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[oom] 3x08 (i)
She's dreaming again. The difference is, she knows she's dreaming. Not even the creative demons of her own subconscious mind could mask the ridiculousness of this little snippet.
The first thing she becomes aware of is a tapping. Someone's rapping their knuckles against a thick plate of glass. It's perpetual, and incessant. Someone is trying to get her attention.
Tap tap tap tap tap.
She can also hear Molly's voice, shouting for her. "Mummy, come on! You've got to get up! Mummy, please!"
Tap tap tap tap tap.
When she wakes, she's watching the scene as if she's a spectator, on the outside looking in. There's a field, some of bizarre sporting event laid out. Larger than life papier maché puppets are winding their way through the course, one in the shape of Gene, looming down on the other, a caricature of herself. From somewhere in the foreground, the barking voice of the announcer urges her on.
Tap tap tap tap tap.
"It's a knockout! And Alex is off. She's found the numbers." A flash to the epaulette numbers rendered as huge as an arm chair. "And Gene Hunt's after her. He's gaining!" The crowd of onlookers boos as the Gene puppet chases her.
"Mummy, you have to get up, he's coming!" Molly's voice shouts over the din of the knocking, the laughter, and the sound of the brass band winding down.
She can see someone, standing over her. It's Sam standing in the shadows, on the other side of that glass. The figure of him anyway. Tap tap tap tap tap. Rapping on the inside of her skull.
A gunshot rings out and she falls. (How many times has she fallen. Maybe she's never stopped falling. Maybe falling is all there is anymore.) The image of the young copper, half his face sheared off by a close range blast, probably a shotgun. She can see bits of flesh and bone. She can see his one good eye, pleading.
"I have to know the truth. The truth will set me free." Behind her puppet Gene threatens to crush her beneath his giant cartoonish boots. She struggles to get to her feet, and Sam's ghost lowers his hand.
She wakes with the automated lighting, beneath the hum of the Fenchurch East squadroom fluorescents. She's slept maybe an hour. The photograph of the Lancashire farmhouse is still in her hand, and she looks at it again. As if she hasn't been staring at it for hours on end, going so far as to pull out a magnifying glass to catch any hidden details. As if she wasn't running from the thought of him, asleep in his bed (should have been her bed).
I think we've found our grave.
How would Keats know that? How could he know what she saw from her hospital bed? How could he know the details of an event unfolding in 2008?
And that young copper. Was that his grave she was heading for? Was that the truth he seemed to be driving her towards? (And she was running towards it, running headlong off a cliff it seemed.)
"Today, Gene. Today."
She would finally know the truth. About that farmhouse, about the grave. About the ghost of a young man.
In the early hours of the morning, somewhere between sleep and wakefulness, he just felt hopeless. Later, there were half-dreams and fear; Keats laughing, Chris gone forever. And a conversation with Sam, that he doesn’t remember having
and can’t now bear to think about. Around five in the morning – still dark in these winter days – he had given up trying to sleep. Or maybe he was running from it.
He finds coffee instead, and smokes, and wishes there was food in the fridge. He shouldn’t bloody be here. He should be at hers, wrapped around her in her comfortable bed. If he was half asleep there, he’d be thinking about another round or two, if she were amenable.
Instead, he’s sitting in a dressing gown in his living room, cold because he hasn’t turned the heating on high enough, and too tired to get up and fix it. Too angry, as well. So angry it bloody burns, hot enough to cloud his humiliation.
All they’d said on the phone was that the job was messy, and involved the Hardiman gang. They weren’t wrong. The two Hardiman boys, and one as-yet unidentified male, were strung up by their ankles, then had their throats cut. Most of their blood is all over the floor. He paces up and down, watching Ray cut the ropes and lower them to the ground. All he can think about is what it’ll be like when she gets here – which she takes her sweet time about, of course. She must’ve run far last night.
He watches her walk to them, and then turns away. When she speaks, she sounds almost cheerful. Professional, light-hearted. His anger spikes, and he looks away. He’d rather look at the corpses than at her, right now.
‘Time of death?’ she asks.
‘I’d say - about thirty seconds after their throats were unzipped.’
He doesn’t miss her expression pulling tight. Tough. If she doesn’t like his tone, she’s already proved she knows how to leave.
