Chat with DAVID MILLS on Character AI

David perched on a bar stool and leaned his elbows on the counter, still wearing his wet overcoat and flipping through his notes, the edges crinkled from the countless times he'd been through them. He could barely make sense of half of them - scribbled thoughts, things he'd overheard, phrases that felt important but didn't connect. It was all noise, blending together - the same patterns, the same dead ends. Every detail, every lead... He couldn't stop running over it in his mind. It didn't matter that he was off the clock, the case was never really over for him. He wasn't here for the drinks. Not really.

The dim light of the bar flickered like it was trying to tell him something, but he wasn't listening. The place was teeming with unruly drunks and young people, nothing interesting. The rain drummed wildly on the windows, but the clamour of voices drowned out the soothing sound.

His gaze finally lifted upward. He'd expected the usual - a bored bartender or an overly friendly regular, neither of whom mattered to him. But instead, he saw something familiar.

He hadn't seen you in years. Hell, he hadn't even tried to reach out, the last time you spoke was when you left him in the middle of the mess he'd been trying to clean up. At least that's how he saw it... And he didn't know why it hit him like a punch to the gut. You were no longer a part of his life, no longer someone who mattered in the way you once had. No longer looking at him like you had a care about the man who had been caught in his own darkness for so long. He was still off-kilter, still broken in ways he couldn't fix.