Only Love

by Smith, Victoria H.

  He passed me off again, shaking his head while he snapped his seatbelt across his wide chest. “Really, kid. It’s no big deal. Just don’t fall asleep on me, and we’ll be good.”

  His deep laugh hit again after that and I was glad my partner was taking what I did in stride. He put the car into drive and pulled us away from the local doughnut shop he’d parked us at. This was the first time we’d gone here in a while. We used to go all the time, but I started having breakfast with Aubrey and her girls. That wasn’t happening at all now, not since Gabby’s mom was arrested the other night. So much had changed so quickly, sickeningly so.

  We’d been driving a few minutes before Don took a careful sip from his coffee, his gray whiskers shifting as he moved his lip over the rim. He swallowed before looking at me. “Did you hear about Caroline?”

  I placed my drink in the car’s cup holder, my doughnuts still in the bag on my lap. I hadn’t touched them yet. No appetite I guess. I nodded to Don’s question. “Yeah,” I told him. “I’m actually the one planning her going away party.”

  I’d been probably the first to hear about Caroline’s promotion. She called the day she found out. She took a position downstate, detective, and I was really proud of her. She’d been working for that for years. Why she called me first I think was because of the special relationship we had, the one that helped change my life for the better.

  “Now, you’ll have to find someone else to keep you in line,” she’d joked that night on the phone, referring to the life altering position she had in my life. She’d been my rock for a while, my crutch, and really, I probably should request for another to take on her duty as my sponsor, and I would as a backup with her no longer being local. But just that... a backup to her. She couldn’t be replaced. She was more than a sponsor. She was a friend. That night, I wished her well, but in the back of my mind, I felt her departure held nothing but irony. She was leaving too, gone with so many others in my life recently. Gabby… Rissa, and Aubrey.

  Don put his coffee down, running the back of his hand across his beard. “I guess we get to hear it every day now until she leaves. The woman’s head has gotten so big you can hardly be in the same room with her. I’m surprised she’s not taking autographs, Ms. Big Deal Detective she is now.”

  My lips lifted, playing with the edge of the bag that held my doughnuts. “She should be proud. She deserves it.”

  “And you too,” he said nudging me. “I heard the chief gave you a nod for your bust the other night.”

  Not wanting to think about that, I turned my head watching traffic pass by through the neighborhoods. Despite trying not to get bogged down by my thoughts, it was inevitable; the guilt only rose, making a tightness form in my chest. I’d never forgive myself for what went down; for what happened to Gabby. I knew there had been drugs in the building, had my suspicions of the source, but never thought the ultimate supplier would have been Gabby’s mom. Doing my job, I informed my chief where I believed the drugs to be. I also gave him a list of potential buyers in the building, that one included Gabby’s mom, but I honestly didn’t think they’d raid any of the apartments for people actually buying the drugs. The force was looking for the source and anyone else in that equation was outside the bigger picture.

  Though they didn’t look into anyone purchasing, that didn’t matter. Gabby’s mom was the dealer, the heart of the whole operation, and without my knowledge, the chief used the insight I had acquired while living in the building. He fed the information to another officer he had go undercover to the buy. Needless to say, they quickly found out who was the supplier, but in regards to myself, I was the last to find out, the last along with Aubrey.

  Of course Gabby knew, and like my suspicions, she had been selling narcotics.

  She’d been selling directly from her mom.

  They found her book bag lined with cash and drugs in her room that night. Her mom admitted to making her do so, sell for her, and that was the best thing she ever could have done for her, let her off the hook for her mistakes. A huge part of me was happy the woman was away from her, but I couldn’t be fully. How could I when my memory burned with the images of that night? Gabby’s mom, face busted and pressed to the ground, while her daughter screamed in Aubrey’s arms. No matter how safe Gabby was now out of her mom’s hands I could never be completely happy. I never could for taking a mother away from her child, didn’t matter if the child was better off.

  Didn’t matter at all.

  She’d go into the system now, Gabby, and the thought only twisted the dagger in my heart more.

  “It was Shepard,” I told Don, absently, referring to a detective on the force. “It was his bust. Chief sent him in undercover.”

  “But it was your insight,” he continued. “I’d say that’s a job well done. We got the perp because of you. If not for you living there, she’d still be on the rise. Your time living there amounted to something.”

  I knew Don didn’t know any better. I did know that, which was why I couldn’t say anything. My time living where I was could never have been seen as invaluable, could never be discerned as anything but positive. I still believed that. Even still after what Aubrey and I had been going through. She was everything. She and her little family and her little world were absolutely everything to me and I knew that with every fiber of my being.

  “Kid?”

  We’d somehow stopped, pulled off on the side of the road, and Don sat there, squeezing my shoulder, a wrinkle in his brow as he stared at me. In the next moment, he asked me something. “What’s going on?” he’d said, but his words faded away and went without any response from me. I found I couldn’t answer him. I couldn’t because I felt as if I’d have to tell him what he wanted to hear, that everything was okay and I was good on all fronts. I’d have to lie for the peace so we’d be able to go about our day, and I didn’t like that feeling or the obligation that stood behind it. I hadn’t for a while and wondered why I continued to do it. I guess we all picked our battles every day, for peace and tranquility amongst others. But I was different from most people. I was different because I had more responsibilities. I couldn’t succumb to that pressure for the sake of tranquility, for the sake of peace.

