I left the pub downtown at quarter to three. Sure I’d had a beer or two. I was far from drunk, believe me I know drunk.
So when I looked into the pub window, I did a double take and wiped my eyes.
It must have been the reflection from the street lights shining in. But the image stayed, it moved. It.. couldn’t be, the hat, the trench coat, it.. was my partner Parrish O’Hanley..who’d been shot to death a year ago tonight.

That’s the night I started drinking heavily. I should have been the one killed that night, not him. We had a lead on a missing person case we were on. I had just sat at my desk to grab a bite to eat when the call came in.

“Hello, Ladd& O’Hanley Detective agency, what can I do ya for?”, I said in what I thought was my best Hollywood style P.I. imitation.

“OK, I’m on my way, stay right where you are”, I said to the caller.

“You stay, eat”, said Parrish, as he got his hat, “I’ll take this one”.
I got the call an hour later, Parrish was dead, shot in the back of the head.