Jumping the Gun
Invicta AU: "Aim low." When do you know it's time to cut and run? "Pull back." How did a man as honorable as Booth loose touch with his little sister? "Release." Who ran away first?
A/N: I made a brief allusion to the last time Kelly and Booth saw each other in "Invicta" and I realized before I could go on, I needed to explore that moment and those emotions, so I wrote this little diddy. I needed to know what really happened.
But I'm coming home tomorrow
I wanted you to know
That the part of me that can make you smile
Is the same part that needed to go
Cause nothing that nobody tells you
You figure it out if you can
It's the things that you never get over
That build the character of the man
~"Satisfied Man" Stephen Kellogg and The Sixers
15 year-old Kelly Booth stood in a cloud of smoke across from a pool table. She stood with her legs apart and one hand on her hip, she held her other arm out, holding a pool cue. She locked her thumb and other fingers in a circle and gently rocked the stick around the inside of her fingers. She looked around the bar she was in and wondered how many people in the room actually knew she was under 21. The bartender, who was a close friend, definitely. The bouncer, who listened to the bartender, her friends, but definitely not that guy…. She held back a shudder. He had tried hitting on her several times and every single time, her friend Gary had come over, placed his arm around her shoulder, and steered her away. She laughed inwardly. Her friends may be alcoholic thugs, but they recognized a skeezball when they saw one.
"Kell-lay!" Gary called from across the pool table "Your turn!"
She stepped up to the table and surveyed her options. She took a quick turn around the table and chose her shot. Aim low. Pull back. Release. She smiled as her target rolled towards the determined pocket.
"Now I didn't teach you that." Gary whispered from behind her and she laughed.
"Let me do it, Seeley!" 5 year-old Kelly Booth jumped up, trying to get the BB gun from her older brother's hands.
"Back off, Munchkin." 16 year-old Seeley Booth pushed his little sister away. "You're going to hurt yourself."
"No I'm not!" She insisted
"I'm going to tell Pops." Jared, the middle child at 10, warned from his position on a tree limb.
"No you're not." He said to Jared while swiveling out of Kelly's grasp.
"He's not going to be happy." Jared continued to taunt.
"Shut up, Jared." Seeley shot over his shoulder and aimed for the can sitting on the fence post.
"Seeley," Kelly tugged his arm as he pulled the trigger, causing him to shoot off into the distance
"Damn it, Kelly." He looked down at the little girl, but she didn't see the anger in his eyes. She just smiled.
"Just teach me how." She pleaded "One time."
"You're too little, Munchkin." Jared called from the tree.
Seeley shot a warning look towards Jared and then bent down to Kelly's level and smiled.
"If I teach you how, do you promise not to tell anyone?" She nodded solemnly. "And you promise to do as I say?" She kept nodding. "You promise not to be scared?"
"Oh yes!" She cried, clapping her hands together. "Teach me, Seeley!"
"Oh now I'm telling Pops." Jared jumped out of the tree and Seeley stepped in front of him.
"No, you're not." He threatened, "If you tell Pops, I'll never teach you."
"I know how." Jared stuck out his chin.
"You suck."
"Teach me not to suck, Seeley!" Kelly skipped around him, dancing with excitement.
"Don't say "suck"." Jared and Seeley said at the same time and then looked at each other.
"Fine." Jared gave in after a minute and retreated back to his tree.
"Ok, Kells." Seeley bent down next to her. "Before I give you the gun, we're going to practice, alright?" She nodded as he slid behind her and pulled her little arms out in front of her. "Aim low." He instructed, placing her arms where they needed to be. "Pull back." He put his hands around hers and mimicked the firing of a gun. "And release."
"That's it?" She looked at him impatiently
"Yup." He nodded and smiled
Kelly looked at her watch. Seeley would be home by now, back for leave from the Army, she noted with a hint of longing. She looked around the familiar bar. The Silver Harp was where she spent most of her nights now. Her mother was gone again and her father's wife, Alice Booth, was trying to regain custody. There was a hearing that morning, but like usual, Kelly didn't go. She was so tired of being bounced around, that being a regular at a bar was heaven to her. One place where she was supposed to be, playing pool and drinking an occasional beer with her friends.
