#also the amount of criminally offensive side eyes they give each other is so funny

[royaltea000]

if I had a nickel for every time some blonde guy inexplicably got a child I’d have two nickels but it’s strange that it happened twice

[ldouble]

Slumming It | Kevin Atwater X Reader (Chicago PD)

summary: When pulled into an undercover op for the Intelligence Unit, you couldn’t be more excited. The only person who catches your hesitation is your boyfriend. A lot is unsaid in the bullpen, your relationship being one of them.

gif is not mine :)

“You keep looking at me like that and they’re gonna know you’re slumming it with a uniform.”

Your words were punctuated by the complete zip of the knee high leather boots. But it wasn’t till the hell smacks the concrete of the locker room does Kevin look up at you, unimpressed with your statement.

You tilted your head at him, hoping it aided your humor. All it did was send the little eye contact held fleeting.

“I’m not slumming it with a uniform.” Kevin shook his head toward the ground, until he realized what he just said. “I’m not slumming it with you, either.”

Your hands found the other boot, a sigh escaping your lips at how much the tight fitting accessory is going to fit. “You’re tripping up, Atwater,” It glided up with little effort, giving you the chance to cross your legs and look across the room. “I can see Ruzek getting on your ass already.”

“Can you stop with-”

“Or is Halstead sending a sly smirk at you?”

Your light heartedness has no place in the backlit changing room and even little place in a situation like this. Joking about your boyfriend’s friends finding out about his relationship, with you standing there dressed like a hooker, all while working an undercover op...you should’ve stuck with commenting about how the color of the dress did absolutely nothing for your eyes.

Still, Kevin would’ve found a way to call you out. He was quiet but that just meant he spent more time listening. He was done with your ill timed jokes.

“Sorry.” You bit your lip, knowing you pinched a nerve. You didn’t know what to worry about more - the way you just embarrassed yourself in front of a member of the Intelligence Unit or how you insulted your boyfriend.

You hated that the latter took priority.

You found Kevin’s eyes, too dark to read. But the look he was giving you - an analytical gaze mixed with what looked like frustration with the furrow in his brow - had you resorting back to your go-to.

“We uniforms aren’t used to working anyone other than a partner.”

You could hear the worry in your voice growing as each word entered the space. If the tone didn’t solidify his assumption, the choked laugh you gave did it. Nothing said “Can I do this?” like a meek laugh.

Girlfriends worried.

Cops did no such thing.

Straightening your posture you released your hair held in a tight ponytail. Shaking it out, you offered a smile. “Having your team at my disposal just got to my head for a second.”

Kevin pursed his lips, his arms crossed defensively over his chest. He looked great, done up in his own undercover wardrobe. Of course, his wasn’t as extreme as yours.

You were pretending to be a hooker. Short dress, fishnet stockings and heels that were nearly half your height. And that wasn’t including the heel. You hadn’t looked in the mirror after Trudy bombarded you. The amount of lipstick you could just feel on you made you want to wipe it off.

Kevin on the other hand was just supposed to be him. Tall and handsome, a drink of water to fit in right among the elites of this Hookah Bar you were raiding. Minus the badge, you could’ve sworn this look of a blazer and dark jeans had made an appearance at your front door. As well as your bedroom floor at one point or another.

He walked forward, hands finding your shoulders gently, his eyes pouring into yours. He took your breathe away. Or maybe that was the anxiety creeping up on you.

“We’re not at your disposal. We’re on your side.” You couldn’t help but lean into his palm as it crept up your shoulder. “We have your back.”

“Better you than this dress.”

Again, he didn’t find it funny. You sighed, nodding in all seriousness. “You have my back.”

Giving up on the idea of convincing him with a look of complete and utter confidence (you were saving that for the mission) you strode past him, grabbing the furry white jacket off the end of the bench.

On your way, you gave him some of the rope to tug at.

“That easy to tell I’m nervous?” You asked, slipped the fur over your shoulders.