‘A piece of black quartz has been put into each of their gobs.’ Ray sounds positively cheerful about it.
She mutters, towards him, ‘…adding a touch of class to your gangland hit.’
He half-swivels, and stares at her hard. He’s not going to run away from this. ‘Did you get a good night’s sleep last night?’
She meets his glare. He turns away.
‘Well, there’ll be no eye-witness statements here. That’s the thing about these underworld gangster bastard types – very adept at the great disappearin’ act. They’re not the only ones.’
‘Meaning?’
‘You tell me.’
‘You started the train of thought.’
Her tone is markedly cool. Bloody cheek of it. Bloody cheek.
He strides into CID, makes a few pointed remarks about their work-rate. They seem to be on it, though.
‘D’you want a cuppa, Guv?’
‘No! But I’d like my officers t’know a person is dead before they tell me.’ Because that third bloke, he wasn’t dead. He is now, but if they’d just checked he might have been able to get out what he was trying to say before carking it. ‘And I’d like answers to a triple killing, Granger, you stupid plonk.’
Chris turns. ‘Alright Guv, no need for that.’
He turns too. ‘Oh what? You think because you stood up t’me, you’re Leon Spinks now, do ya?’
‘What is it that’s gettin’ at you, Guv?’
‘I’ll tell you what’s getting to me. I’ve been too easy on you lot. Well, not any more. This place is mine. You lot belong to me. Not Drake, not Keats, me.’
They glance at each other, but stuff it. ‘Now somebody tell Drake to get her bony, pointless arse into my office ASA bloody P!’
He slams the door, and chucks himself down behind his desk. A couple of minutes later;
‘Granger! Seven sugars.’
"Farringfield Green. It's just outside Bolton. I could be there in four hours."
Keats paced the floor of his office behind her.
"I'm ready to deliver my report on Hunt. I'll keep the photo." He took it from her hands. "I should be in control of the information, Alex."
Yes, but not the truth. The truth is hers. She sighed, struggling to find the words to express the chaos in her head and in her heart. "You know I'm -- I'm confused, Jim. I mean, can that really be Sam buried up there?" Run down the facts, she thought. "Sam asked Gene to help him. He wanted to escape, and Gene helped him, without question."
"What -- like Tyler's alive? Maybe living in Grand Canary?"
"No," she cuts him off. His sarcasm isn't helping. "No, Sam's dead. I know that. But he hung on to life here for as long as possible. Except that he was dead, and I know that I'm not."
She turns her head so he can clearly hear her words. "Gene can't be the enemy."
Keats scoffs. "The man has a dark side, I mean dear God. Even Julie Andrews would struggle not to see that." He pauses, searching for another way in. "What about Sam's girfriend? DC Ann Cartwright. You know, my office can't trace her either. Maybe both of them are buried up there."
"No. Why? Why would he?" The tears she's been fighting for the last few days threaten again. Her whole existence hinges on this question, and she can't afford to slip up now.
Keats' hands settles on her shoulders, and it steadies her. Some part of her feels she should back away, but she doesn't. She's lacked such a basic human comfort for so long.
"Now, look. You and Sam... are different. You both challenged this world Gene's carefully built for himself. That makes you dangerous to him." He continues to stroke her back, and she feels the dark truth of what he's saying.
"You're not D&C, are you?" She turns her head to look at him. "Who are you, Jim?"
He shushes her, gentle as anything. "Shh. Now look, you've done so much to help everybody else around you, Alex." He turns her to face him, taking her face in his hands like she's a little girl again. "Now you have to help yourself. And that means trusting me."
She doesn't trust him. But it's impossible not to hear, to feel the truth he's telling her. He's the only one who knows who she really is here, and he's the only one who seems to know just what's at stake for her.
She will go to Lancashire and examine the evidence. She will identify the body, if there is indeed a body. (She knows there will be.) She will look for that shattered skull, and see the bones of that young man. And in helping him find the truth, she will find a way home.
The first thing she becomes aware of is a tapping. Someone's rapping their knuckles against a thick plate of glass. It's perpetual, and incessant. Someone is trying to get her attention.
Tap tap tap tap tap.
She can also hear Molly's voice, shouting for her. "Mummy, come on! You've got to get up! Mummy, please!"
