#gavin the pool inspector is that you

[rqgender]

Today's gender is a little more corporate-looking.

[withastolenlantern]

“I’m assisting the Consortium with some thefts,” the detective said, only half-lying. “The Lady insisted I leave the uniform at home. Personally I think she just likes to watch me squirm.”

“Well it’s a lovely dress,” the news reader fawned, “Where did you get it? I must know your secret.”

“Er… Selfridge’s, actually,” Chatham admitted sheepishly, her cheeks suddenly flushed with embarrassment.

“No!” Hill exclaimed. “What a find; it’s simply marvelous. And I love your hair!” she gushed as the detective took on an entirely new definition of red. “It took four people to tame this monstrosity,” she continued, pointing to her elaborate hair style. “Cheryl, my normal stylist, will note doubt be appalled.”

A crash rang out from across the room, and as Chatham turned to see the source of the commotion she found two of the waitstaff helping a large suited gentleman from the floor. A small group of onlookers gathered around some with looks of concern, other faces alight with laughter.

“Gavin’s drunk again, I see,” Hill commented. “No surprise there.”

“Gavin?” the inspector asked.

“Terry. Captain of the national rugby team. Hooker, if I recall correctly.”

“Are you on a first name basis with all of Britain’s sports heroes?” Chatham said, half-incredulous, half-chiding.

“Most of them,” the reporter admitted with a deadpan that took the detective briefly aback. “Sport is big business, you know. Rugby used to be likened to a substitute for actual warfare, in jest anyway, but I think there’s a lot of truth there. The way things are, no one really has stomach for full-on conflict anymore; it’s all proxy-action this and insurgency that, but you can never really win those types of engagements.”

“Don’t I know it,” Chatham muttered, involuntarily scratching her shoulder.

“But people need something to cheer for, to find pride in, especially now that their jobs are gone and their houses are falling apart and their health is failing,” Hill continued.

“I thought only people in my line of work could be so cynical,” the detective teased.

“You try spending everyday reading reports about the impending collapse of the human condition and then follow it up trying to get more than grunts or single word answers out of Sporty McMutton over there,” she gestured across the room. “There’s not a lot happening in the upper floors, if you catch my drift. And that gets old after three minutes… or three shags,” she sighed.

“You didn’t!”

“Our publicists set it up,” the reporter explained, embarrassed. “He’s fit, for sure, and that’s nice every once in a while. But I typically prefer more intellectual and… gentle… companionship,” she continued, all subtext gone as her hand grazed the hem at the inspector’s upper arm.

Eloise Chatham had many talents but flirting was not among them; as a professional investigator it was often painfully obvious when she was being propositioned, but knowing how to respond in kind was another story entirely. A gangly teenager with a dead father, that part of her adolescent education had been entirely insufficient. Not that later on in life the opportunities or experiences were lacking, but rather that she had a tendency to throw herself head long into other aspects of her life, and personal relationships went on the backburner by the kettle. The Service’s shrink posited it was a coping mechanism designed to compartmentalize her trauma: one can’t feel love if they’re too full of hate. The therapist was probably right, but it didn’t help in this predicament.

Her earlier dalliances all had commonalities: short, perfunctory, loveless. The human condition compelled the formation of connections, including the physical, and she was too practical to try and ignore millions of years of evolution. There’d been a young gentleman at university who’d tried to make an honest woman of her, but she was still too raw, then, too full of anger and vulnerability, and she pushed him away. Her enlistment had been an ideal outlet: a literal army of young, fit people all vacillating between periods of sheer terror and interminable boredom lent itself toward the comfort of brief couplings. The senior officers mostly looked the other way so long as it didn’t interfere with the mission. She’d had a long-term arrangement with a young Kiwi lieutenant from another regiment; whenever they were both on station they’d bribe the motor pool sergeant with whatever hooch they could scrounge and spend what precious time they could manage fumbling in the cargo bay of a CH-70 for some semblance of normality. Chatham had found her lilting accent and soft skin a welcome respite from the otherwise horrific clamor of counter-insurgency; she had a fern tattoo across her upper shoulder that the detective spent hours tracing gently with her finger-tips as she tried to ignore the brutality surrounding them. But then her commission ended and she’d mustered out back to England, never to see the lieutenant again.

The newsreader was very beautiful, and it had been, as Gibson was prone to periodically remind her, a long time. Maybe it was the whiskey, or the dress, or the stress of the case, but a not-insignificant portion of her internal monologue screamed for her to make the poor choice and give in to her baser instincts.