He followed your steps, the pink handbag looking teeny in his grasp. “You uniforms got no damn poker face.”

You chuckle at that, feeling better with him in a joking mood. It was forced, you could tell by the way his tongue was sticking out between his lips, but you didn’t call it out. Humor came to everybody in their own ways. Yours was easier to cling to.

“Yeah, well without a uniform I’m sure it’ll get better.” You accepted the bag, twirling it in your fingers.

“Better?” Kevin asked with offense. “Gonna be the best. Why else would we bring you up?” He whispered in your ear as you made your way to the garage.

You pretended to think for a second before turning around, tiptoeing backwards and tracing his collar.

“For you to oggle me.”

The sound of the door opening snapped you back to reality. This was work. You might’ve been pretending to be a hooker but you weren’t on the job yet. Definitely not with a colleague who you would never do such a thing with.

Kevin caught the door, holding it open for you. As you walked past you gave your best respectable-just-another-day-in-the-office smile. But upon his next words, it was hard to keep it up.

“Like I’d show them I’m slumming it with you.”

----

Slumming it, you were definitely not.

You had quested the expensive dress placed in your locker. Why did a hooker did a $500 piece of clothing that barely covered her ass? Because as a high class hooker, expensive taste breeds....expensive tasters.

Men. With money.

But there was only one man you wanted.

He had money, sure.

But he also had guns.

A whole warehouse and business of illegal firearms. Chicago, ever the “Heart of America” was this guy’s selling point. Everything shipped here and then shipped out.

But a man he was. A man with needs. Expensive needs on short time. Besides, he had cash to burn. Made sense he booked it to this club, paid for a girl, had his way with her, and then was onto a business deal with a couple AK-47s by dawn.

Lucky you, getting a front row seat to it all.

You really hoped all you got was a seat. You really didn’t want to have to go to bed with this guy.

Jay would hopefully make sure of that. Imploring a deal on this guy’s “night out”. Who could resist making some money while spending it on something as pretty as me?

You gulped, remembering your first date with Kevin. He paid for the meal, quoting something similar. He couldn’t believe I had said yes to going out. He insisted on paying.

Tough as nails he was in his bullet proof vest. Beneath it, a teddy bear with manners of every mother’s dream.

“Aye, mami, how you doing?”

You turned to the fourth? fifth? guy who approached you, resisting the urge to roll your eyes. He was security, like every other guy who had hit on you yet, and not your target.

They really thought protecting their bosses wasn’t their job. Trying to catch the runner ups was their priortiy.

“Looking for something a bit better than that.” You heard Ruzek say over the comms.

“She’s got standards,” You looked over your shoulder toward Kevin, posted at a table near by. He sent a quick wink before finishing his statement. “As every girl should.”

“High ones, too.” You whispered.

You knew he was rolling his eyes, more so at you chiming in than your hint at your secret boyfriend’s height, but missed it since your view became full by another presence.

“Hi to you, too.”

Bingo.

You smiled at the man you had waiting for all night. One glance at his opening jacket, shimmering from the gun strapped in on both sides, and you knew this was the one. You’d been studying his face for weeks, of course. But nothing said arms dealer like...arms.

Arms that you felt wrapping around you.

Arms that you had to embrace.

It wasn’t the guy that had you nervous. Or the situation. Hell, you felt fine pretending to be a hooker. You had your team behind you.

You also had your boyfriend watching. That’s what made you resistance to accepting the embrace, taking in the fluttery whispers, and nodding at the invitation to his booth.

It was one thing to go undercover and flirt. A whole other when doing it in front of the one person you were undercover with and wanted to flirt with.

You were a cop first, you reminded yourself as you sat down on the plush velvet sofa. You were a cop, you repeated at lips found your neck.

Where the hell was Jay? Swooping in to make this deal? Get you out of this?

“Hey man, hate to intrude here.”

