Fic: The Kubler-Ross Model (5/5) COMPLETE, green cortina, dakfinv
Title: The Kubler-Ross Model (5/5)
Author: dak
Word Count: 2531 this part [approx. 9000 overall]
Rating: Green cortina
Warnings: mild swearing, mentions of self-harm, angst
Spoilers: massive for 2.08
Summary: Sam says he's fine.
A/N: Online two days in a row? It's a miracle! Thanks to everyone who's been reading and commenting, sorry I haven't been able to respond like I normally do! Please enjoy!
Part 1: Denial Part 2: Anger Part 3: Bargaining Part 4: Depression Part 5: Acceptance
Part 5: Acceptance
“You know what I want to discuss today, Sam.”
“Why do we keep coming back to that?”
“Because you keep trying to avoid it.”
“Maybe because there’s nothing to discuss.”
“Need I remind you that it is only upon my recommendation that you’ll be allowed to return to duty, DI Tyler? Now, tell me about that night.”
“I...it was an accident.”
*
He was lying down. There were no windows, or they were blocked, or maybe there were windows, but it was night. Sam couldn’t tell. His mind was trapped in the haze of sedation, and the thought of what drugs they could be using on him in the Seventies caused him to shudder. He tried to sit up, but the leather straps held him firmly to the bed.
“Sam? Are you awake?”
Through his blurred vision, he could just make out the fuzzy figure of Dr. Gower, as the elderly man sat down on the side of the bed.
“You. Was you,” Sam accused, his speech still slurred.
“Mr. Dobbins, the staff tells me you had some sort of outburst last night. Do you want to tell me what that was about?”
“ ‘M not...not Sam Dobbins. Dobbins doesn’t exist,” he weakly pulled at his restraints.
“Have you and your wife been having difficulties, Sam? Is that why she’s stopped coming to see you?”
“She’s, Annie’s, not my wife. I’m not Dobbins.”
“Who are you then?” Gower asked kindly.
“Tyler. My name is Sam Tyler, an’ I’m...I’m a police officer,” he had to make them understand. What they were doing, it was assault, and assault on a police officer was a serious offence.
“Ah. I see. Well, Sam, I need you to rest here for a little, alright? We’ll check on you later.” Dr. Gower pat him on the knee and rose from the bed.
“No! You can’t...can’t leave me here. I’m a police officer!” Sam struggled to focus his vision as he watched Dr. Gower walk towards a bleary figure by the door.
“...sort of psychotic break...” He heard the doctor whisper to the other man. “...delusional episode. Keep him sedated...”
Sam tugged violently at the binds on his wrists. “I’m not delusional! My name...I’m Sam Tyler! Detective Inspector Sam Tyler from A-Division,” he continued to shout as the second figure descended upon him.
“Just relax, Sam. This will make you feel much better,” cooed the second voice.
Sam watched in horror as a needle came into focus and was plunged suddenly beneath his skin. “No!” He yelled and tried to jerk away, but there was nowhere for him to go. “I don’t want that.”
“There, there,” the plunger went down.
“I...” Whatever coherency Sam had obtained, disappeared as his head was filled with the familiar lightness, and an uneasy feeling of euphoria. “...I don’t belong here...”
“None of you do,” the voice sighed and Sam passed out.
*
“You keep saying it was an accident. Are you sure you don’t mean mistake?”
“I didn’t mean for it to happen.”
“Tell me from the beginning, Sam.”
“It was just another, typical day. Lots of arguing. Lots of fighting.”
“Physical or verbal fights?”
“Both.”
“And DCI Hunt hurt your shoulder?”
“No more than usual, but...”
“Go on, Sam.”
“This time was different.”
“How?”
“I...I could see it in his eyes. He wanted to hurt me. Ever since I...I betrayed them to Morgan, he’s wanted to see me suffer. All of them. They all...”
“Are you sure about that?”
“I was, that day. I came back for them, but none of them wanted me here.”
