Wow. I really need to finish one story before I start another, but I can't stop the ideas! This came to me when I came up with the title of one of my chapters for my other NCIS: LA story, and I couldn't get rid of it, so I just had to write it out. And now, over a year later, it's finally done. I need to get help for my procrastination problem =/
Gotta say, that season premiere: awesome!
Disclaimer: I do not own NCIS: Los Angeles
THE THING ABOUT THE PAST…
It started with a flinch.
It was so minute, Sam wasn't even sure he had seen it, but when he felt the slight tremor beneath his hand, and saw the tension set in his shoulders, he knew it to be true.
Which brought up a whole other set of questions. He had been partners with Callen for almost four years. He knew all about the other man's past, the questions he had about who he was and where he came from; he knew about the nickname that wasn't really a nickname, but a letter, a simple placeholder for a name that he didn't actually know, because no one had ever told him. Now he wondered if he knew anything at all. Because that was a definite flinch.
Callen had hinted at some things, but he had never given any detail, and Sam had never asked. And because hindsight is twenty-twenty, Sam now realized just how much of an idiot he had been. He was in law enforcement: he knew the statistics on abuse in foster homes.
But because Callen returned to normal almost immediately after he had taken his hand away, Sam kept quiet. He ignored the event, thinking that if his partner didn't want to bring it up, it should just stay buried. After all, the man had been a federal agent with multiple agencies for well over a decade. If it hadn't been an issue before, why would it be now?
So Sam stayed silent. And he watched. He kept one eye tuned to his partner, but he acted no differently; if it was something Callen wanted him to know, he would tell him.
XXX
It was two weeks later, and Sam was at an impasse. He had spent fourteen days observing Callen closely but discretely, and he was surprised at how many signs he had been able to see. He wondered how long they had been there. And he wondered how many other people had missed it. He wasn't sure he wanted to know the answer.
But when the opportunity came up, he couldn't just let it pass. The two of them were relaxing in Sam's living room, each one holding a beer bottle as they pretended to watch the television that was sitting directly across from them.
"What's up, Sam," Callen asked, somewhat resigned. The intonation made it more of a statement then a question. He had been a federal agent for years; he had noticed his partner's watchful eyes for the last couple of weeks, and it was starting to annoy him. If there was a problem, he needed to know what it was, before it interfered with the job.
The ex-SEAL glanced over at his friend and almost winced. He was one of the best agents NCIS had to offer; it was too much to ask for the man to not notice something. He sighed, and picked up the remote, pressing 'mute'. "We need to talk, G," he replied as the room fell into silence.
"You breaking up with me?" Callen smirked, taking a swig of his beer.
It was that cavalier attitude that set Sam's teeth on edge. The way he refused to admit that anything was wrong. Sometimes he thought that the other man really didn't care about his own health or wellbeing. Like he had been told so many times that he wasn't worth caring about, that he had actually started to believe it. Sam had to admit, it probably wasn't that far off the mark.
Callen watched his partner out of the corner of his eye. Damn it, the man wasn't going to let the joke stand. That meant something was really wrong. And it was probably something he wouldn't want to talk about, or Sam wouldn't be so serious. He exhaled, and leaned back into the couch, throwing one arm casually over the back. "What's up?"
This was the hard part. Sam looked down at the bottle in his hands, twisting it absentmindedly as he organized his thoughts. To his credit, Callen waited patiently, recognizing that the other man needed some time.
When he was ready, Sam looked back up. "You flinched," he said simply.
That caught Callen off guard. "What?" was all he could think of to say.
Sam swallowed, and made sure to meet his partner's eyes as he spoke again. "Two weeks ago, I was trying to get your attention, so I touched your shoulder. You flinched."
Shit. Callen remembered that moment. It had been a long time since he had been caught off guard enough that he would react like that to an unplanned touch. He had just talked to a contact, and was looking for a file. He had been so focused that he hadn't heard Sam's calls. But that touch…
All it had taken was one touch, and he had been catapulted over two decades into the past, when any kind of physical contact was synonymous with pain.
Damn it. It had taken so long for him to stop reacting that way, and he was proud of how much he was able to suppress. His fellow agents believed the mask, and most days, he did too.
He tried to shrug if off. "You startled me, that's all…" He trailed off as his partner shook his head.
