Then everything was grey, now it's just static

Chapter 6

Carlos entered the office without knocking. Owen was working with his eyes fixed on some papers and did not notice his presence.

When he had shown up at the station, everyone had looked at him; they knew what had happened because Mateo had seen Owen arrive home, with that mix of anger and sadness that he had seen him have when a rescue went wrong.

But he had only been to TK and Carlos's house. "Have you argued with TK?" he asked, fearful of the answer, or worse, of not getting an answer.

"I wish I could have, but neither he nor Carlos gave me time," Owen replied.

Although he wanted to lock himself in the bedroom and not talk about it, Mateo needed to know what had happened. He knew how things were between TK and his father, he knew that, after Sadie, TK had put up a barrier with him; he didn't feel ready to let things go back to business as usual.

"I guess TK will need more time."

"And how much more time do I have to give him? Things are strained enough here when we see each other every day. He barely talks to me and I can only get him to say more than two words to me when we're on calls."

"Well, it's not the best year for TK, between Carlos, the ice, his mother's death, and now this."

They didn't talk too much, but Owen told him how he had inadvertently responded badly to TK. "I need him to talk to me, tell me how he's doing and let me help him. But he clams up."

"And you get nervous, don't you, Cap?"

Owen stared at Mateo for a moment. The kid wasn't always clear when he could talk to Owen as if he were a friend or when he should give him the respect of a captain. Many times Owen had told him that at home they were roommates and therefore friends, but when it came to personal matters, he wasn't clear how far he could intrude and speak to him honestly.

"We were talking a good part of the night," Mateo told everyone in the station, after they'd seen him yawn for the fifth time in twenty minutes. "Actually, I think we talked until four in the morning."

Then Carlos had arrived and was greeted by everyone's stares.

No one bothered to disguise their look, and eventually Mateo was forced to tell Carlos what he had told them about the night before.

"What's going on between Owen and TK?" asked Judd, offering Carlos a coffee.

"Honestly, I don't think I'm the one who should say anything. Things have been complicated between them for a long time, it's just that now, last night, everything blew up."

He said no more and everyone knew they wouldn't manage to get anything else out of him. Carlos was a discreet person, and even more so when it wasn't about his own issues.

They let him go up to the office. They would try to talk to him later, although if they knew their captain well enough, they would probably hear the discussion with the door closed and through the walls.

Carlos cleared his throat to get Owen's attention and approached the table when the captain looked up.

"Carlos. How can I help you?"

"Are you really asking me that, Owen?"

It almost caught him by surprise that Carlos was talking to him like that. He set aside the papers he was working on and gestured for Carlos to sit across from him.

"I know you're here about last night."

"I'm not here about last night. I don't want to get into arguments with you about what happened. I'm here for TK."