Chap­ter 94 of We Solve Mur­ders opens with Steve walk­ing through the Dubai Mari­na, a place far from the com­forts and rou­tine of his home. As he moves through the bustling city, he can’t shake the deep sense of dis­lo­ca­tion that has tak­en hold of him. The dis­tance, 3,000 miles from the famil­iar sights and sounds of his every­day life, only ampli­fies the emo­tions swirling inside him. His thoughts fre­quent­ly drift back to Deb­bie, his late part­ner, whose absence still casts a long shad­ow over his exis­tence. The mem­o­ries of their life togeth­er, the laugh­ter, the qui­et evenings at home, and the shared moments of love, all come flood­ing back in vivid detail. He can’t help but feel the void left by her, espe­cial­ly as he wan­ders through a place that feels like noth­ing more than a blur of unfa­mil­iar faces and for­eign sur­round­ings.

As Steve nears an Irish Pub, he holds a brief hope that per­haps this place, with its atmos­phere of cama­raderie and British sports cul­ture, might offer him the slight­est hint of famil­iar­i­ty. He imag­ines that the pub might pro­vide the kind of com­mu­ni­ty feel­ing he once enjoyed with his old friends back home—Tony, Jyoti, and John. But as he steps inside, the real­i­ty hits him hard: this is not home. The live­ly envi­ron­ment, full of the sounds of clink­ing glass­es, bright neon signs, and tele­vi­sions blar­ing sports from all direc­tions, does lit­tle to soothe his sense of dis­place­ment. Instead, the noise and flash­ing lights only add to his dis­com­fort, mak­ing him feel more alone and iso­lat­ed than ever. The real­iza­tion slow­ly sets in that no mat­ter how many pubs he vis­its or how much he tries to repli­cate the famil­iar, noth­ing can fill the empti­ness left by Debbie’s absence. The atmos­phere, though meant to offer com­fort, only serves as a reminder of what he’s lost, deep­en­ing the feel­ing of alien­ation that has been grow­ing with­in him.

Despite the over­whelm­ing sense of dis­com­fort, Steve is unable to shake the thought that per­haps he hasn’t tru­ly enjoyed life since Debbie’s death. The con­cept of enjoy­ment itself feels dis­tant, like a word that has lost its mean­ing. The very idea of feel­ing joy, of find­ing plea­sure in some­thing as sim­ple as a con­ver­sa­tion or a game, has become almost for­eign to him. It’s not that he doesn’t try to find hap­pi­ness, but each attempt feels hol­low, as though the spark that once made life vibrant has been extin­guished. Even as he stands in this new, vibrant set­ting, Steve is con­front­ed with the fact that he can no longer expe­ri­ence life the way he once did. The loss of Deb­bie has stolen more than just her phys­i­cal pres­ence; it has tak­en away his abil­i­ty to find con­tent­ment in the world around him.

As Steve con­tin­ues to reflect on his life, he turns his thoughts to his daugh­ter-in-law, Amy, who has brought some moments of light back into his life. While he has found some joy in pro­tect­ing her and being a sup­port­ive fig­ure, the relief it brings is fleet­ing. The con­nec­tion he shares with Amy is real, and he is grate­ful for it, but it’s not enough to fill the void that Debbie’s death has left. Sim­i­lar­ly, Rosie, anoth­er per­son who has entered Steve’s life dur­ing this chal­leng­ing time, offers him some com­fort and con­nec­tion. Yet even these pos­i­tive rela­tion­ships can’t replace the deep sense of empti­ness that fol­lows him every­where. Despite his desire for com­pan­ion­ship and emo­tion­al sup­port, Steve finds it increas­ing­ly dif­fi­cult to escape the shad­ow of loss that seems to define his exis­tence. These rela­tion­ships, though mean­ing­ful, are not the answer to his grief; they are sim­ply moments of reprieve from the over­whelm­ing sor­row that con­sumes him.

As Steve con­tem­plates his return to Axley, he is filled with con­flict­ing emo­tions. There is part of him that longs for the com­fort of home, for the famil­iar rou­tines and the sense of sta­bil­i­ty it once offered. But along­side this long­ing is the inescapable truth that the mem­o­ries of Deb­bie will always be tied to that place, turn­ing it into a reminder of every­thing that’s been lost. Even the most com­fort­ing places—like the sofa in his liv­ing room, which used to cra­dle him in relax­ation and peace—now seem taint­ed by absence. It is as though the very fab­ric of his life has been per­ma­nent­ly altered, the spaces he once occu­pied now filled with echoes of a past that can nev­er be recre­at­ed. The sofa, once a sim­ple piece of fur­ni­ture, has become a sym­bol of every­thing he can nev­er return to. This real­iza­tion hits him hard, as he under­stands that no mat­ter where he goes, no mat­ter how far from home he may trav­el, Debbie’s pres­ence will always be with him. It is not just her mem­o­ries that linger, but a part of her that has become ingrained in the way he moves through life. Even as he joins François Lou­bet at the pub, he feels her spir­it beside him, a qui­et but con­stant com­pan­ion on his jour­ney. Through the tumul­tuous emo­tions and the many miles between them, Debbie’s influ­ence remains ever-present, guid­ing Steve through the com­plex­i­ties of grief, mem­o­ry, and loss.