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Sixteen sets of eyes were trained on the front of the classroom. Parsing out the letters on the blackboard. Studying the way their teacher paced like he was nervous about something or someone.
Sixteen little bodies sitting as patiently as they could at their desks, hands clasped on top, feet dangling and just missing the floor beneath. The gentle swish of jeans as kids kicked and fidgeted with their feet, knocking shoes together, scuffing toes that could barely reach on the floor or kicking the legs of the desk.
Jack Hotchner waiting with static-glowing anticipation at seeing his dad in front of the class wearing the tie he'd picked out this morning just for the occasion. He picked out the blue-silver one with the weird circle-lines on it. Derek made a comment about trying to impress the kids with Gucci but Jack didn't know anything about that. He only liked the weird circle lines. They looked like coffee beans. Or chain links on a swing set. He liked them. He was doodling them now on his folder in blue crayon.
In the hallway, waiting slightly less patiently, Hotch leaned over the drinking fountain and held his tie in place while he sipped the icy water. He was careful to hold his tie but it still got wet.
“You know,” Reid started as he watched Hotch with abject terror written all over his features. “Drinking fountains, especially in elementary schools, are common carriers of Norovirus, Rotavirus, e.Coli and influenza. Your chances of getting sick from a drinking fountain in a school like this during flu season are astonishing.”
Hotch, with sweet icy water still slicking his lips, narrowed his glare at Reid but said nothing.
“Sorry.”
He was nervous enough as it was, and Reid wasn't helping. Slowly he resumed pacing, his hands shoved deep in his pockets to avoid fiddling with his tie. The tie Jack picked out. It was meant to make him feel good, or handsome, or whatever Jack had said that morning. But he toyed with it like it was some talisman, like it was a good luck charm, and it was starting to make him feel like he was going to vibrate right out of his skin. Standing in front of a courtroom, or meeting with the Director of the FBI didn't make him as nervous as a classroom full of first graders.
He'd been worried about this, almost said no given everything that had happened over the last year. Between Foyet's knife getting up close and personal with his insides, and then Haley being opened up by his bullet...Emily and Doyle and going overseas for months...he was just barely starting to feel like an active participant in his own life again. Regaining some semblance of control. It had shocked him that Jack wanted him to come in and talk at all during Career Week, not after everything that had happened. Jack had barely started to talk to him again about Emily. And that he was coming in limping with a swollen and scraped up cheek after a battle with an unsub, a fireplace poker and a basement well in Oregon the day before...well, he sort of felt about like he'd been scraped off of the lid of a trash can.
“You should stay home,” Derek had said earlier that morning while he tried to suck his coffee down into a sour stomach. His head hurt. So bad. It hadn't been too bad on the jet, he'd managed to play it down during the whole ride back as being tired. Derek pretended to be fooled so that everyone else would buy it too.“You look like shit.”
“Thank you so much,” Hotch had replied quietly, knowing it was the truth but still irritated by it. Derek kissed him on top of the head and told him to lighten up or he really would make him stay home. That did it. He forced a horrible smile, a mockery of a smile, an evil vile thing that made Derek shiver and dumped the rest of the coffee down his gullet before grabbing his keys. “Ready to go?”
“Yeah...but uh...I'm not sure you should be driving, man.”
“You can take your own car or you can get in mine, but you're going to have to pry these keys out of my hand if you want them.”
Derek was not up for that fight.
So, he was there but he wasn't thrilled. And neither was Derek. He'd turned his phone to silent just to stop seeing the messages once he sent the customary “made it okay” to let Derek know that he and his raging concussion hadn't killed them on the road somehow. Now he just hoped that Jack would be proud to see him up there, and not worried. If he saw even an inkling of something in Jack's eyes...he didn't know how he'd continue.
“Should I take off the jacket?” Hotch asked Reid, eyeing his reflection in one of the glass display cases in the hallway. He couldn't decide if he looked professional or too severe. These were kids, not IA.
“No. It makes you look like a real FBI Agent. I should have worn a suit. You know, Morgan told me we should have both worn black suits and sunglasses, he says there's a movie that kids love where the FBI Agents dress like that and it would have been a hit.”
“Do you mean Men in Black?”
It was Reid's turn to stare at him without saying a word. Bewilderment.
