Keeping Katie
Don Cragen watched as the little girl who had come to mean so much to him was playing in the yard with the latest litter of German Shepherd puppies. They were old enough to be without their Mom for a few hours at a time and Katie was taking care of them for her and getting them used to people. Her giggling and laughing took on new heights when they bowled her over and tried to lick her face.
Don settled back in the lawn chair and enjoyed the late afternoon warmth of the sun. He had a cold soft drink in his hand and the latest copy of the Golf Digest he'd been reading. He was content with the world right now. Karen had gone to town for groceries and surprises for Katies birthday which was coming up soon. And truthfully, Don was happy to give her some time to herself. She always had some child or another of theirs with her and she needed some down time.
One of the puppies saw him and wandered over toward Don. He set his glass down and put his hand out for the curious puppy to sniff and try to grab. He couldn't help smiling at the animal. It still waddled as it walked and it had big feet. If it grew into those feet it was going to be a huge dog. There was a twig on the ground by Dons feet, he picked it up and waved it in the dogs face. The puppy tried to grab it with his mouth and ended up tumbling over sideways when it lost it's balance. Don laughed at his antics and the puppy tried to grab his shoe laces.
Katie came over and the rest of the litter of 9 followed her. She leaned against his chair and stuck one bare foot out. A couple of them licked her bare foot, making her giggle and squirm. Two of them got into a mock battle soon joined by the others and it was a jumble of feet, legs and flying fur. Katie laughed and put her arm around Dans neck. He put his arm around her as the most natural thing in the world.
They heard Karens truck driving into the driveway. Don set his drink down. "I'm going to go help Mom bring in the groceries. Keep an eye on these rascals, okay?"
Katie nodded and took his chair. The puppies would have gone with him, but Katie clapped her hands and they turned toward the noise gamboling back where she slid down onto the ground and was lost in a sea of puppies again. Don came over to the truck and opened the door for Karen. She slid down the seat and gave him a big hug. "Hey, handsome." She smiled up at him.
"So you still haven't had your eyes checked?" He teased.
"My eyes are just fine. I can see you from miles away." She informed him indignantly.
He grinned. He liked to tease her and get her indignant responses to his teasing. She could be fierce in her defense of someone she cared about. He liked that about her. "Did you get it?"
"They didn't have the right color. He's going to order one specifically for her. I hope it's here in time."
"If it isn't we'll scour New York until we find one. Or I'll put out an APB for one."
"Right, I can see that. Be on the lookout for a…. Hi, Katie. Did you get the puppies put away?"
Katie nodded and came over to swarm up the side of the truck. She liked to see what was going on all the time. Don swooped her up off the truck and set her back down on the ground. "No peeking. You know better. Go open the door so we can get this stuff in, will you?"
Katies eyes were twinkling and she raced for the door. Don leaned over the bed to see what all was in there and say just bags. "The presents are inside the cab." Karen told her. "I figured I'd have to hide them from her."
"Now I see why Katie is so sneaky. Someone else is too." He teased her and stole a kiss.
"Now who's being sneaky?" she teased him back.
"I'm not sneaky. I know exactly who I want to kiss."
"I'll give you all the kisses you want later. Right now we have food to get in unless you like your ice cream melted."
"I'll wait. If I can have all your attention, it will be worth it."
"I had a thought I'd like to talk to you about later. Something that's been kicking around in the back of my brain for awhile."
"Is it trouble?"
"Define trouble." Karen grinned at him, handing him more bags and taking some for herself.
Katie came back out and took two of Dons marching gamely into the house ahead of the adults. The bags had to weigh almost as much as she did. She set them down on the floor and began to dig in them. "Excuse me, young lady. You know better than that. Go tell the others dinner will be in an hour." Karen told her.
The little girl ran for the door. As soon as she was out the door, Don stepped over to Karen and pulled her into his arms. "Hi." he said, kissing her deeply. "Feeling any better?"
"Yeah, it's just stress I think. I'm going to talk to Dr. Sylvery next time I take Katie in. She's seen us enough to have a good idea of the family dynamics. She should be able to give me some pointers as to how to relieve the stress. She's offered before. For right now, this is all I need."
"You let me know what she says, okay?"
"You know I will. We're nearly ready for the picnic, aren't we? Who's coming from the Squad?"
"The Stabler family, Benson, Fin, Munch, I invited the new guy, Lake, but I don't know if he's coming or not. It was nice of you to invite Novack and Huang too. They both said they'd try to make it. Oh, and I heard from Warner. She's going to come with her daughter but she's not sure if her husband can make it."
"That's a shame. So tell me how it works, with the mixture of ranks off duty. I don't want to put my foot in my mouth or something."
