Hearts Entwine
by
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Fog in the morning? Really. Drivers all looking grouchy.
Of course we usually only get it after lunch, Buddy Marsden mumbled to himself as the drivers glided by his parked step-van. Yes, those faces are annoyed. And waiting. Maybe get a nice blue sky for the rest of the day. That’s what they’re hoping. But, don’t make no nary-a-mind to me, Buddy thought. I jus sits here on duh porch watchin’ the world go by.
Homicide Detective, Buddy Marsden, was doing a solo, for the vice squad, sitting in an old surveillance van. This was another ‘temporary’ assignment for the vice-lads. ‘Get what you can on your own,’ he’d been told, ‘take a month.’ He was sitting up front now, in the driver’s seat, in plain view, comfortable leather slippers, sort of accepting the idleness, one-way traffic sliding by down the gently fogbound street.
He was thankful that it was Friday, but it was only day four and a half so far, with three long weeks to go. Still, it was a day to be cool -- about everything -- if only because it was going to be long and boring. Fridays. The frustration was already peaking, and so was the caffeine, he thought. Talking aloud to himself a moment ago, he realized that the day’s inner-dialogue had now been outed. Early. It was the earliest time in the day on this particular assignment that he’d let himself do that and he was also gently aware that his thoughts were making bottom-scraping noise -- and it’s still morning, but, there it was. He wouldn’t, couldn’t, say that the assignment had gone South this early in the gig so he slid past it. Blame the coffee. Could not get enough of this fine brew. Yeah, too much caffeine. He meant a week’s worth and he didn’t want to go there either.
“Talking to myself is good,” he said aloud. The cab became slightly smaller and the windshield more opaque. “Absolutely.” He smiled. So, he thought, the morning’s going in ‘that’ direction. Yes, a draggy Friday -- afternoon -- starting now.
The assignment felt beneath him. For an ace-homicide-detective, it was beneath him. He was resigned though and actually enjoying the no-overtime schedule this week; it had allowed him to get to an art-film festival every night. The fare was international film-noir with another pair of films showing every night.
He reminded himself that at
Buddy Marsden, ace homicide detective. Oh yeah.
At forty-one, he was feeling about -- thirty, and still skinny, he thought. Balding on top -- for the moment. At five-ten h
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About the Book
A well-paced look at the mind of a psychic cop. One who has seemingly, perhaps necessarily, become a bit bent. As the back story is told in prologue he and his partner are foretold that they will take on a teen-prostitute as a housemate who later becomes crucial to the survival of all of them. The story proper, begins ‘seven years later’ in the years after their cop-lives. They take on a scam together, which is nicely explored. And the aftermath.
The complexity of the interplay between all the characters is seemingly made without moral inquiry. The story depicts the part-time loyalties, shallowness, self-centeredness, denials and presumptions of the nineteen-seventies.
How isolated we are, really, from the people we think we know.
I can modestly say that what you have in your hands is “A good read.”
Stephen J.Chandler
About the Author
The author lives in up-state