Take two: Okay so it turns out I had the year wrong – so that didn't help (2013 and not 2014 as I mistakenly thought) But that fact might make the dates even worse! I think I will give up trying for chronological accuracy and will just go with a day.

Wednesday (Worst work day ever.)

I admit it. Oliver might just be a better guy than I thought. Maybe my judgement of him had more to do with the men I had encountered before, than him …. maybe. I am still reserving judgement, I think. So, somehow Oliver went along with my scheme to go and see Charlie at the country jail. We made our way there in his slightly ostentatious car (I mean who drives a car like that really?) and it turns out that Mr Uptight can actually lie! If I hadn't known better, I might have been convinced by his faux-lawyer routine. He was pretty capable of distracting the guard at the gate so I could make a slight alteration to the jail's records. (Is that a state or federal offence?) Oliver didn't even look too panicked as I did it – familiarity and all that? Or was it a trick of the light?

That car ride was probably the highlight of the day. It all started to fall into a screaming head after that.

We went in to see Charlie – that poor guy looked like he had given up. He just seemed so resigned to his fate. I don't think so Charlie. If we can help in any way we will, even if it is the last thing we do. (More on that later.)

We got Charlie to tell us everything he could remember about Kelly, and it turned out that he knew enough that I could find her through the medical offices she was visiting that day. Oh man, I wish in some ways I couldn't find her. It seems that Kelly was suffering from Hodgkin's Disease and was taking part in a clinical trial. Further digging (Shane, why do you always have to push?) indicated that Kelly did not survive. That poor girl, and poor Charlie too. It devastated me to see him losing what little hope he had; crushed for Kelly and not for his own sad predicament. Charlie seems like a sweet guy in a terrible situation. I felt like everything we shared just made things worse and not better for him. We must do something for him – I have to do something for him. But what?

We left the jail and returned to the DLO to tell Norman and Rita what we had learned. We were all stunned. I wouldn't tell my mother this, or Oliver for that matter, but all I could think was 'Give sorrow words; the grief that does not speak knits up the o-er wrought heart and bids it break.' Shakespeare really has a quote for every occasion. To compound the awfulness of the day, Andrea, Denver Main Branch's harbinger of doom came to tell us that at the meeting Oliver missed, it was decided that the DLO would close as we had lost viability! But we are the last hope for the written word. This day has just been a misery wrapped in a cloak of despair, covered in the secret sauce of melancholy!

Wednesday Evening (Who am I kidding? It was still work, just it was dark out.)

Do a couple of occasions make a habit? Well anyway, we attempted to end the day at our 'regular' establishment; not drowning our sorrows, but certainly not celebrating. I don't know what it is, but for someone who I have only known a couple of days, Oliver certainly does cut right to the heart of things – and seems to confide more than I would expect such a recent acquaintance to do (somehow that doesn't seem right, but I don't know how to define it).

Mr O'Toole is a pretty effective detective. From minimal information, he correctly guessed that my card was a birthday card from my father, and like all others it was sent, and not given personally. Why did I tell him that Dad left when I was ten? It was not his business. But then why did he tell me about his wife leaving? And why did I ask him to dance?

I know I shouldn't speak ill of someone I have never met, but Oliver's wife seems like a bit of a piece of work. What did he call her? Decadent? Who goes with their partner to a place that was special to them and runs away to Paris, leaving the lamest explanation as a message on a phone? And who waits around for two years hoping to hear from their missing spouse? Oliver says he expects her accent will have improved by now – I hope her manners have!

Dancing did provide a little clarity, however. Life is indeed short – and Kelly believed that enough to leave a memorial to her day with Charlie at . Good for you Kelly. Thanks to you, we do have a way forward, and just might get to save Charlie after all. We are back in the dead letter game regardless of what Andrea says.

P.S. Rita has a massive crush on Norman. Oliver says that she terrifies him (Norman, not Oliver).

P. P. S. Note to self: No more sentences that start with the words. 'Oliver says!' I shall definitely 'eschew' that.