Day Of

[greenbeing]

Day Of

It was sunny enough, Detective Terrence Jansen reached up to flip down the car visor. His partner, James Dunbar, always drove. Always. It was like a right of passage, the few times Jimmy had allowed Terry to drive. But it had become a running joke among them, and the other cops in their squad. Jimmy was always in charge. No doubt, no questioning. You just accepted that and moved on. It was almost like Jimmy was some great and powerful genie, and all the rest of the cops were just schlumps down on the street.

Not that Terry had ever gotten that impression from his friend. Jimmy’d never tried to pull some holier-than-thou affectation. He was just one of those down-to-earth guys. Logical, most of the time.

Grinning, now. “Shoulda seen her legs.”

“I thought it was over. You and Anne.”

“It is. I swear. Long over. Her name’s Bernice, if you can believe it. Bernice, but she sure is nice.” Jimmy tapped on the steering wheel. “Nice.”

“You and Christie—”

“Terry—”

“Hear me out,” Terry pleaded. “You’re married.”

“And don’t I know it? Don’t I go home every night? To the same woman? The woman who got over me a long time ago? She doesn’t love me anymore.” Jimmy swerved around a taxi.

“What about you?”

“I’ll get over her. Give me Bernice and that brunette at the club the other night. What was her name? Sasha? Yeah, give me Bernice and Sasha, maybe a case of beer, and I’ll be saying Christie who.” He swore at some cabbie who cut him off, but the way Jimmy drove, sometimes it was hard to tell who was in the wrong. He was so overly self-assured, he could make little gray-haired ladies swear at him. “You shoulda seen her last night.”

“Sasha?”

“No. Christie.” He honked, but Terry couldn’t see any reason, other than to just make noise. “It’s always Christie, isn’t it?”

“Yeah, well—”

“Sometimes I think she was the one who asked me to marry her. Just to see if I’d do it.”

Terry stared out the window for a minute, watching bricks zoom past the window, watching pedestrians who seemed to have been frozen in time. He could almost smell the pizza starting to sizzle as the passed one of his favorite parlors, and the coffee steam melted into the air from the bodega. “What are you thinking for lunch?”

Jimmy grinned and shot him a glance, which Terry caught in the reflection of the window. He laughed heartily, then turned his attention back to the street. “Changing the subject?”

“Of course not.”

“Sick of talking about my… indiscretions?”

“Jimmy, I just—”

“You’re married, too, Terry.”

“Yeah, I am. And I would never—”

Jimmy sort of snorted. “You won’t need to. You got Annie.”

“You want Annie?” Terry was surprised by Jim’s answer. Jimmy had never seemed overly enamored of Terry’s wife, hardly cared a peck about the kid, his own god-son, either.

Jimmy shook his head and checked the rear-view mirror. For him, the traffic never seemed to stop. He always managed to find a way through—back alleys, turn lanes. No matter how many times he got off-course, he always managed to find his way back, faster than anyone who’d tried the straight-shot. Here he backed up, through a parking space that was half-occupied by a motorcycle, and through an alley, dodging a dumpster before they were spit back out on a one-way street headed the way they’d just come. “You and Annie are right for each other. You go good together. That’s what I’m saying.”

“Yeah, well, maybe you deserve your wife.”

Jim turned again, taking a shortcut through a tiny parking lot, up a small ramp, and back onto a street pointed in the right direction. He sped up—he’d manage to cut in front of the traffic jam, in front of everyone who’d stopped for the light he’d refused to honor. Jimmy was chewing on his lip, paying no attention to the road, just using that auto-pilot he’d honed after years on the force. He knew how to play the game.

Terry opened his mouth to apologize, but Jimmy waved him off. “Save it,” he said.

“Jimmy—”

“No, you’re right. Maybe you’re right. You ever think of that, Terry? That you could be right? That you don’t always have to bow down before us all and take our shit? That maybe we should be bowing down before you and you tell us how it goes?”

Terry shook his head.

“I’m not saying I’m going to listen to you.” Jimmy tossed him a grin and sped through a yellow light.

Terry finally laughed.

“That’s better,” Jimmy said. “Lighten up.”

Jimmy often told him to lighten up—what else were they going to do all day? Mope around? Sit there and contemplate life? Or were they going to get out there and have some fun? Just give it up, give in, and enjoy this little crap-shoot.

