A torn quarter page from a catalog appeared on the fridge, supported at its top corners by the E and F alphabet magnets. When she first saw it, as she was reaching into the fridge to grab her lunch on the way out the door, Elaine looked away quickly, before she quite had to register the image or read the description. Her eyes skipped over to Frannie, sitting at the kitchen table with the twins on her lap, watching Lia get slightly more than fifty percent of her oatmeal into her mouth, and distributing the rest over her placemat, pj's, face, and hair. Frannie met her eyes--had been watching her, Elaine was sure, to see what she'd do--and Elaine quickly looked away, grabbing the brown bag with her name written on it.
She kissed a clean spot on the crown of Lia's head and hugged each of the twins, returning a "Bye, babies," to the usual morning chorus of "Bye, ‘Lainie." Then she leaned in for a kiss from Frannie, but slowly, uncertainly. She was afraid, meeting Frannie's eyes, that she'd turn her head, that she'd have to go off to work with only a kiss on a turned cheek, but Frannie was practically a cop's wife now, and she knew the drill. Her eyes softened, and she smiled, and reached a hand up to Elaine's cheek--Elaine automatically dropped her own hand to Nicky's side to steady him--and their morning kiss lasted a good fifteen seconds longer than usual. She grinned as she straightened up. "Trying to make me late?"
"Nah," Frannie said, smiling back. "Get outta here. Be safe and be home on time, I'm making gnocchi tonight."
"Mm." Her mama's recipe, which meant Frannie was only at stage one of culinary bribery. Stage two would be Frannie making Elaine's mom's recipes. Step three would involve chocolate and sending the kids to stay over with somebody for a night, or, depending on how determined Frannie was to get her way, two. "I'll be looking forward to it."
She knew what was on the catalog page. White china dishes kinda like Frannie's mama's good ones, the set they'd looked at when they were doing the registry at Marshall Field's. Frannie liked them, but Elaine had said they didn't need china--the kids would just break it--and Frannie hadn't argued. Not then, in the store, with that bitch of a clerk giving them nasty looks. Elaine had known it wasn't going to be that easy, but she'd hoped for more than a day or two to get used to the idea. It was just dishes, after all. The thought shouldn't turn her stomach.
She parked the car, leaned her forehead against the cool vinyl of the steering wheel, and closed her eyes, heard herself say "Dishes?" and smelled that fat nasty son of a fucking bitch, leaning over her, saw his sneer, felt the cold sweat on her back and the rage burning quiet and low in her guts.
She told herself, not for the first time, that it didn't matter anymore, had never really mattered at all. Kowalski had saved their bacon, she had graduated with an arrest under her belt and a CPD job waiting. Hell, she'd even gotten treated right by the brass--and she'd think that was some kind of a miracle, a black lesbian uniform getting a fair shake, except she knew who she had going to bat for her, not that they'd ever tell her, just like she'd never have asked--and it was years ago anyway, and she shouldn't care. But she'd seen the look in Brandauer's eye, and she knew how close she'd come to losing everything, to being stuck wearing a headset phone and doing the filing for the real cops.
She'd like to think she just had to hate that bastard who'd said it, "China white," like that was some arcane term in a detective division. She'd like to just spit when she said Brandauer's name, like everybody else did. Only there was this little bug in her head, this little worm twisting her guts, that wouldn't let her forget the anger and the fear, wouldn't let her just put it down to one bad day, one jerk, five years back.
She didn't eat dinner with Brandauer every Sunday off white china dishes, after all.
Joey asked her what was up six times before ten in the morning, and when she finally snapped, "PMS," he looked worried and not a little disbelieving, but finally shut up. After lunch--meatball sandwich, chips, two icebox cookies, and a handwritten note that just said Love you, E. XOX--it was paperwork time. She got three reports typed up in an hour, printed them out, and tossed them down on the desk. When she said she'd be back in a minute, Joey looked openly relieved and just said, "Hey, take your time."
She headed upstairs, hoping he'd be gone. Hoping something would save her from doing this, even though she knew she had to. Should've done it years ago, really, except there had been so much else to be pissed off about before this.