"That's not it, G," Sam interrupted. "You were trembling. What was that about?"
Callen looked down, at his own beer bottle. "It's nothing, Sam, you're overreacting."
"Am I?" Callen remained silent, still not meeting the former SEAL's gaze. "That's not the only time," Sam continued, "I've been watching. I don't think it's a conscious thing, but you do it a lot."
Callen thought up a string of expletives; he really thought he had been doing well. Clearly, he was mistaken. He wondered if anyone else had noticed.
As if reading his thoughts, Sam spoke up again. "Relax, G, you're good at hiding. I only noticed because I was looking for it."
A knot of tension eased in Callen's chest. At least he didn't have to worry about explaining anything to Kensi or Deeks. Hetty, he was certain, already knew almost everything. Not that he had told her, but that was just what she did. Sometimes, he actually believed she was psychic.
He shook his head. "Why does it matter?" he ground out with an air of forced casualness.
Sam raised an eyebrow. "Are you serious?" he shot back. How could his partner not see that it could be an issue? "What if it interferes with the job?"
He stopped when he saw the brief contemplative look flash across his friend's face. It was almost… confused. He waited.
"That's not what I meant," Callen finally explained, voice quiet. He refused to look up, trying to keep himself focused, and specifically not think about just what this conversation might uncover. "I mean, why does it matter to you? Why do you care?"
That froze Sam in his seat. So many lifelong insecurities were bared in that simple question. And part of him was hurt. After all the years they had been friends, he really thought Callen knew him better than that. Finally, he was able to thaw out enough to respond. "How can you even ask that, G? We've been partners for four years. You know you're my best friend… and I thought I was yours. Do you honestly think I don't care about you?"
Callen was silent for a while. He couldn't put into words what was going through his mind at the moment. Intellectually, he knew that there were people out there who cared. He worked with them every day, and he knew they were there for him. Because they were family. But he had been alone for so long, sometimes he forgot that he didn't have to be anymore.
He took another sip of his beer. Lowering the bottle, he kept his eyes fixed on it as he replied, "What do you want from me, Sam?"
"I want you to tell me what happened," the former SEAL all but growled. "I want you to talk to me. You know you can talk to me, right?" He trailed off into a softer and more hesitant tone.
Callen couldn't do this. He needed people to believe the lies. He couldn't handle someone seeing past the mask; no one could realize just how screwed up he was. "There's nothing to talk about, Sam," he retorted, using his 'don't mess with me' voice.
Of course, Sam knew exactly what he was doing, and refused to be swayed. "Don't give me that bullshit, G," he shot back. "I know what I saw. How far back does it go?" Callen, caught off guard by the statement, remained silent. Sam lowered his voice, trying to sound serene, soothing, the way one would calm a frightened animal. "Why didn't you ever tell me?"
They both knew exactly what he was talking about. Callen sighed. "I told you some homes were worse than others," he replied, completely devoid of emotion.
"How much worse?" There was no answer. Sam shifted slightly so that he was closer to his friend. "How much worse?" he repeated, somewhat desperately.
The senior agent was torn. He didn't see why they had to talk about this. He had shared. Not much, but he had definitely told Sam things. He finally had his life to himself, and he didn't want to go back to a time where a raised hand meant another bruise, another morsel of pain, or one phone call could send him to more unknowns. He had spent years afraid to speak, afraid to move, afraid to be himself.
How could he satisfy his partner, while still keeping all the old feelings and emotions locked down? Finally, he decided on partial truths. "I've talked about it," he replied hesitantly.
"When?" Sam challenged.
That annoyed Callen. He claimed to know his partner, and yet he couldn't remember the conversations they had had, the stories he had told? "Interrogation room, the counterfeiting case," he replied shortly.
Sam paused, and thought back to the case in question. That had been the one they had worked with Agent Giordano. They'd had the friend of the victim at the boathouse, unwilling to talk. So Callen had told him a story…
Shit. He remembered that story. He also remembered thinking it was just a tale, designed to make the man talk. They had all thought that. "That was true?" he asked, almost a whisper. He couldn't even begin to imagine what witnessing something like that would do to a child.
Callen nodded absentmindedly. "I was twelve," he replied, just as quietly. "I had only been in the house a week or so, but Jay and I were already pretty close. He was a couple years older than me, almost like a typical big brother." Callen paused self-consciously, as he realized what he was saying. The point had been to get Sam to back off, without going too into detail. He coughed, and turned back to the television, still playing some bad sitcom; it was almost funnier to watch on mute. "I'm not a weapon, Sam."
