An Agent of Chaos (BBC Sherlock Fan Fiction)

3. What Is and What Could Be

Autumn was perhaps my favorite time of year. I partially loved it because it was a season change and because of football. Yeah, I'm not a normal woman by any means. I'm unemployed at 25 and can't find even a part-time job. But I could always be worse off. I could have nothing.

            October made its lovely entrance, and school had been in session for about a month now. The days were getting darker, which meant winter was rapidly approaching. Soon would come Thanksgiving, and then Christmas, and then we'd ring in the year 2014.

            I needed some quality time with other people besides Dean and Jim. Thankfully, my sister was available to give me such a thing. She was like Dean, a nightshift person. Spencer took great pride in her job as a police officer. She rarely got involved in many pursuits, but when she did, criminals never knew what hit them. She's fiercely dedicated to her job. She'd always had that protective instinct about her.

            Spencer was usually up bright and early ironically, so I called her and asked her to come by. I met her outside while Dean was still asleep. I wasn't sure if Jim was still holed up in the spare room or not when I left.

            Spencer and I used to go jogging all the time when we were younger. It never really became a family thing, but I had a feeling it would have had Mom not died after giving birth to me. That's what we ended up doing, going out for a jog around my neighborhood. Spencer parked her car behind mine and was already warming up when I got outside to greet her.

Though she's older than me by three years, I have a height advantage on her by half a foot. It's funny sometimes because people always assumed I was the older one. We were almost alike; we shared the same hair color (blonde) and eyes (green). I ended up taller and thinner, Spencer was shorter and got a good chest.

            We started off at a slow walk to get our bodies woken up. I was glad I was going to spend some time with my sister; I needed someone else to talk to. I couldn't clear my head about Jim or Dean. Jim was getting worse in trying to push the idea on me that Dean was lying about who he was, that he was somehow apart of my dad's murder.

            "You still like the nightshift?" I asked Spencer. Birds were chirping loudly, an occasional car rolled the opposite way we were going.

            "It's getting somewhat old now," Spencer admitted, "but sometimes it's unpredictable. I sometimes wish I went back to the dayshift. Nothing like conducting a drugs bust or chasing after a burglar."

            "Doesn't that happen regardless the time of day?"

            "I just think there are different atmospheres with the time of day, you know? During the day, it seems tamer. A lot more goes on at night, I think."

            "I couldn't tell you, I'm not a cop."

            "Say, is everything okay with you and Dean?"

            This made me stop abruptly. Spencer stopped to turn to me. "Why do you ask?"

            "I just want to catch up. We don't really talk that much, and it's not because we're both busy. I don't live at the station. I kind of thought since you weren't calling or texting that you were going through something with Dean."

            I let out a quiet breath. "Oh, no, we're fine. There isn't much to catch you up on, Spence. My life is pretty boring." If you exclude the fact that I'm lying to my boyfriend and housing someone in secret. "I sometimes wish I had a bit of your life, that way I'm not doing a routine every day."