“You want pizza,” Jimmy said.

“What?”

“For lunch.”

“Yeah.”

“Saw you eyeing it as we passed. Not a problem.”

“Thanks.”

“Don’t you worry your pretty little head.” Jimmy reached over, mussed up Terry’s hair, then punched him in the shoulder when he raised his arms, leaving himself open to attack. “I got you covered. You worry like a woman.” He drew lines back and forth on his own forehead. “Got little crease marks and everything.”

The street in front of the courthouse was packed. Jimmy reached back and snagged an evidence bag, handing it over the seat to Terry. “Here. You jump out, run this up, I’ll circle around the block, you jump back in.” Jimmy glanced at his watch. “One minute, forty-five seconds—I’ll have the door open, but I ain’t stopping.” Jimmy unclipped Terry’s seatbelt for him, and slowed down to a crawl next to the line-up.

Terry jumped out. He was never sure how serious Jimmy was, but his partner knew the city well enough that his estimate on how long it’d take to get around the block was probably pretty accurate. Terry hoofed it up the stone steps, through the revolving glass door, past the information desk, skirted around a camera crew doing some report on a crime from another precinct, and belted it up the stairs.

“Detective Jansen!” April Simmons, the lawyer in charge of a case they’d solved nearly a year before, exclaimed when he burst into her outer office. “Care to have a cup of coffee so we can run over the prosecution?” She took the evidence bag and started to check it over, oh so slowly, methodically.

“Can’t,” Terry huffed. “Jimmy’s—downstairs—waiting—gotta—”

She smiled. “I understand. Go on.”

Terry turned, not taking the time to shut the office door, and practically sprinted down the hall. He tore off his raincoat as he went; it was only slowing him down, bulky, flying out behind him like he was some sort of superhero. Which he wasn’t.

Terry took the stone steps back down toward the sidewalk, two at a time, then three at a time. If he’d have stumbled, he would have taken half of New York with him, but there was Jimmy, already around the corner, nearly parallel to the line of parked cars at the meters. Terry lengthened his stride, took the last six steps at a leap, then ran for the car, with the open passenger door, as it glided past him, true to his word, not stopping.

Jimmy laughed as Terry jumped in and slammed the door, inches before it would have taken out a cabbie on the corner. “Perfect.”

Terry threw his coat back over the seat and sank down. “Next time—you go,” he panted.

“One of us had to drive,” Jimmy said innocently.

The radio squawked to life, something about a bank, a robbery going down. Thanks to their impromptu trip to drop off evidence for the trial, rather than sending some grunt officer in uniform, they weren’t too far out of the way. Jimmy frowned and reached for the mic. “So much for paperwork,” he said, then pushed the button to let them know they were responding. He checked his gun, making sure it was properly loaded, safety off, while taking a corner to turn them in the right direction. He put up the revolving light, then checked the car for spare bullets. He shrugged to Terry—“Should be enough. We’re probably going to miss most of it.”

Terry’s ritual for responding to crime scenes wasn’t nearly as practiced as his partner’s. He checked his own gun, his fingers fumbling just a little. He’d never been as adept at these life-and-death situations, at the drama, the heroism. Terry was one of those long-haul guys—he was better for the cross-country trip, for the stakeouts and watching and digging up dirt. Jimmy Dunbar was best in the field, running out there, thinking on his feet. He could do the long-haul thing, even better than Terry could, mulling cases over in his head for months without tiring, but he preferred getting out there and talking to people and cooking up schemes, rather than sitting back at the squad and going over what they already had. The more he got, the easier it’d be to fit the puzzle together, he always said.

Terry’s fingers tapped impatiently on the door, just under the window.

Jimmy smiled over at him. “Relax, we’ll get there.”

But that wasn’t what he was worrying about. He had Annie, and Mikey, his family, running through his head. Mikey was just a baby, just learning to crawl. He couldn’t talk yet. Annie could talk up a storm, but there were some days when Mikey ran her so ragged she couldn’t crawl into bed, and that was where Terry came in, taking over as Super Dad, carrying his wife to bed, tucking her in, feeding the boy, putting dinner on.