“You must have heard of it. The FBI vs aliens? Will Smith and Tommy Lee Jones? It's one of Derek's favorite movies. He quotes it all the time. You know the difference between you and me? I make this look good. Come on, you've heard him say that...” Hotch heard it every single time Derek put on a damn suit. Without fail. It was like some auto-tune in his brain, zero filter.
“Tommy Lee Jones was excellent in The Fugitive. I watched that at Morgan's house two weeks ago. Is it like that?”
Hotch just stared. “No, it's...” Aliens. It's aliens. It's a comedy. He couldn't bring himself to say it though. “Ask Derek. He'll show you.”
He knew this conversation was sinking fast and had to end there. It wasn't that they couldn't talk, usually they managed to be on a very similar wavelength. Under normal circumstances they might both have had blank stares when popular movies were mentioned – Spencer because he had little to no interest in most of what mainstream media pushed his way and Hotch because he had little too no time to indulge anything much at all. But right now, things were strained between them, and Hotch was definitely fighting a concussion. Things could be better. After Emily's death and reappearance, Hotch found it hardest to get back to where he was with Reid and Garcia, and he thought bringing them along today would help that. And if he was feeling better, it might be the case.
“So is that a yes to the jacket, or should I take it off?”
“I'm probably not the best person to ask.”
“I'm here! Sorry I'm late! I made the kids some things, I hope you don't mind sir. I might have raided HR's new employee closet...and then Trisha at the front desk asked me what I was doing and I told her that I was on direct assignment from my big scary boss who she did not want to mess with and she...”
Big scary boss. He sighed and nodded, folding his arms over his chest instinctively. It wasn't that he minded that, necessarily, especially where HR was concerned...but he was a little worried that was how the kids would see him too. That wasn't the goal. HR could be scared of him and he would be all the more glad, but not Jack's class. “What did you take?”
“Just some pens...and some stickers...and I put together a fake case file...and some name badge templates...I thought we could have them each make their own badge and then we could solve a case! I put it all together, a puppy named Pepper who lost her bone.”
“Garcia, we only have thirty minutes. An activity sounds fun but we can't get the kids all riled up and make a mess of the classroom with that short a turnaround. Can you keep it reigned in?”
“Leave that to me, sir. I promise. You just go up there and wow them with your superhero boss-man stories and your fancy suit, and I'll set the stage for a quick little puppy caper.”
“What do I do?” Reid asked. He sounded more than a little concerned that he was going to be completely useless.
“You're going to help the kids solve the case, like their own personal Sherlock Holmes. And Hotch will be the unsub. He'll have the bone in his pocket.”
She extended her hand and in the palm sat a tiny pink bone made of clay. She had clearly made this herself.
“Agents?”
The teacher, a young man in khakis and a blue and white gingham button down beneath a very oddly patterned sweater vest, poked his head out into the hallway. Hotch squinted at the design couldn't quite figure out what the odd shapes and colors were. They looked almost like white and red snakes without heads, but all he really knew was that whatever it was hurt his head. “Are you ready?”
“Great vest,” Spencer said appreciatively, recognizing the pattern immediately. He grinned and peered closely, his fingers winding and twirling with the ropes. “Hotch, look. This vest is all nautical knots.”
Hotch, passing the teacher, got a better look up close and nodded. “So they are. That's very clever, sir.” He loved knots and boats, but the vest still hurt his head. The colors were too intense to be twisted and tied up that way.
“My boss loves boats. He has two of them.” Spencer said it with an apologetic smile, still admiring the swirl of multi-colored knots, as if it made up for Hotch being short with him. “Did you knit this yourself?”
The teacher who introduced himself as Mr. Swanson nodded proudly. “Took me half a year just to plan it all out and make sure all of the knots were correct. Now, you won't be showing the children any blood or talking about...the types of people you deal with, right? I know that Jack is probably used to that sort of thing but I had a lot of concerned parents...especially given what happened to...” To you and Jack's mother, he said without saying it. The look was enough. A little worried, a little defiant. Hotch hated it.
“No,” Hotch replied, clearly irritated. Of course they weren't going to show crime scene photos or talk about serial killers to a group of young children. He resented the question. Mr. Swanson stepped back, letting them pass, giving Hotch a wider berth than was really necessary. Hotch sighed miserably and scolded himself. He needed to loosen up. Of course the teacher knew what happened, it was all over the news, from the attack in his apartment to Haley's death. You would have to live under a rock not to know about it, and he knew as soon as Mr. Swanson saw Jack's name on his class roster he was worried it would be problematic. That alone had made Hotch more than a little hesitant to accept this invitation.
