samuraiprosecutor (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
samuraiprosecutor) wrote2009-07-22 01:35 am
samuraiprosecutor) wrote2009-07-22 01:35 am
Entry tags:
[RL 33: Absence; Edgeworth]
((OOC: Taking place late this afternoon, after Edgeworth left work. All the details of Phoenix's apartment are Idgie's. Sorry if I got anything wrong, Babeh. ^_^;;))
By the fifth visit, the manager almost seemed to be expecting him. She gave a little wave as he stood in the door, beckoning him over, her other hand outstretched. The look she threw at him as he lifted the key from her hand was sympathetic, pitying, but she quickly returned her attention to the overblown acting splashed across the screen in front of her, sparing him from both the look and the rambling commentary that might otherwise have followed. He left the office hurriedly, taking the stairs outside two at a time, and didn’t slow his pace until he was standing in the entryway of the darkened apartment, the door closed behind him.
Somehow the emptiness he’d noted on the first visit, when the apartment had likely been unoccupied for weeks, had only deepened with the arrival and departure of a handful of police officers. The small rooms felt profoundly hollow, almost cavernous in spite of their size. For several moments he stared into the living room, assessing, planning.
Over a minute later, when he was suddenly struck with the realization that he’d looked the entire apartment over dozens of times, that there was nowhere left to look, he swept his gaze around the apartment, his brows furrowed and his eyes lost. Nothing pulled at him. There was nothing to feel, none of the draw in his gut that had told him in so many of his cases that there was still more to find.
His mind flailed for a while, grasping for purchase, the struggle echoed in the slow, wandering path he began to take around the apartment. He drifted from one end to the other, righting a few of the belongings that were scattered about the apartment, barely making a dent in the mess the investigation team had left behind days earlier. He slid open the curtain as he passed the apartment’s only window, letting in a long stretch of natural light.
Eventually, he found himself standing before the closet. Though he barely remembered reaching it, the door hung open, revealing Wright’s meager wardrobe and several of the odds and ends that were to be found in most closets. The cardboard box still sat on the floor, seemingly untouched (it was a false impression; the officers had been given strict instructions to investigate the apartment and everything in it to the minutest detail).
Edgeworth sank to the floor beside the box, brushed aside a few of the loose photos inside, and lifted the first album out, laying it open across his knees.
Unlike the book he’d glanced through on Sunday, this one wasn’t a photo album. It was a scrapbook, carefully assembled, but with little attention paid to its aesthetics. Each page contained an article. Some were in black and white, some in color, but all were on newsprint, all from Los Angeles or California papers. Edgeworth flipped through page after page, his chest tightening each time he caught a glimpse of his own cold gaze staring up at him or that painfully familiar, venerable head of slicked back, grey hair disappearing off the side of the photo.
There were dozens of articles spanning years of his career. After a while he’d stopped keeping track, the scathing criticisms all blurring and fading over time, but he suspected this collection was frighteningly complete, at least where the American articles were concerned. He lingered over the last, a large spread dated only months before Wright had forced his way back into Edgeworth’s life, then shut the book almost timidly and returned it to the box.
It was nearly a minute before he was able to open the next album. And an album it was. The pages were filled with color photographs, which were carefully inserted. All of them were dated, giving him a chronology that he hardly needed. Despite his best efforts, he remembered them far too well.
The boys were close. Body language made the bonds clear in every snapshot, and their smiles, even Miles’ somewhat rarer ones, were utterly transparent. Feeling dry, he sifted through them: a small group around a campfire; boys leaning over the railing at a slick track, pointing excitedly at the speeding cars; an ice cream parlor and three grinning boys with three different flavors of ice cream smeared across their noses. Their parents—all of their parents—were in a few of the photos. He hurried through those, not allowing himself to linger.
Toward the middle, the holidays were approaching. The Thanksgiving pictures were only of Phoenix and his family, as were the Christmas ones. He found it impossible to skip through them, and was intensely relieved when he reached the end.
There was a gap after that, months in which the consistently frequent photography simply stopped. It didn’t pick up again until late spring, and continued on with Phoenix and Larry engaging in the sorts of activities most boys engage in during the spring. It culminated with Larry’s next birthday party, reminding Edgeworth starkly that the month was almost over, and his birthday was only two weeks away. Hopefully it would go unremarked this—
Suddenly his face was buried in his hands, hiding his flaring, burning nostrils and his tightly shut eyes. Fear and fatigue crashed into him like a wave, the culmination of so many nights spent staring at the dreamcatcher as it cast its delicate web of shadows across his wall, nights interrupted by nightmares of absence and stolen warmth. He breathed shallowly into his hands, the sound hissing through his fingers and echoing throughout the tiny apartment.
