IN THE DETAILS

LEE HARKER. CARMEN BERZATTO. ELIZABETH HARMON.

RULES ARE BELOW THE CUT. PLEASE EXPECT SLOW AND SPORADIC ACTIVITY. I AM ONLY STARTING TO DEVELOP THESE CHARACTERS' VOICES, SO PLEASE BEAR WITH ME! AS ALWAYS, I WELCOME PLOTTING, BUT I AM ALSO AIMING TO KEEP THIS BLOG EASY AND FLEXIBLE. — ( SHE/HER, 29, GMT - 7 ).

HER MOTHER’S VOICE, REEDY AND LACED WITH A LIFETIME OF STRAIN,  STRETCHING OUT THROUGH THE LINE TO REACH:   LEE?

THE LIEUTENANT’S VOICE,  SOFT AND LILTING WITH ITS NATURAL MUSIC,  SOUNDING SO SUDDENLY THROUGH THE EMPTINESS TO ASK: CAN I SEE YOU? / @crimenalist

Her head turned,  but her body did not follow;   there was only the slightest of lowering in one shoulder as her gaze sought out the lieutenant.   Eyes met and Lee gave the smallest inclination of her chin for a nod.   Her shoes whispered across the cold tiles,   and in stepping into the lieutenant’s lab,  Lee could see that though there were hardly two specks of dust to rub together out in the hallways, the immaculate took on a new meaning here in this small universe of steel and precise numbers.   The extra lab coats hanging on hooks by the door drew her attention,  but only for a moment;  then,  as light often found itself caught in all manner of matter,  so did Lee find herself drawn back to the sunny,  cordial woman at the centre of the lab.   She stood still and asked,   “  Is this about what Sanford said?  ”

The scene around them had changed several times over,  from the tiny,  dying family - owned grocery store at the corner of the block where the fruits looked odd and the vegetables strange,  but could be trusted for their freshness;   to the barren little park that was certainly dilapidated in spirit, if not in its physical steel bones and false - grass skins;   to the line of tilting houses with their dead beds of flowers and thriving lawns of weeds .. gradually growing in size and shape until the two of them marched beneath elderly elms standing guard prettily in front of so - called real houses with their quaint porches,   complete with the season’s fashionable outdoor decor,  front steps clean of the litter of life signs.   All this,  without more than a few looks and syllables passed between as they shopped,  walked,  and kept their thoughts to themselves.

Beth supposed she preferred this,  if not enjoyed a little.   It reminded her when she’d gone to a country where she knew only a pittance of the language,  and so found herself in the space of her own head,  living and breathing the world within,   and only poking out in the smallest of ways —a nod here, a gesture there— when those in the places outside herself needed her. In these places,  the image of who she was was most clear on the chessboard and that was,  in fact,  what she most preferred. If she could not have that,  a lack of intrusion would do. So that she might keep her own head in order;  so that she might not needlessly expend precious stamina,  precious thought on words without meaning or direction. And so far,  the other woman seemed good for it. Perhaps,  it was a matter of being like - minded,  though Beth held some chagrin to think her own mind was just the same  — or even near being the same  — to someone…   anyone else’s.

Not all the house numbers were easy to see,  some hidden away behind decorative bushes,  others stylized to appear as much as part of the house itself as possible,  rendering the signage useless  — but not house 1620.   Here,  the owner had made sure that the numbers were clear,  large,  and unmistakable.   Beth stopped before the front lawn,  plain and tidy,  and stared back at the windows staring out at them. The lawn was neat,  the steps well - levelled,  and the pathway leading up to the dark blue front door swept free of debris;  she knew if she went around the back and opened up the grill,  she’d find a spare key.   A part of her was humoured:   all this knowledge of a house and it isn’t even mine.   But it did remind her of her own.   How was it?   Her small house in Kentucky,  tucked away in a suburb that seemed to be older and older,  crankier and crankier,   each time she returned to it.   That lawn wouldn’t be as neat,  the front path as clean.   It needed her to come home.

But she couldn’t go home yet.   So,  for now,  this place was hers.   Or maybe it could be this woman’s,  if she needed a place to stay for a few days and would rather have it.   A sigh and a glance over,  and Beth startled,  finding piercing blues drilled into her rather than the house before them.   What,  she’d uttered,  a little rudely,  the word flat and sharp as a blade brandished.   I wonder what you’re thinking,  was the returning rasp and with that,  Beth accepted that maybe their minds were more alike than she would’ve liked.   She didn’t rush to indulge the woman.   Considered her options,  instead.   What she was thinking,  well—  there was plenty to choose from.   In her head,  there was never just one thing,  was there? The hour around them changed and the street lights between the elms blinked on,  the yellow glow winking off one of the house’s windows at them,  at Beth.   “  I was thinking I should’ve just gotten a hotel room.  Like I usually do.   ”   She shook her head and began up the path.

LH. Lee’s voice comes out thinner than normal,  the quality of it less human than it was like wind, whistling and scratching up and through the dry cattails framing a lonely winter pond.   The deep - reaching warmth of her wool turtleneck does little to soothe the soreness of her throat,  but she supposes it is better to have than not;  at least,  it could hide the taut stretching of her neck and the tight muscles ‘neath each time she swallowed and gulped at the air,  as if she couldn’t get enough,  as if she had too many words in her mouth and didn’t want them all tumbling out .. in front of this stranger who was not quite a stranger,  and whose ideas Lee suddenly realizes she doesn’t know what to do with,  where to put.

