Lisa insisted on driving Jimin to Yoongi's party.
"But you just got back," Jimin argued, phone in hand. "Taehyung said he could pick me up so it's fine."
"Exactly, I just got back after a few months of not being able to be your personal chauffeur," Lisa said. Her hands were planted on her hips, which meant she was going to get her way. Jimin didn't know if that was a Lisa thing or a girls-in-general thing since he didn't have any sisters, but the rule never failed. "Don't worry, I won't break up your party," she said with a small snort. "Just let me drive you there."
"Okay," Jimin agreed, giving in because he didn't want to upset Lisa when she had only just gotten back. "But I'm not letting you put the lights on," he warned, and she just laughed. The last time she'd flicked on the siren, Jimin had tried to crawl down beneath the glove compartment to hide from both the loud noise and the people watching them.
"I won't, I promise," she said after a moment, holding a hand up as though swearing on a Bible. "Taking a squad car probably wouldn't be very safe right about now, anyway," she added a moment later, her voice growing noticeably quieter, and Jimin stilled as well.
Lisa had been home for two days now, giving her plenty of time to have seen what was on the television and process what had happened to her partner. Her time in a coma hadn't eased any of the tension, and things were getting more violent than ever.
Jimin wondered if Lisa was angry that Jaebum had died for sins he hadn't ever committed.
--
"So," Lisa said, letting the engine idle so the car could cool down a little bit. "What exactly are y'all going to be doing on your little boys' night out?"
"Just, I don't know, whatever," Jimin said with a small shrug. "They'll probably want to drink. They always want to drink," he said with a groan. Alcohol wasn't that interesting to him, but it seemed to be quite the object of fascination to his brothers.
"Let them have their fun," Lisa said with a smile as she pulled out of the driveway and exited their subdivision. "Just no driving, got it?" She paused at the stop sign longer than usual to look over at Jimin with a stern face.
"Of course," Jimin said with a small nod. Between their helicopter father and their police officer step-mom-slash-aunt, safety was a high priority in the Kim household. Drinking and driving was on the blacklist of activities that no Kim family member would ever consider doing. "So, what was being in a coma like? They're all going to ask."
"Boring." Lisa snorted and turned right, merging onto a busier street and heading in the general direction of Yoongi's apartment. "Sometimes noise filters in, but it's sort of like being in a dream. You kind of forget stuff as soon as it's passed. And time is weird too. When I woke up, it simultaneously felt like I'd never closed my eyes, but also like I'd been asleep for a hundred years. Like some sort of Disney princess curse. Not-" she immediately denied, "-that I'm saying I'm Sleeping Beauty. But, you know, if someone else were to say it, well, who am I to deny them?"
"Right," Jimin said with a smile, looking out the window. He liked when Lisa drove him places because it reminded him of Yoongi's driving, a little slow and extra careful. Of course, Lisa probably drove like that due to her training and because Jimin was 'precious cargo' as she would say, whereas Yoongi drove like a turtle because 'every other driver out here has a death wish.' But still. He liked that.
His smile slipped as he saw the red paint dripping down the window of a house beside the road.
ACAB
All Cops Are Bastards, he filled in automatically, his stomach sinking, and he looked over to find Lisa giving the window a quick glance before looking back out over the road as though she'd never seen it.
"Doesn't it...upset you?" Jimin asked softly. It upset him. It seemed obvious to him that all cops weren't bad, just like all people weren't bad. So why was it such a point of contention for others? Or was he just naïve?
He watched her knuckles tighten over the wheel, and the car sped up for half a second before she eased her foot off the gas. "I...can't say that it doesn't," she admitted after a second, still looking out straight ahead instead of over at him. "But I can half understand it, at least."
"I don't understand it at all," Jimin mumbled, flicking his eyes to the side mirror to see the house flash in the glass before disappearing.
"People are scared," Lisa said after a second while she drifted into the left turn lane. "Police officers have a tough job, and in order to serve and protect people, we're granted certain permissions and authority. But when police officers use that authority incorrectly, or when they choose actions that aren't part of our allowed permissions, then there's usually a bad ending. Nobody wants a bad ending," she finished quietly. "But of course those are the endings people remember. And I can't really fault them for that. It's scary thinking that there are people out there with the power and motivation to hurt you and the people you care about. But, Jimin, I really don't know any cops who wake up in the morning wanting to hurt people. That's not to say they aren't out there, but it's far from 'most,' and it's definitely far from 'all.'"
"It's the bad cops out there who give everyone else a bad name," Jimin said, still feeling unsettled because he'd been watching the television for weeks and hadn't been able to come to his own conclusion on matter. "Why can't the police just weed out the bad cops before they create the bad endings you're talking about?"