You froze for the first time at the sound of that voice.

A voice you loved to hear. But not here. Not with some other guy all up on you.

The dealer let his grip loosen on you and as he turned toward the newest addition to the booth you got your first clear look at it.

Your secret boyfriend.

Currently playing an undercover role he was not assigned to. All while you were undercover as a hooker attempting to get in good with a well known criminal.

The rest of the team was having just as much of a frenzy on your ear piece. Out of the corner of your eye you saw Jay panicking, not so much as ten feet away.

Kevin must’ve beat him to it.

Something told you it wasn’t the want to be the bad guy. Rather, break up the bad guy and you.

He had your back. Too much this time.

The target felt the same way, attempting to shake him off and coming back to you for more.

Your eyes met Kevin’s - more hallow than earlier - over the shoulder of the suspect. It sent you freezing again. What were you to do? Blow cover to save a relationship just as hidden? Or keep this going and lose something you never would’ve really had?

“I like seeing you work.” You giggled, gently pushing him off of you. Your eyes glimmered with fake admiration (really anxiety bubbling up) but it did the trick. You didn’t even have to use your line about how you would work for him later.

Taking the bait, he spun and began chatting with Kevin.

Unfortunately, he liked his work and play mixing. A hand found your leg, circling your knee. Kevin’s gaze never left the dealer’s but you could tell it was killing him. The toothpick, which had been loosely hanging out his mouth earlier, was now being gritted together so loud you could hear it over the music.

What was more obvious than his clear discomfort? The hand sneaking its way up your leg. No amount of disco lights or smoke from nearby bongs could hide the manly grasp on your thigh.

Even when he lifted your skirt up you couldn’t flinch. He was so close to admitting it all. He’d skimmed the numbers and the details but if Kevin pressed a little bit harder...

“Tell me more.”

Kevin’s eyes had swiftly found the connection on your leg. It wasn’t obvious enough for concern but his tone was. It was distant. Unfocused. Everything a dealer didn’t want in a deal, no matter the environment.

“You don’t seem interested in enough.”

“I am.” You giggled.

Damn. You were too quick to jump. He gave you a disapproving look and you could see it all falling. Everything you had worked for. Gone because you were trying to protect this case more than your real relationship.

“Not as much as me, girl.” Kevin spat.

He caught both of your attention’s, scooting closer. “I want armory. I know you have it. I can swear on the things you’re gonna do to this girl tonight, you can get it to be by tomorrow.”

OK, you weren’t the only one putting work before romance.

The thought scared you for a second but you had more to worry about. Most importantly, the feverish squeeze of your thigh that bloomed from the exciting prospect of a business deal.

The guy said it himself, shaking hands with Kevin and giving all the details we needed for a case.

You were stunned how good this was going. It was all falling into place.

Kevin seemed just as shocked too, sitting there silently...which was very unlike the bold player he was pretending to be.

Of course, no story has a perfectly happy ending.

The fault in the plan, the lack of calling out the safe word to trigger the team flying in.

The word slumming (your choice) barely crossed your mind before the guy’s lips were on yours and he was hurting you with such force.

You felt trapped for what felt like eternity (with your boyfriend looking on at least) but what was really seconds before he was ripped off of you.

“Get your hands off of her!” Kevin threw the guy on the ground, the gun in his belt loaded and aimed at his head.

He looked back at you once his hands were up, breathing heavy. OK, it had messed with his head as much as yours.

A little too much, though.

Because the next thing you knew, Kevin was kicked to the ground and the dealer was grabbing his own gun.

Thankfully, you were wearing a uniform more fit for the job.

In seconds you clashed with the arms dealer, hitting down hard on his hand to realize the gun in his grasp while simultaneously grabbing the other pistol from his pocket. Just as you lifted it up to aim it, Kevin was forcing him onto the booth, hands behind his back.

“Chicago PD!” Had just left your lips as the rest of the team came by. You breathed out, no longer having to play it cool.