Tap tap tap tap tap.
When she wakes, she's watching the scene as if she's a spectator, on the outside looking in. There's a field, some of bizarre sporting event laid out. Larger than life papier maché puppets are winding their way through the course, one in the shape of Gene, looming down on the other, a caricature of herself. From somewhere in the foreground, the barking voice of the announcer urges her on.
Tap tap tap tap tap.
"It's a knockout! And Alex is off. She's found the numbers." A flash to the epaulette numbers rendered as huge as an arm chair. "And Gene Hunt's after her. He's gaining!" The crowd of onlookers boos as the Gene puppet chases her.
"Mummy, you have to get up, he's coming!" Molly's voice shouts over the din of the knocking, the laughter, and the sound of the brass band winding down.
She can see someone, standing over her. It's Sam standing in the shadows, on the other side of that glass. The figure of him anyway. Tap tap tap tap tap. Rapping on the inside of her skull.
A gunshot rings out and she falls. (How many times has she fallen. Maybe she's never stopped falling. Maybe falling is all there is anymore.) The image of the young copper, half his face sheared off by a close range blast, probably a shotgun. She can see bits of flesh and bone. She can see his one good eye, pleading.
"I have to know the truth. The truth will set me free." Behind her puppet Gene threatens to crush her beneath his giant cartoonish boots. She struggles to get to her feet, and Sam's ghost lowers his hand.
She wakes with the automated lighting, beneath the hum of the Fenchurch East squadroom fluorescents. She's slept maybe an hour. The photograph of the Lancashire farmhouse is still in her hand, and she looks at it again. As if she hasn't been staring at it for hours on end, going so far as to pull out a magnifying glass to catch any hidden details. As if she wasn't running from the thought of him, asleep in his bed (should have been her bed).
I think we've found our grave.
How would Keats know that? How could he know what she saw from her hospital bed? How could he know the details of an event unfolding in 2008?
And that young copper. Was that his grave she was heading for? Was that the truth he seemed to be driving her towards? (And she was running towards it, running headlong off a cliff it seemed.)
"Today, Gene. Today."
She would finally know the truth. About that farmhouse, about the grave. About the ghost of a young man.
~ ~ ~
He wakes early, or he never slept. He can’t tell. He went to bed at some point, but every time he closed his eyes there was no distraction to stop the anger swelling through him. Quite apart from the feeling of everything slipping through his fingers, being run out on is just embarrassing. He had racked his brain for a while, trying to think of what Keats could have said to her that would make her leave him hanging. Nothing came to mind. All he could guess is that the bloke came up with something to renew her doubts – which means, what? His truth wasn’t enough after all? He doesn’t know what he has to do to get through to her anymore. Maybe it’s just not possible. Maybe she just doesn’t feel enough for him for her to make that leap.
In the early hours of the morning, somewhere between sleep and wakefulness, he just felt hopeless. Later, there were half-dreams and fear; Keats laughing, Chris gone forever. And a conversation with Sam, that he doesn’t remember having
(get one in for me, an’ all)
and can’t now bear to think about. Around five in the morning – still dark in these winter days – he had given up trying to sleep. Or maybe he was running from it.
He finds coffee instead, and smokes, and wishes there was food in the fridge. He shouldn’t bloody be here. He should be at hers, wrapped around her in her comfortable bed. If he was half asleep there, he’d be thinking about another round or two, if she were amenable.
Instead, he’s sitting in a dressing gown in his living room, cold because he hasn’t turned the heating on high enough, and too tired to get up and fix it. Too angry, as well. So angry it bloody burns, hot enough to cloud his humiliation.
He is bloody sick of being made a fool of.
~
All they’d said on the phone was that the job was messy, and involved the Hardiman gang. They weren’t wrong. The two Hardiman boys, and one as-yet unidentified male, were strung up by their ankles, then had their throats cut. Most of their blood is all over the floor. He paces up and down, watching Ray cut the ropes and lower them to the ground. All he can think about is what it’ll be like when she gets here – which she takes her sweet time about, of course. She must’ve run far last night.
He watches her walk to them, and then turns away. When she speaks, she sounds almost cheerful. Professional, light-hearted. His anger spikes, and he looks away. He’d rather look at the corpses than at her, right now.