"Jimin, I agree with you one hundred percent," Lisa said. The green arrow flicked on, and she eased onto the gas. "Officers who aren't ready to protect and serve – and to do so fairly and without discrimination – shouldn't get a badge or a gun or anything. Police officers have a lot of power, and bad people can use that power to do very bad things." She pulled up to another stop sign and looked over at Jimin for a long moment. There were no cars behind them, which gave her a little bit of time. "But, Jimin – and please believe me, I'm not trying to influence your opinion on anything because your dad raised you to be a free, independent thinker and I absolutely agree with him on that – but Jimin, please believe me when I tell you that no one hates a bad cop more than a good cop."
A car started pulling up behind them, and Lisa eased through the stop sign, looking back out over the road, and Jimin let her words sink in.
No one hates a bad cop more than a good cop.
Jimin believed that there were good cops and bad cops. Lisa, Jaebum, Officer Lee, everyone at the station who had helped him in two major stages of his life – those were his good cops, cops who wanted to bring missing boys back to their families and find justice for victims and protect people. But Jimin knew that there had to be bad cops too. He'd never met any, but he knew they were out there because bad people were out there and they worked their way into every profession.
"Lisa?"
"Yes, Jimin?"
They were getting close to Yoongi's apartment now, but he still had more questions.
"Do you think that Jaebum died for nothing?" The words were past his lips, and although he hated the paleness that spread over Lisa's face as a result, it was the question that had been haunting his mind for the past few months, intensifying once Lisa had returned. He could ask it now or later, but it was going to come out at some point.
"I think...that he shouldn't have died," Lisa said, clenching the steering wheel once more and sniffing at the air in an effort to hold back her emotions. "Jaebum and I...we were just part of a small force stationed along that street because there were reports of protestors growing violent, and a few fights had broken out and resulted in civilian injuries. We were there to protect people and property from being destroyed. We were there-" Her voice started to shake. "-to protect and serve, because that's our job." Lisa took a deep breath, and Jimin regretted having asked her in a car because this was probably the first opportunity she'd had to talk about the incident and she couldn't even give it her full attention without crashing the vehicle. "We weren't there to incite violence. But people want violence, right now. And they wanted-" She took one hand off the wheel and held it over her mouth, trying to remain strong enough to finish her thought. "And they wanted to hurt us. And they did. They killed Jaebum and they put me in a coma. And it still didn't give them the happy ending that they wanted."
Jimin was silent. He wanted to tell Lisa that it was okay, that she didn't have to talk about it, but he didn't want to stop her if she needed to share in order to cope. He knew that talking things out sometimes made them a little less painful, and he didn't want to deprive her of that emotional relief, but he still felt horrible for asking.
"But, do I think he died for nothing?" Lisa repeated, placing her hand back on the wheel and blinking rapidly to catch any rogue tears. "No. Because...maybe this is unrealistic of me, I don't know." Her hands shifted on the wheel slightly as though she were gearing herself up. "I never wanted him to die. But I can't change that now, all I can hope is that some of those protestors saw what happened, that Jaebum didn't injure anyone else even when he was mobbed by violent people. I hope they find out what a good cop he was-" Another sniff, but Jimin could tell by the strength in her eyes that she wasn't going to break down, that she was steel and she was fire and she may bend but she would not break. "-and what a good man he was, and I hope they will mourn the loss of him in our community. The world needs more cops like him, not less."
Jimin nodded, and he rested a hand on the center console. He wanted to reach out and offer Lisa some small physical comfort – a squeeze on the shoulder or a small touch on her arm – but he didn't cross the distance between them, just put his hand in the middle for her to take if she wanted to. "The world needs more cops like you, too," Jimin said quietly.
Lisa stilled for a long moment, and the car rolled to a stop on the shoulder of the road in front of Yoongi's apartment building. She swallowed, closing her eyes, and her hand fell from the wheel, fumbling for a moment before meeting his, and she ran her thumb over his knuckle, squeezing as though to reassure herself of his presence. "Go," she said after a long moment, opening her eyes and looking out her side window, her hand still in his. "You've got a party to go to, right?"
"I mean it, Lisa." There had always been a part of her that rejected acceptance. Jimin had noticed it a long time ago, how she was always hesitant with kind words and sincerity. How, when Namjoon would hold her hand in his, she would look over with a questioning wonderance as though asking him if he were really okay with (just) her. How, despite being a part of their family life for twenty odd years, she was still surprised to be included in their traditions and activities. And while that part of Lisa frustrated him, it resonated with him too, because he understood that sort of broken.
"Thank you," she said quietly, giving his hand another squeeze before extricating her fingers from his, giving his hand a pat, and placing her hand back on the wheel. "Now, off you go. Have a good time, Jimin. I mean it. And don't hesitate to call me if you need a ride home from the slumber party."
"You'll be the first person I call," Jimin promised with a smile because he knew that Lisa, for good or bad, derived her own sense of value from her usefulness. She liked feeling needed, liked knowing that people could depend on her. So even if Jimin figured that he could probably take the driving test and get his own license, he didn't, because it gave Lisa an excuse to drive him around and feel wholly and utterly necessary to his existence.
Lisa, his good cop.
--
published 08/18/20 (mm/dd/yy)