Chapter 22
Dr Will enters the cold autopsy room and, despite it only containing the dead, he closes the door as quietly as possible. Of the three steel benches in the centre of the room only one supports a body covered by a white sheet. He walks over to it and respectfully pulls the sheet down to reveal the face of the deceased.
His young detective friend, Max Myer, lies there with his eyes closed; motionless. Dr Will sighs deeply. “This is disrespectful to the dead,” he says.
The body of his friend opens one eye and smiles, “The dead aren’t here though,” he says.
“Get up,” Dr Will says while trying not to laugh. Max throws the sheet off and sits up then slides himself off.
“I was lying there for five minutes. What took so long?”
“I knew you were in here so I wanted to let you spend some time with the dead. You enjoy it?”
“Conversation felt a little one sided but once you get them talking you can’t shut them up.”
They both laugh and Dr Will says, “Welcome to my world. Why are you here?”
Max loses most of his smile, “I just needed to get away from… everything.”
“I saw your appearance on the news. Looks like you’re famous.”
“It looks like people don’t care so much anymore for the murderer I put away.”
Dr Will shows no sympathy, “That card was only going to last you so long. Your suspension went pretty fast.”
Max smirks, “Not for me.” He wants to change the subject and says, “So, how’s death?”
“Death? Inevitable,” says Will, with a small tinge of bitterness. “At least I don’t work in tax.”
“Without death you’d be out of work.”
“If there was none of this type of death I’d have been a normal doctor and spent my time helping people instead of figuring out the ingenious ways we’ve come up with to kill each other.”
“My brother included.”
Will nods, “Indeed and especially.” Max gives an enquiring look at his friend’s comment, to which Will replies, “Especially your brother because those poison concoctions he uses, give his victims a slow and painful death.” Max nods his regretful understanding. Will continues, “See, I can do death. It happens. It’s a part of life. I’ve had the oldest of the old and the newest newborns come through this room and if they’ve died, as everyone does, I’m fine, I can study them, you know, academically. But it’s when I come across people who have been tortured, people who’ve had those slow, painful deaths that I’m affected. Where another human being’s purpose was to put someone through as painful an experience as they can. I’ve had countless people of all ages through here who have been treated like they’re worth less than animals. A broken body I can accept, a broken soul, however, of a person who kills, that’s where I’m lost.”
Both men stand in silence. Will thinks over the many murder victims he’s referring to while Max thinks about his brother and how it came to be that the person he grew up with can possibly glean pleasure from causing so much pain. They stay that way for a good few minutes when Max quietly says, “Gee, thanks, I came down here to get away from all the depressing crap.”
Will smiles and apologises as Max’s phone rings. He says his goodbye and answers the phone as he leaves, letting the door slam shut on his way out.
His trek back to the office was spent on the one call from his parents. They did their standard Seinfeld-style three person phone conversation and his parents spoke over each other to explain to Max exactly how horrible Earl was during the interviews he conducted with them just moments before. By the time Max got back to the office he was boiling with rage. Claire had also spoken to him and told him how Earl had treated her - he was ready to kill.
Back at the office Max makes a line straight to Earl who sits with Carl in the meeting room. Max doesn’t care what they’re doing - he’s interrupting. The young detective weaves his way through the desks and bursts into the meeting room without a word. The two senior detectives look up to see Max barrelling down on them - eyes burning with rage. They both stand as Max grabs Earl and slams him against a wall with a crash which pulls attention from everyone in the office including Alan who runs over from his desk.
Max doesn’t yell as he holds Earl up against the wall, he simply speaks softly, with a ferocity that surprises Earl, “You treat my family like that and think I’m too scared to tear you apart!?” Earl struggles under the pressure from the younger, larger and stronger detective. Max doesn’t let up. “You think you’re brave because you can speak to my family like that?” Alan and Carl try to drag Max off but struggle to move the much stronger man. They supplement their near useless effort on him by pleading for him to back off voluntarily. Their pleas go unheard as Max continues his quiet abuse and, seemingly, doesn’t even notice the two trying to drag him off.
Max is so focused on his anger he also doesn’t notice the audience he has peering at him through the windows that separate the meeting room from the rest of the office space. No one other than Alan and Carl actually steps in to help though.
Earl stops struggling against the stronger man and tries a different tack, “I don’t show favouritism. I interviewed your family the way I interview everyone.”
Max yells for the first time, “Shut up!” He whispers again. “They told me what happened. They told me what you said. How you treated them. You think you could accuse them of hiding my brother without me finding out? You’re a stupid old man.”
Earl responds, “You set the theme here Max. You set the standard. Your family had to lift themselves out from under your failure from when you protected your brother.”
Every word Earl says makes Max more furious but he continues to speak with a whisper, “I never protected him.” Max is interrupted by the first voice, other than Earl’s, he’s become aware of since entering the office. Barry yells his name, loudly, and he turns to see the fat man standing at the door of the meeting room, glaring at him. For the first time Max also becomes aware of his audience and pushes himself off Earl now noticing Alan and Carl behind him with their hands on his shoulders.
Barry steps in with a glare intense enough to bore holes through Max. He says to the young detective, “I’m not even going to debate this with you. Go home.” Max considers arguing but just walks out after a quick look at Alan who gives a nod encouraging Max to do what he’s told.