"Basically we're all civilians together if we're off duty, but they don't want to do something that'll get them in trouble with me when I'm back at the stationhouse. "It's nothing official, just sometimes things slip you're not supposed to let slip, especially when kids are involved."
"Well, I have plenty of prizes, ribbons, and activities planned so they shouldn't have much time to embarrass the parents. And I have the magician set to come at 1:30. That'll give everyone a chance to eat and sit down to digest while the show is on."
"And that band is going to come here at 3:00. It'll be great for the kids to dance and they'll play for a couple of hours. By then we can pop in the movies and the adults can have some of our music and dancing while they do that. I figure about 4:00 the kids should be getting tired and everyone'll be ready to go home."
"Good. Sounds good. Is anyone bringing a date?"
"Olivia might bring her brother if he's in town. Munch has a cousin who is going through a rough time and he wants to bring him along. I said it's okay. I'm not running a halfway house for relatives, but what could I say? They're a good bunch."
"It's fine, Don. Could you chop up the lettuce for me? I figured we'd have tacos tonight. There so much going to be happening in the next few days, I wanted something simple for a meal. I got several days worth of easy meals. It'll just depend on what we want for dinner."
"Good thinking. So what did you want to talk to me about?"
"I'd like to..." The outside door opened and the kids came pouring in.
"An hour." Don told them.
"Katie told us dinner was ready." Laslo said
"Katherine!" Don said sharply.
Katie tried to look ashamed of herself but it seemed to Don that she was proud of what she'd done. "Dinner isn't ready yet and Katie knew that. Karen, do you need their help?"
"No, I'm fine."
"Either go outside and rest until dinner or do something in your rooms. Not you, Katie. You and I are going to have a talk, young lady."
Katie was uneasy, looking to Karen for help. Karen just shrugged at her. BB led the rest of them back outside. Don pulled up a chair and sat down so he was closer to the girls height. "You lied to them on purpose, didn't you?" Katie looked down, avoiding Dons direct look. "Didn't you?" he said more sternly.
The girl nodded unhappily. She peeked at him from under her lowered head.
Don caught her look with one of his own. "I think you owe them an apology. You got them to come in, knowing they were going to have to wait to eat because you wanted it that way. That's a lie. That wasn't fair to them and I'd be really mad at you if you did that to me. Why did you do that?"
Katie signed something. Karen translated automatically. "I wanted to come back in."
"You wanted to be nosey, to see what we were talking about so you lied to get your own way. That isn't right and you know it. I'm going to have to punish you for this and you're going to have to apologize to them." Katie really was afraid of the word punish. Don picked up on this immediately. "What do you think your punishment should be?"
Katie made a gesture he didn't recognize. "She wants to know if you're going to spank her." Karen said.
"Now you're being silly. You know we don't spank in this house. Hitting is not the answer." Don told her sternly. The first thing you are going to do is apologize and I'll let you know what your punishment is going to be after dinner. Right now, you're going to go into your bedroom and think about what you've done."
Katie looked pleadingly at Karen. She shook her head. "Dad is right. You did wrong and you know it. You have to be punished. Go to your room until we call you for dinner."
Katie ran for her room crying. Don looked over at his fiance. "Thanks for backing me up." he told her sorrowful face.
"It has to be done. This time it's a lie, next time it'd be bigger. I hate being the bad guy, but coming from you this means more than if it came from me. What kind of punishment are you going to give her?"
"I don't know yet. Why did she expect to get a spanking?"
"Her biological father believed in corporal punishment. She doesn't remember much, but she remembers that."
"I'll explain that to her when I talk to her than I don't believe in it either. Have I told you how much it means to me that you refer to me as Dad?"
"I think of you that way. Anyone can be her father, it takes someone special to be a Dad. You are a Dad."
Don smiled and went back to chopping up the lettuce and then the tomatoes and onions when Karen gave him them as well. She made the meat, cheese and put the food on the table, stopping frequently to come and give Don a kiss, which he found endearing. He called the rest of the group in to dinner and went in to see Katie sitting forlornly on her mattress, tears streaking down her cheeks. "Come eat, Katie." He said kindly.
She walked by him and solemnly took her place at the table next to him. All through dinner she kept her head down and didn't eat much. Don noticed Karen biting her lip to keep from saying anything to her about her behavior. He appreciated the effort it took.
When dinner was over the kids were going to get up from the table, but Karen told them to sit back down. "We're having a small family meeting. A problem has come up that we need to discuss. Everyone here has experience with people lying to them or doing the lying themselves. I want each of you to tell me one of your experiences and how it affected you. Either what happened when you got caught or what happened because you were lied to. BB, you start."
"I uh, I got into trouble at school because one of the oter kids had taken a necklace from a desk and tried to pin it on me."
"And what happened?"
