Stains
"You almost seem to admire him."
"In a way, I do. But I hate him, too."
There wasn't supposed to be any smoking in the small office that bordered the one-way glass, but the old man didn't care. He was too close to retirement to give much of a damn about petty rules and useless regulations anymore. He'd postponed several appointments with human resources to discuss his departure; he'd already trained a couple of Captains and several Lieutenants. They'd long since stopped trying to promote him or convince him to leave. He just stayed, and worked, and smoked.
The two detectives watched their suspect do nothing. He sat, impassive, staring at the scarred top of the cheap pressboard table. He didn't even fidget.
"So all we gotta do is get him to write it up, right? Even though his statement is on video." The younger man was experienced, but still relatively new to the gold detective's badge.
"Yeah. The DA's a stickler like that. Sometimes the assholes over at the Defender's office get the videos suppressed for one reason or another."
"Even if they do, it's a slam dunk. Easiest case we've worked in months."
The old man looked through the blue smoke at his trainee and squinted. "Yeah. We need to enjoy this one."
"Want me to run in there with a pad and pen?"
A pause.
A puff.
"In a minute."
Silence. Finally, it's broken.
"Tell me somethin, boss."
Inhale.
Exhale.
"Sure."
"How is it you have any sympathy for him? How can you admire and hate the guy at the same time?"
The old man coughed thickly and snubbed out the coffin nail in an empty drink can. The sounds of coughing and the *hiss* of fire against old Coke were the only sounds for a full twenty seconds.
"You and me, kid, we're killers. We had choices. We made 'em. One way or the other, we walked this path we're on. We're just lucky, is all. He ain't."
"How the hell do you figure that?"
"The only thing that kept us from being labeled murderers is the side we were on. The uniform we wore. The hunk of brass in our pocket now. That guy in the fishbowl doesn't have a team. He betrayed the Social Contract. There ain't room for that sort of thing in civilized society."
"What about intent? Doesn't that count?"
A rare smile passes across the old detective's weathered, wizened face. For just a moment, ice gleams in his eyes.
"Oh, I intended harm when I've done it, kid. Sometimes I just wish I'd been as free as that guy in there, and not given a fuck about the consequences when I've held back. And I've held back so much."
He lit another cigarette and sat down in a padded metal chair that saw the best side of life before Carter was elected.
He continued, staring through the glass and the man at the desk. "You will, too. You already have. Because that's the trust we have to live by." He paused, leaving the Marlboro dangling in the corner of his mouth, and he made eye contact with the young detective. "Monsters leave a stain, no matter how much we scrub. So I hate him. And I admire him." His gaze returned to a past that haunted every day of his present. "Because I've almost been him."