shellyharmon (shellyharmon) wrote in birthrightrpg, @ 2021-01-30 19:51:00 |
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Entry tags: | npc, shelly harmon |
Interview
Who: Shelly/NPC Doherty
What: Flashback
Where: Upstate New York
When: December 27th, 2011
Ratings/Warnings: Reference to Death, Tragedy, Etc.
Shelly had to look down at her hands to keep from seeing her reflection. At least they weren’t in cuffs. She had been in the interrogation room -- was it called an interrogation room -- for what seemed like hours. A styrofoam cup of water and plastic-wrapped sandwich was in front of her, untouched. The blonde wasn’t under arrest, she had been assured repeatedly. But it still felt like it. She still couldn’t quite believe what they had told her when the cops found her at her motel room by the freeway. Everyone in the house was dead. Massive fire.
Had it been her fault?
Doherty was watching from the other side of the mirror. “I want to talk to her.”
His partner shook her head slowly, her arms crossed. “I don’t think it’s a good idea,” she told him, tilting her head to face him. “But I know that’s not going to stop you.” With that, she drifted through the open door. Rob ran his fingers through his hair tiredly. He was running on fumes, having been awake for the past thirty-six hours. He felt 20 years older overnight. And he had yet to talk to the young woman who could piece it all together for him.The cop went through a second door, and he was no longer separated from her by a sheet of glass.
Shelly sat up straight in the hard-backed chair, lifting her chin to see the newcomer. There was something instantly familiar about him. She reached for the cup of water, taking a lukewarm drink. The blonde waited for him to speak first, but it seemed like he was doing the same. He pulled out the chair across from her, the metal-tipped legs scraping against the vinyl floor, making them both visibly wince. The gesture was comforting somehow, like they were both just people. That illusion vanished for her when he did finally speak, however.
“Take me through it from the top,” he told her, authoritative, elbows leaning on the table. “You meet my nephew at college, you lie to him about your name, and then you get him to invite you to Christmas dinner? Did you need a free meal that badly?”
She tensed up instantly, her arms crossing protectively over herself. “Yeah, that’s exactly it,” she replied coldly, meeting his gaze.
He realized he had started out poorly, could feel her defenses fly up like a wall of armor. “Look, I’m not going to try to bullshit you,” he began, trying to steer the ship back on course. “I’m exhausted. I’m grieving.” Doherty looked down at his hands, slim gold wedding band the only ornamentation on them. It had gotten slightly tight, not enough for him to go get it resized, but just enough to provide a daily reminder that he was tied to someone, that he wasn’t completely alone in the world. It didn’t really help. “Graham is -- was -- my brother. That was my sister-in-law. My nephews. I’m trying to understand how I could lose them all in one day. Just one single day. Gone.”
Shelly forgot about her defensiveness in the wake of this admission. She swallowed, her shaking hands betrayed by the styrofoam cup of water. “I’m sorry,” the blonde whispered, her gaze dropping downward. “But I told everything to the woman earlier. There was a guy, maybe mid-twenties. He was weird. Being around him made me feel weird.” She frowned. “He had an accent. I think he said he was from Europe. And Graham...Mr. Doherty, he said he had met him while volunteering. His name is Tim. He spent the night. I don’t know when he left, but it had to have been between me leaving, and the fire.”
Doherty listened intently, not interrupting, doing his best to arrange his features into something kind and open despite the raw wound that opened each time he heard his brother’s name. “Michelle, here’s the problem that I have. That we have. The name this mystery man gave leads to no one. No one knows anything about him. No one can even confirm he was there, besides you. What we do know is that Graham’s safe was missing nearly four thousand dollars.”
She could easily blame it on Tim. She was no stranger to lying, evading, manipulating. Shelly had gotten quite good at it, rather quickly. There was a pang of guilt, though, that threatened to pull apart the seams. How could she tell this man the truth about his dead brother? What would happen to her if she did?
Shelly drank the last of her water, resisting the urge to chew on the soft lip of the cup. “He paid me.”
That wasn’t what Rob was expecting to hear. He sat up straighter in the hard-backed chair. “Excuse me? Paid you for what, exactly?”
Her voice became smaller, quieter, less measured.. She curled inwardly a little, a wave of regret and embarrassment and fear engulfing her and taking her back to a specific moment when she was younger. “It really is better for you if you don’t know,” Shelly told him, brown eyes lifting to meet his tired ones. There were lines around them, puffy bags of sleeplessness. Bloodshot. He needed to sleep. He needed a few hours of forgetting. “It won’t solve what happened because I’m not the reason why the fire happened. I’m telling you, it was that weird guy. He made everyone this drink.”
Doherty was frustrated, and it seemed there were only three choices on where to direct that frustration at the moment: either Graham, Mystery Man, and Michelle. He could choose to take it out on her. It would be convenient, and easy. But he knew in his heart that she didn’t start the fire, or cause it. As for the money, maybe she was right. Graham had been secretive. There were cracks in his marriage. Did he really want to know what his dead brother would have been getting up to with a college-aged girl?
“I believe you,” he told her, his voice heavy. Everything about him and in him felt heavy. The guilt, the grief, the anger. It was burying him alive and he wasn’t doing anything to stop it. He hadn’t eaten, hadn’t slept. “Do you know what survivor’s guilt is?”
Shelly nodded. It was a moment before she spoke. In that silence, the wall clock ticked audibly. “I’m sorry,” she told him, and she meant it. “I know what it’s like to lose someone. I was so angry at everyone for continuing to live and do things like smile and laugh. How dare they, you know? Act like the world is still turning. It’s not fair that they don’t feel it, too, this giant missing chunk.” The blonde shook her head slowly. “That was just one person. I can’t imagine…” She trailed off, looking up at him, her eyes shiny. “I’m just sorry.”
Doherty nodded. “Yeah. Yeah, I am, too.”