Robin surveyed the top of the stairs as if finally ready to summit K-9, before reining in the mental histrionics. He steeled himself with a deep breath and a firm grip on the banister, and started the ascent of this upside down world where his personal hell was always one floor above him. 

After arriving at their bedroom, Robin watched Drew dress before the mirror. It was part of their daily ritual for helping him get past his wife going transgender. As morning wakeups went, he couldn't argue its jolting value.  

Drew ran her eyes over him. He knew she was looking for the uniform, missing one of her turn-ons. She still couldn't help herself after all this time. Since he'd gotten promoted to detective, Drew had had to make some painful adjustments of her own. 

"You stand in that doorway less and less. I really hate thinking you're avoiding me." Emotional blackmail. Her specialty.  

Robin guessed if she was planning to sport a dick where her husband least expected to find one, added leverage probably wasn't a bad idea.  

Robin coughed as he inhaled. He already missed the scent of his favorite perfumes on her, but they had been replaced now by men's cologne. His reaction wasn't lost on Drew.  

Continuing his descent into his personal hell, Robin watched her don a pair of cufflinks next equal to six months of his pay, and a tie clip that would give the Hope Diamond an inferiority complex. Her gestures at applying both were more rehearsed and refined than the jewels themselves. Even the mirrors basked in the glory of her return visits, doubtless finding life pointless without her. They were only now rebounding from the pained withdrawal caused by the commoners trailing in her wake, himself namely, like those minions who straighten the queen's cape on the ground behind her as she walks. That thing she did with her hair, folding it up in more swirls than Chinese origami, seemed like something passed down from generation to generation.  

The poor never had reasons to pass things on like that. 

"Why don't we take another stab at playing detective?" Drew said. 

"Sure," Robin replied, after some hesitation. He rankled at the condescending remark, considering his chosen profession. All the same, he was eager to capitalize on her aristocratic background for the sensitivity that gave her to subtle body-language cues and things left unsaid. He sometimes resented her Republican outlook on things, but couldn't deny she was better at the soft skills he needed to survive at his new job.  

He sensed she was being manipulative. Drew was no doubt afraid he was pulling away from her. Maybe he was. Leave it to her to find ways to sink her hooks into him. He supposed that was part and parcel of all those people skills. Like the rest of their relationship of late, if he wanted to enjoy the hotdog, best he learn to appreciate the sauerkraut that goes with it. He winced at the unintentional double entendre. 

"We still have time before you have to show up at the office." Finished tying her hair back, she said, "Let's find a crowded venue that's hard to filter for the telltale signs you need to identify in your mark." 

"I'm for that."

***

"What do you see?" Drew asked. "What do you hear?" Robin struggled to distinguish patterns in the chaos, like one of those illustrations hiding faces and figures he couldn't identify until jumping over to the pattern-recognizing right-side of his brain. 

They were standing in the Bay Area Rapid Transit station in the best possible position to watch the gate, and the facing wall which displayed giant edgy posters. Drew nodded at the college-aged couple as they came through the turnstile. The male teen, wearing a backpack and displaying a flair for Bohemian-chic, led them to the Josh Ellingson artwork.  

BART had made it a point of late to draw on the wealth of Bay Area artists to brighten their interiors, Drew recalled reading in The Daily Californian. The piece the couple was fawning over showed a child descending an escalator, surprised to see a deep sea diver in full regalia ascending with an octopus hitching a ride on his back and helpfully holding the BART ticket. They gushed over that for a while before venerating the piece in the "First Ride" series, which featured a kid gaping at the rockets whizzing by the window of the BART train while a miniature toy rocket sits on the seat between him and his mother.  

Drew read the subtle body language between the couple and their facial expressions to decode the dynamics of their relationship, and waited for Robin to do the same. He just wasn't as practiced at reading people. Having not grown up in the hyper-political reality of the rich and famous, he never needed to learn. Not growing up on the mean streets, either, where he would have apprenticed at seeing better what was coming at him next to stay alive, meant life had doubly blindsided him when it came to being a detective. So she waited patiently. 

"He's hoping the shared bond over the artwork will score him points," Robin said, "and get him one step closer to getting laid."  

"Good. Has he gotten her in bed yet?" 

"No, I don't think so. His eyes seem too gentle and sheepish. Almost like he's waiting for her to make the first move."  

"Wrong. He's not fully awake yet. They both crawled out of bed together less than an hour ago, and he's not as quick to sharpen as she is. He's been to bed with her a few times, explaining his comfort level with her. The cozy leaning into to her, violating any sense of personal space, the easy laughter, the way he lets himself bump shoulders with her teasingly, knowing full well the shocks of sexual stimulation each contact will send rippling through her body. He's just as confident in how she feels about him as he feels about himself."  

"How could you possibly know they just crawled out of bed together?" 

"Her squinting and tensing every time his eyes go to her face. She's used to wearing makeup and feels exposed and nonpresentable. They were in a hurry, and she didn't have time. It's subtle, considering her tomboy getup, but, if you look closely, you'll see she's wearing his underwear." 

"Could be hers, part of the ensemble." 