*
Figures moved in shadows. Faces were no longer visible. Voices muttered things to him, around him, above him, but he could understand nothing. He knew he cried out for help, for Gene, for Annie, but the voices would only sigh softly and tenderly brush his arm.
Days, months, hours, in the dark room all time was skewed. Several times he tried to get out of the bed, but failed. He didn’t even know if was restrained anymore, or if his body simply couldn’t find the strength. The Guv could get him out, if he wanted to, but did he? Gene didn’t want him to be here forever, but maybe he did. Maybe it was the easiest way to deal with his oft-errant DI. Now, Sam was out of the picture, Ray Carling, the Guv’s right hand man could finally take his due place at Gene’s side.
Annie, well Annie would move on, too. He saw the way Chris looked at her, and Chris could be sweet. Girls liked sweet. Annie liked sweet. Sam was never sweet to her, not lately, not since he’d nearly cost them their lives. Not since he’d...
This was what they’d been planning all along. This was what they’d wanted from the beginning. This was what Sam knew he deserved since he came back.
*
“How bad was your shoulder?”
“I don’t know. Sore. He’d twisted it tighter than normal...I thought he had.”
“When did this argument occur?”
“Afternoon. Early afternoon. I couldn’t even tell you what it was about.”
“And how did you two get on the rest of the day?”
“He seemed normal enough. Everyone did, but...”
“But what?”
“I just...I couldn’t shake the feeling that...that everyone was looking at me in disgust.”
“Why would they do that?”
“They weren’t. I don’t think they were. It was...every glance, every comment, it’d only twist my shoulder even further. It was like, they were all pretending everything was okay, when I knew it wasn’t. I tried to get them to talk about it, but they never talk! I tried asking Annie what was the matter, and she laughed. She asked me why I looked so worried, what was wrong with me.”
“Then what happened?”
“It hurt so badly, by the end of the day.”
“Your shoulder?”
“I picked up some pain relievers at the chemist’s on my way home.”
“What else?”
“I...I was afraid I wasn’t going to be able sleep that night. I had, there was so much on my mind. I bought a box of sleeping pills, too.”
“What did you have for dinner?”
“...Nothing. I thought I had some leftovers from the night before, I was going to eat those, but when I got back to my flat, I remembered I’d brought them in for lunch. I decided it would be best if I just went to sleep. I hadn’t been sleeping well. I took some of the pain killers, I was going to get a cup of water, but I was so tired, and the bottle was right there. So I used that. Then I took some of the sleeping pills...”
“With the whisky?”
“A few minutes later, my shoulder still hurt, so I took some more, but it still hurt. It wasn’t making the pain go away. So I took some more, and I drank some more, and the bottle of Anadin fell under the bed, so I picked up the sleeping pills and thought if I fell asleep, then I wouldn’t feel anything. So I took those, and I didn’t fall asleep. Then I took some more, but it wasn’t working. My mind wouldn’t switch off. So I took some more. And then the bottle was empty, and then the whisky was empty, and then I finally fell asleep.”
*
He was moving. He was being moved. He didn’t want to move. He didn’t want to be moving. He did, but not like this. Not by this.
“It’s alright, Sam. It’ll be over soon.”
The voice was meant to comfort. The voice came across as cold and cruel, carrying him down the hall. Not the voice, the voice wasn’t carrying him. Whoever possessed the voice was carrying him.
“You won’t have to suffer much longer.”
Suffer? Was he suffering? He wasn’t suffering. If he was, it was because he was trapped here. Trapped in the, where was he? The hospital. Yes, trapped in the hospital.
“Soon you’ll be free.”
He was free. He had been free, and he’d messed it all up because he couldn’t let go. He wanted to let go, but not from this life. He wanted this life. He chose this life. He was dragged outside. This life was going to end.
“Oi!” That was a different voice. “Drop ‘im, right now!”
“No. No! I have to save him. He needs his pain to end. He wants it to end.”
“The only thing that’s goin’ to end is your life if you don’ put me DI down.”