The car jerked to a stop. They weren’t the first ones on the scene. One car was already on fire. There were civilians crouched behind corners, unable to get away without drawing fire.

And there was the man, an AK-47 in hand, shooting everything that moved.

Jimmy put the car in park, pushed open his door, crouched behind it as Terry did the same. They could talk through the open car as they surveyed the scene.

The man looked too bulky to be real—obviously he was wearing something underneath the shirt, probably a Kevlar vest—he was better prepared for this than Jim and Terry were, their vests safely hung up in their lockers back at the squad, not getting wrinkled, gathering a bit of dust.

Jimmy leaned back into the car a second. “We’re just back-up, that’s it. Two uniforms over there helping a couple people to safety…” Over the radio they could hear other cars responding, heading toward the scene.

Terry felt himself relaxing. They weren’t alone here. They were both armed, he had Jimmy watching his back.

A uniformed officer, wearing the customary dark blue, knelt over a man by the bus stop. Probably his partner. Terry swore to himself, and during the next free moment, he skirted over there, half-crouched. They were safe, him and the other officer, but only for a moment. It was only a matter of time, and they had to get out of there.

Terry glanced back at Jimmy, who had rolled down his window and was taking aim. Another second, then Jimmy would draw the fire, Terry and the officer would be free to get to safety.

One second. Terry kept his eye on Jimmy, waiting. He’d know the moment.

There.

“Go, go, go!” he yelled, pushing the officer in front of him.

The glass partition of the bus stop exploded.

Terry nearly fell, the shock, it felt like his heart stopped. The officer, right in front of him, falling, bleeding, dying. Terry scrambled forward.

The world sort of went hazy. Unclear. Like fog, not like night, it was too bright for that. This felt more like a concussion, where he couldn’t think straight. Annie, Mikey, Annie, Mikey, Annie.

The next moments, they all blended together. Every breath was an eternity, but after a few breaths, time would speed up, and he’d live those moments over, fast forward. He blinked.

He felt his gun being taken from his hand.

He breathed in.

That was Jimmy’s shoe, right there, right in front of him.

He breathed out.

It replayed.

“Terry! Look at me!” The noise all rushed back.

Jimmy ran over, took his gun, stepped up, stood straight, went forward, fell.

Breathe in.

“Take the shot, Terry!”

But he didn’t have a gun.

Breathe out.

Again, in reverse this time, he saw blood, then none, then felt the gun taken from his hand.

It sped up, forward, gunshots, three of them, maybe four. It was the sound of his own gun firing, but how? He knew that sound so well, but where was his gun? What was going on?

He bent around the electrical box.

Blood.

Staring at his partner, lying prone on the sidewalk, unmoving, Terry distinctly heard the voice, “He’s empty, Terry, take the shot!”

When he tore his eyes away from Jimmy Dunbar’s quickly paling face, he noticed the gunman lying in his own pool of blood.

“He’s empty, Terry!”

Terry’s eyes fell back to the body at his feet. The lone man standing, over the body of his partner and his friend.

“Terry, he’s empty!”

If that had been the case, then what had happened?

He breathed in, feeling faint. There was movement around him. He wasn’t sure if there were more cops coming, or if the world was coming to an end, if the very backdrop around him was crumbling, and would soon reveal itself as a façade.


* * *


“Don’t go in there,” Lt. Schumacher said, grabbing Terry by the arm.

“Why not?”

“You’re in no shape, and neither’s he.”

“How is he? How’s Jimmy? I have to—”

“What you need to do is get a hold of yourself.”

Terry flinched. He’d suddenly had a notion the lieutenant was going to slap him, but the blow never came. “I have to know.”

“You know what we know. You were there. There’s been no change.”

“Is he—stable?”

“You want coffee?” The lieutenant passed his arm into the large hand of a uniformed officer, not giving Terry a chance to break away. He felt like he was in custody as he shook his head and protested, being led off down the long, long narrow hall, mostly beige, slightly blue, or was that just the tinge, from the lights? Fluorescent lights could play with your head, make you see colors that weren’t there. Inside he was pulling away, yelling, Let go, and Get your hand off me, and I have to see him. But outside there was nothing, he just felt pale, like he wasn’t himself. Like there was some wall that had been erected between himself and the rest of the world. Between himself and himself.

