15
Wake Up And Smell The Contradictions
Vanessa
The vibrating cell phone cast a glow so bright that she could feel it through her eyelids. She groaned and pulled the comforter over her head, sinking into the warmth under the heavy blanket to escape the chill of the room. She had been sleeping like the dead, a rare occurrence for her these days, until the nuisance on the nightstand had started its drumming. The hollow buzzing, amplified by the wood of the bedside table, stopped after a minute. Her muscles relaxed, mind drifted, and soon she was on the edge of a pleasant unconsciousness. Then it started again.
Growling out a sigh, the air of the room was like ice as she reached an arm from under the covers. It took a few slaps on the nightstand for her hand to find its target, and she pulled the phone into the warm pocket under the blanket as soon as it was in hand. Squinting against the searing light, she slid a finger across the bottom of the screen and tucked the glass against her cheek.
“Hello?” Her voice cracked like dried mud.
“Operator.”
Like the flip of a light switch, her mind went from semi-sleep to alert when she heard the relieved voice of Detective Reid in her ear.
“Long time,” the man said. “Did I strike a nerve in our last conversation?”
There was no animosity in his voice, but she resented him throwing her words back at her all the same. She had been visiting Eddie and Liam the last time she had talked to the detective, having to report in on everything she had observed at the event for the Prime Minister the night before, which wasn’t much. The Americans complained about the Indians, the Indians complained about the Americans, and they all pretended to be civil to each other’s faces. On Senator Ross’s arm she was able to make small talk with many dignitaries, foreign and domestic, but they never made it within twenty feet of President Wilkins or Prime Minister Das. If she didn’t know any better, she would think that Ross was avoiding the possibility of an interaction with the world leaders, something for which she was grateful. As much as Eddie would have loved to know what the two most powerful men in the room talked about that night, Vanessa was happy to keep her distance. Wilkins and Das were two sides of the same coin, and both sides scared the shit out of her.
Detective Reid’s morning call had interrupted her and Eddie’s discussion of the dinner party, and was put to an end in a hurry when Eddie noticed the direction the call was going. She hung up as soon as he told her to do so. In the week since, she had avoided any calls from the detective, and would have continued to do so had she thought to check who was calling before answering the phone tonight. Her exhaustion could take the blame on this one.
“I don’t see the point in engaging in a one-sided conversation, Detective.” She spoke in a low tone despite being alone in her apartment. “What time is it?”
“About that…” His voice had an echoing quality to it. “I want to apologize.”
“For calling at this ungodly hour, or for acting like an ass?”
He chuckled. “Both, I guess,” he answered. “My family is everything to me. I can’t see straight when I think anything bad might happen to them.”
Silence filled the call as she contemplated his apology. It sounded sincere enough, but she wouldn’t put it past the detective to do anything to try to gain her trust back or trick her. Even so, she was harboring her own guilt about her role in their last few interactions. She had relished in shoving his hypocrisy in his face, hoping to shatter the glass house he was living in, but she hadn’t meant to make him believe that his wife and son were in any danger. In retrospect, she imagined that she would have had a similar reaction to him were she in his shoes, maybe worse. Between the detective’s duplicity and the rescue of her by the Senators at the party, she wasn’t so sure she knew anymore where good stopped and evil began.
“You could get yourself killed with that temper.”
“I know,” he sighed. “James laid into me pretty good after everything.”
She smiled at the image, and interjected before Reid could say anything that may make her change her mind. “I’m sorry too. It wasn’t my intention to make you believe that your family was in danger. I can promise you that we never have, and never will, come anywhere near them without your knowledge. Though,” she added as an afterthought, “I’m still going to count you flying off the handle as a point for my team.”
“What?” he asked her in confusion.
“Oh, I guess I’ve never told anyone about that. It’s stupid.” Her face burned. “I like to keep a tally for each time we get one over on each other. It… keeps things interesting… I guess.” Her voice puttered out like a spent candle. It was as if she had just revealed herself to be too immature for the reality that she found herself in, and maybe she was. Eddie and Liam may be her age, but every other player in their game had at least a decade on them.
“Oh, right,” he responded fast and without judgement. “James has something like that too. He has you in a dead heat. I suspect he’s taking bets about it on the side, with the other officers. You two would probably get along well, actually.”
