#Lise Zanders & Kenny Stowton

[justmoreocs-writing]

Annalise sat on the balcony, legs through the railing and feet swinging beneath her. There was too much to do, too many things to think about, that she found herself frozen. It seemed almost like an insurmountable pile of stuff, and instead of facing it head on she was currently ignoring it all. Perhaps that way it would all just disappear.

‘Did you know, the security across the road’s shocking?’ Kenny said softly, somehow managing not to startle Lise. She’d half been expecting him to turn up, not to check up on her per se, but just so she wasn’t alone. ‘Five minutes and you could change the colour of every light, Liquorice.’

Lise scoffed, shook her head ever so slightly. ‘Ye of little faith. I could do it in three.’

She heard his footsteps as he cautiously walked on the metal grating and over to her. ‘You’re not gonna do anything rash, are you?’

‘Depends what you mean,’ she countered, finally looking up at him. There was a deep frown between his brows, concern shone brightly behind his eyes. ‘I was thinking of playing Barbie Girl through their P.A. system.’

The quirk of his lips proved the joke was decent, but he smothered it quickly as he crouched beside her. ‘I mean it, Annalise. Don’t go looking into it all. Leave it to the professionals.’

‘To you?’ she asked, voice little more than a tentative whisper.

Kenny’s expression dropped, shock caused his mouth to gape as he floundered for the right lie. There was no need, his reaction was confirmation enough for Annalise.

‘I’m not gonna get you to break whatever secrecy promises you’ve made, Kenny. I just… I need to know what happened to him. Why it happened to him.’

Kenny closed his mouth and gave her shoulder a squeeze. ‘Someone’ll figure it out,’ he said, but there was a sliver of doubt behind his words that she didn’t like. Still, she pushed that feeling aside and instead rested her head on his shoulder, just wanting to forget about the wake that was happening in the room behind them. To forget about her grief for the moment so it couldn’t consume her.

[justmoreocs-writing]

‘No but seriously,’ Lise said, waving a chip at Kenny, ‘how can you not know how to format in Word?’

‘I know how to format in Word!’ he defended, rolling his eyes as she quirked an eyebrow at him. ‘But why would I know some weird keyboard shortcut to capitalise things?’

Lise nudged his leg with her foot, which was resting on the edge of his chair.

‘You’re meant to be an IT nerd. You put us to shame, you know that?’

‘You deal with software, I’ll deal with the rest of it.’

‘Cop out,’ she sung, grinning at him the whole while. It was moments like this that she’d missed while he was working elsewhere. It wasn’t the same teasing him when their schedules matched up, holding back all the jokes and things for the next time they caught each other. She’d been warned that working with your best friend could be an issue, but she still wasn’t seeing it that way.

‘Remind me never to go into business with you,’ he said as she pulled her feet off his seat.

‘Wouldn’t want a prettier partner,’ she teased, winking at him as she stood.

Despite the normality of the comment, despite how it was how they’d always been around each other, a slight colour flooded to his cheeks. He opened his mouth, as if to say something, before his phone buzzed and the moment was lost.

‘Eve?’

‘Eve,’ he confirmed, his fingers already flying across the screen. ‘You didn’t have to wait, you know.’ There was an edge to his voice, something hidden there that she couldn’t quite decipher. Whatever he needed to talk to Eve about, he hadn’t wanted her there for the meeting, but he hadn’t wanted to blow her off either. She wondered if she might finally learn a little about the mysterious things he’d been doing with his mum. She doubted, and she didn’t really mind, but part of her wondered…

‘I’ll be back. Gotta pee,’ she said, smirking when he groaned in mock disgust.

She was washing her hands when she heard him call to her: ‘Just going outside!’

‘Don’t get lost!’ she shouted back before shoving her hands under the dryer.

When she was finally done she headed back into the main office, fiddled with her phone. The idea of working as a partner with Kenny wasn’t exactly the worst thing in the world. They’d been there to help each other with issues for years, bounced off each other well enough.

The idle musings and wonderings, however, were not enough to stop her noticing the time ticking by. To stop the concern from creeping up on her.

Lise stood, an oddly nervous feeling sitting heavily in her stomach. Kenny didn’t go out at the best of times unless he was cycling, and it was now beginning to reach the five minute mark. She knew it was probably nothing. He’d probably caught Eve outside and they were having the meeting there because it was to do with before. That way, they didn’t need to dismiss her and broach all kinds of hurdles with the Secrets Act and all things that were way above her paygrade.

Somehow, that didn’t ease her concerns.

Before she even reached the doors, someone came barrelling in. The woman’s eyes locked on her, skittered across her as if accusing her of something.

‘Who are you?’ they asked simultaneously.

Lise crossed her arms firmly across her chest. She had every right to be there. This woman, however…

‘Eve,’ she introduced. In that moment, the world seemed to still. The paleness of the woman’s face, the look behind her eyes...

‘Where’s Kenny?’ Lise asked, voice distant even to her own ears.

The woman’s expression softened ever so slightly.

‘No.’ Lise’s voice was barely more than a strangled whisper; she’d seen that look before. It was the look the police officer had worn when they’d told her mum about Bill. She hurried out of the room, brushing away Eve’s arm as she went.

She needed air, needed to see him. This had to be a lie. It was all wrong. She opened the nearby window, started sucking in deep breaths of air.

She bowed her head, and that was her mistake. A sob rose from her before she could stop it. There was no mistaking Kenny’s outfit. No ignoring what the broken body on the floor meant.

A hand on her back stopped the world from spinning away from her completely; prevented vertigo from taking over.

‘We have to do something,’ she said, bile rising in her throat as her thoughts swam.

Eve didn’t say anything, just kept her hand on Lise’s back as if that might somehow help. Might somehow make the realisation any easier to swallow. Because right now there were no words. Right now, there was only trying to remember how to breathe.