Halfway through talking to the class, he felt a flush rising beneath his collar and shrugged out of his jacket, careful not to spill Penelope's delicate little bone and ruin the surprise. He draped it over his arm and continued talking, trying to make sure that he kept his body language as loose and gentle as possible. Children, not law enforcement. He crouched in front of desks and made eye contact when children asked questions, careful not to loom over the top of them, he knew exactly how big and how scary he could look without even trying. He was tall and sharp, severe looking. It served him well in many situations, but here he needed to remember how to be gentle.
“Did you have a question?” he asked, crouching beside a desk in the front. The little girl had started to raise her hand but sucked it back down quickly and looked away.
“You're Jack's dad?” she asked in a voice that sounded like the squeaker from a dog toy that had been well-loved. It was breathy and high-pitched. She was nervous. He smiled and raised his eyebrows, erasing the frown from his face.
“I am. My name is Aaron. What's your name?”
“Margot. D-do you c-c-carry a gun?” He couldn't tell if her stutter was genuine or just fear, but he waited patiently for her to finish her question before answering.
“I do.”
“D-do you have it right n--n-now?” She didn't look interested, she looked frightened. His heart pumped ice.
“No, I don't. None of us are carrying weapons right now.” There was a resounding “awwwwwwww” noise from mostly little boys in the classroom, and Hotch looked up in time to see Jack joining the chorus. He was a little disappointed but not surprised. “We only carry our weapons in the field, when we might need to use them to keep ourselves or other people safe.”
That wasn't entirely true. Sure, he wasn't wearing a weapon now, because they were strictly forbidden to, but normally...he didn't go anywhere without them. One on his hip, one on his ankle. Even at his desk. He had a number of reasons why, but no one really even asked.
No one asked him about a lot of things.
“Okay! We have a case for you!” Penelope clapped her hands, snatching the attention of the children quickly away from Hotch and the weapon talk. He appreciated it immensely as he pushed himself back up to standing and hid his stiff limp the best he could. “I've just been informed that my adorable little puppy named Pepper has lost her bone! Around the room there are clues that will lead you to the culprit, or our unsub. Does everyone remember what unsub means?”
“UNKNOWN SUBJECT!” The class shouted in unison. They'd liked that part. Hotch watched Penelope command the class's attention effortlessly and he slipped back into the corner quietly, ready to play his own part. She'd built in a moment of quiet for him.
“Doctor Reid is going to help you guys figure out the clues, I'm going to sit here with Pepper in case anyone wants to talk with her and do a cognitive interview...you know, asking her questions about what she remembers, what happened, that sort of thing.”
The class rushed around desks, first to get to Penelope and her little stuffed puppy to ask it plenty of oddball questions that Spencer had to reign in. “I'm not sure that's relevant to our investigation,” he said when one boy asked if Pepper had sniffed any good butts today. The boys laughed hard and even a few girls tried to hide their giggles.
“Whether or not Pepper has pooped today is probably not going to help you figure out where her bone has gone,” Reid said full of exasperation. Mr. Swanson didn't step in and put an end to the poop jokes, a fact that Reid found more than a little frustrating. He couldn't understand the fascination.
“No! If she went to the park to take a poop then maybe she left it at the park!”
He sighed miserably. “Okay. I suppose that could help us narrow down a geographical profile for our unsub...”
Hotch stood and watched quietly from the back of the classroom. Every so often Margot glanced back at him with a look on her face that said she'd figured something out, she was onto something, but she kept it to herself. He was profiling the kids while they worked, careful to tap his pocket every so often and glance around to see if anyone was even looking at him. So far it was only Margot.
A group of children wandered around the room with magnifying glasses, carefully poking around for clues as to the whereabouts of the bone. On the whiteboard, Penelope and a small group were putting up crime scene photos that looked like glitter bombs had gone off on Hotch's desk. He was a little worried about that but almost like she could feel his eyes boring into her, she glanced at him and winked and he hoped that meant she'd cleaned it all up. None of the kids seemed terribly concerned with the objects on the desk, just the massive amount of glitter that outlined the dog's missing bone from where it had been lying. The next photo was the hallway at the BAU with footsteps in glitter. He patted his pocket and turned to look out the window when one of the children shot him a glance.
