FIC: Human Landscapes [Dani Reese, Gen. Part 6/8]
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6.
A line in the sand. Dani thought she could draw a line in the sand in her undercover work, the line where she’d say ‘Fuck you’ to her superiors because this wasn’t what she signed up for. She signed up to be a cop, not to enable druggies to get high just so she could get more information, not to pretend she’d be shooting up, not to pretend to like a guy just because he was connected to a cartel.
But there were the things Dani learned about herself during undercover:
She can lie like nobody’s business. She can lie with a straight face; lie looking like shit, covered in shit. Lie with a muzzle of a gun stuck to her face and demanding her to do things she would never do.
Lying came easy for Dani and it shouldn’t have been a surprise. It was the only way to survive under her father’s house.
Lying by omission, lying to tell him or both parents where she was and who she was with or as simple as learning a language she was forbidden to learn. Cop kids either didn’t lie or learned to well.
But the best lies Dani said were the lies she told herself.
-/-
They always say your first time sticks with you and that’s true for most things: first kiss, first time you fired a gun, first time you had sex, first kill and first hit.
First kiss was easy, Jeremy Laurence. She was fourteen and he was fifteen. Jeremy was cute and had freckles along his nose with his dark hair and smiling eyes. He made her heart flutter, even when he smirked. Dani thought he was cool.
She remembered how surprised she was at how soft his lips were and how sloppy the whole process was and then Jeremy put his hand awkwardly on her left breast. She developed early and she was the only girl in her class to wear a bra at twelve. The kiss ended with Jeremy shouting bloody murder when she kneed him on the groin.
Sex was high school and beer. The only first she had vague memories about but Dani remembered it was awkward and messy and Dani thinking what the hell the big deal was. It took college for Dani to realize how much fun sex could be and how much she really liked it.
The first time she fired a gun, she was 10 years old, Leyla caught Dani holding Jack’s service weapon, a revolver. Her father was mad and angry and all the things that described Jack Reese. He grabbed her arm and forced her to listen to a two-hour lecture on gun safety and told her: “If you’re going to play with my guns, you damn well better learn to do it the right way.”
He drove her to the firing range and drilled her on the right way to hold guns, shoot a target, draw and holster a gun. He drilled her until she had it right, never letting up. Always that barking, emotionless tone: “Again.”
Dani doubted this what her mother had in mind when she marched to her husband and demanded Jack keep a better eye on his weapon.
The first time she killed a man was like the first time she had sex: messy, fast and loud. It was a raid, one of the first buy bust operations she was allowed in. Her Kevlar was too tight on her frame and then there were shouts of: ‘Police! Police!’
The gangbangers responded with gunfire. Instinct and training took over. Once the gunfight ended and the smell of gunpowder and blood filled the air Dani stared at the bodies around them, the survivors crying for surrender. She didn’t know which of the dead bodies was the one felled by her gun.
She did remember the glassy eyes, her shaky hands at the recoil and the giddiness over the first successful raid giving way to nausea. The beer and the whiskey after the raid helped her sleep and forget the glassy eyes.
But of all the firsts, the one that stood out above everything else, above the hazy memories was the first time she took a hit. If she closed her eyes she could remember it vividly, needle in the arm the inevitable wait for the drug to take effect. She didn’t want to, the first time, never expected to do so but her target was suspicious. She can’t join in with the party if she didn’t party with his product.
And she was so close to breaking in so, so close. Months of undercover work boiled down to that point and so very aware that if she didn’t sell this it would be far worse than getting a reprimand. So she took the needle and told herself it was only once, just once and for this case only.
The pain and the fear and everything else vanished and, God… she still dreamed of that first high. It’s the ghost all addicts chase after, the one that started it all. Booze and fucking can only take it so far.
A quick pinch of the needle, a line on a table and that’s all it took-
The line in the sand blurred into nothing.
-/-
Coffee was on her desk when she arrived, Reese dropped her jacket on her chair. The collar of her shirt felt damp, Reese reached up and made sure her hair was in place. Crews had called to remind her about the meeting with the SID crew but Reese suspected he’d called her because he was bored. Ever since he made a crack about calling only when there were homicides Reese knew he’d find a way to remedy that.