Lark’s advice drops like a stone and lands on the muddy,  half - frozen dirt path before them,  and is quickly left behind as they walk forward,  up the winding,  sporadically tree - lined path,  at a steady pace.   FUCK THE HOUSE.   Fire hazards everywhere.   Lark doesn’t know how right she is about that.   Piles upon piles of decades old newspapers and magazines,  of clothing so threadbare and dust - bitten most people wouldn’t even use them as dish rags,   of countless dead appliances and beds with no one to sleep in them,  of phone books,  Bibles,  and outdated manuals describing the process behind everything from pie - baking to taxidermy. All useless,  all flammable,  all hers.   All that is left of a life shot through by—

It’s enough to pull Lee to a full stop,  just before they round the last corner,  face - to - face with the house.  Her house.   Stomach churns and for a sharp,  ear - ringing second,   Lee really believes it:   she’s going to hurl into the frost - covered bushes right beside her.   Internal systems whirl and she can feel the shift,  the bracing to pivot away from Misery the second she tastes the bile.   But there’s nothing in her stomach to sting on its way up,  not this time.   So,  it’s just saliva that oozes out from the walls of her mouth,  pooling underneath tongue until she thinks it might just spill over her chapped lips,  but it all slithers down her throat instead.   The problem is this: the house isn’t empty.   Fire hazards everywhere.   Memories everywhere. Reminders everywhere.   The trust is,  the house ahead is stuffed full and Lee doesn’t know,  doesn’t remember a time when it hadn’t been full.   Fuller than she ever even knew.   What would it be once emptied?   What would ooze out of its walls,  then? Lee stares ahead,  right through the evergreens that hide the house from view.   She can see it just fine in her mind’s eye.   “  I’m going to sell it.   I think that’s—   the best I can do.   But I can’t just—   leave it.  ”

CB. he figures he ought to feel bad about it and he does. nearly seventy - two hours did he leave Amy on read,  unable to find the right words,  the right mindset,  the right intentions to message her back even when she’d made it so easy for him.   it’s a yes or no question he already knows the answer to,  infinitely simpler than any other of the one - hundred - and - one questions rattling around his panic - addled brain and still..   he'd froze.   for three days the text weighed down the slim,  flat body of his phone,  transformed into nothing short of a dense fucking brick in his pocket that pulled him into imbalance,  changed his gait,  and made the world tilt the wrong way.   he didn't want the chaos and the stupidity of his life as it is to bleed through,  not even by accident,  if he were to message her back so unthinkingly,  without at least a hint of a plan in place. Amy texts and Carmen’s mind makes two - three - four ( ! ) incredible,  exhausting bounds into the future where everything’s on fire and he’s lost yet another potential friend.   dead and demolished before they even had a chance to get off the ground.   all because he wasn’t careful,  all because he’d gotten used to and so good at cutting with the sharpest of knives.

it takes him time to write the words   —   first in his mind, then just before the bear’s doors had opened .. and there wasn’t a single sound in the back alley except for the humming of the walk - in freezer in conversation with the ticking of the kitchen clock that was the perpetual white noise of his mind,  on his phone,  sent to Amy:

HEY,  OF COURSE TOMORROW OKAY?

it’s also good to know Carmen then sat on another three words for the entirety of the saturday night service,  regretting not sending them earlier when it might’ve made a difference,  thinking it might not be too late even now to quickly hit send if he can get his hands free for five seconds,  worrying that it might be the biggest mistake he could make to not send them.   three more words,  never sent:

ARE YOU OKAY?

It is not like Lee to chase after anyone,  but she will follow.   And so it goes.   The woman’s outburst in the conference room rang in her head,  a bell’s vibration that would not clear,  would not fade.   Even the murkiest of waters would settle eventually once disturbed,  ripples lost over time,  a stillness to return as the default. But what was in Lee’s head must not have been so simple as water;  whatever substance filled the space between her ears liked to hold onto things   —   to keep,  to hoard.   The woman’s voice would live with her for days,  if not weeks now..   she just knew it. Even once it had sunken below the surface,  there would be a morning,  some night,  a moment between the innocuous ticks of the clock,  where these words would come back and Lee would remember:   sometimes we are too slow,

sometimes..  we are just too late.

After,  there wasn’t anything left to say. Some of the men tried to laugh it off,  half - hearted and awkward efforts to call a woman hysterical .. without saying the words,  to write it off as the typical shit agents have to deal with,  the demands,  the high and heavy drama of it all when none of was ever that deep,  ever that interesting. The world was fucked,  fucked up ( ! ), and wasn't it just so laughable whenever some people made it clear they still hadn’t come around to that idea? and so on and so forth.   Lee didn’t laugh. Neither did she fidget,  shift,  glare,  or stare at anything except for what had been left on the table.   Her silence seemed to radiate,  adding something thick to the air, stifling those nearest to her as they breathed in.   Laughter broke away to awkward coughs broke away to mumbled resignations to return: we still have a job to do,  

we still have to do the job.

The second the tension in the room shattered,  Lee walked out of the door the Collard woman had left open behind her. She did not chase,  she only followed.   Following without seeing her mark,  but knowing that as long as she kept to this path,  made the turn here,  went down the corridor there,  she would discover her,  half - surprised herself that she had.  As if she hadn’t somehow known all along that Collard wouldn’t have stormed all the way out of the building,  that she would instead make a stop,  take a pause.. because this business with the killings wasn’t finished and she wasn’t finished with them either. Lee parked herself in Collard’s blindspot,  arms held rigid at her side. She could not see the cup of coffee in Collard’s hand,  but from the motion of the woman’s arm,  she could see she was stirring it. Sugar,  perhaps.  Or maybe to cool it.   It didn’t take long and the moment Collard’s arm rested,  Lee quietly cleared her throat.   “Don’t go after them alone.   What you said in there..   I think it fits.   If you have more,  tell me and I can help..   do something.”   Her shoes whispered across the carpet - tiled floor, steps lateral,  bringing Lee no closer to the woman,  but closer to the wall.