Mr. Brice, also known as "Mr. Room 2" was a most peculiar man, Mrs. Reardon thought. When she cared to think about it. Mostly she cared about her tenants paying their rent on time. Mostly she thought about that, and keeping the house in repair. But now and again, when the three men who rented rooms were out, and the quiet got thick, broken only by the swishing of her broom or mop, she wondered about him.
He didn't talk much. Just a brief "Good morning," or "Good evening" if she happened to see him going in or out. In the five years he'd rented her back room (the smallest in the house, but boasting a private bath), she could count the number of conversations she'd had with him on the fingers of one hand.
He kept strange hours. Sometimes he'd be gone for a few days. Then his old green Chevy would reappear in the graveled-over backyard that served as a parking lot, and he'd be around for a day, maybe two, and then off again. Whatever he did, money didn't seem to be a problem. Like clockwork, on the last working day of the month, she'd find an envelope pushed under the door to her room with the next month's rent.
He didn't drink, unlike Mr. Room 1 whose trashcan regularly overflowed with beer bottles. And he didn't smoke, unlike Mr. Room 3. She'd never caught him bringing women over either.
He didn't seem to have any friends.
And for a relatively young, single man, he was almost obsessively, fastidiously neat.
Yes, Mr. Room 2 was definitely a peculiar man.
Craig was an odd duck, Bob Bellingham thought. Most of the time it didn't bother him. But every once in a while, there'd be a wild gleam lurking in the back of Craig's eyes as he alphabetized the drug box for the third time, or rehung the hoses so the ends all lined up perfectly, or something else. And that gleam bothered Bob just a bit.
It was there the day Craig's car wouldn't start and he'd been two minutes late to shift. Of course the other guys had ribbed him something fierce. Bob was happy when the tones went off and the squad was dispatched to school where a kid had fallen off the swings. Then there was a trash fire. Then a slip-and-fall at a grocery store. Easy calls, but they got Craig away from the station and the wild gleam settled a bit. And when they got back to the station and the guys started in on Craig again, Bob told them to lay off his partner.
Then the kid had broken something in Craig. A multi-car pileup in the fog, and the kid had gone through the windshield. Craig had found … most of him. The fog had caused plenty of other accidents and all the squads were busy, so it had been him and Craig on this one. And he'd seen Craig's face go completely white. Craig hadn't said anything to anyone at the station for nearly a week after that. He'd finally responded to Bob's daily "Hi, partner," and things were sort of back the way they should be.
But on foggy days, Craig's white-knuckled hands fisted on the squad's steering wheel like he was clutching a lifeline. And the gleam lurked in his eyes. Bob prayed for easy runs in the fog, and shielded his partner as best he could from the hard ones.
He was a weirdo. The walking rule-book. A neat-nik. A jerk. The only person who never called him names was his partner. And Bob was so very everything Craig was not. Bob was a good paramedic though. And a good partner. Craig knew Bob tried to help him when the creeping fog rolled through the city and everything whited out. Bob let him hang onto the steering wheel, let him do anything where he didn't have to look in the eyes. The dead, empty eyes like the kid with his head caved in. Craig knew.
He hated when Bob went on vacation. That was when the dreams came. The fog creeping in from the bay, the squad pulling up alongside the crumpled cars… Wasn't too bad at first. They'd radioed in for help, knowing it would take time, and ran to the nearest car, a green station-wagon with the right-front quarter-panel crumpled from where it had hit something. Maybe another car. The windshield was mostly missing, Craig noticed as they worked to free the unconscious woman pinned by the steering wheel. One by one, they cleared the four cars, working in tandem to stabilize the victims.
Then it had gone to hell. The first woman woke up calling for 'Tommy'. Her son, who was in the car with her. The paramedics exchanged glances - they'd been sure they'd got everyone. Craig went back to the car, leaving Bob to try to calm the woman. He never knew what made him take another look at the windshield, notice the bits of cloth caught on the jagged shards. Bits of cloth and a smear of blood now that he looked closer. It took a long two minutes to find the kid. Bob would have helped, but Bob was taking care of the other victims. It wasn't Bob's fault.
The kid was dead, the side of his head caved in, bits of glass everywhere. Craig picked him up, took him back over to Bob. The kid's mom was unconscious again thankfully. Bob got on the phone to Rampart, and they tried. Oh God, they tried to bring him back.
Craig knew it was his fault. He wasn't good enough. He'd never be good enough. He went to work anyway because he didn't know what else to do. He didn't talk to anyone. Couldn't talk to anyone. He wasn't worthy of their time or attention and they stopped. Except for Bob. Bob who said "Hi, partner" to him every day. It wasn't Bob's fault that he, Craig, wasn't good enough.
He deserved to be miserable. He was a failure. He'd always been a failure. It didn't matter how often he read the rules, or how hard he studied. He could never do anything right. That's what his father had always said. And Bob was on vacation so he'd see the kid in his dreams. See those empty eyes staring up at him begging him without words to make it all better.
He'd failed.
Two days before his next shift. Two days. No one had posted shifts to cover. His dirty uniform was in the hamper. His shoes were shined and ready. There was nothing to do but sit. He sat and thought about the kid.
His hand went to his jacket pocket. The bottle of sleeping pills was there. He'd seen them at the store where he stopped and bought the TV Dinner he'd eaten without really tasting it. He'd bought the bottle too. There were 50 little capsules in it.
Craig went into the bathroom and filled a paper cup with water. Setting the cup on the sink, he opened the bottle and counted out ten little piles of five capsules each.
Afterward, he stretched out on his bed. It wouldn't matter any more.
It was absolutely unlike Craig Brice to simply not show up for a scheduled shift. So it wasn't too hard for Bob to persuade Johnny and Roy to cover for him while he went and checked on his partner. The Captain grumbled of course, but agreed after a couple of minutes. Ten minutes later, Bob pulled up in front of the address they had on file for Craig.
Mrs. Reardon didn't know what to think. Of course, Mr. Brice was in. His car was right there, wasn't it? Come to think of it, she hadn't seen him in a couple days, but that was nothing strange.
Bob interrupted her fairly gently at this point and said that he was Craig's partner at work and was worried because he hadn't showed up. Craig wasn't ever late for work.
It was the 'Craig' that convinced Mrs. Reardon that the big man in the blue uniform was telling the truth. She let him in and led him down the hall to room two.
"Mr. Brice, there's a gentleman here to see you," she called as she knocked on the door.
"Craig, it's me. Bob. You ok?"
A couple moments of silence.
"Craig?" Another moment or two. Mrs. Reardon shuffled nervously from foot to foot as the big man knocked on the door again. Then he turned around. "I hate to ask, but can you let me in? I swear I won't touch anything."
She should have made him get the police and a warrant. But he was there and he was right that Mr. Brice would never miss work without calling in. She fumbled out her keys and turned the bolt.