fic: outside the gates of eden

[uberniftacular]

Title: outside the gates of eden
Fandom: Criminal Minds
Characters/pairing: Hotch and Gideon, gen
Rating: PG
Summary: Jason and Hotch have had a very bad day.
Warnings: some alcohol abuse
Author's notes: an early installment of my joint project with language_escapes.  In our universe, Hotch stayed a lawyer instead of working for the BAU.

 

 

Aaron Hotchner somehow manages to resist the urge to breathe a sigh of relief as the judge declares the court in recess until Monday morning.  Prosecuting murder trials is never easy, but some trials are worse than others.  He straightens his jacket as he stands, keeping his stoic prosecutor façade firmly intact, though inside he feels ready to bolt.  Hotch throws a quick glance across the courtroom to where Jason Gideon sits as an expert witness.  He nods almost imperceptibly, knowing Jason will correctly interpret the gesture.  See you at home, I have to get out of here, the look says as he turns toward the door.

 Forty minutes later, he’s turning the key in the lock at Jason’s apartment.  The lock sticks sometimes, but after six months, he knows just how to make it cooperate.  He closes the door behind him, making sure it’s locked before taking off his shoes, which he leaves beside the door.  His briefcase lands next to his shoes.  The sound of a Billie Holiday record fills the apartment, and he doesn’t need to look to know that Jason is sitting in the armchair near the television, an open book in his hand that he isn’t really reading.

 Hotch treads lightly as he makes his way to the kitchen, pulling the newly-purchased bottle of scotch from his pocket as he walks.  Ordinarily, he would’ve brought home Guinness, but he knows Jason can’t stand it, and today he figured they’d need something a little stronger anyway.  He pulls two glasses from the cupboard and pours a good measure of scotch into each, then carries both glasses and the bottle into the living room.  One of the glasses he sets on a coaster next to Jason, who looks up long enough to nod his thanks.  The bottle goes in the middle of the end table between the chair and the couch with the expectation of needing more, and Hotch’s glass ends up next to it.  Hotch leaves long enough to hang his suit jacket, take off his tie, and take his case notes out of his briefcase; when he returns to the room, the scotch in Jason’s glass is half gone.

 Hotch sits on the couch and begins to leaf through his case notes, sipping on his scotch as he reviews the day’s proceedings.  The notes are typical trial notes, and he doesn’t spend too long on them before flipping to the folder behind his yellow legal pad, the folder containing the official FBI report on the case.  Opening the folder, Hotch leafs past most of the pages of the report and comes to rest at the back of the folder.  Like he’s done every day this week, as a reminder to himself of why he does what he does, he spends some time looking carefully at the photographs of the families who had been so affected by this case.  The children, so many of them, who are now without parents, several of whom have no other family to turn to.  The tiny blond boy who looks so much like his own son.  The twin girls whose only family now is an aging grandmother.  Hotch lifts his glass to take another sip, only to discover that he’s managed to drink it all without really realizing it.  As he looks up to refill his glass, he sees that Jason’s glass is full again, and wonders if it’s his second or third.  Just as he decides it doesn’t matter, Jason speaks up.

“It’s my third, but who’s counting?  I’d be surprised if we didn’t finish the bottle before the evening is over.”  Hotch smiles grimly at that, because he knows Jason’s probably right, and finishes refilling his glass.

 Two hours later, Jason’s prediction has proved correct.  The scotch is gone, and now they’re working on a bottle of vodka Hotch found in the back of a cupboard.  They think it may have been a present Jason got at work, but neither of them is sure.  Billie is still singing – they’ve listened to the same side of the album four times in a row because neither of them has wanted to put the effort into doing much more than start the side over, and neither wants to turn it off.  That would mean silence, which would mean they’d end up talking about the case they’re both trying to forget.  Jason has given up pretending to read and sits in the recliner with his feet up, his humming along with the music growing more out of tune the more he drinks.  Hotch threw the case file down on the coffee table an hour ago, where it landed with the pictures of the kids on top.  He stares at the pictures with unfocused eyes until he gets distracted by a pale flash of motion in his peripheral vision.  A giggle escapes his mouth unbidden as he looks up to see what it is: it’s Jason’s big toe, sticking through a hole in the (ancient) brown sock.  Jason looks up with a quizzical expression on his face, then follows Hotch’s gaze down to his own foot.  He snorts and wiggles his toe on purpose, raising his eyebrows at Hotch.

 “Are you ever planning on buying new socks, or do I have to call your mother and see what she has to say about it?” Hotch teases, and begins to giggle anew at the sloppy look of horror on Jason’s face.  They can both imagine what Judith Gideon would have to say about her son wearing socks with holes in them (to court, no less!), and neither is entirely keen to have that particular experience any time soon.

 “Don’t even joke about something like that, Hotch!  You know what would happen!  Besides, why would that be necessary, what with you mothering me all the time?”

 “I seem make a better mother than I ever did a dad, so it seems to work out,” Hotch says, giggle turning bitter and fading as he gulps the shot of vodka in his hand and grimaces.  Jason raises an eyebrow, and his glass, as he gives a subtle nod towards the closed door, the colorful sign in childish hand still tacked to it.

 “It isn’t as if I’ve been that great of a dad either, Hotch, as you may have noticed.”  Hotch pours himself another drink and stares into his glass, both men sitting in silence for a time.  When Hotch looks back up, Jason is staring at him, a gleam in his eye that Hotch knows means he’s about to suggest something unorthodox.

 “What if…what if we could give it another try?”  Hotch looks at Jason with a slight tilt of his head; he doesn’t quite follow yet, but he knows it will come.  Jason gestures to the pictures from the case file, still lying open on the table.

 “Kids like that.  What if we could give ourselves a second shot at being parents, and give those kids a second chance at a decent home life?  Instead of just letting them get lost in the system.”  Hotch’s head comes up a little at the idea, but the practical questions aren’t far behind.

 "What about the logistics of all of this?  Between your profiling and my court cases, neither of us are home enough to even be considered for foster parenting.  And we wouldn’t be able to go on living here for much longer, either.  And what about Jack?”  Jason looks like he’s been expecting these questions, which makes Hotch wonder vaguely how long Jason may have been considering this possibility.

 “I’ve been considering the possibility of retiring from profiling altogether, actually; I can teach criminal psychology at the FBI academy, maybe do a little consulting work on cases occasionally, but primarily teach.  That way I would be home in the evenings more often than not.  And we can move out of the apartment if we have to; it’s not like we can’t afford a house.  I know this is really the only place Stephen would know to contact me at,” this a little wistfully, with another glance towards the door, “but I can leave a forwarding address with the post office, and obviously with my parents as well.  Jack wouldn’t be a problem either, Hotch.  It’s not like fostering children will prevent you from ever seeing him, and hopefully he’ll get along well enough with them that he can still stay with us during the weekends that you have him without it being a problem for anybody.  Playmates may do him some good, actually; if he has someone his own age to play with when he’s here, you wouldn’t have to feel so guilty if you had to spend some of the time working on a case.”  As Jason talks, Hotch finds himself starting to feel more and more convinced that this might actually work.  The kicker comes when Jason, seeing that Hotch is interested, slides the folder with the pictures across the table towards Hotch.

 “On top of everything else, we can give kids like this a chance at a better life.”  Hotch looks down at the pictures, and when he looks back up at Jason, there is a new light of determination in his eyes.  A nod and a raised glass are all that are needed, and the decision is made without words.