A Sunday Kind Of Love || Angela Lopez

°•the good, the bad and the ugly•°

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Caroline hated how she clung to routine; she needed the structure, the reassurance, the familiarity, all of which (in reality) were double edged swords that left her open to the very threats that made her this way. The structure because everyone she knows knew that she ran in the mornings at times too early for the world to be awake, the need for reassurance shows how easily disrupted her state of mind could be, no matter how many years had passed since she was sixteen, and the familiarity? It meant that she easily missed any parts of her routine that deserted her: Jackson, Lucy and Nolan.

She'd been the one to rope them into early morning beach-side runs with her before class, and now shifts, but nobody had joined her since Jackson told her to 'dim' it down. They had skirted around each other for the past few days, and Caroline had kept to casual conversations to try and soothe their wounds, but Jackson kept shrugging her off to the point she had snapped at him at the end of last shift; all hope went out the window that whatever this was, once a petty disagreement and now a make or break matter of principles, would be resolved cleanly - even if she hoped it would.

Maybe Erin would run with her? Probably not... but, then again, she never expected the rookies to be awake this early simply just to run and there they were, approximately 400m ahead of her, so that she could remain out of sight and out of their minds, all the while keeping them entirely in both her sight and mind.

She watched as Jackson ran through Lucy and Nolan, separating them for all of 2 seconds, before they seemed to get impossibly closer. Normally, she would've ran ahead with Jackson, gossiping about how it's a wonder they hadn't been revealed as a couple yet and just how odd it was that they were one in the first place. Caroline hoped Jackson was missing the gossip even if he wasn't missing her yet.

"This is Caroline speaking, who is this?"

"It's Erin, princess, don't you pay attention to caller ID?"

"Only when I'm not actively running.. you're playing through my headphones right now"

Erin's audible recoil at the mention of running this early gave Caroline all the answers she needed about whether she would join her - she wouldn't.

"Poor life choices aside, princess, feel like giving your favourite TO a lift?"

"I don't know about favourite but... I'll be there"

She hung up on Erin before she could hear her complaints.

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Caroline sat alone on the right side of the briefing room, the other rookies on the left, as she spun her pen along and between her fingertips. While Erin had joined her in previous briefings, Tim was returning today and Erin refused to let him see her 'lacking' by sitting in the 'rookie row'. The second stage of Erin's plan? An orthopedic cushion; one that lasted all of 2 seconds once he spotted it, whipping out his pen to pop it.

"Alright, alright, alright. Settle down. Settle down. Let's get to it." Caroline stopped twirling her pen, popping it back in her pocket as she looked up at Sgt. Grey when he walked in "You ready, Officer Nolan? 'Cause once again, we start with you."

"I'm flattered?"

"You shouldn't be.." Sgt. Grey looked over at Caroline amused, smiling to himself when she ducked her head to avoid attention but kept the sly smile.

"Yesterday, a four-man crew disguised as zombies knocked over a cash advance near Pico and Robertson. So, Officers Bishop and Nolan were able to apprehend two of the criminals, while the other two escaped. Somehow, Officer Nolan managed to let a civilian steal ten grand in already stolen cash. Luckily, CCTV captured our thief. Still waiting on an I.D."