Don't You Forget About Me by Suzanne Jenkins

getting a DUI. Yes, she was an adult, but he was pushing it on her and then telling her she needed to get on the road. What was his hurry? A real gentleman would have insisted she spend the night and leave for work early Monday morning. She thought of his phone ringing, the eagerness he had to get back in the house to answer. Was he double dating?
    Finally, the lights of the city appeared below her. Merging on the Henry Hudson, she thought how lucky she was to have such a great apartment. Then she reminded herself that she was being schizophrenic. She hated her apartment! Anyway, she would love it tonight because it wasn’t upstate. What she really hated was anything old and moldering, like that “new condo wannabe” Jeff lived in, with its fancy plumbing fixtures attached to ancient old plumbing. He had said to her at least fifty times, “Don’t flush more than six sheets of toilet paper down at a time.” Huh? You’ve got to be kidding me!
    Face it, kiddo , she thought to herself, no one is going to be able to replace Jack . She wondered how Pam did it. Sure, Andy was nice looking, and he was obviously head over heels in love with Pam. But he was no Jack. Jack was so smooth. He was larger than life. Jeff Babcock was a nobody. He had two nice vacation homes, but they weren’t that nice. And he was a fabulous cook. However, it wasn’t the greatest selling point for an anorexic. She wondered if they would be together long enough for that lovely fact about her to be revealed. She pulled into her parking garage and parked the car. It felt so good to be home.
    Dragging her suitcase into the elevator, she pushed the button to her floor. When she stepped into the hallway, a fleeting sense of gratitude overcame her. She unlocked her door, and the lighted vista of New Jersey was the first thing to greet her. It was so beautiful. The sun had just set, the lights from Weehawken were starting to come on, and the red reflection on the Palisades…Well, it was breathtaking. She could afford to be grateful, just for a second. “Thank you, God. Forgive me for being miserable,” she said to the ceiling.
    Anne Smith was in trouble. What the hell am I going to do? She never thought she would get caught cashing Pam’s checks. The truth was she didn’t see anything wrong with it, so what was there to get caught? She stuck to her story that she thought the money was for her use while Bill was incarcerated. So they could take her to court, and she would prettily cry her way out of trouble. It was that absolute asshole of a husband of hers who was to blame, and she was going to make sure he paid.
    Around lunchtime on Sunday, Tom Adams came into the precinct to finish up some work. On top of a pile of papers on his desk was a copy of a refusal to hear William Smith due to lack of evidence.
    “Fuck,” Tom said out loud. This meant Bill would be released today. It had been almost twenty-four hours since they brought him in. Now time was up, and the judge was refusing to hear the evidence that he broke parole by causing a disturbance. It had been a slim chance to get him back to Rikers, but they wanted to take it, mainly to keep him from harassing Sandra Benson.
    Well, he had exactly twenty-four hours, and Tom would wait until thirty seconds before the time was up to unlock the cell door. Smith’s attorney hadn’t tried to have him released earlier; there was no sign that he had even called his attorney. Tom guessed there was a money issue, but in that case, a public defender would have been provided, and it looked like he refused. Either Bill Smith had given up or was avoiding going home.
    For the second time in two days, Anne Smith received a phone call from prison, telling her she could come pick up her husband. The previous night, when he didn’t come home from his mother’s, she didn’t even bother to call there. She didn’t care. Her boys had a wonderful Saturday with their mother, and she didn’t see any reason in hell to