Relief warmed her chest. “Well, we’re up by two, so I’m not sure how well we’d really get along. He can’t even count to two.”
Reid’s laughter rang out in her ear, and she smiled.
“What could he possibly think gave you guys a two point bump?”
“You think I’m going to tell you? That would destroy our advantage,” he said with amusement.
“No,” she laughed, “I suppose that would be too easy.”
Their laughter faded, replaced by another moment of silence. In a million years she never would have imagined having a companionable silence with the austere detective, but then, unexpected experiences with the men in her life were becoming increasingly common. She decided it best to take advantage of his sudden bout of good will, whether real or strategic on his part.
“Can I ask you something, Detective?”
“Sure,” he said after a moment’s hesitation.
“Is it hard for you… to do this job?”
He sighed, and she wondered if he felt conflicted in the same way with the two lives that he was living; that of the oppressor, and of the oppressed.
“Sometimes,” he answered.
She waited for him to elaborate, holding her breath, but received nothing but his silence in return. When she opened her mouth to ask him if he was still there, he finally spoke.
“They acted like I should be grateful to be given the choice.” He paused again, his voice distant in a way that had nothing to do without however far away he was from her. “Stay on the job, follow orders, and my family would be safe from the horrors of the ghettos. Rock the boat…” He didn’t finish the thought, leaving her with the implication before he continued. “It wasn’t a choice, not really.”
The underside of her comforter was a dark abyss as she searched for the right response to his confession. None of the words that filtered through her mind seemed appropriate when held up against the gravity of what he had just told her. He saved her from her indecision as he continued on again.
“I think the worst part is having no one that I can talk to about it. I can’t burden Amina with my demons. She already does so much for our family, and I won’t add to her troubles.” His voice grew quieter still. “I don’t even know why I’m telling you.”
“I can only imagine what it’s like, to police those who are like you.”
She cringed as soon as the words left her mouth.
“I do what I have to to protect my family,” he said with a hard voice. “I seem to recall a remark from you about your family being unworthy of their lives as well.”
“I’m not like you,” she said in response to his implication, and she wanted to believe it. “I didn’t sell my soul to save them.”
“Didn’t you,” he asked. “I don’t recall murder being particularly good for one’s soul.”
She listened to his heavy breathing on the other end of the line. It seemed that the Detective’s period of good will had expired.
“It may not be,” she said, “but we kill the monsters that prey on the weak. We don’t help them to commit their horrors.”
“It must be nice,” he said in a wistful tone that was dripping with his insincerity, “to live a life without contradiction.”
“Ha!” The exclamation burst from her before she could stop herself. No contradiction? If only that were the case. Her head was full of so many contradictions that she often found herself worrying about her ability to continue keeping it all straight. She knew there would come a day when she would say the wrong thing to the wrong person, or would act the wrong way in the wrong situation, and that would be it for her. Not a possibility, but an inevitability. Her life, what little of it that belonged to her alone, would be over. Just like that. It was a day she lived in constant fear of.
“I really wish it were that simple,” she whispered.
His response was not immediate, but it came without animosity.
“I believe you.”
“Ouch.” One corner of her mouth lifted. “Bet that hurt to say out loud.”
He laughed, and she heard the strange echo she had noticed at the start of the call.
“Where are you?”
“The stairwell. I didn’t want to wake Amina.”
“Not at the precinct?” Surprise lifted her eyebrows. “Is that allowed?”
“You weren’t answering when I called from there,” he explained.
“Well, I only answered at this hour because I forgot to check who was calling. Don’t count on it happening again.”
“I guess I should take advantage of my good fortune, then,” he joked.
“You haven’t already?”
A smile colored his voice as he asked, “What’s the Collective up to these days?”
She rolled her eyes, sighing through her own smile. “Goodnight, Detective.”
“Will you answer my next call?”
“We’ll see,” she said, and hung up the phone.
The screen indicated the time to be ten past three in the morning, and she pulled the covers tighter around her body. If she was lucky, she might be able to get another hour of sleep before her alarm for work would go off.
Thanks again for your patience while I’ve been sick. Please let me know what you think of this chapter, and like and comment to help me please the algorithm gods! :)
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I love this look into Reid's emotions...he's growing into a very complex character, and his relationship with Vanessa is so good. I love phone calls - they're a way to have such a confessional moment that might not (or definitely wouldn't) happen irl.