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By Terri Whitman © 9-23-04

Sweat trickled down the detective’s back making it itch. The summer evening heat wasn’t helping. It had been hanging on for days and when combined with the high humidity, made everything, even breathing, a chore.

He didn’t know if it was the heat or the stress of the latest developments that caused his upset stomach and pounding headache. Either way, he felt like shit.

Solitude is what the detective wanted right now. Some place he felt sure he’d be alone. Although the hour wasn’t late, it was unusual to find the ancient building deserted. The detective’s footsteps echoed as he ascended the polished wooden steps.

Feeling beleaguered, he turned the brass doorknob and entered the office. The interior was stifling, which didn’t help his mood. He paused briefly at each of the all too familiar desks of his co-workers, disheartened that the original occupants of two of them were no longer with the unit, one was dead and the other was now living on the Big Island.

The detective sighed heavily and thought about how it was back in the beginning. The unit was new and more or less had a free hand when it came to gaining control over the stubbornly embedded criminal elements.

Disenchanted with how restrictive his job had become, he thought of the dismal options that lay ahead for him. Retirement was one option but it didn’t appeal to him. He was a man of action, accustomed to being active most of his waking hours. He was too young to retire just yet.

With the political interference that had now embroiled the legal system, he knew remaining a cop of any kind wasn’t where he wanted to go. The thought of going into politics was an absolute ‘no.’

Continuing on, he opened the door just behind the secretary’s desk. Before he entered the office behind that special door, he stopped to look at her desk. A coffee pot was located just behind it, next to the door. He wondered how many cups of coffee he had drunk from that pot. The tidy desk in front was the testament to the efficiency of its current occupant. How many secretaries had they had? He still missed the one who had been there the longest, who loyally mothered all the men of the unit, especially when one of them had been hurt or suffered a loss.

Shaking himself out of this reverie, he finally walked through the doorway and stepped inside. The office was dark, but it was a little bit cooler there. He wished it would rain or the trade winds start up; anything would be better than this stifling heat.

He walked out onto the very familiar lanai that he had shared with his best friend countless times. Reaching around to scratch his back, he felt the bulge of his weapon, an instrument of death he had been forced to use too many times. Who knew how many lives changed in the process? His friend had told him about its use during the course of his job and of how he should feel every time he had to use it. At first he didn’t agree, but over the years he learned how right his friend had been.

He looked out over the twilit city vaguely aware of the street noise below. The streetlights had just come on. The traffic was heavy with evening partygoers. A life he use to love, but seldom got to enjoy because of the pressures of his job. He wondered if he’d ever get to enjoy another party night anywhere in Honolulu or Waikiki

The detective thought of the many times he had enjoyed the nightlife with different female companions. Unfortunately, he also remembered the love he had lost due to a ruthless killer. If it hadn’t been for his friends, he probably would have probably gone over the edge. Many other women came into his life after that, but none of those relationships ever lasted. His job always interfered.

Leaving the lanai, he walked back into the inner sanctum of his working world. There he stopped at his desk and looked at the various items accrued during his tenure with the department. His fingers traced along many of the framed awards and citations hanging on the wall. Some he cherished, like the one he got for saving a little girl’s life. Others he accepted only because of pressures from above or because his friends had persuaded him to do so. He hadn’t accepted his position for the recognition but to serve his community.

As he approached the pictures along the wall, he stopped at the one of his best friend. He remembered that case. All but one person thought it was unsolvable. He smiled when he remembered the breakthrough. One little tiny piece of evidence, a dead flea, proved to be the key to the case and had helped pound the last nail into the coffin of their adversary.

The detective turned his attention to the other desks. His gaze stopped at one whose tidiness told him its occupant had finally finished his last assignment. Stacks of files, books and papers had littered it earlier that day. Yet it had an organized form of disorganization about it.

Continuing on, he stopped at another desk. There he saw the latest file he and his associates had been working on.

His anger and frustration grew. Bureaucratic nonsense had forced them to take longer than necessary to collar their suspect, and then the courts had ultimately turned the killer loose. A technicality they said, a stupid technicality. And now there was a trumped up charge of collaboration filed against him asserting that one of the killer’s friends had seen some sort of payoff.

Earlier that afternoon he had met with the District Attorney, the Governor and his friend. It had not gone well. Facing uncalled-for sanctions that would lead to the demise of his career, the detective looked inward for a solution but found none.

Going back to his desk, he sat down. Removing his badge and keys, he placed them in the middle drawer. He removed his holster. For several minutes he looked at it. Then he removed his gun and unloaded it. Carefully he cleaned and oiled his weapon, paying particular attention to the barrel and hammer. Having a dirty gun could get a person seriously injured or even killed. Finished, he reloaded it.

Gripping the gun with his right hand, he was careful to keep his index finger away from the trigger. Slowly he spun the cylinder around, listening to the smooth metallic clicking of the bearings. Turning his weapon so the barrel faced him, he could barely make out the points of the bullets as they sat in their slots.

Slowly he brought his weapon closer, his index finger moving into its normal position. He heard a door open and steps coming his way.

He placed the muzzle inside his mouth.

“NO! Don’t!”

BANG!!!!

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