He couldn’t feel much. He couldn’t see much. A prick in his arm. A gunshot. He was falling. Stairs? Was he rolling down stairs? He was. The stone steps outside the hospital. He rolled down, and into something soft. The needle ripped away. Had the plunger gone down? He rolled down something hard, but was cradled by something soft.
“Tyler! C’mon. Wake up.” A tap in the face. A slap in the face. “Can you hear me, Sam? Are you in there? Bloody hell...”
A face. A blurry face. A green and blonde and tired face.
“...Guv...”
“That’s right, Sammy. We’re here. We’ve got yeh.”
“...sorry...”
“So you say. Could show it by not passin’ out on me every other day.”
“...’kay...”
A slap in the face. Pain. Good pain. Comforting pain. Home pain. “I told yeh before, Sammy-boy. I’m not losin’ yeh like this.”
*
“I didn’t know what was going on. Gene was shouting and shouting at me. He kept repeating the same thing. ‘Sam, Sammy, what did you take? What did you take, Sam? How much?’ And all I could think was ‘Christ, what does he want now?’ He slapped me, trying to wake me up, and I opened my mouth to yell at him, and sicked up all over his shirt. I thought, ‘that’s the last time I eat leftovers.’”
“What happened next?”
“My shoulder hurt, my stomach hurt worse, and my head...all I wanted to do was go back to sleep, but Gene wouidn’t let me. Kept shaking me and cursing at me, saying how I had a one-track mind. How I should’ve forgotten about Morgan, because they had. He had. All I wanted to do was go to sleep.”
“What did he do?”
“I...from what I can remember...he carried me out to the car. Drove me to hospital. I didn’t think anything was wrong. I kept trying to tell him I was fine, but I couldn’t get the words out. I finally passed out when he took me inside. I woke up later, and that’s when I met you.”
“Sam, that night, did you attempt to commit suicide?”
*
He knocked on the door tentatively. Gene or Annie was going to pick him up from hospital, the next day, but Sam had managed to sweet talk his doctor into releasing him early. Now he stood in front of his Guv’s home, knowing he had a serious amount of explaining to do.
“You’re supposed to be in bed,” was the first thing Gene said as the door swung open.
“I know. Can I come in?”
He allowed Gene’s appraising look to sweep over his pale, exhausted body and waited to be permitted entrance. Finally, the Guv stood back and ushered him inside, catching his elbow as Sam tripped in the door frame.
“You should be sleeping.”
“I have to talk to you.”
“Now?”
“Yes.”
He heard Gene’s sigh, then followed his lumbering Guv’nor into the kitchen.
“Well? Goin’ to talk or what?” Gene finally asked when they were sat across from each other at the table.
Sam took a deep breath and decided to get it all out at once. “I was trying to kill myself that night.”
Gene grew very still, allowing his lit cigarette to burn down in his hand. “You should be talkin’ to Cartwright about this.”
“I’m talking to you. And, yes, I will talk to Annie, but I wanted to see you first. You’re the one that found me.”
“So...” Gene sighed. “Dare I ask why?”
“Do you really want to know?”
“Probably goin’ to tell me anyhow.”
“It’s complicated.”
“Tyler, everything with you is more complicated than Gordian knot...What?”
“Nothing. I’m just surprised you know what a Gordian knot is.”
“I will still smack you. Now get on with it ‘fore I decide I don’t want to hear it?”
Sam scrubbed his hands through his hair. “I...you...all of you, you forgave me, for what happened with Morgan. You dealt with it, and you accepted me, and you moved on, but I...I couldn’t. I wasn’t ready to believe that I could be trusted so easily. No one was punishing me, so I punished myself.”
“Sam...” Gene dropped the butt into the ash tray. “That deal, with Morgan, even if you’d gone through with it, it weren’t worth your life.”
“But it was worth yours!” Sam countered, then dropped his hands into his lap. “I...I went through a lot, in that tunnel. I thought about home...about Hyde, and I knew I was ready to give all that up for you. Then, later...no one was doubting me, so I doubted myself.”