Drew explained, "Only, she's been swaying back and forth in her hips as if to rub up against it, and by way of it, him, all this time. And the lip is riding above the pants as a subtle teasing reminder of recent pleasures. She also wants to reassure him she's his entirely, down to labeling herself his property. She's feminist at heart. See the Berkeley Women's Music Collective flyer another passenger is clutching in her hands that just made her smile? But she gives away her power too easily owing to her low-confidence level. This is likely her first relationship." 

"Wow. Maybe we should just wire you to me with an in-ear mike and a video camera tucked in the brim of my hat. That way, when I'm in the field-". 

"You'll get the hang of it. There's one more thing, Robin, and it's important."  

Studying the pair of art enthusiasts, Robin scrunched his face, brain straining. After a while, he let out a breath. "Nothing. I'm sorry." 

"They're planning to steal the painting," Drew said. 

"No way." 

"You haven't noticed the way his eyes have been darting to the security cameras, despite refusing to crane his neck to take them in better, the furious manner in which he's been drawing diagrams to cover the layout of the place? Even from this distance you can tell from the movement of the pen those aren't words he's writing. It's a blueprint he's fleshing out with all the details pertinent to a thief." 

"I'll call it in," Robin said. "Is that why you picked them, coming through the turnstile?" 

"In part, from how his eyes eagerly devoured and coveted the drawing, even before he pushed through the gate. He had to lower them to keep from telecasting his feelings to the world. And then there was his fumbling to get his backpack off, turning comically around on himself a few times, which was really just an excuse to check out the position of the security cameras without being obvious." 

"He's got a sweet disposition, almost too sweet for this world. If I had to guess, I'd say he's stealing the painting to help fund the war against those who would make the world a meaner place less suitable for his kind. He's just trying to bring about a better future in his own inimical style." 

"Huh." Drew had to admit, the psych-profile fit with everything else she'd picked up on the kid. Still she hadn't seen his m.o. as clearly as Robin had. Perhaps it was beginner's luck. As to the irony of someone with an artistic temperament stealing from another artist to fund his war on terror... well, it was the kind of thing youth was likely to overlook, caught up in fanatical zeal, or likely to rationalize, as the crass-commercialism of the artist being ripped off made him one of them. 

Drew canvassed the setting for another ripe opportunity.  

"And what's his story?" Drew gestured at the unsavory street-person fishing out of the garbage cans hugging the roof-support posts. She could tell Robin was having trouble seeing past the explosion of feelings: revulsion, guilt, shame, fear, pity, remorse, condescension, and strangest of all, delight at his exotica. He took a deep breath and redoubled his efforts. 

"Generic crazy," Robin said. "Off his meds. Schizophrenic, from the looks of him." 

"Nope. He's not seeing ghouls and goblins or hearing voices. That's PTSD. He startles at the slightest noise or object to move in his peripheral vision. Sadly, there are characters and incidents in life that'll do that to you."  

She grimaced thinking of what Robin's chosen profession could do to him, PTSD among the occupational hazards. Without a lifetime of building the scaffolding inside his mind to help him weather the stormy behaviors of the most mercenary minds, he had none of the infrastructure in place to support the lightning-fast reactions needed to steer clear of them. 

Robin worked to coordinate the vagabond's crazed expressions and his jumpiness, which he evidently thought were meant to chase people away from him, with: the sounds of the turnstile as the latest person came through; the whoosh of the arriving train; a passenger setting down a suitcase a little too close to the seedy fellow. He smiled. "Yeah, I see it now." 

"You probably want to find him some help before it's too late." 

"Absolutely," Robin said, again sounding as if it were more of a concession to her than as something he would think to do on his own.  

On their way up the stairs to street level, Robin grabbed a copy of The Daily Californian. He'd taken to underlining passages to help him in their debates, hoping to hold his side of the conversation better, so Drew wouldn't get bored and let her mind wander. She found the gesture endearing and refused to let on she was on to him.  

She imagined, observing his boyish innocence, they had found one another like day must find night. She held on to that thought, even as the report of a gun rang out from downstairs.  

Robin looked down to see it was PTSD man, firing wildly into the crowd. He reached for his gun and took a step forward, only to have Drew hold him back. Lucky she had, too, as the next shot landed where his chest would have been if she hadn't grabbed his arm. Suddenly he was glad for the manly strength she possessed in that arm. "Stay out of it," she said. "There's an undercover cop already on the scene." 

Robin refused to leave the scene without further confirmation. The next shot heard was from the undercover cop, tearing through the shooter's chest. The cop showed his badge to the crowd to calm them. 

Drew thought, That was the second time in a row Robin's face registered betrayal. Learning to read people better, that was a lifelong undertaking that could only benefit by her presence. Still, she reprised her concern at just how unprepared for life growing up in a comfortable middle-class household, where he pretty much got what he wanted, had made him. It dulled his senses and left him without any psychological defenses beyond naïveté. In his world, positive overtures followed from love, honesty, and openness, not hidden agendas. "I suppose this is why you chose to become a cop in the first place, as a cure for gullibility," she said.  

"And as a chance to replace a culturally deprived childhood for a life in which I meet all kinds." Robin's eyes lingered on the scene below. 

"Talk about a rude awakening." 

Robin gulped, returned his attention to her.  

He must have been born with an equally bad sense of timing, Drew thought, forced to work on his coming-of-age drama during Economic End Times. His lack of people skills was the last thing he needed walking into a room in which anyone in the crowd could be the next one to go postal.