That's The Way Of It

11: Layer By Layer

Officer Anita Barnes had seen a whole hell of a lot in her 35 years of living. More than anyone her age should have ever seen, that’s for sure. Being an LGBTQ+ person of color from the South, she definitely experienced far more than her fair share of racism and bigotry both. And just by being a woman in general, she had experienced many types of mistreatment and sexual advances, even in the workforce as a police officer.

Her life had never been an easy one.

As she was growing up she often had to fight for her voice to be heard, fight to be taken seriously and sometimes she even had to fight to be seen as a human being at all.

That’s one of the biggest reasons as to why she fought so hard to not be partnered up with Officer Hammill. She did everything that she could think of, aside from quitting her job. Her chief, however, seemed think that riding with Officer Barnes would be good for Hammill. Not to mention the fact that Anita was one of the last few in their group that had not had to ride with him.

Hammill’s partners came and went in an almost constant state of rotation. From the stories Anita had heard spoken in hushed tones around the precinct, she was definitely not looking forward to being Hammill’s partner.

For the first time since going into the police academy, she was not looking happy about going into work. Even on bad days, during some of their worst cases, she had faced work every morning with a willing spirit. Since being assigned to ride along with Hammill, her perspective of the job had started to change.

Up to this point, Hammill had been on surprisingly…decent…behavior. However he had alluded, he had hinted, he had tip-toed to the brink of impropriety on more than one occasion. Hammill had done it enough that Anita knew to always keep her guard up around him.

Anita's work ethic had simply always been, “Do it right the first time and you won’t have to do it again.” It was something that her mothered had always taught her and she did her best to live up to that standard. Anita believed in fairness, honesty and hard work.

Hammill was her exact opposite in al of those aspects. Hammill could often be found lying or hiding the truth, creating shortcuts and even shirking his responsibilities onto other people. Which are the exact reasons as to why is was so abnormal that he jumped at the chance to take on Brenna’s case.

Normally during their teams briefings, Hammill would not listen, interrupting incessantly or simply saying that he didn’t have time for their bullshit. That day, however, he was quiet. More quiet than Anita had ever seen him. Too quiet, in her personal and professional opinion. His little beady eyes stayed focused on the Chief, his pencil twitching in his hand, listening very intently to every single aspect of Brenna’s case, even bothering to actually ask a few questions.

And if people were shocked by his participation, it was nothing compared to how shocked they were when he actually stood up and VOLUNTEERED for he and Anita to take the case.

Upon hearing his words, Anita had whipped her head around so fast that she almost gave herself whiplash.

‘What the actual fuck…’ she thought to herself.

Even their Chief’s eyebrows slightly rose in surprise, which was saying something coming from the man who barely showed any emotion a all, even on the worst of cases. The chief agreed to the request and decided let them have the case. Anita had narrowed her eyes in suspicion as Hammill’s face looked like he was the cat that ate the canary - smug and filled with an over-inflated sense of self-importance.

Anita hated it.

Sitting in the squad car outside of the hotel Brenna was staying at, Anita had frozen in place, her eyes widening as the snippets she had heard of Hamill’s phone conversation.