Kevin was also given a break when Jay came in to take him away. In two steps he was in front of you, releasing the gun from your hand and pulling you close.

“I’m never letting you out of that uniform ever again.” He muffled into your head before tipping your chin up.

You smiled, cutting the distance between your lips till they grazed his when you spoke. “You can try all you want but I know you love seeing me out of it.”

Kevin pulled your close, squashing whatever space lay between you two.

“Woah, what’s going on here?” Ruzek called out with a holler, bringing you both to reality.

Out of the corner of your eye. you saw Kevin stumble a hand flying over his head as he thought on his feet.

You took a step forward, a hand on Kevin’s chest. “Kevin is slumming it with me, a uniform.”

Laughs erupted from the team, Voight shaking his head.

Kevin saddled up beside you, pulling you close once again.

“How many times I gotta say I’m not slumming it with you?”

“A million. “You shrugged. “I did have to lower my very high standards for-”

You words went unfinished as his lips found yours again.

You didn’t mind, thought. There’d be another undercover case sooner or later. You could tell him then how it was you who lucked out.

The End

[scrthaddct-blog]

Just A Few Moments @ Main St Station

I was waiting for my heroin dealer’s coke dealer.

John, my heroin dealer, could be relied on to have heroin 90% of the time. Other dealers were 50% on a good week. So I liked John, and tried to give him my business whenever possible. Sure, it was a mission to get to Main St from College and Bathurst, especially since my other dealer was at Howard Park and Roncesvalles, but I owed that guy $30 from two months ago and hadn’t gotten around to paying him back, probably because I’d recently gone back to blow after a long layoff. I hadn’t quit heroin or anything, and in fact had already grabbed a few points from John, but I wanted some coke too because I liked to be awake for the heroin high. Usually John would have everything ready at his apartment, which was eight minutes east on foot, but today his dealer was late so we were waiting together in that vast atrium below ground level but above the subway platforms

I typically saw John two or three times a week but our meetings were terse affairs, a few kind words during the exchange, meaningless banter or some grumbling about the Way Things Were. but today his dealer was two hours late and we were swiftly running out of common ground.

John was older than fifty and probably bound for the penitentiary. He’d been busted twice the previous autumn, with heroin both times, heroin containg fentanyl because all heroin these days contains fentanyl, but the cops inexplicably charged him with possession of carfentanil with intent to distribute, a crime that carries a mandatory prison sentence.

This all happened during the opiate crisis when fentanyl was in the news all the time. There were few facts but plenty of hysteria and misinformation. If a person in pain is administered an appropriate dose, fentanyl is a highly effective and safe painkiller, but carfentanil is lethal to humans at any amount, even a dose as infinitesimal as a grain of salt. I’d been buying and enjoying John’s heroin for over three months when they grabbed him, and there was simply no fucking way it contained carfentanil. That shit is for rhinoceros surgery, and John wasn’t a fucking zoologist. He was, unfortunately, an ex-convict with numerous prior offenses, making prison all but guaranteed. His trial kept getting pushed back and he didn’t know how to feel about it. On one hand, it delayed his inevitable incarceration. On the other, his lawyer was an addict and John was paying him in heroin.

“Motherfucker’s costing me a fortune,” he growled, pacing up and down. He was always pacing, like he was subconsciously rehearsing for jail. He had miraculous energy, John did, up at seven-thirty in the morning to head to Queen Station and sell to his nine-to-five clients, fanning out around town between ten and three, hitting the injection sites and miscellaneous workplaces (like mine...can’t tell you where, sorry). If you wanted drugs from him after three, you had to head up and over to Main St, where John was shooting up and making flaps for the following day, finally nodding off around midnight. He never stopped, John didn’t.