He started calling her early in the morning, all hours of the day dropping in inane bits of trivia and then saying goodbye before she could cut the connection herself. She didn’t have an adult for a partner, she had a goddamned twelve year old.
Reese placed her sunglasses on the desk and watched Crews watch his phone vibrate, he had on a satisfied smile; left alone Crews would just let it ring until it either fell or the battery died. She reached over, ignored Crews’ protest and flipped the phone open.
“Crews’ phone.”
Crews watched her, dismayed. “Hey, Connie.” She raised her eyebrows at him, he had on the same weird expression he always had whenever Constance was around. “Yeah, he’s here.” She passed the phone to Crews. “Constance, says she needs to tell you something.”
“Thanks.” He spun his chair around until all Reese could see was the back of his head. “Connie, how’s court? Sent any guilty men to jail?”
Reese shook her head and powered up her computer.
“Detective?”
Reese turned and saw Mary Reynolds. “Mrs. Reynolds?”
Reese surreptitiously placed another folder above Luke Reynolds’ file. She had the file pulled after they returned from the university, Luke died from overdose and a real bad cut of dope, weeks later Mary’s sister filed a report against Sullivan and Jackson but nothing came out of it.
"May I speak with you?"
"Sure," Reese said and pulled up a chair next to her table.
Mary settled into the chair. "I wanted to talk about..." She paused and took a deep breath. Reese glanced at Crews, he was still talking to Griffiths but he swiveled his chair back around and seconds later he snapped his phone shut.
"Is this about yesterday?" Reese asked.
"Yes." Mary answered, tucking back wisps of hair that escaped her ponytail. "I wanted to... my sister, she's a very vocal person but her bark's usually worse than her bite."
"Understandable," Reese said.
"She's just very protective," Mary continued, rubbing her hands on her lap. "After Dan died, Cindy helped us a lot and she loved Luke."
"We understand." Crews said again.
"I just... I wanted it to be clear." Mary looked to Crews and he returned it, looking sympathetic and watchful. Reese took the opportunity to study Mary, hands fidgeting, moving from her lap to clutching her hands together and finally palms on the edge of Reese's desk.
"He thought I didn't know." Mary said, apropos of nothing. Reese moved her head a little, confused. "I pretended I didn't know, told myself I was only seeing things but I knew. I knew."
"You knew?" Crews asked because the words were stuck in Reese's throat.
Mary didn't look at them, diverted her attention to Reese's sunglasses. Reese watched Mary move her sunglasses around until she settled on the placing it a little between the boundary between her desk and Crews' desk. "I knew he was using drugs."
Oh. Reese thought half a second before Crews went: "Oh."
"He thought I didn't know," she repeated, "but a mother always knows we just we pretend not to know because then it wouldn't--" Mary broke off and Reese suddenly found herself under Mary's focus. "Do you have children, detective?"
Reese shook her head.
"It's hard seeing your child that way. Pretending and you pretend with them, and you think, just think: if I loved him enough... it would go away. But it doesn't and it gets worse and when you try to intervene... " Mary let go of Reese's glasses and buried her face in her hands. "They were children."
Reese didn't fidget or move or anything else because Davis stood right behind Mary with that expression. Like she'd lived through what Mary lived through. The bullpen was suddenly smaller and she was all too aware of all the people in the room.
"Mrs. Reynolds," Crews said, "would you like some tea?"
"I... I would, thank you."
"I'd like some tea myself," Crews went on, happily, "tea and coffee, Detective Reese also loves a good cup, of coffee I mean. She doesn't like tea, do you, Reese?"
"Not really." Reese murmured.
Crews stood and he moved around, blocking her view of Davis. "C'mon, Reese, let's show Mrs. Reynolds the best place to get these things."
"That's not..." Mary began.
"The world is a wide place," Crews continued. "And the sun is in its heaven."
Mary frowned, confused. "I'm sorry, what?"
Reese pulled her jacket of her chair. "We'll escort you out, Mrs. Reynolds."
"Oh..." Mary stood up, a bundle of confusion and stalled grief, when Reese turned for the elevator Davis was still looking at her.
