The Other Side of the Mirror

by Lex H Jones

  “If I could move my right arm, I’d hit you. Luckiest day of your life,” Carl said with narrowed eyes. “Now help me up, will ya?”

  “Your shirt and jacket are on that chair,” Trent informed him as he helped Carl get out of bed. “I didn’t let her cut you out of ‘em, ‘cause that looked like a new shirt and I know you only buy those once a decade.”

  “Thanks for not letting them put me in one of those little white dressing gown things,” Carl remarked, fastening his shirt, slowly so as to not disturb the tender flesh of his side.

  “That was for my benefit. Those things tend to gape open, and I didn’t wanna be seeing your ass,” Trent remarked.

  “You’re a true friend.”

  Chapter Forty;

  Brotherly Love

  “S o let me get this straight... it’s you that’s tailing me now?” asked Carl as he sat back in the passenger seat of Trent’s car.

  “I’m not ‘tailing’ you, Carl. Someone has to watch you, though. Keep an eye on you, that’s the rules. I volunteered ‘cause, well… it should be me, I guess.”

  “Is that ‘cause you wanted to rib the crap out of me for it, or ‘cause you were the only cop who was likely to give an accurate report of my actions?” Carl inquired as he adjusted himself so that his side wasn’t causing him as much pain.

  “Bit of both,” Trent shrugged. “You gotta admit, you being a suspect in your own investigation is a little funny.”

  “Funny as in ‘ridiculous’, definitely.”

  “For the record, no one with any sense actually believes this crap, Carl,” Trent assured him. “Even the guys that don’t like you know this is a set up. They just don’t care.”

  “That doesn’t bother me so much, let ‘em think what they want. I’m more concerned with the fact that our serial killer is a cop.”

  “Lot of the guys wearing a badge in this City are involved with all kinds of crap, you know that as well as anyone,” Trent reminded him.

  “Yeah, but this is different. Taking bribes or being addicted to drugs, that’s to be expected here. But how could our evaluations miss the fact that someone is a complete psycho?”

  “I don’t know, but my gut tells me it has to be someone that’s been on the force for awhile, to get around us like that.”

  “Yeah, mine too,” Carl agreed as the car pulled up outside his apartment building. “I know you gotta wait outside whilst I’m done talking to Jimmy, so don’t insult me by making up some other reason for hanging around, okay?”

  “Wouldn’t dream of it,” Trent assured him. “So now that you’ve had your little ‘biting back’ moment, why not admit that you actually need my help getting up the stairs?”

  “Fine. But one joke and you’re dead. Stitches or otherwise, I can still kick your ass.”

  Carl opened his car door as Trent walked round to accompany him. He needed a little help standing up, but once on his feet he was fine until they reached the staircase. The act of lifting his legs up one after the other seemed to pull at his stitches and make him short of breath, so Trent had to help him slightly by bracing him up. The nurse had said the knife blade had avoided doing any serious damage, but Carl could still feel how deep it had gone. It felt like a hole had been torn in his innards, making it impossible to do something as simple as putting one foot in front of the other without causing pain. Still, he ignored it and carried on. He had work to do before letting himself rest tonight, and it was crap that wouldn’t wait. The sleep in the hospital hadn’t exactly been voluntary, but at least it had brought him some time to build up a little energy. Every step was currently taking far more out of him than it should, so Carl was increasingly grateful for what rest he’d had.

  “Okay, here we are,” Carl said with a grateful sigh at the sight of his apartment door. “Wait here, I don’t want Jimmy to think he’s under arrest or being interviewed or anything.”

  “No problem. Am I okay to smoke in here?” asked Trent as he removed a cigarette from the packet.

  “Probably not, but knock yourself out anyway,” Carl shrugged as he unlocked his door and entered the apartment.

  The door closed behind him and Carl instantly found himself resting against the kitchen sideboard. Damn stairs. Damn knife wound. He closed his eyes for a moment to shut out the throbbing pain, and then glanced around the living room.

  “Hey Jimmy, you here?” He called out to the empty room.

