Childtime Institutions (continued)

She was not even sure what she planning to make. Her mind, though, seemed to have it under control. It was not until several moments later that she even realized what her hands were doing and paused, a box of dried pasta in one hand, and stared at it in confusion. She did not remember removing it from the pantry, but there it was in her hand. Beth took a deep breath, closed her eyes, and then took another one.

When she opened her eyes, she placed the box onto the counter, and then studied the array of ingredients she had gathered. With some relief, she saw that there was all appropriate for a family pasta dinner—except for the diced jalapeños, those did not make any sense at all. With a barely audible sigh, she returned that can to its place in the cupboard, and then began to prepare the meal.

Get a grip, Beth, she scolded herself. It won’t do you any good for the kids to see you like this.

She shot a quick glance toward the living room sofa. Ben remained obliviously immersed in his video game. Nick would know when he got home, even if she tried to hide it. He had always been able to tell . . . even when it was infuriating. She tried to force the images from her mind, those both of Denice and of Lori, and wished that Jessie were home. Not that it would have mattered one way or the other in terms of her daughter’s fate later, but it would have helped her better right then.

She turned on the faucet and, as the large pot filled with water, she wondered what dinner would be like at Sallie’s house—if they could eat at all.

- 4 -

Perez snapped his boots closed and rose, testing their fit. He flexed his arches and then cautiously wiggled his toes, hoping that the salve Merise had given him would prevent his blisters from getting any worse. It had helped with the irritation, but the sensation created by the greasy layer of salve was almost worse than the blisters. Almost.

“Perez!”

One of the more senior patrols officers, Perez thought he had been on the force for about year, nudged him hard against his shoulder. Before Perez could fully react, the man spoke again.

“You coming or what?”

Perez bit back his retort. It annoyed him to be treated like that, but knew that it came with being new to the force. He silently vowed to never treat new recruits the same way after he had gained some experience on the streets—and he wondered whether he would keep that promise. Being on the streets changed people—he had seen it happen. He had watched as friends, fresh new officers on the force, turned into people that he barely recognized any more. Again, he had vowed not to let it happen to him.

I’ll quit the force first.

Again, he wondered whether he would be able to keep that promise as well. He had fought hard to earn his place and rank—low as it was for now. He was not sure that he could abandon them both simply to appease what might be some misguided form of nobility on his part.

He rose hurriedly, making sure that he failed to stumble over his own boots. With a rising sense of panic, he tried to remember who he had been paired with for the night. Sawyer had the night off, so he had been assigned to a different partner for this shift. He had not recognized the name and, since it was not a familiar one from his class at the academy, he had assumed that it was one of the more experienced patrol officers.

Falling into step behind the other recently-graduated recruits, he tried to force his memory to produce the name.

George-something? Jorges? Jorgensen?

No, he realized, none of those were right. He was not even certain that it even contained any of those sounds. His mind did that to him sometimes: teased him with hints about what he wanted to remember, only to finally reveal something that the real answer was barely associated with his vague recollections.

Entering the briefing center, he took one of the seats toward the back of the room. He sat down next to a female recruit that he did not recognize from his class and would have flashed her a quick smile had she even remotely indicated that she was aware of his presence beside her. Her gaze remained directed straight ahead and her expression did not reveal even the slightest flicker of change. Perez gave an inward shrug and turned his attention toward the front of the room.

They had arrived a few minutes early, but one of the things that he had learned very early on was that showing up early would rarely gain you any attention, but arriving late would almost certainly guarantee that you be noticed, often severely and publicly. Perez was not sure which of the two was worse—and vowed never to find out.

A sergeant and two lieutenants appeared at the front of the room. Behind them, the briefing panels lit up. The official insignia normally displayed on them dissolved to reveal a series of statistics. Images appeared next to some of these. What they meant, Perez did not know. He suspected that he, along with the other patrol officers present, were about to find out.

What little hushed conversation that was around him stopped as the sergeant stepped close to the podium. The two lieutenants flanked, looking ominously serious. Their gazes swept across the those gathered in the room, pausing occasionally to settle on a particular person, but never for long enough for Perez to figure out who it might be that warranted those few moments of special attention.