desk is a mess of case files and photos --------- people in various states of undress peek back from their shiny surface, as if awaiting divine punishment. immortalised in flagrante delicto. to the left, barely visible, a picture of a blurry figure in a suit scaling a building. her chest aches whenever she looks at it, so she doesn’t. refuses to. jess is reclining on her chair, bottle of cheap bottom shelf whiskey in hand when the door opens. she doesn’t care. nothing has been making a lot of sense lately, with the cavernous chasm opened in her chest, pulsing and empty. if she closes her eyes, she can still see her mother’s blood on her hands; so she doesn’t sleep. hasn’t been sleeping more than a couple hours for weeks now. it’s only when the smell of cologne hits her nose that sorrel hues shift, and with that move, the raise of an eyebrow.