Broken Mirrors

Chapter 1: The Queen of Diamonds

I would remember this moment for the rest of my life. It could have been her eyes that told the story. She was unlike anything I had ever seen. She had a haunting look on her face, an expression in her dark, green eyes that I will not soon forget. I felt paralyzed. All I could do was stare back. It seemed as if her gaze beckoned me, like she had some secret that she wanted to reveal but it was only meant for me.

"They don't teach you this at the academy, huh?" a faint but familiar voice ripped me back to reality.

"Parker's over there," the Chief said.

I looked over to see my partner puking his lunch out into the town sewer system.

"He'll be alright. It's a lot to take in, especially in your first week," the Chief.

He patted my shoulder, trying to be reassuring, before turning away.

I looked back over at the pale white corpse laid out on the blacktop of the town landfill. She was laid out as if she was presented for all to see. Trash littered her body. It was truly a grim sight to behold and yet, she seemed serene. Her dark black hair and pale features seemed to glow in the moonlight. Her eyes were wide open. These dark, green eyes that would soon come to haunt me stared up into the night sky. She had probably been there for a few hours. The crows had already begun to defile her body but had fled the scene when we got close. All that remained now was this lifeless woman surrounded by about a dozen cops and a murder of hungry crows circling overhead. I don't know which was worse.

"Hanson found this," the Chief said. I turned to look.

He held up an evidence bag that contained a Queen of Diamonds playing card with X's scratched over the eyes.

"What do you think that is?" I inquired.

"It could be something or it could be nothing. It could have just been part of this cesspool around us," The Chief said, gesturing around. "They're still completing their full sweep of the body, but this is a nasty one. This kind of stuff doesn't happen around here."

◆ ◆ ◆

It all began in 1997 when I first decided to enter the police academy. The cop gene must have run in my family. My father before me had been a cop and his father was a cop. To be honest, I never much cared for cops. In this town, there really wasn't much else. As the story often goes, I never really knew my father. He wasn't around much when I was growing up. The job always came first. Sure, he would send money our way occasionally, but I was lucky to see him twice a year for a family dinner which always ended in a heated argument with my mother. He may as well have been a distant uncle. He was killed in the line of duty when I was seven. I remember staring at his lifeless body in an open casket in front of my crying mother. It didn't even really look like him. As a matter of fact, it didn't even look human. I stood there looking down at this thing who I didn't even know, and I felt nothing. How could I?

My mother died shortly after. You could say she died from a broken heart, but it was more likely her failing liver. With no other family, I was brought up by the system, bounced from foster home to foster home. Like most of the youth that get lost in the shuffle of foster care, I had my fair share of troubles and I struggled with behavioral issues. I tended to fly off the handle and exhibited what my psychiatrists referred to as a "propensity for impulsive behaviors." The perfect characteristics for a police officer. I had a few run-ins with the law, but I think the judges took pity on me because of my circumstances so I never ended up in any serious trouble. When I turned 18, I was kicked out of foster care. I had minimal direction and no aspirations. I worked as a garbage man to save up enough money to pay for rent. All the while I tried to keep my head low and stay out of trouble. But most weeks I would have to steal to survive, only small things though. At 21, I was fed up with the way things were going and decided that I had two real options; one, I could resort to a life of petty theft and crime to support myself or two, I could join the police academy.

I grew up in the small town of Little Falls; a one-horse town that was at one time a prominent steel manufacturing town years ago. In more recent history, the town had struggled economically when the steel mill was forced to close. You can usually tell when a town is on the brink of financial collapse once the antique shops move in, and Little Falls was teeming with them. Not to mention the welcome sign at the front of the town which ironically read, "A Town with a History." Ironically, that was all the town had left because, from the looks of it, it certainly didn't have a future. Anybody driving through could tell what a hole this place was. The poverty was reflected in the crumbling buildings and potholes so large you could house a family of four. Not to mention the ever-growing homeless population. Most people got out of there as quickly as they could. For those that had stayed, there was no other option.

Little Falls rested in a valley between two large mountain ranges. The population was no more than a thousand people. So, everybody knew everybody, and your business was everybody's business. The only saving grace for the town was the one main, four-lane road, Main St., that served as an interstate road between two larger cities, Salem and Redmond. For this reason, the street remained relatively busy during the day. The street was littered with antique shops and a couple of bars. It was surrounded by a few side streets where most of the residents lived and the whole town was shrouded by thick woods. A small pond with a waterfall sat just on the outskirts of town which is where the town got its name. The police academy was in the larger neighboring town of Salem.

It was at the academy that I first met Harrison Parker. Although, he preferred to just be called Parker, his mother's maiden name, since he had been named after his father. He and I shared a similar upbringing. With a deadbeat dad and a drug addicted mother whose crack addiction never quite made it out of the 80s, he also spent a fair amount of time in foster care. We bonded over this shared experience. He was, at times, like the yin to my yang. While I was a quiet and withdrawn type, he was loud and outgoing, always seemed to know the right thing to say. I'm sure his good looks didn't hurt either. His blonde wavy hair and lean, 6'1" stature drove women crazy. I on the other hand wasn't what you would consider conventionally attractive and never could maintain an actual relationship; no matter how hard Parker had tried to set me up. He also basically helped carry me through the academy training program. However, no matter how close we got, I could never fully let him in. Maybe it was because I had been burned before, but I tried to keep some of the secrets in my past hidden from him for fear that he might stop helping me if he knew what I really was. When we finally graduated together, he even helped me get my first real job.

We graduated together in the early fall of 1998. The weather had just begun to cool off and the trees began to change color. Parker had made some connections at the academy and was able to get an officer job back in our hometown with the Little Falls Community Police. He had put in a good word for me and I was soon also hired there. We would start our new lives on September 21nd, 1998.

In such a small town, the force was a small one, consisting of half a dozen officers before we arrived. Chief Stephen Davis was the head of the station. He was an older, no nonsense man who always seemed to be barking orders.

Detective Ronald Lloyd was the lead detective at the station. He always displayed a serious and professional manner, rarely deviated from his routine and had little time for tomfoolery. His partner was Detective John Hanson.

Detective Hanson was an intelligent man and he never wanted you to forget it. He displayed a constant sense of superiority and smugness. He was always interjecting with smart remarks and seemingly always had to get in the last word. The two were seasoned vets on the force and were nearing retirement.

Then, there were Officers James Charles and Daniel Clearwater. Officer Charles had recently been left by his wife after she had an affair with the local postman. His bitter attitude, especially towards women, was readily apparent.

Officer Clearwater was Charles' partner and somewhat of a buffoon. Rumor has he was dropped on his head on multiple occasions as a child.

Finally, there was Dr. Doug Finley, the forgetful and otherwise forgettable town medical examiner.

Our first week was relatively uneventful. Boring introductions and standard paperwork filled our first few days. Little did we know that our lives would soon be changed forever.