Purpose Made

Note: This story was originally published in Black Cat Weekly #261

    ~ The house was destroyed. Not a single piece of furniture remained upright or intact. The lights weren’t off; they’d been shattered with a gulf club. Pebbles of glass mixed with the contents of the kitchen trashcan strewn across the floor. A bald, shirtless man stood in the kitchen panting and holding the aforementioned gulf club like a samurai sword. A middle-aged woman, presumably Dana Tomlin, curled against the dining room wall behind a tangle of recently distressed fiddleback chairs. Her lower lip trembled. Her eyes pled with Friday for help.

 Friday held up her hands to the couple and said in a steady, authoritative voice, “Let’s everybody be calm.”

The bald man let out a war-cry and raised the golf club above his head preparing to hurl it at one of the two women. Friday’s sidearm appeared in her hand as if conjured. She drew a bead on the man, the glowing green dots of the gun’s sights settling neatly inside the outline of his torso.

 “Don’t make a decision you can’t undo,” she said with a calmness that surprised even her. She didn’t want to shoot the man. She’d give nearly anything not to have to, but Friday was also acutely aware that she was the only thing standing between this deranged man and his terrified ex-wife. She steadied her aim and put steel into her voice. “Drop the weapon.” ~

Police officers work with all types of partners. In most departments, you end up getting whoever is closest to the call as your back up. But everybody has their favorites. Some of my best partners have been female officers who are as different from 6'4" me as they can be. Where I could get by on just being big, they had to walk the line between courtesy and aggressiveness. Too far one way or the other, and they were in trouble. Friday was my way of writing about what that looks like. She's the type of partner I was glad to have checking in.

A few years later, I was struggling to bring to life one of my other characters, old, cleaver Detective Ambrose Broyhill (see "Hit and Run" to read his first story). As it turns out, Friday was just the sort of partner he needed, too.

I hope you enjoy this early look at Friday's adventures! It's one of my favorites.