  There was no answer so Carl walked into the bedroom, where he found Jimmy stood by the window biting his fingernails. On the bed was an open rucksack.

  “Who’s car is that?” Jimmy asked he looked out of the window.

  “Trent, he dropped me off.”

  “You okay? You look a little tired.”

  “I got stabbed, but it’s fine.”

  “You got stabbed?”

  “Yeah, and I also said that it’s fine,” Carl assured him. “I got patched up, no serious injuries, nothing to worry about. What’s with the bag, you going somewhere?”

  “What? Oh, no, I’m just getting rid of some stuff,” Jimmy smiled as he walked into Carl’s bathroom and started to apply some eyeliner.

  “You heading out tonight?” Carl inquired.

  “Thinking about it, but I dunno.” Jimmy called back.

  “Listen, I need to ask you about something,” said Carl, feeling somewhat awkward. “When you go out, either at night or whilst I’m asleep... have you ever left the door unlocked?”

  “Why would I do that?”

  “Not intentionally, jackass. I mean, you always were kind of forgetful. I’m not mad, it’s just kind of important.”

  “Important how?”

  “My old gun, the one I told you about? Someone’s been using it... that serial killer.”

  “Um... you sure?”

  “Yeah, they matched the bullets. I’d have known if someone broke in here, which means the door was open for ‘em. Only people that know about my gun are other cops, so...”

  “You think a cop did this?”

  “Yeah, but I can’t pursue that line of investigation until I’m sure about this.”

  “They have you as a suspect right now, don’t they?” asked Jimmy, biting his thumbnail as he returned from the bathroom, his eyes now painted with black eyeliner.

  “Yeah, but I can sort the whole thing out. Come on, Jimmy, did you leave the door unlocked?”

  “They shouldn’t think it’s you. They shouldn’t! After everything you’ve done for them, how hard you’ve worked... it’s not right. It’s not!”

  “It’s fine, just calm down.”

  “I’m just trying to protect you, Carl. That’s all I’ve ever done...” Jimmy said quietly as he shook his head and stared at the floor. “You need to understand that, okay? I love you, like a brother.”

  “What are you talking about? I only want to know if you left the door unlocked. I’m not even pissed at you!”

  “There’s a lot you don’t understand, Carl. There always has been,” Jimmy protested, involuntarily glancing at his rucksack and causing Carl’s own attention to be diverted to it.

  “What’s in the bag, Jimmy?” Carl questioned, swallowing the heavy black lump in his throat.

  “I just want to keep you safe, Carl. I never wanted to ruin anything for you...” said Jimmy, reaching for the bag.

  Carl grabbed the bag before Jimmy could and pulled it open. Inside were some clothes that he removed, including a denim jacket that he stared at for a moment before dropping it to the floor. Underneath the jacket were two items that caused Carl’s blood to run cold; his old service revolver, and a dark red opera mask.

  “Holy Christ, Jimmy, what did you do?” said Carl, his voice so low and quiet it was almost a whisper.

  “I can’t deal with this... I can’t... you won’t understand...” Jimmy sobbed, pushing past Carl and running out of the bedroom.

  “Stop right there, Jimmy,” Carl demanded as he pursued Jimmy into the living room.

  Jimmy tu
rned to see that Carl was now aiming his gun directly at him, his hand shaking from a combination of the physical effort of aiming the weapon with the pain in his side, and the act of being forced to hold it towards the last person he would ever have expected. The old wooden framed mirror was at Carl’s side, so that out of the corner of his eye he could see his image aiming the gun at his friend. He hated it, despised it, but still couldn’t bring himself to lower the weapon.

  “You don’t understand,” Jimmy repeated. “You never have. I have needs, but... I wanted to keep you safe. To protect you. You’re like my brother, Carl! You always have been, I needed to protect you!”

  “From what? Gay guys I don’t even know? How does killing them keep me safe?” Carl yelled. “Jesus Christ, Jimmy, what the hell happened to you?”

  “I couldn’t help it! I have needs, you know that! I didn’t want them to know who I was, to ruin your reputation and everything you’ve worked so long to build up!”