All he could hear was Jimmy’s voice. Not even the words, just the tone. Angry, ordering, insisting. Like a father, showing him the ropes. And all he could see… was black. Like Jimmy’s funeral.

“Terry,” a voice said.

The uniformed officer stopped, giving Terry a moment to turn. The massive form in front of him was another detective in their precinct, Doug Bergan.

“How’s he doing?”

“I… I—du-dunno.” His eyes roved wildly over Doug’s large face. Doug could tell him. “You gotta go see him. Tell me. H-how is he?” he pleaded.

Doug patted Terry on the shoulder, but it wasn’t a comforting action. “You stay here.”

“Why?” His voice was little more than a whisper.

“What happened out there?” Doug had his best detective’s look on his face, using all his skill to look into Terry’s soul and find the truth.

Terry shrank back.

“Word on the street…”

Doug didn’t need to say anymore. Terry shook his head, vehemently, so it hurt, so he felt dizzy, so he couldn’t see straight. The walls moved, closer, he shook his head so fast, they converged and became one.

“Whatever you do, don’t go see him.”

“I gotta—”

“You gotta stay away from Jimmy right now. You got that? I don’t know what happened, but he sure as hell will. You know that, right?”

Terry found his head was moving up and down slowly. “Y-yes.”

“Now, what happened?”

The words were near his throat: I froze. But he couldn’t say them. “Jimmy… got shot. In the head. In the head.”

He’d lost his partner. He’d failed. Jimmy would know. If he lived. If he didn’t die. Jimmy’d know.

“Stay here.”

“S-sure.” Doug moved off. “Are you sure?” he whispered. Would Jimmy know? Because it wasn’t possible, was it? Jimmy was his best friend. Terry’d do anything for Jimmy. Terry’d take a bullet for the guy, just to keep him safe. He was sure of it.

Wasn’t he?


* * *


Terry replayed the scene in his head. They’d called psych services. He’d talked. He’d told them all about it. Where the gunman was, where he was, how Jimmy—reckless as always—had gotten shot in the head. He hadn’t told them about Anne, about how Jimmy and Christie had been talking about a divorce, about the affair, or the fights, or the late nights drinking with the buddies, looking for anything to smooth over the rough times. Terry was a good friend. He hadn’t told them how Jimmy wasn’t thinking rationally. How he’d run to where Terry was pinned down, and managed, somehow, with all that adrenaline, to get off the one shot to take the guy down.

“What happened?”

“Jimmy… took my gun. He was out of ammunition. So he took my gun. He thought he could get the shot, so I let him.” Terry shook his head. “I shouldn’t have.”

The therapist was making him feel better, though. Talking it out was helping. Maybe if he could talk to Jimmy he’d feel even better, knowing whether or not his friend was going to be okay.

Terry’s stomach tightened. He looked down and saw nothing of the room but his hand clenched, white, without blood, without any of the blood like he’d seen all over the sidewalk, waiting for the ambulance to come. How could he talk to Jimmy about this?

Doug had said he’d be sure to know, Jimmy would be sure to know exactly what happened. Jimmy’d never done anything wrong, this was his duty, as a cop, to take that guy down, and he had. He certainly had. Consequences be damned. Because, maybe because he didn’t have a kid at home. And his wife was mad at him. But if Doug was right, even though Terry had known Jimmy for years, if Doug was right, Jimmy was sure to blame Terry for him getting shot. For making him come after the gun, making him run out into the open, where Terry hadn’t had a clear shot, and take his gun, and leave himself wide open.

“What are you thinking?”

“There was so much blood. Is he… is he okay? Do they know yet?”

“No.”

“Today… what happened?”

“Why do you keep asking me that?”

“Because you keep giving me different pieces of the puzzle.” The therapist slid forward on his seat, resting his elbows on his knees. “Look, when a person experiences a highly traumatic event, sometimes, they block out bits and pieces. Not consciously. Call it selective amnesia. Their subconscious is trying to protect them.”

“You think I’m trying to protect myself from something?”

“I want to make sure you can come to terms with what happened.”

“Not a problem.” Terry slumped down. That was Jimmy’s term; what Jimmy always said. It had slipped out so suddenly, like he was trying to fill his partner’s shoes.

But Jimmy was not going to die. He’d get a chance to make things right.