Chapter Three: Something Yet to Be Found

Lewis standing at the bridge trying to come to grips with the fact Hathaway wouldn't be staying on after he was gone….it shouldn't have surprised him or shaken him, but it did. There should have been something he'd been able to give the young sergeant to keep the job from wearing him down through the years, from tearing him apart and spitting him out. And, he had tried. A bit late and all, but he'd told Hathaway he needed a partner to see him through; having Val, that was what had gotten him through all those early years.

And he'd seen, once she was gone, how quickly the dark moved in to fill the vacuum her death had left in his life—he'd thought he'd been lost to it, but then…Laura. But, that didn't happen for everyone. Saying Hathaway needed someone wasn't finding him just the right person. That had been beyond Lewis' abilities or job mandate.

And, in the end, surely, every man had to find whatever it was he needed to see him through for himself…and who was Lewis to say Hathaway was wrong to get out before it was too late if he'd never found whatever that was. He certainly didn't want the job to turn Hathaway into a brooding old man, home alone, listening to his music, and drinking himself to an early death.

Morse had taught him so many things, and Lewis had soaked most of them in with an eager willingness but that…Lewis had thought that was one thing he wanted no part of. But, Lewis had almost become that old man in those dark, empty days, months, and years after he'd lost Val. Always before he'd been able to see the good in life and choose not to wallow in the bad—and it was a choice. A decision made to not let the darkness cast a dark, threatening cloud over his life—to always look for the silver lining and not get drawn into the blackness of despair. It hadn't been a hard choice to make with Val beside him and the kiddies small enough to need him. But with the grief and sadness overwhelming him after…after she was gone and they were grown—well, it had seemed beyond him to get up in the morning let alone choose to accept what had happened and get on with his own life.

Without her, it hadn't been easy after all. But…somehow, with Laura waiting for him—her mischievous grin as bright as the sun itself-the dark hadn't managed to steal it all from him; somehow, though he couldn't say how exactly, he'd managed to break loose from its strangling grip and come out into the sunshine.

But, had he left his sergeant back there in the dark? Fighting demons as much from his past as those from the job? If so…well, the lad was spot on leaving before it was too late.

Drinking that pint with Lewis as they'd hashed out 'Robbie' and 'James' and tried to find a footing outside of the inspector/sergeant relationship they'd only ever known, Hathaway had felt only relief in Lewis' acquiescence to his decision. He knew Lewis wasn't pleased with it. Was, in fact, deeply unsettled and disappointed in it. As though it mattered whether Hathaway stuck with the job or not. Which, along with Innocent's equally unhappy reaction, was the only thing that made him question if he really wasn't making the best decision. He'd struggled with it for so long through the years he'd been on the force that finally knowing it was settled had been a huge relief in itself…one that felt supremely right in every other way. Get out. Get out now, before the job embedded itself ever deeper into his spirit until he could no longer tell where it ended and he began. Until he couldn't see past it to glimpse even a shred of innocence in the men and women he passed in the streets—only the guilty, the liars, and the murderers. Get out while he still cared.

But, standing there, after his long trek ending just that smallest bit short of his intended destination, Hathaway took in a long breath and let it out in a resigned sigh. The peace he'd come all this way to find he suddenly knew wasn't in the old, old church almost within his sight, but back in Oxford, back where he'd begun his journey, back where he belonged. Because it did matter—the job. Someone did have to look evil in the eye and say 'here it stops' or there would be no innocents in the streets. He might hate the job, hate what it did to him, hate what it made him and what it made him see, but…peace came only in doing what must be done. And, somehow, policing had become that for him.

Just as well, Innocent had insisted on filling out his forms as a temporary leave of absence instead of the permanent termination he'd agitated for. He turned around and began to retrace his steps.