“Well,” Mr. Swanson said when they had five minutes left. “Everyone have a seat and let's talk about what we learned. Does anyone think they know who our unsub is?”
The kids clamored into their seats, desks scratching and screaming against the linoleum floor while Reid and Penelope took their places at the head of the classroom. It took almost a full minute for the chaos of the moment to settle into hushed anticipation.
“So, does anyone have any guesses?”
“POOP!”
“What do you mean, Jackson? You'll have to be more specific.”
“I mean she ate her bone and she pooped it out at the park!”
Hotch smiled and shook his head, watching the way Penelope's face crumpled in quick disgust. “No, no the unsub is not poop. Does anyone have a real guess?”
When the classroom fell silent, Hotch stepped forward and walked down the aisle. His heels clicked rhythmically against the linoleum, echoing his thump thump thumping heartbeat. As he passed Margot's desk he tipped his head, indicating to Reid that she might know something before he came to a full stop next to the teacher's desk. He folded his arms over his chest and made himself look a little less...big. He softened his features and scanned the room, smiled at Jack who waved at him happily.
“You,” Reid said, pointing at Margot. “I think you know something.”
She shook her head and glanced, a little hesitantly, at Hotch. His heart almost broke. She was too afraid of him to say what she knew...that he had the bone. She'd caught all of his hints, she was the only one who even looked.
“Would you like to whisper it in my ear?” Penelope asked, her heels clicking quickly along the floor as she made her way to the little girl's desk. “You can tell me.”
“What if I'm wrong?” she asked in a desperate voice.
“I bet you're not. My good friend Agent Hotchner seems to think you know something.”
She looked at him quickly, a little scared and shook her head.
“But if I'm wrong, then I'm falsely accusing someone...”
Hotch straightened up at that and approached her desk. “You're right, but there is no harm in following your leads and investigating the evidence. Sometimes it leads you to the wrong person, but there are ways to rule them out once you get there. For example, you could say it was Doctor Reid who had the bone the whole time. He's been involved in the investigation and leading it the whole time, so he could be moving you in directions he wants you to go to throw you off of his scent. But what could you to do figure out if it was him?”
“It's not him.”
Hotch smiled. “Okay. But hear me out, if you thought it might be him, how could you find out?”
“SEARCH HIM! CUFF HIM AND SEARCH HIM!”
Hotch glanced around to find the boy who had been shouting about poop and shook his head. “That's probably not the best practice and it's likely to get you into trouble. But we could ask him to come to the police station to answer some questions. If we have a warrant we can search his home, his car, or his person, but you have to go through the proper channels to obtain that warrant first. You need to have something called probable cause.”
Margot nodded and stared at her hands. Hotch, distressed by her behavior, crouched beside her again. His knees popped and his head swam dangerously. “You think it's me, don't you?”
She looked at him with her dark eyes wide and nodded very....very slowly. He smiled. A full smile, before producing a little pink bone from his pocket. A small dusting of glitter clung to the tips of his fingers and coated her desk. She stared hard at it for a moment, almost disbelieving.
“You were right. What made you think it was me?”
“You didn't talk to us while we were looking around, and you kept touching your pocket like you were afraid you'd lost something or maybe broken it...”
“Right. I was behaving suspiciously, wasn't I?”
“Yes. You were in charge and then you didn't talk anymore.” She lowered her voice and smiled a little in spite of her fear, whispering like she had a secret to tell him. “I also think you have a headache and you're sad.”
“I think you're a very good profiler,” he whispered back to her, patting her desk and giving her the tiny bone as a souvenir. “Nothing gets by you.”
“Alright class, time's up! Let's thank Agents Hotchner, Reid and Garcia for their time and Pepper for trusting us with the case of her missing bone!”
The three of them walked out together, Reid and Garcia excitedly chatting a few steps ahead of Hotch about how the day had gone. How they should do this again, although Reid did mention he would like some ground rules regarding foul jokes. He was still irritated by all the time wasted on poop jokes.
“I know you guys give all of your boring seminars in universities and hotels and police stations but what about schools? Little kids! This would be so fun! Take this show on the road, just the three of us.”
“And Pepper,” Hotch added, because it had been too long since he'd spoken. Penelope let out a burst of laughter.
“Sir, you were brilliant. Spectacular. Those kids loved you. Like, they thought Wonderboy and I were fun but they were...they couldn't take their eyes off of you!”