Gary called her back to reality again and she went another round at pool. When she stepped back from the table, she heard the bells above the entrance to the bar jingle. Hoping it was a friend, she looked up expectantly and saw the familiar black beret of an Army Ranger.
"Crap." She muttered and her friends looked at her for an explanation. "My brother."
"The sniper?" Her friend Tara looked around the bar. "Where?"
"You think if he was a sniper, he'd blend in a little better." Gary snorted as he pointed to where Kelly was following Seeley's every movement.
"Shouldn't you be running out the backdoor?" Tara asked, taking a step in front of Kelly, blocking her from Seeley's view.
"No," Kelly shook her head. "He'd find me eventually." She handed her pool stick to Tara and smiled weakly. "Time for me to go home."
She grabbed her bag and threw it over her shoulder as she approached Seeley with her chin held high.
"Seeley." She greeted coolly.
"Get your ass outside." He gave her a little push.
"Nice to see you too." She snipped as he held the door open for her and they passed through.
"Do you have any sense of appreciation?" He asked once they got outside into the street. "Do you know my mom has been searching all day for you? There was a hearing this morning."
"Oh," Kelly shrugged nonchalantly. "That was today?"
"I'm taking you home." He walked towards the familiar red Volvo that belonged to his mother, Alice.
"I don't want to go back to Stephanie." She protested, not moving from her spot on the sidewalk
"Jesus, you don't know." Seeley sighed as he opened the passenger door for her. "Your mom didn't pass the drug test. She violated probation."
"She's in jail." Kelly nodded, following his thought. "Where does that put me?"
"Back with us." He motioned towards the car. "Dad's home. May I suggest you get in the car and we'll quietly get into the house before you get into too much trouble?"
"Why are you helping me?" She whispered and he smiled morbidly.
"Because I'm a sucker for a no-win situation." He motioned for the car again, trying to quench his anger. He couldn't explain why, but he was extremely mad at her. Maybe it was because he found her in a bar, maybe it was because she really didn't seem to care. More than likely, it was the distant gaze in her eyes that told him she had been drinking, probably all day. He had no idea why, but he was mad.
She quietly got into the car and he made his way to the driver side. They rode the familiar streets in silence, Seeley casting an occasional glance at Kelly, who was looking out the window, sulking. He pulled into the driveway and before he could even turn off the engine, Kelly was halfway to the back door.
She burst through the back door and stormed through the kitchen. Alice was washing dishes and called her name as she went by, but Kelly kept walking.
"Christ, Seeley," Alice exclaimed when he came in "Where did you find her?"
"You don't want to know."
Kelly was making her way down the hallway when she saw a glow on the floor, coming from her father's office. She stopped in the doorway and turned to look at him. He was hunched over his desk, his severe brow crumpled together in concentration. She got that look from him, she realized, and so did Seeley and Jared.
She was still standing there, contemplating their unconventional family when he looked up. She braced herself for harsh words when he surprised her by not saying anything. She started to smile and say something congenial when he stood up, crossed the room and slammed the door in her face. She stepped back into the hallway and it was then that she saw Seeley out of the corner of her eye.
Kelly turned a quarter turn and took in the sight of her brother leaning up against the staircase with his arms crossed. Gone too long to be any help with her confusion and pain directed at their father, he looked at her blankly. He looked older. His sharp features appeared to be more jagged, more defined. He had lost a lot of weight and somehow it made him seem more intimidating than the warm, kind brother of her distant memories.
She started down the hallway and when she crossed paths with him, Seeley unexpectedly reached out and grabbed her arm.
"Where are you going?" He hissed through clenched teeth.
"To my room." She twisted her arm, attempting to lose his grip, but he clung on. "Let go, you're hurting me." His grip lightened, but he held on tight.
"Outside." He pushed her towards the front door and she had no choice but to go.
