2 Chapter 2:"Teacher's pet"

The next morning, Patrick packed a few of his possessions and clothes into his suitcase and proceeded to leave his apartment. It was a decent place, but he was glad to get away from it for a while. Anyway, a change of atmosphere for a week or two couldn't do any bad.

He loaded the Peugeot and drove away, but before heading to his sister's, there were a few things he needed to do first.

Traffic in Brooklyn was heavy at that time of day, so it took a good half-an-hour to get to the office. His usual routine included getting to work earlier, but today was different.

The elevator dinged as he reached his destination on the seventh floor. The room was filled with buzz and activity. People scuttled about, others typed away noisily at their computers, and the telephones didn't stop ringing.

He made his way to his cubicle, on the far side of the room, without too much interaction with his colleagues.

Lonely wasn't a word to describe Patrick. His number of real friends was considerably limited, yes, but he just wasn't the type for going out and doing what most normal people would do. He secretly considered just the concept of friendship in a workplace a reason for distraction, or even worse, something that could get out of hand and become way too personal. Keeping things cool and professional was more his game, getting to know his partners a little bit of course, but without overdoing it.

His briefcase landed with a thud on his desk.

"Oh hey there" said a man sitting opposite Patrick's cubicle, in a small one of his own.

"Hello, Reece."

Reece was a young guy, recently graduated from St Francis college with a degree in journalism, and he was a bright and a sincere optimist ("sometimes too much" thought Patrick). He had frizzy black hair and an almost-overweight body, and black rimmed Ray-Bans rested on the bridge of his nose.

"Never seen you arrive this late before, your alarm not go off?" he asked.

"What? No! I'm about to go live with my sister for a while, remember?"

"Umm, no, I have no recollection of you telling me that, bro."

"I've already told you not to call me that, and..."

Patrick paused and thought. There was a great chance Reece was right, maybe he hadn't told anyone except his boss. Oops.

"Well, you know now."

He then started collecting a couple of things from the drawer underneath his desk.

"But when are you coming back? You can't just leave!"

"I can leave" Patrick corrected him, waving a piece of paper in his hand "I've got a permit, and anyway, I've got some paperwork to catch up with, so I'll be doing that from home... well, my sister's home. I'll be busy enough!"

"Why though?"

"Ugh, are you serious? Alan Chamberlain, OEE,... ring a bell? It's all over the news!"

"Yeah, I wrote an article about it myself, but-" Reece stopped and suddenly looked as if he'd just made the discovery of the century "You're his brother-in-law!"

Patrick rolled his eyes. "Took you long enough, eh?"

He closed the drawer and walked away again, heading toward his boss's office.

"Oh, so Elaine Chamberlain is your sister... See ya, bro!" he called after Patrick, making an emphasis on the last word.

"Hilarious, Reece. Hilarious."

Patrick then knocked on the door of the big office in the corner of the room, and barely waiting for an answer, let himself in, slightly smiling at Reece's constant urge to be annoying.

His smile faded when he saw who was inside.

"Speak of the devil, here he is"

Apart from the women behind the desk, who was Patrick's boss and editor, there was another man, standing with his back to the wall.

Patrick snorted. "The only devil here is you, Pliny."

Walter Pliny was an old companion of Patrick's. Even though they had had to put up with each other over the years, they had never got on very well... and they weren't slow to admit it. A certain atmosphere of competition and tension always emerged when they were in the same room, for they were almost the same age and had roughly the same degree of experience in their careers.

Patrick's arch-enemy was slim and tall, and he had a long nose and slit eyelids. Like Reece, he also wore glasses, but his had hardly any outline. Just two shards of glass for two dead-like eyes. Patrick always thought that with the spectacles, Pliny believed he looked smarter.

Even though they hated to admit it, the two individuals were actually quite similar. Both single, almost lonely men, but with good jobs. They were cunning, smart, and a little over-ambitious at times. You could even use the word work-addicts to describe them, because, as I said before, they didn't have much of a life outside their jobs. They were both top-class journalists, and the rivalry between them wouldn't end at least until they retired.