  I looked at Don, still staring at me and waiting for an answer. I think I knew what I had to do for a while now, but the thing about pressure was that it made you buckle in the worse possible way. I knew the consequences of that when it came to my drinking. While, yes, the drinking had spiraled beyond my control due to the troubles of my former marriage, it had taken root even before that. I knew the origins of my drinking. I had been a closet drinker for a while even before things went rocky with Lia, taking a shot here and there when I was stressed. It was nothing out of hand, but I did do it and it all had surfaced when I started this job.

  It had surfaced with the Lopez case.

  Don shook my shoulder again. “Kid—”

  “What happened that day, Don?” I asked surprising myself with the words that came from my mouth. But once they had, I think I understood. I wanted to give him the benefit of the doubt. I wanted to believe in something. I wanted to believe in him. “What happened the day of the Lopez case? With Carlos Ruiz?”

  He eyed me curiously. “What do you mean?”

  Staring forward, I moved my hand across my jaw as if working the muscles to move. I had to go there.

  I had to tell the truth—finally.

  “Because I don’t know, Don,” I said not looking at him. “I don’t.”

  “Kid—”

  “I didn’t see what happened!”

  My words reverberated between us, the quiet hum of the engine suddenly so loud after the silence. Don stared at me, a shock widening his eyes. His arm draped across the steering wheel; he seemed to be at a loss for words. Like he didn’t know what to say or how to even go about what was next.

  That only made one of us.

  I pushed a hand down my face, letting out a breath. “I didn’t see Carlos Ruiz shoot fir
st.”

  His eyes left mine just then, shifting across the dashboard in front of him, and because they had, I couldn’t get a read on his eyes, and consequently, the thoughts behind them. Was this news even a shock to him? Did he know I hadn’t seen a thing, was too far away to even form an opinion on that day? But one better…

  Was he guilty of shooting first?

  I decided to continue into the unknown. “But I didn’t see you shoot first either,” I admitted, finishing my thought. It was one of many.

  He made his way back to me again, the wrinkles around his eyes so deeply set, and his gray whiskers moved around his mouth before he spoke. “What are you trying to say, kid?”

  That question took root in my mind as well. I didn’t really know what I was trying to say, if I was accusing him of something or if I wasn’t. I just knew I had some demons to account for, some wrongs to right, and as I thought about this day, this moment, I knew it was a long time coming. It was no mystery how Aubrey felt about this case, her feelings about my hand in it, and yes, I wanted to do right by her. But as I sat there, staring at the man who had been my mentor for over eight years, I knew I wasn’t doing this for her.

  I was coming clean for myself.

  I couldn’t harbor this secret anymore. I couldn’t lie to myself anymore, and though I may lose my partner’s trust and potentially risk shaking my relationship with my colleagues because of it that was a burden I was willing to take on. I couldn’t be this person anymore, a man who forwent justice to appease others. My dignity meant more to me than that. The citizens I fought every day to protect meant more to me than that, and if someone else’s honor was damaged in my decision to fallback, keep silent under the system, that was something I needed to attain for.

  I braved on. I had no idea how much of this Don knew as I never talked to him about the case. Outside of my official statement, he had no more details from me. In the back of my mind, I always wondered if he hadn’t questioned for a reason. Today, he would no longer need to wonder.

  I told him my positioning that day, how I was toward the back of the store, acting as backup to him. I think he knew that part. He told me that day to cover him, and so I did, gun drawn at the command, but everything happened so fast. I couldn’t get to him without sudden movements. I edged closer in the wings, but even still I couldn’t get too close without making my presence known. I was stuck and since I was behind Don that was the only vantage point I had. Behind him, I could only see his back, the shop owner to one side and a kid to the other, the perp who robbed the place. But there was another there, another perp. I knew because I saw Don reach for his gun, but he didn’t aim it at the kid to the side of him. But ahead of him, to another.

  “It doesn’t have to be this way, son,” Don said ahead of him, again to someone I couldn’t see. “Lower your weapon,” he continued. “Don’t do this.”

  I attempted to move again, but that was when the perp to Don’s left, who I later found out was Manuel Lopez, spoke, and I remember the words clear as day as they surprised me.

  “Put the gun down, cus,’” he’d said, and my eyes flashed. He was trying to talk down the man ahead of Don, the kid who I now knew was Carlos Ruiz. Manuel didn’t want Carlos to shoot. He didn’t want him to be the hero for the pair.

  It turns out fate had other plans.

  Two pops sounded in the air, one after the other like lightening, and to the floor fell a body. I saw him now; finally saw him as I got closer. Carlos was on the floor, his young life fading away, pooling below him in a sea of red around his body.