On to Chapter 7
6.
A line in the sand. Dani thought she could draw a line in the sand in her undercover work, the line where she’d say ‘Fuck you’ to her superiors because this wasn’t what she signed up for. She signed up to be a cop, not to enable druggies to get high just so she could get more information, not to pretend she’d be shooting up, not to pretend to like a guy just because he was connected to a cartel.
But there were the things Dani learned about herself during undercover:
She can lie like nobody’s business. She can lie with a straight face; lie looking like shit, covered in shit. Lie with a muzzle of a gun stuck to her face and demanding her to do things she would never do.
Lying came easy for Dani and it shouldn’t have been a surprise. It was the only way to survive under her father’s house.
Lying by omission, lying to tell him or both parents where she was and who she was with or as simple as learning a language she was forbidden to learn. Cop kids either didn’t lie or learned to well.
But the best lies Dani said were the lies she told herself.
-/-
They always say your first time sticks with you and that’s true for most things: first kiss, first time you fired a gun, first time you had sex, first kill and first hit.
First kiss was easy, Jeremy Laurence. She was fourteen and he was fifteen. Jeremy was cute and had freckles along his nose with his dark hair and smiling eyes. He made her heart flutter, even when he smirked. Dani thought he was cool.
She remembered how surprised she was at how soft his lips were and how sloppy the whole process was and then Jeremy put his hand awkwardly on her left breast. She developed early and she was the only girl in her class to wear a bra at twelve. The kiss ended with Jeremy shouting bloody murder when she kneed him on the groin.
Sex was high school and beer. The only first she had vague memories about but Dani remembered it was awkward and messy and Dani thinking what the hell the big deal was. It took college for Dani to realize how much fun sex could be and how much she really liked it.
The first time she fired a gun, she was 10 years old, Leyla caught Dani holding Jack’s service weapon, a revolver. Her father was mad and angry and all the things that described Jack Reese. He grabbed her arm and forced her to listen to a two-hour lecture on gun safety and told her: “If you’re going to play with my guns, you damn well better learn to do it the right way.”
He drove her to the firing range and drilled her on the right way to hold guns, shoot a target, draw and holster a gun. He drilled her until she had it right, never letting up. Always that barking, emotionless tone: “Again.”
Dani doubted this what her mother had in mind when she marched to her husband and demanded Jack keep a better eye on his weapon.
The first time she killed a man was like the first time she had sex: messy, fast and loud. It was a raid, one of the first buy bust operations she was allowed in. Her Kevlar was too tight on her frame and then there were shouts of: ‘Police! Police!’
The gangbangers responded with gunfire. Instinct and training took over. Once the gunfight ended and the smell of gunpowder and blood filled the air Dani stared at the bodies around them, the survivors crying for surrender. She didn’t know which of the dead bodies was the one felled by her gun.
She did remember the glassy eyes, her shaky hands at the recoil and the giddiness over the first successful raid giving way to nausea. The beer and the whiskey after the raid helped her sleep and forget the glassy eyes.
But of all the firsts, the one that stood out above everything else, above the hazy memories was the first time she took a hit. If she closed her eyes she could remember it vividly, needle in the arm the inevitable wait for the drug to take effect. She didn’t want to, the first time, never expected to do so but her target was suspicious. She can’t join in with the party if she didn’t party with his product.
And she was so close to breaking in so, so close. Months of undercover work boiled down to that point and so very aware that if she didn’t sell this it would be far worse than getting a reprimand. So she took the needle and told herself it was only once, just once and for this case only.
The pain and the fear and everything else vanished and, God… she still dreamed of that first high. It’s the ghost all addicts chase after, the one that started it all. Booze and fucking can only take it so far.
A quick pinch of the needle, a line on a table and that’s all it took-
The line in the sand blurred into nothing.
-/-
Coffee was on her desk when she arrived, Reese dropped her jacket on her chair. The collar of her shirt felt damp, Reese reached up and made sure her hair was in place. Crews had called to remind her about the meeting with the SID crew but Reese suspected he’d called her because he was bored. Ever since he made a crack about calling only when there were homicides Reese knew he’d find a way to remedy that.