‘Time of death?’ she asks.
‘I’d say - about thirty seconds after their throats were unzipped.’
He doesn’t miss her expression pulling tight. Tough. If she doesn’t like his tone, she’s already proved she knows how to leave.
‘A piece of black quartz has been put into each of their gobs.’ Ray sounds positively cheerful about it.
She mutters, towards him, ‘…adding a touch of class to your gangland hit.’
He half-swivels, and stares at her hard. He’s not going to run away from this. ‘Did you get a good night’s sleep last night?’
She meets his glare. He turns away.
‘Well, there’ll be no eye-witness statements here. That’s the thing about these underworld gangster bastard types – very adept at the great disappearin’ act. They’re not the only ones.’
‘Meaning?’
‘You tell me.’
‘You started the train of thought.’
Her tone is markedly cool. Bloody cheek of it. Bloody cheek.
~ ~ ~
He strides into CID, makes a few pointed remarks about their work-rate. They seem to be on it, though.
‘D’you want a cuppa, Guv?’
‘No! But I’d like my officers t’know a person is dead before they tell me.’ Because that third bloke, he wasn’t dead. He is now, but if they’d just checked he might have been able to get out what he was trying to say before carking it. ‘And I’d like answers to a triple killing, Granger, you stupid plonk.’
Chris turns. ‘Alright Guv, no need for that.’
He turns too. ‘Oh what? You think because you stood up t’me, you’re Leon Spinks now, do ya?’
‘What is it that’s gettin’ at you, Guv?’
‘I’ll tell you what’s getting to me. I’ve been too easy on you lot. Well, not any more. This place is mine. You lot belong to me. Not Drake, not Keats, me.’
They glance at each other, but stuff it. ‘Now somebody tell Drake to get her bony, pointless arse into my office ASA bloody P!’
He slams the door, and chucks himself down behind his desk. A couple of minutes later;
‘Granger! Seven sugars.’
~ ~ ~
"Farringfield Green. It's just outside Bolton. I could be there in four hours."
Keats paced the floor of his office behind her.
"I'm ready to deliver my report on Hunt. I'll keep the photo." He took it from her hands. "I should be in control of the information, Alex."
Yes, but not the truth. The truth is hers. She sighed, struggling to find the words to express the chaos in her head and in her heart. "You know I'm -- I'm confused, Jim. I mean, can that really be Sam buried up there?" Run down the facts, she thought. "Sam asked Gene to help him. He wanted to escape, and Gene helped him, without question."
"What -- like Tyler's alive? Maybe living in Grand Canary?"
"No," she cuts him off. His sarcasm isn't helping. "No, Sam's dead. I know that. But he hung on to life here for as long as possible. Except that he was dead, and I know that I'm not."
She turns her head so he can clearly hear her words. "Gene can't be the enemy."
Keats scoffs. "The man has a dark side, I mean dear God. Even Julie Andrews would struggle not to see that." He pauses, searching for another way in. "What about Sam's girfriend? DC Ann Cartwright. You know, my office can't trace her either. Maybe both of them are buried up there."
"No. Why? Why would he?" The tears she's been fighting for the last few days threaten again. Her whole existence hinges on this question, and she can't afford to slip up now.
Keats' hands settles on her shoulders, and it steadies her. Some part of her feels she should back away, but she doesn't. She's lacked such a basic human comfort for so long.
"Now, look. You and Sam... are different. You both challenged this world Gene's carefully built for himself. That makes you dangerous to him." He continues to stroke her back, and she feels the dark truth of what he's saying.
"You're not D&C, are you?" She turns her head to look at him. "Who are you, Jim?"
He shushes her, gentle as anything. "Shh. Now look, you've done so much to help everybody else around you, Alex." He turns her to face him, taking her face in his hands like she's a little girl again. "Now you have to help yourself. And that means trusting me."
She doesn't trust him. But it's impossible not to hear, to feel the truth he's telling her. He's the only one who knows who she really is here, and he's the only one who seems to know just what's at stake for her.
She will go to Lancashire and examine the evidence. She will identify the body, if there is indeed a body. (She knows there will be.) She will look for that shattered skull, and see the bones of that young man. And in helping him find the truth, she will find a way home.