  “You think I care if they know that I live with a queer? You think that’s worth killing people?” Carl screamed.

  “You don’t understand!” Jimmy cried again, black eyeliner streaming down his face as he took a step closer to Carl.

  “Stay where you are, Jimmy! I’ll fire, I swear to God!”

  ***

  Out in the hallway, Detective Trent couldn’t wait any longer. He’d heard the voices from within the apartment getting louder and louder—Carl’s and the other voice, not quite identifiable to him. Finally when the yelling turned to full on angry shouting, he knew that waiting any longer could risk something bad happening, one way or the other. Carl had a temper, that much was obvious to anyone that knew him. If the guy he was speaking to could push his buttons to this degree, then there was no telling what might happen. Stamping his smouldering cigarette out on the floor, Trent drew his gun and then marched towards the door. With a silent count to three, he kicked the door open and aimed his weapon inside. Whatever he had expected to see upon entering, it wasn’t this.

  Carl was stood on the far side of the room, his gun pointed at a large, wooden-framed mirror. He was shouting and aiming his gun at the reflection, his face red with more anger than Trent had ever seen in it. When he heard his fellow detective enter the apartment, Carl turned towards him, still holding his gun. It was then that Trent noticed Carl’s face was stained with twin streams of black eyeliner.

  “Jesus Christ...” He muttered under his breath.

  “I won’t let you take him! I won’t!” Carl screamed in a voice that was a little more high-pitched than his usual, gruff tone. It was so bizarre that Trent could have sworn it sounded like a different person.

  Carl dropped his own weapon and grappled with Trent to force him to do the same. Trent kept a firm grip on the handle of his weapon, forcing himself not to let go despite the best efforts of his friend and fellow officer. The two men struggled with all the effort they could muster. Carl was the stronger of the two, but in his weakened state Trent was able to hold his ground. For a second, Carl let go of Trent’s wrist and punched him in the face. Reacting on instinct Trent immediately altered the angle of his gun and pulled the trigger.

  Chapter Forty-One;

  The Other Side

  of

  the Mirror

  “S o... let’s talk about what happened,” Commissioner Grant said with a heavy sigh, breathing into his hands as he looked at Trent across the desk.

  “You can read my report.”

  “I need to hear it from you, Detective.”

  “I heard Carl yelling at someone, went in to see what was going on and found him staring at a mirror and screaming. He ran at me, we struggled, and my gun went off. The bullet went up through his chin and into his brain, killing him instantly. It wasn’t intentional, I wasn’t even aware that I’d fired it. And I feel like shit. Anything else you need from me?”

  “Your report will be given to internal affairs, as well as my statement that Carl was under tremendous pressure. There were threats on his life, and he cracked. There will be no mention of his being this serial killer or anything else. With enough money in the right hands, we can make it stick and save his reputation, at least.”

  “So you’re going to protect him using the very methods he hated?”

  “I’m afraid so.”

  “Well that makes me feel wonderful, Sir,” Trent said with a tone of angry sarcasm. “Now why do you need to speak to me about this? You can read my report.”

  “Carl Duggan was your friend and there are some things you don’t understand.”

  “Some things? Try EVERYTHING!” Trent yelled, leaning forward and slamming his hands on the desk.

  “Alright, I understand how you must feel. I will explain everything to you, but it cannot leave this office, do you understand?” Grant said, keeping a calm tone in the hope that it would encourage Trent to do the same.

  “I don’t care what anyone else wants to know, I just need to understand how my friend could be... this.”

  “Carl joined our force straight out of the academy... that was back in the days we had our own academy, not just transfers from other cities. His scores in everything were off the chart, best damn cop we’d ever seen. More important than that, though, was his resilience. His determination. There was this logical deduction puzzle all the cadets had to figure out, and Carl could not get his head round it. So he stayed in that classroom all damn night until he got it. Stayed awake for twenty-four hours solid until he found that answer.”

  “Sounds like Carl,” Trent nodded.

