Viciously.
All alone, but for their killer.
And maybe, in twenty years’ time, after being lost in the stacks of Homicide, their manila folder, the only record of the life they had lived, would find its way to Larkin’s desk. It’d be full of nothing but DD5 forms with the same notation: No progress to report.
He’d solve their murder.
He’d remember their name.
That is, assuming Larkin was still alive by then.
Because these days, he wasn’t so sure.
“Everett?”
Larkin blinked, turned his head back to Myers. “Can you say that again.”
Myers was quiet for a moment, studying Larkin studying her. Then she said, gently, as if pressing fingertips to a bruise to see if it still hurt, “Have you thought more about what I said last week?”
“No.”
Landmines reflected back from Myers’s eyes, but she carried on. “I think taking a pause in our research is a start, but that you should seriously consider the benefits of therapy.”
Larkin put both feet on the floor and leaned forward. “There are five prominent therapies currently utilized for trauma: TF-CBT is designed specifically for children and teens, CBT primarily focuses on unlearning problematic patterns of behavior, while CPT deals more with the thought-processing side of it, neither of which address my condition. There’s also EMDR, but that’s not ideal for patients with complex trauma or those currently abusing drugs. That leaves us with PE, which intentionally exposes the patient to their trauma as a way to regain power. But I don’t avoid places or people because my brainthinksthere’s an inherent danger present in them. I avoid situations Iknowwill prompt an association.
“It’s been eighteen years, but every single memory I’ve made since then is as fresh as wet paint and I can’t control the compulsion that makes me reach out to touch it. I can still taste that mud and hear my skull cracking and feel my heart breaking—” Larkin’s throat tightened suddenly and he couldn’t finish speaking.
All at once, the couch was too deep, too low.
The recirculated air of the office too cold, too stale.
Larkin’s SIG P226 dug into his ribs.
He stood and walked to the window, putting his back to Myers as he studied the surrounding skyscrapers, staring at the light reflecting off glass and steel until his eyes burned. He longed for the night just then, those seconds of reprieve that haunted the dark, that he searched out, chased down on midnight drives.
—the glow of the dash, streetlamps like tracers, Doyle’s quiet presence the latitude and longitude marking peace on a map, the harmonic content of his voice like physiological poetry.
“The dark’s not so bad,” Doyle had said. “It’s a promise that you made it. That tomorrow is on its way.”—
Larkin closed his eyes, grasped at the safety of that memory. “I experience a trauma that’s provoked by a trauma that can’t be healed.” He turned around and addressed Myers. “Therapy wasn’t designed with someone like me in mind.”
The air of the fire-engine red walk-up grew warmer the closer Larkin got to the fourth floor. He tucked a handful of mail—mostly Doyle’s, although he was finally receiving flyers for grocery deliveries and home furniture sales in his name since changing his address—under one arm before digging keys from his pocket. Larkin balanced a paper bag in his hand, a slice of pizza inside, orange grease steadily seeping through the cheap paper plate. At the landing, Larkin turned and walked the cramped, quiet hall to 4A. He paused a few steps short, studying a shoe-sized cardboard box in front of the door, before approaching. He unlocked the door, held it open with his foot, and crouched to collect the box.
Det. Everett Larkinwas written in black Sharpie, the letters rigid, geometric, unnatural, a clear indication that the sender wished to remain unidentifiable. Underneath his name was the building’s address, apartment number, even zip code. What wasn’t present was a return address, nor any indication the package had been in the care of a delivery company—no stickers, stamps, or barcodes.
“Oh, you got your package,” croaked an older, male voice.
Larkin turned toward the next set of stairs as Humphrey Gabel of 5A tottered down the steps. Their upstairs neighbor was an estimated eighty-years-old, tall and willowy, with snow-white hair that Doyle had referred to once or twice as looking very “Doc Brown,” and who, rain or shine, freezing or sweltering, seemed to always be donned in a plaid bathrobe and clogs straight out of 1975. After having lived here for seventy days, Larkin had gathered that Gabel was this building’s nosy neighbor, which had turned out to not be so terrible, as the older gentleman was quick to report maintenance issues before they had time to affect other tenants, and he was always polite when he came around to share neighborhood gossip with Doyle.
Gabel waggled a finger in the general direction of the box. “You keep such late hours. I didn’t want it sitting in the vestibule all day.”
“Thank you,” Larkin said automatically. “Who delivered it.”
Gabel made a sort of shrugging motion with his mouth. “Oh, I don’t know. It was with the rest of the day’s deliveries. Could have been USPS or FedEx. UPS didn’t come today.”
“You’re certain.”
Gabel nodded.
