"Ma'am, we just want you to comply and answer our questions. That's all we ask of you. For now you're innocent until proven guilty."
The detective sits approximately three and a half feet away from me, and, truthfully, it's not far enough. If I really wanted to, I could reach over the table and choke him, but that would be my biggest mistake. I'm already in here, being questioned, for a crime I didn't commit. If I lay one finger on the detective then surely my life would be spent behind bars; eating slob for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, dealing with women that haven't been touched by their husbands in twenty years, and plotting my way out of the cell without even a sliver of chance from seeing sunlight another day in my life.
"I have told you several times that I'm not going to open my mouth until I have a simple paper fucking cup of water in front of me. I ran from one side of town to the other with no stops and I curved in an out of those trees like a dog in a timed obstacle course. Now get me some water. Until then: Fuck. You." I give him a nasty glare. He deserves it. What kind of place doesn't give a girl water after running a dozen miles?
The detective stares at me, sighs, and gets up. He doesn't bother to push his chair in, which upsets me. As he leaves the room, he unlocks the door. He opens the door, leaves the room, closes the door, and locks it. I can feel several pairs of eyes on me from outside of the questioning room. Although I can't see them watching me, I know they're there. I'm sure the detective is snitching on me to his buddies right now instead of fetching me some water. His buddies are probably giving him high fives and telling him that he's the best detective this town has ever seen and that he'll crack my case wide open, but I think otherwise. I've seen Law and Order a few hundred times. I respect Olivia Benson and the Special Victims Unit, but this place? Fuck this place. I don't belong here and they know it. The detective, the officers, all of them. God himself knows it.
In response to them watching me, I give them the finger. Y'know which one; the finger that's longer than all the others and is somehow offensive. I'll never understand it, but I don't have to. I'm using it to my advantage. God gave me ten fingers for a reason, and two of them have always been put to great use. After my finger scene, I sit down and fold my hands on the table; simply pretending that I have some sense of class within me. To be honest, I don't have any sort of mannerism in me. I can barely bite my tongue sometimes.
The detective comes back several minutes later with a dixie cup of water for me and a granola bar. For a moment I think that this place isn't as bad as I had led myself to believe, but the thought quickly vanishes. I shouldn't be here. I'm innocent, and there's no way that the detective can find me guilty. I didn't do shit.
"We're not a homeless shelter so we don't usually give out food during a questioning, but we need you to stay sane for the sake of your questioning. My colleagues were looking through your medical files and they noticed that you're both diabetic and asthmatic. Feel free to ask us for anything else at any time." He sits back down across from me. As I chow down on the granola bar, all he does is stare. No talking. Absolutely nothing. Just blank silence.
As soon as I finish the granola bar, I begin to chug my water. I wipe my mouth with my sweater sleeve and push my garbage towards him. He glances down at it, clears his throat, and looks back up at me.
"Can you tell me your name?" He asks.
I wish Olivia Benson was conducting this questioning. She's tougher with her words, but I admire her. Unlike this detective, Liv would try to relate to me. Perhaps she'd realize that I was innocent and wrongfully accused. She'd let me free and I'd go about my day and do my usual routine: eat, sleep, work. This detective is preventing me from receiving my rightfully given freedom.
"You looked through my files," I stated. "It seems as though you should be telling me your name and introducing yourself to me." His eyes begin to drop a bit and his body tenses up, but he clears his throat once more and begins again.
