Getting Out

It was after midnight when Lorin stepped out of the police station, peering out at he weather, and pulling her jumper over her head like a hood. It didn’t help. Her sleeves were soaked. Her shoes were worse. Under the shelter a short distance away, three men smoked. One looked at her. She looked away. She hated the smell of cigarette smoke. Acrid and clinging, and the way it brought unhappy childhood memories... She didn’t want to be near them. A snob she may be, but she'd never been in a cell before, and she was rattled. These men, with tattoos on their necks and eyes that she's fancied were cold and sharklike, stood like three middle fingers to the establishment. She didn’t want to be near Jac either, but he was a safer option than those men. Preferable to going back inside, if only just. Better than standing out here in the rain and waiting for a taxi. Jac was standing beside the car, briefcase in hand. Hair plastered darkly to his scalp, that sharp suit soaking through with every moment. Isn't it funny, normally if you saw a computer standing out there in the rain, you'd try to move it somewhere dry. Nona was behind the wheel, watching her through the wipers. Lorin walked to the car. Perhaps, after all, motivated by a desire not to have the machine malfunction in some unpredictable or dangerous way. She got in the back. Didn’t speak. Not so much as a "Excuse me," or "Thanks for getting me out". The car rumbled out on to the main road. "You’re classified now," Jac said. "Cognitive instability. Emergency intervention." Lorin stared out the window, triumph burgeoning in her at last. "It’s enough to have you committed." I knew I couldn't trust him! "Could you email the documents to me, please Jac," Nona asked, as if this were a perfectly innocuous sentences. He smiled a small smile. "Already done." Nona's phone buzzed. They pulled up outside Lorin's flat. "Your home free," Nona whispered. Lorin headed herself out into the rain, and was still fumbling for her keys when Nina's car pulled away. "You're half-right," * Thank you for reading!