  The bile rose in my throat at the sight, the sickness spreading like a cancer throughout my body, but I had to detain his cousin, Manuel. He didn’t even resist while I cuffed him. He’d been in too much shock; the retched look frozen across his face. We both watched Don and Carlos, and while the owner left to make a call to 911, Don had gotten to the floor. On his knees, he leaned over the sixteen-year-old kid. Carlos had been long gone by that time, that I knew, but despite that, I saw Don place his hand on the boy’s shoulder. He then closed his eyes, his lips moving while he whispered something to the air.

  I could only gather it was a prayer.

  Don stayed silent the whole time during my recollection today, not breaking my story once, and when I was done, that silence continued for a while. For me, I knew why. The memory of that day was always hard, which was why I tried never to think about it. But speaking it aloud, really verbally for the first time in all its truth, I felt something I never would have expected, and that was relief, a deep one I could feel through my entire body, throughout my soul.

  Don’s hand moved to his mouth. He turned off the car, and then sat back. We both did.

  “But you said you saw him shoot first.”

  My head moved in his direction, but he wasn’t looking at me. I nodded. “Yes.”

  Shaking his head, his eyes shifted down. I didn’t know what I expected him to say, but the last thing I anticipated was what he said next. He said one word: “Why?”

  Blinking, I let the silence continue. He was asking me why? I didn’t understand. Of course he knew. In fact, he’d been so much of the pressure; always reminding me to have his back, support him like he’d do for me, and did, years later throughout the worst of my disease. He had to have known why I went along with his statement and the shop owners. I had been a kid, right out of the academy and placed with an esteemed veteran of the force as my partner. No, excuse I knew. I knew that now.

  While the very thoughts filtered through my mind, that word: “why,” that answer to his question, he finally turned my way.

  He suddenly let out a heavy sigh, pushing his hand behind his neck. “Because you felt you had to,” he concluded, staring at me.

  I found myself confused. He was acting as if he didn’t know that very fact. Or was he? Acting that is. I shook my head. “I guess, when you always told me to have your back…”

  “But I never would have told you to lie for me, kid,” he said, surprising me. He leaned forward, placing his hand on my shoulder. “Yes, I want you to have my back, but…”

  My eyebrows narrowed and I felt the need to ask a question, a question I asked earlier. He hadn’t answered before as I had decided to admit my truths, but now, I needed to know. “What happened that day? With Ruiz? Did he actually shoot first?”

  I never wanted to know an answer to a question more. I knew Don could very well continue with his official statement, but this time, there was no pressure for a specific answer. There was no IA and no legislature breathing down our backs. It was just him and me. An old man and his kid.

  “He did, Adam,” he said, and honestly, truly, I believed him when he said it. I realized something after I did. I hadn’t really before, believed him that is.

  I released a breath, feeling the relief of that. But then, I had another question upon crossing my arms, turning to him. “Why do you think he did?”

  Yes, Carlos would have served time, but he had been a minor. Any time behind bars would have been a more forgiving sentence than the consequences of shooting an officer.

  Don tapped the steering wheel. “I honestly think he was just scared. I saw the fear in his eyes, right there down to his soul. His older cousin was there and Carlos had the means to protect them both as he was armed. He made a choice.”

  He had. We all did really. I looked up at the old man. “Did you pray for him? That day?”

  He nodded, gazing away. “I felt it was the least I could do. I’m here and he’s not. The least I could do.”

  We both sat there with that thought, and I couldn’t help thinking about something. What was next for us? Where did we go from here? For me, the answer seemed obvious, obvious but one of the hardest things I’d ever have to do.

  “I’m going to have to change my statement,” I told him. With the case being closed, that might not matter, especially since what I’d actually witness that day would be inconclusive. It was still something I had to do though. Anythi
ng else wouldn’t be right.

  Don could have reacted any way upon what I said, but like so many times today he surprised me again. Placing his arm around me, shaking my shoulders once, he gave me a small smile. “We’ll go together.”

  Together. This man really did have my back and I was happy at the thought.

  He released my shoulder when our police scanner picked up. The codes were light until Don turned it up. The smile left his face and edged into something more intense, something more serious. By what I just heard on the scanner mine had to be doing the same.

  I flicked on the siren, lights too, while Don let the precinct know we were on our way to the scene through the walkie, two partners in sync with our dual reactions. We were in the area, so I could imagine we might be one of the firsts to get there. Don confirmed we were headed in that direction, then got us in gear, decoding what we’d heard while he drove.

  “Bank robbery,” he said, though I think more to himself than me. He didn’t sound nervous, and I knew he probably wasn’t. I felt about the same. This was our job and it was time to act, but one thing I did notice though was my heart did race, just a bit while we drove. It didn’t happen all the time, but it was natural with the job sometimes.

  Adrenaline was normal when one put their life on the line I supposed.

  Gabby chose to wait out in the car while I went in to grab Rissa from daycare. She’d been so quiet lately. Too quiet. It scared me that I didn’t know what was going on inside her head. I’d taken a few days off from work and school so I could give her my undivided attention, but she wouldn’t open up. Even today, there were a few legal matters to sort out in order for me to take temporary custody of her, and she had hardly said a word, much less shown any emotion. Even that would’ve been a good sign. My heart was in limbo right along with hers, waiting for word on her mother, wondering what would happen if she wasn’t able to come home for a while.