Chapter Two

'Coming to the Penny?' Dov asked.

'No,' Gail answered, without even thinking about it. She knew what would happen if she went out tonight; she'd come for a drink, maybe staying just long enough that they wouldn't get overly suspicious. She'd try (and fail) to temper the angry glances thrown in Nick and Andy's direction, and ignore Traci's questions about what was bothering her. She'd come home angry, keep drinking, and wake up with the world's worst hangover.

Gail had distanced herself from the group as much for their benefit as her own. She knew whose side they would take, after all. As much as she hated Nick for what he had done, she knew her own transgressions had been far worse.

'Gail, is everything okay?' His tone was one of an almost impatient sort of concern, as if he knew that whatever answer that came out of her would be a lie.

'Yes.' Her response was terse, and, admittedly, a little bitchy. 'It's been a long week,' she said, which really wasn't a lie. Her life was at the point where they all felt like long weeks, because being at work seemed to make her permanently pissed. 'I just want to stay home and relax.' That was a lie, and Dov wasn't stupid enough to fall for it; he was smart enough to let it go, though. He left with a brief glance backwards. Gail ignored it.

The door clicked shut, and she was grateful to be alone. When she was alone, she didn't have to pretend like she didn't care. She could take off her pants, and sit on the couch eating Cheese Puffs and watching shitty horror movies in peace.

But even that lost its charm after the first half of Evil Dead 2. Her mind kept wandering – had Nick and Andy sealed the deal yet? Were they, at this very moment, on their way to Vegas? Was he telling her that she was everything he wanted in a woman?

Ugh. The whole thing made her sick. She hated that she still cared. She hated that she hadn't been enough, because she had never been enough, for anyone. More than anything, she wanted to push it out of her mind, but that wouldn't happen when she was lying around the house watching T.V.

Her phone was sitting on the kitchen bench, charging. She tapped out a text message, without looking up.

I'm bored.

It was about ten minutes before a reply came, and when it did, Gail had to read it twice before she fully processed it.

How much do you like body parts?

Um…a normal amount? Are they attached to anything?

Meet me at the morgue, was Holly's cryptic answer. Gail wasn't entirely sure she wasn't about to become the victim of another serial killer. But no. Inviting Gail along to look at body parts was exactly the kind of weird thing that Holly would do.

Based on the assumption that she may or may not end up elbow deep in intestines, Gail dressed down, which suited her just fine, because she didn't really feel like changing anyway.

'Oh, good; I was getting to the fun stuff,' said Holly, without looking up, when Gail walked into the morgue half an hour later. 'Grab some gloves.'

'You called me in because you wanted help?' Gail said, somewhat bemused.

That, Holly looked up at. Her eyebrow quirked slightly, and Gail's stomach gave a jolt. 'Give me a little credit. I called you because I won't be finished for another hour, and I know you get impatient. But as long as you're here, it wouldn't hurt for you to learn a few things.' She opened a cabinet at the corner of the room and pulled out a lab coat. 'Here.'

Gail fumbled the catch, but managed to bend down and pick the coat off the floor without further incident. Holly gave a smirk, which Gail chose to ignore.

'You don't think I know enough?' Gail asked, as she shrugged on the coat. Holly handed her a pair of clear-lensed goggles, and then the box of nitrile gloves.

'Well I could make a comment about the general lack of crime scene preservation amongst police officers, but I won't. Be careful, those'll make your hands smell like gunk.'

'Better than making them smell like corpses.' Gail shrugged.

'You haven't smelled the gunk yet,' Holly grinned. Almost cautiously, Gail took a sniff of the gloves, but she couldn't detect anything. She vaguely wondered whether Holly was trying to trick her.

For the most part, she watched, as Holly sliced open the dead guy. Gail leaned against the bench, watching intently. People generally seemed to think that she was unintelligent, and she made no efforts to correct that misapprehension. It seemed easier.

'Here.' Holly gestured, and Gail peered over. 'Put this on the scales.' Gail put her hand out, and before she could even react, Holly had passed her a human kidney.

'Am I even technically allowed to be doing this?' Gail asked, suspicious that the answer was a clear-cut "no." 'One thirty-six grams.'

'You don't need a medical degree to weigh an organ,' Holly laughed. 'But don't worry. It's not like I'm just letting you at it with a scalpel.' Gail pouted, and gave Holly a puppy-dog eyes look. She kind of really wanted to use the scalpel now.

'Fine,' Holly sighed. 'Not this one though. Somehow I don't think that'll play well in court.' She gave a small frown, as though thinking. 'Okay, close your eyes.'

'I don't do surprises,' Gail said bluntly, but she closed them nonetheless. For almost ten minutes, she heard a lot of slamming, cluttering, and if she wasn't mistaken, muttered cursing.