“Spent too much time with that shrink.”
“Yeah,” Sam laughed. “Probably.”
“Sam...” Gene trailed off.
“What?”
“Why did you want to go undercover afterwards? Only had been back at work a month.”
“You could’ve said no.”
“I did.”
“Yeah, suppose you’re right,” Sam leaned back, rubbing the back of his neck. “Worked though, didn’t it? We managed to draw out Peterson. Put a stop to his ‘mercy’ killings.”
“And you managed to nearly get yourself killed. Again.”
“I think I wanted to lose myself again, forget everything that had happened. Ignore it. But I’m done with that now. All of it.”
Gene eyed him carefully. “You sure?”
Sam sighed and thought carefully. “Yeah. Pretty sure.”
“An’...” Gene coughed, “if you’re not?” He mumbled.
“I’ll tell someone.”
They sat in silence for almost five minutes before Gene spoke again. “We done with this talkin’ shite now?”
“Yeah. For now.”
“Good. Cos it bein’ Saturday, the match is on, an’ I’m not goin’ to let a girly thing like ‘chatting’ get in the way of me match,” Gene rose from the table, heading towards the refrigerator for a beer. “Can stay and watch if you want,” he said, without looking at Sam.
“Thanks, but I’ve got to run.”
“Goin’ to ‘talk’ with Cartwright?”
“No,” Sam replied, picking himself out of the chair. “My roommate, while I was undercover. He was moved to a different ward while I was there. Thought he’d...I never got the chance to say goodbye.”
“Right. See you Monday, then.”
“Monday,” Sam agreed and walked to the door.
“Sam,” Gene called after him.
“Yeah?”
“Don’t get yourself admitted.”
“Sure thing, Guv,” Sam smiled, then opened the door and stepped outside, nearly getting run over by a gang of kids running rampant down the pavement. He shouted at them to be more careful, then strolled off in the other direction, relishing the feel of his leather jacket, flared trousers, and the sound of his Cuban heels clicking against the ground. It was good to be home.
Author: dak
Word Count: 2531 this part [approx. 9000 overall]
Rating: Green cortina
Warnings: mild swearing, mentions of self-harm, angst
Spoilers: massive for 2.08
Summary: Sam says he's fine.
A/N: Online two days in a row? It's a miracle! Thanks to everyone who's been reading and commenting, sorry I haven't been able to respond like I normally do! Please enjoy!
Part 1: Denial Part 2: Anger Part 3: Bargaining Part 4: Depression Part 5: Acceptance
Part 5: Acceptance
“You know what I want to discuss today, Sam.”
“Why do we keep coming back to that?”
“Because you keep trying to avoid it.”
“Maybe because there’s nothing to discuss.”
“Need I remind you that it is only upon my recommendation that you’ll be allowed to return to duty, DI Tyler? Now, tell me about that night.”
“I...it was an accident.”
*
He was lying down. There were no windows, or they were blocked, or maybe there were windows, but it was night. Sam couldn’t tell. His mind was trapped in the haze of sedation, and the thought of what drugs they could be using on him in the Seventies caused him to shudder. He tried to sit up, but the leather straps held him firmly to the bed.
“Sam? Are you awake?”
Through his blurred vision, he could just make out the fuzzy figure of Dr. Gower, as the elderly man sat down on the side of the bed.
“You. Was you,” Sam accused, his speech still slurred.
“Mr. Dobbins, the staff tells me you had some sort of outburst last night. Do you want to tell me what that was about?”
“ ‘M not...not Sam Dobbins. Dobbins doesn’t exist,” he weakly pulled at his restraints.
“Have you and your wife been having difficulties, Sam? Is that why she’s stopped coming to see you?”
“She’s, Annie’s, not my wife. I’m not Dobbins.”
“Who are you then?” Gower asked kindly.
“Tyler. My name is Sam Tyler, an’ I’m...I’m a police officer,” he had to make them understand. What they were doing, it was assault, and assault on a police officer was a serious offence.