"My best friend didn't believe me when I said I didn't take it. It told her I didn't but because I had lied to her before she didn't believe me."
"And you got kicked out of school for a few days, didn't you?"
"Yes. Then they found the necklace in someone elses purse but my friend still didn't want to be friends any more."
"What happened to the thief?"
"She got taken to jail for a whole bunch of things she'd stolen. She never came back to school there."
Katie eased off her chair and snugged herself up against Don. "Laslo, you're next."
They went around the table and everyone had a turn. Laslo spoke about his parents, Barry said his grandfather had been ready to get married when someone spread a lie about him and he almost didn't, so Barry nearly wasn't born. Karen told about the fact that someone lied about her way back when she started this place and she almost didn't get to open and have them all come live with her.
When it was Dons turn he had a hard time choosing which one to tell. "I've seen a lot of people get into trouble for lying. Sometimes they're scared, sometimes they want something they can't have, sometimes they just think lying is a good thing. I remember this one little boy who came into our offices and he said that someone had hurt him and they hadn't. But because he said that other people thought his father was a bad man and they sent him away to prison for a long, long time. The little boy tried to tell the truth but by then no one believed him because he'd lied so much. His father spent a long time gone because he lied. No matter how many times he said he was sorry, that couldn't make up for what he'd done. Lies hurt people."
"Did they ever get to be father and son again?" Karen asked.
"They lived together when the father came home, but can you imagine trying to live with someone who you can't trust? It was really bad for them."
Katie was crying again, signing at a furious rate. Karen called her over. "Katie, come here. Tell me what you're saying again."
Karen turned her so everyone could read her hands. "Katie says she's sorry for what she did and she hopes you all don't go away. She says she won't do that again."
Katie crawled up onto Karens lap and flung her arms around her neck. Karen cuddled the girl for a minute. "But you did do this and now you have to tell Dad that you're sorry. Now he has to punish you. He doesn't want to punish you, but you have to know you can't do that again."
Katie buried her face in Karens neck and shook her head vigorously. Karen peeled her arms down and made Katie look her in the eye. "No. You did wrong now you are going to take your punishment like you should. Look at Dad when he's talking to you."
Don was on the spot and he had no idea of what to give her as punishment. "Katie, I love you, you know that, but I don't like people who lie. I have to punish you. I don't want to, but you won't learn otherwise. Do you understand?" Don told her sternly.
The terrified little girl was nearly a puddle on the floor, trembling so much he was worried for her safety. She nodded, barely.
Behind her Karen made two signals. A K and nine fingers in the air. K-9. Don looked at the girl. "For the next week you are going to clean up the dog droppings in the kennel. All of them." Katie stood waiting for the other shoe to drop. It took her a minute to realize that he was done. She peered cautiously at him. He caught her eye. "Next time I won't be so nice, got me?"
She nodded and grabbed him with both hands when he offered her a hug. He hugged her back, not minding when he saw he was being watched by the others. "Can we go now?" Barry asked gruffly.
Karen threw a balled up napkin at him. "Go. Finish your chores tonight and any homework."
"I'm glad I don't have homework anymore." Barry said.
That caused a ruckus where the other kids were concerned as they left for various chores. They all stampeded out.
"That was well handled." Karen told him moving over to sit next to him on the chairs.
"For now. We'll have to see how it goes. I think we're nipping it in the bud soon enough."
"I know something else I'd like to nip." Don told her in a low voice.
She pretended mock indignation. "Dirty old man! Tell me more."
The phone rang and Don reluctantly let Karen up from where she'd been sitting on his lap and he'd been kissing her. "Just shoot it." He grumped good naturedly.
She grinned and winked at him. "Wesson residence. This is she. Yes. She does? Okay, when? I see, he's sitting right here. Let me ask him." She covered the receiver.
"Can you make an appointment on Wednesday in the city with me?"
"I should be able to. Find out what time."
"What time do you have open? 2, 3:30 and 4:30."
"Four thirty is good for me."
"Four thirty. Okay, did she say what it was about? Okay, thank you, Ellen."
She hung up the phone and looked at him with a worried expression on her face. "What's going on?" he asked.
"I made a casual inquiry to a lawyer about what would it take to adopt Katie. Just in general and she offered to check into it and didn't think it was a problem. I didn't make any firm commitments until I talked to you, but apparently she's found out something that is sending up red flags and she wants to talk to both of us about it."
"You never said anything about it."
"No, it was just something I've been kicking around for a while and it just didn't seem to be a major deal then I met you and, well, here we are."
"Don't get too concerned, love. Lawyers can get upset over the slightest thing. We'll figure it out together."
"If you say so." She said wanting to believe him, settling back on his lap. "Now where were we?"
Don resumed kissing her, but the total relaxation was gone. A part of her was worried.
TBC