She held her breath, stepping through the doors to the old familiar bullpen, hoping no one would spot her and clap her on the back and want to talk about old times. She got lucky, though, or unlucky if she judged by the sensation of her stomach lining burning. The room was mostly quiet. People either had their heads down busy at their desks or weren't there at all, and Ray Vecchio was in the former group.
She walked over to her soon-to-be brother-in-law and crouched down by his desk. "Hey, Ray. Can I talk to you a sec? Privately?"
He looked up, startled and then wary, which was no surprise. The only reason she and Frannie hadn't gotten hitched before now, even if it was just jumping the broom instead of the real thing, was that a certain somebody's big brother had refused to give her away. His Mama--most of the women in the clan, in fact--had worn him down, but it had taken the better part of two years to do it. Elaine had done her own bit of work on him in that time, and he seemed to have learned a little healthy respect. Good for him.
He glanced up over her head, scanned the room, and said, "Yeah, interview two should be open."
"Right," Elaine said, and straightened up. She wasn't going to go wait for him, like a perp cuffed in the chair. She stood over him, instead, while he fiddled with this and that, stuffed papers into drawers, until he finally figured out that she wasn't going to just go away. Then he sighed, and stood up, and before he could do it to her, she gestured him ahead of her, and Ray gave her a frustrated smile that was just a show of teeth, but he went.
He sat down on the edge of the table, when they got to the room, and Elaine shut the door and leaned against it. "Frannie told me Maria told her she heard you telling your Ma you don't know what to get us for a wedding present," she said, spitting out her info trail like she'd rehearsed this, which she hadn't. Much. Out loud.
Ray stared back, but he wasn't going to stare her down. She could feel five years of sick helpless anger solidifying into strength, and she wasn't going to let go of it until she was good and ready. "Yeah, I don't. You got any ideas?"
"I know what I want from you." He raised his eyebrows, and she said, "I want you to do me a little favor that will make my life a lot easier if I'm going to be related to you for the rest of it."
Because you couldn't feel like this about family, not family like Frannie's, and Elaine wasn't going to be the cause of that being ruined any more than it already had been. So this was going to end, here and now, because it had to, and Ray was going to cooperate if she had to hold a gun to his head. "Well, by all means," Ray said, and she could see he was getting a little comfortable, which was fine, because, hey, they were all family here, right? So why shouldn't he be comfortable? "What's a little favor, between family? Whaddya need?"
"I need to ask you a question, and I need you to answer me. Truthfully." Nobody else could've ever asked. Welsh just plain never would, and Fraser, if he thought of it, probably wouldn't want to know, and Kowalski had to know he'd get his teeth loosened just for bringing it up, but Elaine was a chick and unhittable, even if she was the wicked dyke cop who'd corrupted his baby sister, and she really, really wanted to know.
Ray nodded, and Elaine took a deep breath. "While you were gone," she said, slowly, steadily, holding eye contact. "About a month before I graduated the academy, the 2-7 got hit by IA for a discrepancy on an evidence log. The log showed ten kilos of H, except by then nine of them had disappeared."
Vecchio looked completely blank. So far, so good. Elaine leaned harder against the door, against her old comfortable anger. "It was your bust."
She hadn't asked a question, not really, but Vecchio was a smart guy, and he'd run an interrogation or two in his time, and he knew how IA could get. He leaned forward, elbows on knees, and didn't look away from her once, and her stomach unknotted even before he said anything, because this was going just right, and she already knew his answer. "Listen, Elaine. Was this that shit with Brandauer? Welsh told me about that. The guy had a grudge against the Lieu, he leaned on some stoolie to get a story so he could mess with the 27th. Probably he'd heard a rumor that something was up with me and the Feds. He figured I was a weak spot for Welsh and he pointed the finger at me. That's all."
He didn't say I had nothing to do with it, because of course Elaine hadn't asked, hadn't had to ask. She took a deep breath, and let it all the way out, and felt herself smile. Brandauer was a worthless sack of shit, messing with Frannie's brother like that, making her think stupid thoughts for years, but no more. Ray leaned back in his seat, and smiled. "So what's the question, then?"
Without missing a beat, Elaine said, "Whatcha doing for dinner tonight? Frannie's making gnocchi. And I know just what she wants for a wedding present, too."
Email is always welcome at dsudis@yahoo.com
Or you can drop me a comment.