“Ah. I see. Well, Sam, I need you to rest here for a little, alright? We’ll check on you later.” Dr. Gower pat him on the knee and rose from the bed.
“No! You can’t...can’t leave me here. I’m a police officer!” Sam struggled to focus his vision as he watched Dr. Gower walk towards a bleary figure by the door.
“...sort of psychotic break...” He heard the doctor whisper to the other man. “...delusional episode. Keep him sedated...”
Sam tugged violently at the binds on his wrists. “I’m not delusional! My name...I’m Sam Tyler! Detective Inspector Sam Tyler from A-Division,” he continued to shout as the second figure descended upon him.
“Just relax, Sam. This will make you feel much better,” cooed the second voice.
Sam watched in horror as a needle came into focus and was plunged suddenly beneath his skin. “No!” He yelled and tried to jerk away, but there was nowhere for him to go. “I don’t want that.”
“There, there,” the plunger went down.
“I...” Whatever coherency Sam had obtained, disappeared as his head was filled with the familiar lightness, and an uneasy feeling of euphoria. “...I don’t belong here...”
“None of you do,” the voice sighed and Sam passed out.
*
“You keep saying it was an accident. Are you sure you don’t mean mistake?”
“I didn’t mean for it to happen.”
“Tell me from the beginning, Sam.”
“It was just another, typical day. Lots of arguing. Lots of fighting.”
“Physical or verbal fights?”
“Both.”
“And DCI Hunt hurt your shoulder?”
“No more than usual, but...”
“Go on, Sam.”
“This time was different.”
“How?”
“I...I could see it in his eyes. He wanted to hurt me. Ever since I...I betrayed them to Morgan, he’s wanted to see me suffer. All of them. They all...”
“Are you sure about that?”
“I was, that day. I came back for them, but none of them wanted me here.”
*
Figures moved in shadows. Faces were no longer visible. Voices muttered things to him, around him, above him, but he could understand nothing. He knew he cried out for help, for Gene, for Annie, but the voices would only sigh softly and tenderly brush his arm.
Days, months, hours, in the dark room all time was skewed. Several times he tried to get out of the bed, but failed. He didn’t even know if was restrained anymore, or if his body simply couldn’t find the strength. The Guv could get him out, if he wanted to, but did he? Gene didn’t want him to be here forever, but maybe he did. Maybe it was the easiest way to deal with his oft-errant DI. Now, Sam was out of the picture, Ray Carling, the Guv’s right hand man could finally take his due place at Gene’s side.
Annie, well Annie would move on, too. He saw the way Chris looked at her, and Chris could be sweet. Girls liked sweet. Annie liked sweet. Sam was never sweet to her, not lately, not since he’d nearly cost them their lives. Not since he’d...
This was what they’d been planning all along. This was what they’d wanted from the beginning. This was what Sam knew he deserved since he came back.
*
“How bad was your shoulder?”
“I don’t know. Sore. He’d twisted it tighter than normal...I thought he had.”
“When did this argument occur?”
“Afternoon. Early afternoon. I couldn’t even tell you what it was about.”
“And how did you two get on the rest of the day?”
“He seemed normal enough. Everyone did, but...”
“But what?”
“I just...I couldn’t shake the feeling that...that everyone was looking at me in disgust.”
“Why would they do that?”
“They weren’t. I don’t think they were. It was...every glance, every comment, it’d only twist my shoulder even further. It was like, they were all pretending everything was okay, when I knew it wasn’t. I tried to get them to talk about it, but they never talk! I tried asking Annie what was the matter, and she laughed. She asked me why I looked so worried, what was wrong with me.”
“Then what happened?”
“It hurt so badly, by the end of the day.”
“Your shoulder?”
“I picked up some pain relievers at the chemist’s on my way home.”
“What else?”
“I...I was afraid I wasn’t going to be able sleep that night. I had, there was so much on my mind. I bought a box of sleeping pills, too.”