'You should probably change your gloves,' Holly said, from somewhere near Gail's left.

'I can't see,' Gail protested.

'You call that an excuse?' Holly's voice was just inches away, and Gail had to force herself not to jump as hands touched hers. The gloves were stripped off efficiently, and replaced with new ones. 'Okay. You can open your eyes.'

Gail opened them, and the first thing she saw was a dead pig lying on the autopsy table. 'Seriously? Is this supposed to be some kind of dig at me?'

Holly raised an eyebrow. 'Would I do such a thing?' She passed the scalpel over, handle first. 'We don't exactly have an endless supply of human cadavers to practice on. Pigs are good for when we want to test things out. You ready?'

Gail nodded.

'Okay…Start here…and now move downwards at an angle towards the centre of the chest.' By the time they'd finished, "another hour" had turned into three hours, and Gail passed a pig heart (that didn't seem to be all that much smaller than a human heart) back and forth between her hands.

'I do love blood and guts,' Gail said. She abandoned the pig heart, and started twirling the scalpel between bloody, gloved fingers. She looked sideways at Holly, who was staring. 'What?'

Holly shook her head, and smiled. 'Nothing,' she said. 'It's just…you sound happy.'

'What, I'm not allowed to like things?'

'It's the first time you've given any suggestion of it.'

'I like things!' Gail protested. 'Like food…and alcohol…' She paused, struggling to think of something else. 'Guns. Horror movies. Shoes.'

'So bodies are just the clear next step.'

'Naturally.' Gail bent down, and peered at the open cavity of the pig's chest. She resisted the urge to poke it.

'Maybe you should have gone into forensics,' Holly said. It was almost an aside, but Gail considered the point.

It was a little sad that she considered it a viable alternative. Her job would have been so much easier if she didn't have to talk to people. Didn't have to give a shit what they thought about her, or be upset when they inevitably decided she wasn't worth their time. She found it easier to hate than to love, and that was the saddest thing of all.

'I would've been disowned,' Gail said, her voice a bitter laugh. It wasn't entirely true; her parents would have been disappointed, but they would have come around eventually, even if it meant they were less proud of her than they were of Steve (but then, that was always going to be the case; after all, people liked Steve). At least, she told them several times a year, she hadn't gone into drug dealing. 'So. Second date. Pig autopsy. Very classy.' Gail regretted the words immediately after she'd spoken. Not because it might have sounded critical – she didn't really care about that – but because she didn't want to make any assumptions about what it was or wasn't. She tore off the gloves, and nearly puked at the smell on her hands.

'Well given that the first one was a wedding, I figured I had to shake things up a bit,' Holly said. 'But if you want something a little more conventional, it's not even midnight – we've got time for something else.'

'Think we could hock this thing for bacon?'

'Only if you know of a black market pork dealer within walking distance.'

'I've got an idea,' Gail said, feeling a grin creep onto her face. 'But we're gonna have to get really drunk.'

…

Holly stared at the sign. 'I wouldn't have picked you for a karaoke fan.'

'Well that's just one of my dirty little secrets.'

'I can't wait to find out the rest.' Her tone, while amused, was also sincere. If it had been someone else, Gail might have rolled her eyes. With Holly, part of her wanted to impart those dirty little secrets (even though they weren't really as dirty as some people seemed to think).

They started with wedges and beer, and moved on pretty quickly to tequila. Anything less meant it would have taken hours to get drunk enough to even consider getting up on stage and singing Total Eclipse of the Heart.

Two a.m. (after a lot of alcohol, and a lot of fun) saw them by the cab rank, sharing more than a slight peck on the cheek.

'Do you want to… ?' Holly started, and Gail's heart skipped a beat. She had no idea why, but she was suddenly terrified. Maybe it was because the last person she'd slept with had pretty much brokenher. 'You know, what, never mind,' Holly said quickly, and she turned her head. Gail was almost surprised to see her cheeks red from more than just the alcohol.

'No it's not…I mean, I do, but I…'

'Right,' Holly nodded.

'I'm sorry,' Gail said, quickly, and made her escape before she could embarrass herself even further. Her heart was still pumping fast when she walked inside the front door an hour later.

'Fuck,' she muttered, slumping onto the couch. 'Fuck.'

Half the time she was with Holly, her mind was on Nick and Andy. When they were doing things, she was fine, but when there was a moment of near intimacy, or when the conversation slowed, it all came hurtling back. It was something about that innate fear of being hurt again. It had happened with Chris, and it had happened with Nick. She would have given anything to scrub her memory clean with a gallon of bleach; to forget, or even to just not care.

More than anything else, she wanted to move on with her life, even if she did keep screwing it up.