Another thing: he looked wildly different in age every time I saw him. And I don’t mean he was rapidly aging. He’d look thirty-five one day, like a senior citizen the next, then in his forties the next. It was fucked. I never asked him about it, though I wanted to. John was a unique guy. A fireball. Even when he looked old, he never stopped radiating fierce vitality. The thought of him behind bars made my chest feel funny. It wasn’t right to put him away like that, to stomp on someone so alive.

As we passed our second hour of waiting, I began to fidget. John had regaled me with detailed descriptions of seemingly every street fight he’d ever fought in, or watched from a safe distance, and I was bored. I didn’t doubt the veracity of some of the stories; we met at Yonge and Dundas one summer day and he was limping badly, his face covered in fresh cuts. But he was in a good mood. He swore he’d won, despite being outnumbered, a number that no doubt changed each time he told the tale to somebody.

He could lie sometimes, and he ripped me off a few times when I started buying blow because I actually thought a gram was $200, since a gram of heroin is $200, but after I’d bought three grams from him I learned that a gram of coke was in fact $100 and he’d been overcharging me by a criminal 100%. I didn’t pursue the matter, but the next time I told him I wanted blow, I made sure he knew I intended to pay $100 per gram moving forward. I still liked the guy. And it was my kinda fault for being so ignorant anyway. I wasn’t going to find a better dealer. I wasn’t. As I said, John always had heroin ready to go, but it was more than that. When you’re an addict, you get this exaggerated fondness and respect for your dealer. I can’t explain it. Maybe it’s a form of Stockholm Syndrome. Doesn’t matter. Point is, I liked him. He was like the cool uncle you only see every other Christmas, the one your Mom insists you stay away from because he has a “checkered history” and always smells strange and musty, like he spends a lot of time gardening.

“Dumb motherfucker,” John muttered.

“Your lawyer?”

John looked at me like I was stupid. “No! My coke guy!” He was still pacing. He was on something, but it wasn’t heroin.

“Has he texted?”

“Only like...fifty times. Said he was leaving Broadview an hour ago. Then he said ‘just a few moments’ a half hour ago.”

I frowned. Broadview Station was twelve minutes away. But I knew John well enough to know that he would take any criticism of his coke dealer’s lateness as a criticism of him, John, an attack on his judgment of character. I had to sound diplomatic, almost neutral. “Is this guy… reliable?”

“Of course,” John narrowed his eyes at me. “He never ghosts me. He...oh! There’s one thing I should tell you.”

“Okay.”

“He kinda has this thing.”

“Okay…?”

“Uh…”

“Just say it.”

“He kinda thinks he looks like Robert Plant.”

I blinked. “What?”

“He thinks he looks like Robert Plant.”

“So...what am I supposed to do about that?”

“If he brings it up, just agree with him.”

“What?”

“Or if he asks you if you think he looks like anybody, tell him he looks like Robert Plant.”

“You want me to tell a grown man that he looks li-”

“YO!” a voice bellowed.

We looked. A man with sopping wet hair was grinning at us - well, at John - from the top of the escalator. He hopped off with an awkward lunge. Behind him a young woman was cresting the moving steps, sipping a bottle of Nestea and wearing some kind of sweater with a single sleeve.

“Hey!” John called back.

The cocaine dealer was wearing a wrinkled black and blue ski jacket he was keeping unzipped. Actually, “wearing” is too generous a verb for how he wore the jacket. The thing was hanging off him, almost like it was alive and trying to get away because it found him disgusting. He looked familiar, though, and as he got closer I realized something astounding. Astounding and...confusing.

The man looked exactly like Rod Stewart. Not Robert Plant, not even a little bit. But he looked every bit like Rod Stewart.

I turned to John in amazement. “Did you mean Rod Stewart?”

In a flash, John grabbed my arm and twisted it behind my back. He was not play fighting, he meant it. He sidled over to me and said through gritted teeth: “Robert. Plant. Okay?”