  “We don’t get cops like that in this City, Trent. Do you understand me? If we had half a dozen of ‘em, we could turn the entire place around. But we don’t. Until Carl.”

  “He was the best, I know. Reminding me of that doesn’t make me feel any better, Sir.”

  “We couldn’t take him on. Not once we’d gotten his medical report through,” Grant said with another heavy sigh. “There were some irregularities that would have kept him off the force. But he was too good to reject, so we buried them. I buried them.”

  “What kind of irregularities?”

  “He ever talk to you about his childhood?”

  “Not really.”

  “There’s good reason for that,” Grant explained. “You see, Carl was what you might call an effeminate child. The kind of kid who likes dolls and jump rope instead of sports and army men, you understand? Modern attitude on the subject is that people can be gay from a young age, it’s not something they decide in later life. I don’t know if that’s true or not, I’m not a sociologist, but if it is true, then Carl was gay, right from the start. His dad wasn’t the liberal type. Apparently he was... well, kind of like you. But worse.”

  “Thanks for that,” Trent said quietly.

  “You know what I’m getting at Trent, just go with it. He hated his own son, looked at him and saw the exact opposite of everything he’d wanted from his kid. So he tried to do what guys like that always do; beat the problem away. Admittedly I’ve only read the reports on this, but it sounds like Carl got the worst treatment you can imagine from his dad. The kind that damages you for life. Verbal as well as physical. His dad used to tell him he hated him, that he wasn’t his son, that he was nothing to him.”

  “No kid needs to hear that.”

  “No, they don’t. But one day, Carl changed. He suddenly started acting all tough and manly, playing the roughest sports he could find, kicking the crap out of other kids who used to pick on him. He became a little bruiser, everything his dad had wanted... half the time, anyway.”

  “And the other half?”

  “He was still effeminate and soft, the way he used to be,” Grant replied. “Carl’s mind forced itself to become the only thing he could become to stop his dad treating him like dirt. Only it didn’t work, not entirely. He effectively became two different people. The therapists call it DID, Disassociative Disorder. Carl actually started to believe that he was two people—he could talk to the other
half of himself like it was a separate kid. He even named it, Jimmy Galante, he called him. They were like best friends, brothers, an imaginary friend that was actually part of himself.”

  “Christ, he was messed up,” Trent remarked.

  “Very much so,” Grant nodded. “Which is why his parents... or his mom, at least—his dad having called it quits by this point—took him to therapy. He got his own psychiatrist, who managed to figure out everything I just told you. Even she said that it was unusual, though. Split personalities, they often hate each other, or at least they don’t get along. Carl and Jimmy were different, though. They actually cared, each about the other.”

  “So wait a minute... was Carl aware of this? Did he know about all this crap?”

  “Carl? No. Jimmy? Yes,” Grant replied. “You see... and I only know this from the psychiatrist’s notes... apparently it’s quite common for one of the personalities to know the whole truth, and the other to be ignorant of the fact. That was what went on with Carl. Jimmy knew the whole score, knew that he and Carl were one and the same, everything. Carl, on the other hand, actually believed that Jimmy was a separate person; he never learned otherwise. I mean maybe the psychiatrist told him about it, but he obviously didn’t believe her, or didn’t take any notice of it.”

  “I’ve known Carl for years, I don’t know how all of this could have slipped by,” Trent admitted.

  “Well there’s more yet,” Grant continued. “All the techniques the psychiatrist used to try and ‘integrate’ the personalities didn’t work, so she had to turn to drugs. Strong drugs, the strongest you can get. Anti-psych pills that actually repress one of the personalities, leaving just one complete person. Carl started taking them around the time he was twelve years old, which was the legal minimum, given the strength of the drugs.”

  “So he went a few years thinking Jimmy was actually a separate person?”

  “He had to, the therapy wouldn’t work and the doctor couldn’t legally prescribe the meds. That’s why the identity got so strong; it was allowed to grow and develop. Jimmy was his own person, in every way imaginable. He liked different music, different food. There’s even evidence to suggest that he had different allergies.”