to good use, and Art chuckled.
Kathryn's cleaning frenzy took nearly the entire day and included a lengthy trip outside to mow the lawn and weed her modest garden. When she'd opened the garage to get the mower out, Tim had caught a brief glimpse of the car Art had mentioned, but nothing else. He wondered whey she even had a car, when she appeared to never leave her house.
Something else Tim had learned about Kathryn over the course of the week was that she seemed to enjoy cooking. He found it strange, though, how she would make giant batches of food and eat the same thing for several days in a row. The thought of eating pasta salad for six meals straight made his stomach feel a little sour, though he couldn't argue with the utility of it. On Saturday, Kathryn showered and changed into the Grizzlies shirt early before setting about making a meal for herself. Then, she tucked her legs up under on the couch and settled in to watch a movie. It was the first time she hadn't eaten at the kitchen island, and he wondered whether she had simply forgotten that she was being watched, or if this was some new part of her weekly ritual.
Tim was tired by the time she'd finished her meal, and as he watched her curl up with a blanket, resting her head on the arm of the couch to continue watching her film, he felt his eyelids heavily droop, wishing he could be lying on her comfortable looking couch, too, instead of reclining in a car that smelled like garlic and using the dashboard as a footrest.