I nodded, terrified, and John released his grip and turned to greet our company. The man - Rod Stewart...I mean Robert Plant - hadn’t seen the scuffle. He was preoccupied with the young woman, who was nodding at everything he said but obviously not listening and obviously bored. As they approached I saw that she was wearing gauze on one arm, a hastily prepared cast of some kind, flapping wildly from that weird subway wind tunnel effect.

Rob motioned at them to follow us into the corner of the vast concourse, the corner with the bank of payphones. Nobody else was down there except for a busker in the very middle of the room. The guy seemed to know just three songs that he played over and over and over. As we were waiting earlier John had gone over and requested some Led Zeppelin but the dude shook his head, a pretentious I’m-the-artist-and-you’re-not gesture, and resumed his turgid trio of dirges. I didn’t recognize the songs and neither did John. They must have been originals. They were atrocious and also indistinguishable from one another. People passed him hurriedly in ceaseless procession, but nobody tossed coins and none of them gave us a second glance. It was a perfect place to buy or sell drugs. Yes, the omnipresent eye of the camera followed our movements, but does anyone actually monitor those things?

John had already taken his scale out of his backpack when I joined him at the payphone bank, Rod Stewart and his friend arriving moments later. He was still talking at her, and you could see from his body language he was bragging about something, something he considered an achievement of magnitude. You could see she was too tired to hate him. She would wear him down, over time, with her vast indifference. She would outlive him and inherit his empire. Or not.

Rod Stewart surreptitiously tossed a big bag of coke at John, who immediately got to work. relieved to have something to do with his hands, just relishing the task. I hope one day to love my job even half as much.

“Cover me,” John said over his shoulder. “All of you. Pretend you’re on the phone.”

Rod Stewart and his partner ignored him, which made me feel like I couldn’t. I had to show them whose side I was on. There were four phones, so I picked the one farthest from the wall, farthest from the booth John was using to weigh the coke. I figured Rod Stewart would use his bulk to hide John from the steady stream of people heading for the escalators. But instead he did nothing. He just stood there like the asshole he was proving himself to be.

Feeling stupid, I picked up the phone and turned my back to John. Rod Stewart and his companion were still oblivious to the world around them, only now the young woman was speaking, berating really, and I realized she was a mail order bride. She was growling at him in a foreign language, Romanian maybe, something Eastern European probably, when she looked at me and instantly softened and smiled and for just a second I believed her before realizing she was only trying to make Rod Stewart angry and jealous.

He turned and saw me and visibly balked, rearing back with a sudden jerk, and I realized he hadn’t noticed me until that very moment. (I was doing a lot of realizing that afternoon, a thought which was itself a realization, I realized.) Here we go, I thought. Once again, having waited too long somewhere with someone, I have found myself in a circumstance of imminent violence. All because I like drugs because they help me forget I’m me. I don’t like being me. I don’t like me at all. Lots of people don’t like me, for good reason. I “borrowed” money to buy drugs, I stole, I cheated, I lied. And I’m sorry for all of it. But I swear on everything I’ve ever loved that it didn’t feel like a choice. It really didn’t. I was on autopilot. I had one directive: Get drugs. And I did everything I could to fulfill that directive.

Does that mean I deserve a beating? Probably. But if I have to die a drug related death, can’t it be closer to downtown? One of my old home stations? (That’s the station nearest your place, which is probably self-evident so sorry for explaining.) I’ve moved many times, though rarely by choice. You get kicked out of places a lot when you’re a drug addict. In my case, not for behavior. I don’t drink all the beer in the fridge or stagger home at 3 AM and play loud music. I just have a tendency to spend the rent money on drugs. I spend all money on drugs, a standing policy that has brought me here, staring at an angry man who looks like Rod Stewart and wants to hit me. He is breathing slowly and glaring at me, just staring and not moving.