“What did you have for dinner?”
“...Nothing. I thought I had some leftovers from the night before, I was going to eat those, but when I got back to my flat, I remembered I’d brought them in for lunch. I decided it would be best if I just went to sleep. I hadn’t been sleeping well. I took some of the pain killers, I was going to get a cup of water, but I was so tired, and the bottle was right there. So I used that. Then I took some of the sleeping pills...”
“With the whisky?”
“A few minutes later, my shoulder still hurt, so I took some more, but it still hurt. It wasn’t making the pain go away. So I took some more, and I drank some more, and the bottle of Anadin fell under the bed, so I picked up the sleeping pills and thought if I fell asleep, then I wouldn’t feel anything. So I took those, and I didn’t fall asleep. Then I took some more, but it wasn’t working. My mind wouldn’t switch off. So I took some more. And then the bottle was empty, and then the whisky was empty, and then I finally fell asleep.”
*
He was moving. He was being moved. He didn’t want to move. He didn’t want to be moving. He did, but not like this. Not by this.
“It’s alright, Sam. It’ll be over soon.”
The voice was meant to comfort. The voice came across as cold and cruel, carrying him down the hall. Not the voice, the voice wasn’t carrying him. Whoever possessed the voice was carrying him.
“You won’t have to suffer much longer.”
Suffer? Was he suffering? He wasn’t suffering. If he was, it was because he was trapped here. Trapped in the, where was he? The hospital. Yes, trapped in the hospital.
“Soon you’ll be free.”
He was free. He had been free, and he’d messed it all up because he couldn’t let go. He wanted to let go, but not from this life. He wanted this life. He chose this life. He was dragged outside. This life was going to end.
“Oi!” That was a different voice. “Drop ‘im, right now!”
“No. No! I have to save him. He needs his pain to end. He wants it to end.”
“The only thing that’s goin’ to end is your life if you don’ put me DI down.”
He couldn’t feel much. He couldn’t see much. A prick in his arm. A gunshot. He was falling. Stairs? Was he rolling down stairs? He was. The stone steps outside the hospital. He rolled down, and into something soft. The needle ripped away. Had the plunger gone down? He rolled down something hard, but was cradled by something soft.
“Tyler! C’mon. Wake up.” A tap in the face. A slap in the face. “Can you hear me, Sam? Are you in there? Bloody hell...”
A face. A blurry face. A green and blonde and tired face.
“...Guv...”
“That’s right, Sammy. We’re here. We’ve got yeh.”
“...sorry...”
“So you say. Could show it by not passin’ out on me every other day.”
“...’kay...”
A slap in the face. Pain. Good pain. Comforting pain. Home pain. “I told yeh before, Sammy-boy. I’m not losin’ yeh like this.”
*
“I didn’t know what was going on. Gene was shouting and shouting at me. He kept repeating the same thing. ‘Sam, Sammy, what did you take? What did you take, Sam? How much?’ And all I could think was ‘Christ, what does he want now?’ He slapped me, trying to wake me up, and I opened my mouth to yell at him, and sicked up all over his shirt. I thought, ‘that’s the last time I eat leftovers.’”
“What happened next?”
“My shoulder hurt, my stomach hurt worse, and my head...all I wanted to do was go back to sleep, but Gene wouidn’t let me. Kept shaking me and cursing at me, saying how I had a one-track mind. How I should’ve forgotten about Morgan, because they had. He had. All I wanted to do was go to sleep.”
“What did he do?”
“I...from what I can remember...he carried me out to the car. Drove me to hospital. I didn’t think anything was wrong. I kept trying to tell him I was fine, but I couldn’t get the words out. I finally passed out when he took me inside. I woke up later, and that’s when I met you.”
“Sam, that night, did you attempt to commit suicide?”
*
He knocked on the door tentatively. Gene or Annie was going to pick him up from hospital, the next day, but Sam had managed to sweet talk his doctor into releasing him early. Now he stood in front of his Guv’s home, knowing he had a serious amount of explaining to do.
