InsaneJournal

Who: Ernie and Jasper (and possibly Hannah)
What: Meeting so no one has to bear the unbearable alone.
When: November 1, 2003, shortly after 16:00
Where: Ernie's flat
Rating: Worksafe

Despite the growing pile of paperwork showing up on his desk, Ernie had enough and had to cut off at 4:00 pm. He had given them an hour of overtime to get what needed to be done out of the way, but that was all that he was willing to do that day since he had lived the entire day as if it were a movie that just played in front of him.

He had vascillated between feeling either very numb and distracted to just plain old sad and angry (such as when he had communicated with Zacharias Smith during the breaks that his colleagues poked him into taking since they realized that something was wrong--and he refused to go home early). He had spent the briefest of times outside of the Ministry to check on a security detail that he had to arrange; he didn't let his eyes linger on the crime scene for much longer than he had to. He never did take very well to crime scenes, but knowing what it was made him feel sick. He was quite lucky that he didn't have enough time to even consider that before he had returned back indoors to run a debriefing session and to update the new shift that was coming on.

By the time he had returned to his flat he was exhausted having had little sleep for the last few nights. Upon his return, Ernie had flopped down on his couch, still in his uniform, and had taken to staring at the ceiling. He did remember that Jasper was going to come by sometime, but told himself that he'd prepare tea shortly. He'll just sit there in the meantime. He considered for a moment how relieved he was that he had heard from both Justin and Hannah that morning. That initial panic was what got him through the night, and the rush of work got him through the bulk of the day (despite his apparent disconnect from it), but now the only thing was left were muted feelings of despair.