Hotch, hot under the collar again, shook his head. “They were scared of me, that's all. I'm sure Jack has told them all stories I'd rather they not know.”
“What? No. No way! I bet a few of them are going to dress up as you for Halloween. They looked at you like you were some kind of superhero.” She may have been laying it on a little thick because he really needed a win. He'd had the worst possible year, the last few months being what she could only describe as a living nightmare, and he needed a win. But she also really thought those kids didn't just like him, they wanted to be him.
“I don't think they were scared of you,” Reid chimed in while they shoved all of their boxes of supplies into the truck of Hotch's SUV. “I think they liked how you got down on your knee beside their desks when they asked questions instead of standing over them. That was pretty smart, it never occurred to me. And how you looked them right in the eye, even the kid who wanted to only talk about poop.”
(x)
“I heard you were amazing today,” Morgan said, scrubbing the last of the dishes from dinner. Hotch was wiping down the counters, his sleeves rolled up to his elbows. His head was throbbing and all he could think about was getting into bed, falling asleep and with any luck staying that way for a considerable amount of time. He was exhausted.
“That's an exaggeration. The children did seem engaged, though. Penelope really had a great idea.”
“I don't know, man. The gallon size Ziplock full of thank you cards addressed to Agent Hotchner says otherwise. Jack brought 'em home in his backpack.”
Hotch, flushing not for the first time that day, shook his thundering head. He remained silent, lost in his thoughts, the trance only broken by the gentle pressure of Morgan's hand settling on his shoulder.
“Hey,” he said, turning Hotch toward him. He could see the wash of tears in his eyes and frowned, confused. He knew Hotch had a concussion and was bound to be a little off for a week or so, but this seemed a little extreme. “What's going on? I tell you that you did great and you're gonna cry about it?”
“There was one girl who figured out that I was the unsub, and she was too afraid of me to say so.”
Morgan almost laughed but held it in, knowing how close Hotch was to complete breakdown. On top of the scuffle with their unsub, he was tired. He hadn't slept a full night in weeks, the nightmares were back and worse than ever. He could appreciate the precarious place they occupied, so instead of saying anything he simply made his way out of the kitchen and toward the mess of cards on the dining table. He'd already read them all and knew exactly which one he needed. They were all nice, some of them canned responses, others silly little drawings of a puppy and poop, all sweet. But he had one in mind. Smoothing his way through them, pushing until he found the one he knew was right, he held it up in front of his face. It was a big red heart with glitter glue streaks and great globs of chunky glitter all over the front.
“Deer Agent Hotchner,
Thank u for being nice to me even when yor sad. I hop you get happie soon and yor hed stops hrting.
<3
Margot”
Morgan read it aloud before handing it to Hotch, little kid creative spelling and all. Helping Jack with his homework had definitely gone a long way toward him being able to decode the words. “This girl? Margot who wants you to be happy? You think she was afraid of you? I dunno man...you call yourself a profiler but I think you're slippin'.”
Hotch, swiping the tears from his eyes with hands that couldn't seem to keep steady, stared at the card. And then at Morgan. His head still hurt but something inside of him felt warm, like all the pressure had been released and he was light. Ready to collapse, maybe, but that suddenly seemed like a very good thing. He felt relaxed.
“Look, man. You aren't wrong. You're fucking intimidating as hell. Your posture is scary, your suits are scary, you brain is terrifying and that frown could make someone piss their pants if they were on the wrong side of it...you're right. But you already know all of that, it's nothing new. And I know how you go out of your way to be conscious of how you come across to victims, to families, to people who are scared, to children. Jack said his class thought you were the coolest and they all want to come over to our house to play. Jack asked if we could have a barbecue so they could all come over. Every damn one of them. You didn't scare anyone today. Except Mr. Swanson, I guess he was a little...”
“He told us not to talk about serial killers in front of children and started to bring up what happened with Foyet.” A little defensive, a little remorseful. He still wasn't sure how he felt about Jack's teacher.
“Yeah. Garcia told me he shoved his foot all the way in his mouth and then went totally silent for the rest of the time. Maybe you coulda been a little nicer to that poor man...Reid said he was wearing a vest with knots on it that he knitted himself? I mean...”
“I'll apologize.”
“Nah. He'll probably make sure Jack gets the best grades in the class. Let him be a little scared.”