“You’re supposed to be in bed,” was the first thing Gene said as the door swung open.
“I know. Can I come in?”
He allowed Gene’s appraising look to sweep over his pale, exhausted body and waited to be permitted entrance. Finally, the Guv stood back and ushered him inside, catching his elbow as Sam tripped in the door frame.
“You should be sleeping.”
“I have to talk to you.”
“Now?”
“Yes.”
He heard Gene’s sigh, then followed his lumbering Guv’nor into the kitchen.
“Well? Goin’ to talk or what?” Gene finally asked when they were sat across from each other at the table.
Sam took a deep breath and decided to get it all out at once. “I was trying to kill myself that night.”
Gene grew very still, allowing his lit cigarette to burn down in his hand. “You should be talkin’ to Cartwright about this.”
“I’m talking to you. And, yes, I will talk to Annie, but I wanted to see you first. You’re the one that found me.”
“So...” Gene sighed. “Dare I ask why?”
“Do you really want to know?”
“Probably goin’ to tell me anyhow.”
“It’s complicated.”
“Tyler, everything with you is more complicated than Gordian knot...What?”
“Nothing. I’m just surprised you know what a Gordian knot is.”
“I will still smack you. Now get on with it ‘fore I decide I don’t want to hear it?”
Sam scrubbed his hands through his hair. “I...you...all of you, you forgave me, for what happened with Morgan. You dealt with it, and you accepted me, and you moved on, but I...I couldn’t. I wasn’t ready to believe that I could be trusted so easily. No one was punishing me, so I punished myself.”
“Sam...” Gene dropped the butt into the ash tray. “That deal, with Morgan, even if you’d gone through with it, it weren’t worth your life.”
“But it was worth yours!” Sam countered, then dropped his hands into his lap. “I...I went through a lot, in that tunnel. I thought about home...about Hyde, and I knew I was ready to give all that up for you. Then, later...no one was doubting me, so I doubted myself.”
“Spent too much time with that shrink.”
“Yeah,” Sam laughed. “Probably.”
“Sam...” Gene trailed off.
“What?”
“Why did you want to go undercover afterwards? Only had been back at work a month.”
“You could’ve said no.”
“I did.”
“Yeah, suppose you’re right,” Sam leaned back, rubbing the back of his neck. “Worked though, didn’t it? We managed to draw out Peterson. Put a stop to his ‘mercy’ killings.”
“And you managed to nearly get yourself killed. Again.”
“I think I wanted to lose myself again, forget everything that had happened. Ignore it. But I’m done with that now. All of it.”
Gene eyed him carefully. “You sure?”
Sam sighed and thought carefully. “Yeah. Pretty sure.”
“An’...” Gene coughed, “if you’re not?” He mumbled.
“I’ll tell someone.”
They sat in silence for almost five minutes before Gene spoke again. “We done with this talkin’ shite now?”
“Yeah. For now.”
“Good. Cos it bein’ Saturday, the match is on, an’ I’m not goin’ to let a girly thing like ‘chatting’ get in the way of me match,” Gene rose from the table, heading towards the refrigerator for a beer. “Can stay and watch if you want,” he said, without looking at Sam.
“Thanks, but I’ve got to run.”
“Goin’ to ‘talk’ with Cartwright?”
“No,” Sam replied, picking himself out of the chair. “My roommate, while I was undercover. He was moved to a different ward while I was there. Thought he’d...I never got the chance to say goodbye.”
“Right. See you Monday, then.”
“Monday,” Sam agreed and walked to the door.
“Sam,” Gene called after him.
“Yeah?”
“Don’t get yourself admitted.”
“Sure thing, Guv,” Sam smiled, then opened the door and stepped outside, nearly getting run over by a gang of kids running rampant down the pavement. He shouted at them to be more careful, then strolled off in the other direction, relishing the feel of his leather jacket, flared trousers, and the sound of his Cuban heels clicking against the ground. It was good to be home.