That confused the ex-SEAL. He raised an eyebrow in question, but didn't reply. After a moment, Callen risked a glance at his friend. He sighed, and elaborated. "I'm not something you can just fix. You can't take me apart if I'm not working properly, identify the problem, solve it, and put me back together. It doesn't work that way."
Sam honestly didn't have a response to that. He watched, dumbfounded, as Callen grabbed both of the now empty beer bottles, and returned them to the kitchen; he returned a minute later with two more, which he unceremoniously opened, using the edge of the coffee table. Setting one down in front of Sam, he brought the other to his lips, and took a long sip.
The two stayed in silence for several minutes. Sam couldn't figure out how to continue, after Callen's last statement. Was that really how Callen saw it? Was that how he saw it?
It wasn't until the bottles were half empty that Sam worked up the nerve to speak again. "We've been partners for four years, now. You know you're my best friend. Why didn't you ever tell me? Not just little pieces of information whenever it comes up… Why didn't you ever really talk to me?"
The question hung heavily in the silence that followed, as did the hurt that laced the ex-SEAL's question.
Callen sighed, twisting the beer bottle around in his hands as the contemplated his situation. Finally, he came to a decision; Sam was right: if he couldn't trust his partner, who could he trust? There was no denying the fact that the other man was his best friend. Hadn't he already proven he wasn't going anywhere? So what was holding Callen back?
At this point, the agent figured it was more about self-preservation than anything else. He had buried it all for so long, that it was just simpler to leave it that way.
"I meant it, Sam," Callen finally replied, voice quiet and pensive. "You're going to try and solve every little problem, one at a time, probably make a list and check each one off until you finish, but what happens when you finally realize that it can't be fixed? I was broken a long time before I met you, and a few years of friendship isn't going to change that."
"You didn't answer my question," Sam said once it became clear that Callen was done speaking.
The other man let out a half snort that sounded slightly less stable than Sam was used to. If he had to hazard a guess, he would imagine that his partner was on the verge of losing it. Maybe if he gave the man a little nudge, they could finally get somewhere. He doubted Callen had ever really let go. He just took each negative as it came, gathered it in, and buried it. The problem with that approach was that, eventually, it had to go somewhere. Sam was slightly impressed that Callen hadn't already broken down. He knew that his friend didn't meet any of the typical molds, but he knew that, like anybody else, if he actually made an effort to talk about it, to work through it, he would finally begin to heal. He needed to realize that none of it was his fault, and that it didn't have to define who he was. As brilliant as his partner was, Sam didn't think he had ever really grasped that fact.
"I'm not Nate," the ex-SEAL continued in an almost whisper. Callen jerked slightly, not quite looking up at his partner, before his eyes returned to the bottle in his hands. "I'm not going to quote stupid shrink phrases, about how talking helps you heal – even if I believe it will – because I really don't fancy having to explain a black eye to Hetty tomorrow."
Here, Callen let out a snort. He truly loved how much his partner understood him… sometimes. Sometimes, it was just a huge pain in the ass. Strangely enough, he was feeling both ends of that spectrum in this conversation; it was starting to get confusing, and he had a vague feeling of whiplash, from the way his emotions were going back and forth.
Sam paused to watch his partner for a moment; Callen seemed to be responding slightly to the promise that he wouldn't try to psychoanalyze him. "I just want to make sure you realize that you're not alone. I'm here, I always have been, and I always will be. First and foremost, you're my best friend. I don't want to fix you, because I don't think you're broken."
The silence hung in the air for several minutes. Sam was content to wait for Callen to respond, knowing that the ball was in the senior agent's court. Finally, he heard a whispered response, so quiet he wasn't sure the other man had even spoken. "That's because you don't really know me."
