So I got back from Bosnia and talked to a psychiatrist for ten minutes. Haven't talked to anyone since. I don't want it to be about me. Ever. Doesn't matter what 'it' is, it's not about me.
I know it's good to talk, and I know the only way I'm ever going to escape the awfulness of the memories I've carried around since then is to let it all out, but I just don't think it's ever going to happen.
I used to think, when I'd come home — after I'd walked out on the professional psych-woman — that I'd find a woman to confide in. A lover. Always found women easy to talk to. And there'd be these women that I'd sleep with or do whatever with, and not once did I ever think, yep, I can talk to you, let me tell you all sorts of fucking shit that you won't believe. Not once.
I thought, romantically maybe… is this romantic?… that there'd be someone out there, and I'd know instinctively that she was the one and that I'd want to talk to her, and it would just all come out in a rush, and I'd probably end up crying like some fucking reality TV contestant. There'd be one, and I'd know.
Well, I damn well knew it wasn't Jean Fryar. Holy crap, we never talked about anything, other than her and what she needed and what I was giving her and how I could make her life less shit.
Peggy, however, she was different. Right from the start, I thought, this is it. This is the woman I'll talk to. This is the woman with whom I'll sit down, and she'll be my counsellor and I'll be able to get all that fucking crap out of my head. I'll spew it all forth, and she'll sit there and take it in, and it won't be in my head anymore because I'll have got rid of it, it'll be in her head, but it won't bother her the way it bothered me because it won't actually have happened to her, so it'll be like off-loading an illness to someone who can't get it. Peggy was the one, and I was going to tell her tomorrow.
Yep, roll out the Beatles song. The time was never right, tomorrow never came. Never. I'd sit there, thinking OK, this is it, this is it, now. Right now. Right fucking now. Say something!
I never said. And she knew. She knew there was a lot of shit in there, and she waited for me to tell her. It hung over us. We wouldn't really be a couple until I'd shared. And so we were never really a couple. Despite twelve years of marriage.
She's still waiting. And now, it's not so much going to be about diamond earrings, it's not so much about me lying about my whereabouts — although obviously it would be if she knew I'd been sleeping with the boss — it's about Bosnia, it's about me living in a war zone for two and a half years, it's about me getting completely mentally fucked up and never telling her about it. And the diamond earrings… you know what they were saying? They were saying, all right, it's time for number seven to come in. I'm here, I'm back, and this time I'm talking. Honestly.
Honestly, for fuck's sake.
*
Two hours later and just about finished that report on the newsagents. Paperwork. It's not that I'm sitting on it; I keep getting interrupted. The usual crap of any given Monday. I've had enough. Need a holiday from all this. Murder, pointless little criminal investigations, Peggy, Charlotte. I need a break from it all.
Taylor arrives. Got a serious monk on. Walks past me, then stops, takes a second, turns round.
'What is it with you fucking sergeants?'
I glance at Herrod's desk. I don't equate, on any level, the fact that I was late for work yesterday with the fact that Herrod has been missing for twenty-four hours. He's a knob, and I — despite the occasional opinion to the contrary — am not. Vaguely resent being the same grade as him, although sadly neither of us is going anywhere.
'You fucking turn up when you feel like it, Herrod's god knows where, and now fucking Eileen Harrison calls in sick. Did you know that? Did you know she'd pulled a sicky?'
I just look at him. One of those occasions when it's best to let him spout. Authority has to spout off every now and again or else it loses its grip on the reality that it's an authority.
'We've got work coming out of our arse… I don't give a fuck if she's got a cancerous tumour in her neck which she broke falling down the stairs after suffering a fucking heart attack. Get the fuck in here, for God's sake…'
He's still staring at me like I'm the bad guy. I've been in here since eight this morning, and I'm saying nothing. Admit that I'm a little surprised, as I do think that Eileen Harrison is the type of ball-breaking workaholic that would come to the station regardless of being a heart-ravaged, broken-necked cancer victim.
Maybe I should call her.
That thought comes into my head, and then I think, for fuck's sake, you idiot, leave it alone.
Taylor is still looking at me like I'm the five-day-old leftovers of a chicken vindaloo when Charlotte Miller appears in front of us.
'Gentlemen.'
She has walked in on a lot of anger which doesn't immediately dissipate. She can't help but notice, but chooses to ignore it.
'I'd like to see you in my office, Chief Inspector,' she says to Taylor, then turns away.
Taylor watches her go, and then gives me a look before he follows her.
'She's probably going to make me a Sergeant so that there's someone to actually do all that fucking Sergeant type work that you lot don't seem to give a fuck about.'
He walks off; I watch him go. Manage not to let rip at his back by counting to ten. The phone rings before I get to three. I answer with very low levels of enthusiasm.
'Hutton?'
'Ramsey,' says the detached voice. Bloody Hell, just what I need. Another theft of Winnie The Pooh masks in Rutherglen.
'What is it, Stuart?'
'Got a woman down here wants to talk to Herrod.'
Tell her he's not here and get her to come back in three years time.
'It's about the Keller and Bathurst murders. Said she spoke to Herrod on the phone yesterday morning.'
Instant wake up call. They said that Herrod disappeared after taking a call.
'Can you show her to one of the rooms, Stuart. I'll be down in a minute.'
'Aye, no bother,' he says and is gone.
Put the phone down, drum my fingers on the table. Got a weird tingle. It's a police thing. Gut instinct. About to get a breakthrough.
Won't go leaping into the midst of the Taylor-Miller conflab just yet. Wait and see if my guts are in order for a change.