One must adapt to the highly fluid circumstances endemic to the purchase of hard drugs in low quantities. Rich people don’t have to put up with this shit. They buy in bulk. There is a delivery service here in Toronto, possibly fictional but whispered of in hopeful, reverential tones, that offers every drug ever. Anything you wish, right to your door. One former dealer of mine (dead from OD) told me the minimum order for this mythical service is 5k. My Roncesvalles-Howard Park man snorted at that figure and insisted it’s only 2 grand. John insists it’s $10 000. Imagine that. Having the kind of money to order any drug you want, or might want later on. That’s the life I liked to tell myself I deserved, not a life of evading marauders and ersatz-Rod Stewarts, waiting for my heroin dealer to weigh out a fucking gram of coke, after already waiting two hours before that for my heroin dealer’s coke dealer who looks like Rod Stewart but thinks he looks like Robert Plant whose companion from Eastern Europe has an injured arm he was obviously responsible for to show up and WHAT THE FUCK IS TAKING THESE PEOPLE SO LONG

YOU ARE DRUG DEALERS! DEAL DRUGS!

As the big galoot gaped at me, taking in my presence and blurting random vowels, John daintily picked a large rock of cocaine from his bag, not mine or his own, snorted it, and winked at me.

I couldn’t help it. I laughed one of those sudden laughs that sounds like a bark, further confusing an increasingly agitated Rod Stewart until John, turning back to his scale with a studious frown, like he’d been there the whole time, said casually over his shoulder, “that’s my boy I told you about. He’s with me.”

Just like that, like pressing enter on a password in a video game, Rod Stewart nodded and backed off.

Saved by John. What a guy. He’s with me. A wonderful phrase. Uttered by my dealer without forethought but nevertheless filling the father-sized hole in me, a warm sense of belonging, of mattering, spreading through my lower region...or else I was sicker than I realized (despite all the realizing going on elsewhere) and needed either heroin or a toilet very soon.

But even if the feeling was gastrointestinal distress, it didn’t diminish the sweetness of John’s sentiment. I was with him. I was not with Rod Stewart. I grabbed the phone because John told me to, making my allegiance plain, and it felt good to have John reciprocate. I decided to snort some H right then, to sustain the warmth inside me, when four police officers - Toronto Police, not Transit Cops - materialized seemingly out of nowhere at the bottom of the escalators and sized us up.

There was nowhere to run and they damn well knew it, and they knew we knew it, so they were taking their time, as police like to do when they know they’ve got you, like a cat toying with its prey. Taking pleasure in the kill.

More than a little belatedly, Rod Stewart and his friend from Eastern Europe picked up their respective phones and began nattering nonsense as John hurriedly swept the cocaine crumbs away and stuffed all three bags of it, his own, mine, and Rod Stewart’s, down the front of his pants. If we aren’t arrested, I thought, ask John if he’s wearing underwear.

Taking a deep breath, I grabbed my phone, closed my eyes and murmured an agnostic prayer, which goes please please please please please please please please please until someone tapped me on the shoulder.

Expecting a looming cop, all sarcasm and accusation, I was flabbergasted to see John grinning and pointing at the cops, all four of them, standing in the center of the room, interrogating the talentless busker, who was sputtering and kinda scared, and in that moment I forgave him his crimes against music and loved him for being my diversion. Our diversion.

The TTC has a recorded announcement that plays over the speakers inside every single station, something about reporting misconduct or felonious acts. I can only remember the ending: If you see something, say something.

We watched as the cops led the guy out of the station, his body language dramatically changed, gone from confident musician to sniveling inmate. He shot a helpless glance at me as he got on the escalator. I gave him a soft wave and a kiss. I’m an asshole.

“Poor fuckin loser,” Rob Stewart said, shaking his head.

“Here,” John handed me my bag, mercifully free of pubic hair, and I went home and snorted coke and heroin in alternating increments all night and into dawn until both were gone and I went to sleep and when I woke up I felt empty and lonely and depressed so I crawled out of bed and tried to figure out the quickest way to get drugs again.

I did not thank what or whomever I’d prayed to.