"What are you doing here anyway, Darren?" asked Pliny with a look of contempt "I thought you were off today. Oh, and tomorrow, and the next day, and the next,... It'll be fun without you around. You should probably just work at home from now on, make everyone's day better-"

"Alright, cut it out, Pliny." said the woman behind the desk, without looking up. She seemed to be busy with a whole lot of papers on her desk.

Patrick gave Pliny a mimicked face of disappointment, almost like a father scolding his son. The other man just rolled his eyes in return.

"Boss, here's the paperwork you asked for..." said Patrick, advancing towards the desk.

She hesitated, but then remembered. "Ah yes, just leave that on the pile there, Darren"

He obeyed.

"Busy morning?" he then asked, seeing all the paperwork.

"Of course it's a busy morning-"

"I wasn't asking you, Pliny."

His boss sighed. "Yeah, the usual I guess. Just a couple of deadlines, you know."

"Right. Once I get to my sister's house, I may be able to help you out."

"Ok, thanks."

"Give me a few hours and I'll get to it."

Before heading out the door, he winked at Pliny.

The other journalist just mouthed the words "Teacher's pet" at him, with an ironic smile.

"Jealous, I know" was the response he got, again mouthing the words.

Patrick then proceeded to leave the building. Unfortunately for him, that involved walking past his cubicle again.

"Hey, Patrick!"

He frowned, and considered pretending not to have heard Reece calling him.

"Hey-"

"Yes, yes, what?" he answered not bothering to hide his annoyance.

"Umm, I was wondering if you would like to have a drink tonight, you know, after work. There's a few of us going; me, Larry, Claire and a couple others. And I just thought if you would like to come along..."

"You already know I don't do those sort of things." answered Patrick bluntly "Besides, I'm busy tonight."

"You're busy every night."

Patrick didn't know what to answer to that.

"Well-"

"C'mon bro, it'll be fun! Just relax for once, have a little chit-chat with your mates-"

"You're not my mates."

But after Reece gave him his most pleading look, he gave up.

"Fine, I'll think about it" he groaned.

"Yes!"

"But don't 100% count on me coming, I'm not guaranteeing anything!"

And with that, he left the office floor, using the elevator once more.

Once back on the road, he knew he had one more stop before heading to West Village.

Hunts Point wasn't a familiar spot for Patrick. He rarely travelled up towards The Bronx, because there was never the need. Both his apartment and his workplace weren't even close, so it was perfectly normal.

While he drove, he kept looking down at a newspaper on the passenger seat. The front article explained the death and circumstances of his brother-in-law Alan, including the place where they had found his body two days earlier. That's where he was headed.

He finally arrived at the location.

It was a dark and cold morning. Huge clouds floated low in the sky, blocking the sunshine completely. It looked like it was about to rain. Patrick parked the Peugeot in an open space that faced the huge river, less than fifty yards away. He noticed there were a couple of other cars too, mainly police ones or black SUVs.

That was a good sign; the cops were still there.

He heard noise coming from around the corner, off to his left, so that's where he went. He soon encountered a small group of people, mostly just regular citizens, but also a couple of reporters. They all stood behind a yellow tape, and an officer wasn't letting them go any further. Patrick recognized the tape, for he had seen it on many other occasions... it was the tape used for marking a crime scene. He had arrived.

Beyond it, there were more people running about, but they were all wearing uniforms or vests that said NYPD on the back. There was of course no body, for the ambulance had almost certainly taken it away to the autopsy the day before, but Patrick knew they had to do a few other things too at the crime scene. It unfortunately looked like they were finishing off, for the officers and agents seemed to be packing up.

But Patrick had arrived just in the nick of time. He looked at the faces of the people working, and soon found who he was looking for.

The woman looked up just at that moment, and their eyes made contact with each other. She rolled her eyes, stopped what she was doing and headed straight for him.

"Patrick? What are you doing here?" she asked quickly.

"Oh, hey Joana. What a coincidence, bumping into each other here." he said, with a smile on his face.

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