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The officer is kind, if a little bit pushy. “You hit him with a bat?” Officer Clarke, who introduced himself first, looks suspiciously at the bat and then at Cole. “Are you sure about that?”
“Look,” I answer a little bit snarly. “My father’s a cop. My brother’s planning on becoming a cop when he gets out of the service. My sister is a dispatcher. My mom too, for that matter. I’m a teacher. I’m not in the habit of lying to the police.” I keep going, even after it is clear that Officer Clarke isn’t questioning my integrity anymore. “This guy was in the house all evening, I’m pretty sure. Hiding until I went to bed. He was trying to rob my sister’s house. And I heard him from upstairs. I grabbed the only thing I could, because I couldn’t bring my gun with me from Maine. So yeah, I hit him with a bat. If we’d been in Maine, I wouldn’t have needed the bat.”
His eyes are wide, but then again so are Cole’s.
“Ma’am.” His demeanor shifts. “Are you okay?”
I sigh and do my best to put him at ease. “No. Yes. Or I’m getting there. I will be. I don’t know.” So many emotions flash through my head that I’m having trouble even expressing the simple ones. “I’m just tired.”
He takes both mine and Cole’s information, as well as the story that Cole gives him from what he heard and saw. Then he takes the overly pale, strung-out boy away in cuffs. He doesn’t really look like he can be more than sixteen or seventeen at most, and he won’t look me in the eyes. I feel bad for him, until I remember that he’d been trying to steal from Cassie and he scared the shit out of me.
I follow them out to see that a few of the neighbors are watching what’s happening, including Sori. She waves at me, a concerned smile on her face and a glass of wine in her hand. She lifts her other hand and I see the massive bottle of wine she’s holding out in silent offering. All I can do is shake my head slightly at her. I need something stronger than wine if I’m gonna drink away tonight, that’s for sure.
“I don’t think he took anything,” I tell Officer Clarke after he places the kid in the back seat of the cruiser. “And I don’t want to press charges for anything other than a breaking and entering.”
He stares at me with surprise, pausing as he writes everything I say in his notebook. “Are you sure about that?”
“Yes.”
It isn’t what Cassie would want. She’d been in New York to get an advanced degree in social work. It’s the reason she lived away from her boyfriend and the rest of our family. The very last thing she’d ever want me to do was make a kid’s life harder. If she’d been alive, she’d probably adopt the kid instead of having him arrested. She cared, more than anyone else I know.
“I’ll call you if there’s anything else I need from you.” He holds out his hand, offering me one of his business cards. “And if you find that there is something missing or you have any questions, don’t hesitate to call.”
When the cruiser is gone, and all the excitement disappears with it, most of the neighbors go back into their houses. Sori is one of the last to go, but not before she shoots me a suspicious look when she sees Cole still standing next to me. She stares pointedly between us and then smirks. The look on her face is easy to figure out. She isn’t going to let me get away for too long without giving her all the details on what’s happening between the two of us.
When I turn away from everyone else, I find Cole watching me carefully. I can practically see the gears turning in his head while he figures out what he is going to say. What he’s going to do to keep me from shattering with the weight of the evening.
“You really are one of the unluckiest people I have ever met.”
When he pats the stairs after plopping down, I can’t refuse to follow his example. So I sit next to him, pull my legs up to my chest, and lay my head on my knees.
“She was my twin sister.” I answer his statement from earlier, when he saw the picture. “Identical twins in every way. And when she died, I swear I lost a piece of my soul along with her. I was driving into the city and I felt it the moment she was gone. I’m so broken it’s not even funny. I don’t think I’ll ever be okay. To be honest, I don’t even think I want to be okay.”
I don’t know what I expect from Cole. A smart-ass retort or maybe something geared toward trying to make me feel better. Whatever it is that I expect from him, he surprises me again.
“I listen to music at night because I can’t stand the silence. Not since my first deployment. When we were there, the silence was the worst part. The most dangerous. In a firefight, we knew what to expect. We knew what was coming. Where the danger was coming from. But the silence… I couldn’t stand the silence and what it held.” His words shock me. “After the night you came over and told me to shut up”—he laughs lightly—”I make sure to use my soundproof headphones so I don’t bother you at night. Knowing you’re there, on the other side of the wall just a knock away, makes it more bearable than it used to be.”
I don’t know what to say or how to act with his admission. Thankfully, he makes that decision for me. Cole pulls me into his body, wrapping me in a one-armed embrace, without ever making eye contact or making me feel like I have to look at him.
“I think we’re all broken. We just need to find a way to move through this shit as best we can.”
“I don’t want to be alone.” I lean into his embrace, trying my best not to think about the implications of what I just said. “I don’t want to see her face and her blankets and her stuff. I can’t do it. Not tonight.” He tightens his hold, just enough to let me know that he hears me. That and he understands my pain and he’s not leaving me alone.
Cole stands up and offers me his hand, all while not saying a word. There isn’t anything left to say. He’s shown me that I was wrong about him, and he’s done it so slowly that I don’t even know. So, with all the pain and emotions I’ve gone through, there is only one thing left to do.
I let him guide me to his condo, and I try not to lose myself in the process.
He’s only a man.
He can’t fix me.
He can’t fight my demons for me.
But with one smile and the way his hand caresses mine… I realize it’s too late.
I already lost.
And I don’t think I care very much.