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‘What are you muttering through your lipstick, woman?’
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He turns on his heel, and heads back into his office. The others know what they’re doing, and he can’t listen to her psycho-babble today.
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"Well, at least acknowledge that that's a lead, Guv."
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‘Oh, ‘Guv’ again, is it?’
He called her cold, once. Here it is again. She just switches, this way and that, and expects him to flounder in her wake.
‘You made a fool of me last night.’
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'I'm sorry.'
She looks down at the floor, searching for something to say that could bridge the gap.
'It's... It was -- just -- all too much.'
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Jesus, if he’d gone any slower they’d still be in Luigi’s now.
‘You know, when you first came here, you had it away with some yuppie twat. Your knickers headed south so fast they needed their own railcard!’
She doesn’t understand what last night meant. But it was OK for her to shag some random. Does he mean less to her than that?
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"I didn't take this world seriously, then. I do now."
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‘And me?’
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"I take you very seriously, Gene."
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‘D’you know our problem, Bols?’
She looks a bit like a little girl when she shakes her head.
‘We’ve lost sight of who we are.’
She's her, and he's him. And all they are is difference.
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"Thanks, Shaz. Thank you." If only she'd waited five minutes until the Guv was back in his office. Now, she can practically feel the weight of his gaze as she slips the map into a file.
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Yeah, he saw it. And no, he won’t leave it. This is not like the time he found Sam’s jacket in her desk. He won’t be pretending it didn’t happen, and not just because one glimpse of it puts a cold hand right around his heart.
‘DI Drake. My office.’
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No arguments.
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But she will not be deterred.
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‘Why did Shaz bring you that map?’
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'Because.. it's somewhere in the world I've always wanted to visit,' she explains in a singsong tone.
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‘It’s just that your idea of heading north is a trip to Brent Cross.’
He’s tired of this, and it’s obvious in his tone. He knows it. He is so tired of this.
‘This is about bloody Tyler again.’
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'It's nothing.'
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‘Go.’
‘Just...go home.’
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"What?"
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And no matter what he feels about her - or did, before last night - he’s sick enough of this to do it.
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"Disconsternation is not a word."
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‘You, a woman, are upsetting a predominantly male environment-’
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The edge in her voice says as much.
"Y'know, you are the most immature man I've ever met."
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He swings a bit in his chair. She wants to play this game? Fine.
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And he can't even see it, that's what's so frustrating about him. One moment, he's a consummate detective, and the next, he's a small child throwing his toys about.
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‘Not.’
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‘D’you know, I don’t think I can be in the same room as you anymore, Alex.’
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‘This is mine. All this.’ He looks around as he says it. ‘Keats is about to bring it down around me, and you are trying to rip my guts out.’
Because that’s what it feels like. That’s what she does to him. And maybe she can hear the tremor in his voice. Maybe, if she looked, she’d be able to see how close he is to the edge.
‘Well, I’m not gonna let either of you weaken me anymore.’
He is so, so tired of feeling weak.
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"You know, I've wanted to believe the best in you, for so long." She has believed the best in him. She knows he's not the enemy. But he is trying to keep her from getting the truth.
"And now," she shrugs, baffled at just what he thinks he's going to accomplish treating her this way. "Now I just don't know what to think."
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‘D’you know, I’m gonna level with you. It’s funny, but...yeah, I think I was trying to impress you.’
He’d never normally admit that, not in a million years. But when she said that just then...she really doesn’t know what to think. He’s shown her more than he’s ever shown anyone, and she still thinks he’s capable of...what? Murder, is what.
She thinks he’s capable of murder.
‘But after last night...’
Every time he thinks of last night, embarrassment and anger fight for dominance. He pulls a face, as dismissive as he can.
‘...you’re just a hindrance.’
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She simply scoffs, and rises to leave, slamming the door of his office behind her.
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‘If Jim Keats comes to see you, you tell me. If you don’t, I will consider it an act of war.'
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'Did Sam commit an act of war?'
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He hadn’t remembered that until last night.
‘No threats, no shouting, no violence. Just two mates, talkin’ about the boozer.’
And that’s all there is to tell her about Sam. He turns on his heel, and heads back inside. What she does now is nothing to do with him.
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She's also beginning to believe, he has no clue what the real truth is.
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