The Complexity In the Gray

The Closed Case

The case, the latest in a series of peculiar and unnerving events which left one wondering at their own place in such an unscrupulous and conniving world, had been solved.

Making his way down a short flight of steps, Benoit Blanc paused. Petrichor from the afternoon's downpour, one that had only recently passed over the city stirring in his nostrils, he hesitated, swaying on his feet. The space where his wedding band usually resided felt unnervingly cold and empty as he took hold of the metal railing beside him. The private investigator stared at his hand before taking a deep breath of cool, moisture filled air. Letting the breath out he used the stability of the railing to lower himself down to the city block's concrete foundation.

He was tired. Lord, was he tired!

Over the past several days his mind had been set to a powerful frenzy! A maddening, itching whirl of ants marching through his cerebellum and calling it home. They marched this way, they marched that way, all the while gnawing to get loose, fighting to be freed, and casting his mind ablaze in their fury. With their fire the case had burned Benoit through like an inferno until, not unlike a spent match, there was nothing left but smoke, and the charred husk of what once was.

But if there was truly nothing left then why did his bones feel so damned heavy? Weighing him down, down to where he sat; uncomfortably wet, and cold, staring at a gray sky veiling a gray city. One to be forever changed by what had happened here today. As he was.

Yes, Benoit thought as he took in the morose scene around him, the world was full of grays. Rights and wrongs. Rights done for the wrong reasons, and likewise wrongs done for the right ones. What he'd done, his theft of evidence in a case that made for a startling parallel to one he'd thought previously solved, was one such gray.

Deftly Blanc brushed a hand over his jacket's face, both alarmed and assured by the presence of the documents he well knew resided beneath. They sat slumbering, held close to his heart while their contents were kept, quite decidedly, out of mind. It didn't bear thinking, not just yet, not while the pieces were still in play, he told himself. He needed to wait, and see how the die was cast. He needed to take his time. But taking his time never truly came easy for the man, and he wanted- no, needed answers now.

As the warmth slowly seeped out of Benoit's body thoughts of his husband Phillip, and the life they had built together, sat heavily in his mind. Never had their relationship seemed more reckless, foolhardy, or outright snakebit, than it did here and now.

How Benoit had ever convinced himself that he could be happy, let alone safe, and secure with the man he loved was mind-boggling. Hubirus, no doubt.

The man sat rubbing his ring finger with an overwhelming sense of malaise. Keeping the ring at home while he worked had been his idea. All these years Phillip had kept it safe for him while he was away. It had been Benoit's means of protecting the ones he loved most. It was also why they had never taken one another names.

Now however? Now he didn't feel protected. He felt vulnerable, alone, scared even, without his ring.

Scarcly tangible, it stood there, he thought, like the devil at a crossroads, poised between the man and the truth. His past and his present laid bare, and with each a connection to the case, one that hit uncomfortably close to home. It felt as though uncovering that which would rather stay buried, Benoit would undoubtedly be risking his very soul.

He shuddered.

The sound of approaching foot-falls stirred the private investigator from his troubled reverie. Conscious of his demeanor and any misconceptions one might gather from his posture or even the shudder Benoit straighten himself out, back rigid, and adjusted his lapel. Let whoever was coming up behind him believe that it was merely the weather getting under his skin, and little else.