He managed to compose himself just before the manager knocked pertly on the door, heralding her entrance with only a moment’s notice. By the time she appeared, the contents of the box had been replaced and Edgeworth was already rising to his feet. Curtly, he turned down her offer of water, dropped the key into her outstretched hand, and escaped from the dim apartment.
By the fifth visit, the manager almost seemed to be expecting him. She gave a little wave as he stood in the door, beckoning him over, her other hand outstretched. The look she threw at him as he lifted the key from her hand was sympathetic, pitying, but she quickly returned her attention to the overblown acting splashed across the screen in front of her, sparing him from both the look and the rambling commentary that might otherwise have followed. He left the office hurriedly, taking the stairs outside two at a time, and didn’t slow his pace until he was standing in the entryway of the darkened apartment, the door closed behind him.
Somehow the emptiness he’d noted on the first visit, when the apartment had likely been unoccupied for weeks, had only deepened with the arrival and departure of a handful of police officers. The small rooms felt profoundly hollow, almost cavernous in spite of their size. For several moments he stared into the living room, assessing, planning.
Over a minute later, when he was suddenly struck with the realization that he’d looked the entire apartment over dozens of times, that there was nowhere left to look, he swept his gaze around the apartment, his brows furrowed and his eyes lost. Nothing pulled at him. There was nothing to feel, none of the draw in his gut that had told him in so many of his cases that there was still more to find.
His mind flailed for a while, grasping for purchase, the struggle echoed in the slow, wandering path he began to take around the apartment. He drifted from one end to the other, righting a few of the belongings that were scattered about the apartment, barely making a dent in the mess the investigation team had left behind days earlier. He slid open the curtain as he passed the apartment’s only window, letting in a long stretch of natural light.
Eventually, he found himself standing before the closet. Though he barely remembered reaching it, the door hung open, revealing Wright’s meager wardrobe and several of the odds and ends that were to be found in most closets. The cardboard box still sat on the floor, seemingly untouched (it was a false impression; the officers had been given strict instructions to investigate the apartment and everything in it to the minutest detail).
Edgeworth sank to the floor beside the box, brushed aside a few of the loose photos inside, and lifted the first album out, laying it open across his knees.
Unlike the book he’d glanced through on Sunday, this one wasn’t a photo album. It was a scrapbook, carefully assembled, but with little attention paid to its aesthetics. Each page contained an article. Some were in black and white, some in color, but all were on newsprint, all from Los Angeles or California papers. Edgeworth flipped through page after page, his chest tightening each time he caught a glimpse of his own cold gaze staring up at him or that painfully familiar, venerable head of slicked back, grey hair disappearing off the side of the photo.
There were dozens of articles spanning years of his career. After a while he’d stopped keeping track, the scathing criticisms all blurring and fading over time, but he suspected this collection was frighteningly complete, at least where the American articles were concerned. He lingered over the last, a large spread dated only months before Wright had forced his way back into Edgeworth’s life, then shut the book almost timidly and returned it to the box.
It was nearly a minute before he was able to open the next album. And an album it was. The pages were filled with color photographs, which were carefully inserted. All of them were dated, giving him a chronology that he hardly needed. Despite his best efforts, he remembered them far too well.
The boys were close. Body language made the bonds clear in every snapshot, and their smiles, even Miles’ somewhat rarer ones, were utterly transparent. Feeling dry, he sifted through them: a small group around a campfire; boys leaning over the railing at a slick track, pointing excitedly at the speeding cars; an ice cream parlor and three grinning boys with three different flavors of ice cream smeared across their noses. Their parents—all of their parents—were in a few of the photos. He hurried through those, not allowing himself to linger.
Toward the middle, the holidays were approaching. The Thanksgiving pictures were only of Phoenix and his family, as were the Christmas ones. He found it impossible to skip through them, and was intensely relieved when he reached the end.
There was a gap after that, months in which the consistently frequent photography simply stopped. It didn’t pick up again until late spring, and continued on with Phoenix and Larry engaging in the sorts of activities most boys engage in during the spring. It culminated with Larry’s next birthday party, reminding Edgeworth starkly that the month was almost over, and his birthday was only two weeks away. Hopefully it would go unremarked this—
Suddenly his face was buried in his hands, hiding his flaring, burning nostrils and his tightly shut eyes. Fear and fatigue crashed into him like a wave, the culmination of so many nights spent staring at the dreamcatcher as it cast its delicate web of shadows across his wall, nights interrupted by nightmares of absence and stolen warmth. He breathed shallowly into his hands, the sound hissing through his fingers and echoing throughout the tiny apartment.
He managed to compose himself just before the manager knocked pertly on the door, heralding her entrance with only a moment’s notice. By the time she appeared, the contents of the box had been replaced and Edgeworth was already rising to his feet. Curtly, he turned down her offer of water, dropped the key into her outstretched hand, and escaped from the dim apartment.
[OOC]
...baw. T-T
Re: [OOC]