He started calling her early in the morning, all hours of the day dropping in inane bits of trivia and then saying goodbye before she could cut the connection herself. She didn’t have an adult for a partner, she had a goddamned twelve year old.
Reese placed her sunglasses on the desk and watched Crews watch his phone vibrate, he had on a satisfied smile; left alone Crews would just let it ring until it either fell or the battery died. She reached over, ignored Crews’ protest and flipped the phone open.
“Crews’ phone.”
Crews watched her, dismayed. “Hey, Connie.” She raised her eyebrows at him, he had on the same weird expression he always had whenever Constance was around. “Yeah, he’s here.” She passed the phone to Crews. “Constance, says she needs to tell you something.”
“Thanks.” He spun his chair around until all Reese could see was the back of his head. “Connie, how’s court? Sent any guilty men to jail?”
Reese shook her head and powered up her computer.
“Detective?”
Reese turned and saw Mary Reynolds. “Mrs. Reynolds?”
Reese surreptitiously placed another folder above Luke Reynolds’ file. She had the file pulled after they returned from the university, Luke died from overdose and a real bad cut of dope, weeks later Mary’s sister filed a report against Sullivan and Jackson but nothing came out of it.
"May I speak with you?"
"Sure," Reese said and pulled up a chair next to her table.
Mary settled into the chair. "I wanted to talk about..." She paused and took a deep breath. Reese glanced at Crews, he was still talking to Griffiths but he swiveled his chair back around and seconds later he snapped his phone shut.
"Is this about yesterday?" Reese asked.
"Yes." Mary answered, tucking back wisps of hair that escaped her ponytail. "I wanted to... my sister, she's a very vocal person but her bark's usually worse than her bite."
"Understandable," Reese said.
"She's just very protective," Mary continued, rubbing her hands on her lap. "After Dan died, Cindy helped us a lot and she loved Luke."
"We understand." Crews said again.
"I just... I wanted it to be clear." Mary looked to Crews and he returned it, looking sympathetic and watchful. Reese took the opportunity to study Mary, hands fidgeting, moving from her lap to clutching her hands together and finally palms on the edge of Reese's desk.
"He thought I didn't know." Mary said, apropos of nothing. Reese moved her head a little, confused. "I pretended I didn't know, told myself I was only seeing things but I knew. I knew."
"You knew?" Crews asked because the words were stuck in Reese's throat.
Mary didn't look at them, diverted her attention to Reese's sunglasses. Reese watched Mary move her sunglasses around until she settled on the placing it a little between the boundary between her desk and Crews' desk. "I knew he was using drugs."
Oh. Reese thought half a second before Crews went: "Oh."
"He thought I didn't know," she repeated, "but a mother always knows we just we pretend not to know because then it wouldn't--" Mary broke off and Reese suddenly found herself under Mary's focus. "Do you have children, detective?"
Reese shook her head.
"It's hard seeing your child that way. Pretending and you pretend with them, and you think, just think: if I loved him enough... it would go away. But it doesn't and it gets worse and when you try to intervene... " Mary let go of Reese's glasses and buried her face in her hands. "They were children."
Reese didn't fidget or move or anything else because Davis stood right behind Mary with that expression. Like she'd lived through what Mary lived through. The bullpen was suddenly smaller and she was all too aware of all the people in the room.
"Mrs. Reynolds," Crews said, "would you like some tea?"
"I... I would, thank you."
"I'd like some tea myself," Crews went on, happily, "tea and coffee, Detective Reese also loves a good cup, of coffee I mean. She doesn't like tea, do you, Reese?"
"Not really." Reese murmured.
Crews stood and he moved around, blocking her view of Davis. "C'mon, Reese, let's show Mrs. Reynolds the best place to get these things."
"That's not..." Mary began.
"The world is a wide place," Crews continued. "And the sun is in its heaven."
Mary frowned, confused. "I'm sorry, what?"
Reese pulled her jacket of her chair. "We'll escort you out, Mrs. Reynolds."
"Oh..." Mary stood up, a bundle of confusion and stalled grief, when Reese turned for the elevator Davis was still looking at her.
On to Chapter 7