Once outside, he all but threw her on to the front steps and quietly shut the door behind them. He started pacing along the front porch while Kelly sat, fuming.
"You had no right to come get me." She pouted, crossing her arms and staring off into the distance
"I had every right to come get you." He stopped and turned around to face her. "I haven't been home in over a year and do you know what the first thing I heard when I got off that plane? "Kelly is missing, go find her." I put my life on the line every damn day and I come home to find you at a bar? Are you stupid?" He raged. He didn't know where the anger came from, but he slowly felt the pressure releasing.
"I must be." Kelly responded after a moment of stunned silence.
"No, you're not." He said with a sigh. "You're not stupid. You're young. You're lost." He stood next to her and leaned against the pillar that held up the overhang. "I have no right to yell at you."
"This is so you!" Kelly looked up at him. "You get mad at me and when I'm supposed to be mad at you, you do something so infuriatingly selfless like admit you're wrong!"
"I'm not supposed to admit I'm wrong?" He asked, amused
"No, you're supposed to pick a damn position and fucking stick with it!" She yelled as she pushed herself off the steps and walked halfway down the front walkway, then walked back. "Be mad at me. Yell! Tell me I'm a worthless piece of shit because that's what everyone wants to do these days! Do it!" She insisted.
"No." He said after a pause and sat down on the front steps. "No, because I'm leaving."
"You're what?" She asked, suddenly even more mad than she was before. "I've got issues and my brother is a fucking martyr."
"Hear me out." He patted the space next to him on the stairs. "I'm going to retire from the Army soon and I'm going to try to find a civilian job. Maybe out in California. Somewhere far away." He looked at her. "I can't get mad at you because I'm about to do what you've been doing: running away."
"I'm so confused." She shook her head.
"Get your act together and then come with me." He looked at her with pleading eyes. "We both just need to get away. I kill people for a living. You're killing yourself."
"Aim low. Pull back. Release." She said softly
"What?" He asked with a small laugh "You planning on actually killing yourself?"
"Aim low. Pull back. Release." She repeated and looked up at him with a pleading look in her eyes. He couldn't read it at first, but quickly he nodded in understanding.
"Where are you?" Seeley asked after a minute "Aiming low?"
"Maybe I'm pulling back." She shrugged. "Waiting for everyone else to release."
"We're family, Munchkin. We're not going to ever get to the release part."
"Yeah you are." She sighed. "Dad's there."
"Dad has been there for a long time." Seeley smiled sadly. "Remember when we lived with Pops?" Kelly nodded. "That's when Dad let go."
They sat there, each lost in their own train of thought. After a moment, Kelly looked up at him with big, round brown eyes.
"I'm not going to be miserable, Seeley." She whispered, "I promise."
"You're making this sound like goodbye." He looked sadly at her
"I'm not strong enough." She shook her head "This bouncing around, not belonging… it's too hard."
Suddenly, the rage that had subsided flared up again. He was offering an olive branch and she was turning him down. Fine. Let her destroy herself. He wasn't going to wait around for her to get her act together. If the Army taught him one thing, it was that life was too short. Too short to hold on to dead weight. He never left a man behind, but this one man, his sister, was fighting too hard to be worth saving.
"Alright then." He stood up abruptly. "Ruin yourself. I've watched men die. In my arms, I've held them and I've watched them breathe their last breaths. I'm through. I've tried to save you since the day you came to us, and I'm through. This isn't me being a martyr, it's me being me. Yes, you're family, but if you're going to insist on being this stupid, this immature, then we're done." He stopped his tirade, seeing that there were tears in Kelly's eyes. He stepped away, almost afraid of how much farther he would go. Silently, he turned around and started inside.
He stopped at the door, angry at himself for speaking to her that way.
"Think about my offer." He said as he held the doorknob in his hand "Think about living with me after I get out of the Army. Start over with me. We both need some redemption and maybe we can find it together."
There was no response. He inhaled slowly and turned around, hoping to plea his case one more time.
She was gone.
..fin..