Sam raised an eyebrow. "Don't I?" he challenged. Callen jerked again, in something that could most likely indicate a negative response. Sam shifted so that he was facing his partner more head on. "Your favorite color is blue. You pretend to love sushi even though I've never actually seen you eat it willingly. You prefer wine over beer any day, though when we're alone like this, you'll always give in to my preferences." Callen looked up and met Sam's steady gaze as he continued, "Your favorite ice cream flavor is vanilla – 'nothing wrong with the classics', as you say; you love old movies, and hate the beach, even though the majority of places you lived before settling here were within fifty yards of the water. You could be classified as a 'closet geek', even though you pretend to know nothing of technology or science, leaving that field to Eric and Nell, but I know that you're not clueless. You like to pretend otherwise, to give Eric his chance to shine. You want him to be happy, and feeling like he's superior, in some small way, to us, accomplishes that. I know that you act aloof, and standoffish, but you know your team better than most leaders. You know what makes Kensi tick, you know how to push Deeks' buttons… and you always know exactly what I need."
Callen waited until it seemed like Sam was done talking, before he jumped in, trying to make his point. "How old was I when I got my first speeding ticket?" Sam just looked at him blankly. Callen sighed. "Did you know that the officer let me off with a warning, because I was late picking up a couple of my younger foster siblings, whom I wasn't supposed to have to pick up anyway, but our foster mother was going to attempt to drive completely shitfaced, so I had to wrestle the keys from her and shut her in a bathroom?" Sam shook his head slowly, wide eyed. Callen laughed mirthlessly. "How about the time I got into a fight with Barry Wilkins, because he was making fun of one of my foster brothers; I got sent to the principal's office, while Barry got to walk away, because I was the weirdo. The freak in foster care. And when I got home that night, well let's just say that my foster father made the black eye and split lip from Barry look like party gifts. Or how about how I got this?" He asked, pulling his shirt down slightly at the collar, revealing a smattering of old scars across his shoulder and neck. They were faint, but clearly there, and at least fifteen years old, probably more. Sam was looking slightly sick now, and Callen moved his gaze away, subconsciously going back to the television, which was now showing a commercial for some sort of air freshener. His eyes glazed over as he spoke again, each word unknowingly acting as a punch to the gut to his partner, who felt like he had learned more about Callen in the last four minutes, than the last four years.
"How about Donald Dekkar? Know about him?" Sam shook his head absentmindedly, and Callen responded with a derisive snort, his eyes still glazed, though suddenly much harder than they had been a moment before. "I didn't think so. Not even Hetty knows about him." He broke off suddenly, ashamed of himself for letting his anger override his common sense; no one was supposed to find out about that, the black hole in G. Callen's history. He had tried his best to forget… Fuck, he just wanted to forget. Dekkar had been the final straw for him. The final nail in the coffin for the child G. Callen. In one night, that… man… had killed him. And what had emerged from the ashes was a hardened survivor.
"What happened?"
The query was quiet, probing, but held no urgency. Sam clearly wanted Callen to answer on his own terms.
The senior agent sighed, almost inaudibly, and looked away, jaw tightening slightly, the only outward sign of the tension that wracked his body. Though if the former SEAL were to place a hand on his shoulder, he would be hard pressed to ignore the tremors, or the taut muscles.
The silence stretched on, as the muted television show ended, and another episode began. Callen seemed to have turned into a statue, his outward demeanor showing no sign of the inner turmoil.
After a full five minutes, the agent finally moved. Without a backwards glance at his partner, he got up off the couch, and walked outside, closing the back door of the house rather forcefully behind him.
Sam's eyes filled with worry, his gut clenching as he watched his partner retreat – run away. Shit. Times ten. He knew Callen had been running pretty much his whole life, but now he thought he might grasp just how much of an impact his past might have affected the man he had spent the last four years working with.
He waited a few minutes before following his friend, draining his beer bottle and setting it down on the coffee table on his way out.
He found Callen sitting on the grass in the backyard, staring up at the stars. While Sam watched, he emptied his own beer bottle, and casually tossed it to the side, where it fell over, rolling a foot or two, before coming to a rest. Callen bent his knees, propping himself up on one hand, while the other arm rested across his knees.
It wasn't a Callen that Sam was used to. The Callen he knew was restless. Always moving, always doing something; his partner wasn't a man who liked to stay still.
But the man in front of him… this wasn't his partner. Except that it was. Maybe this was the real Callen, the one he thought he knew, the one he was slowly learning that he didn't really know at all.
Because that past was always there. Buried, hidden, but always there, simmering, just beneath the surface. Callen could pretend otherwise, and Sam had always just followed his lead; he trusted his partner, and he trusted him to know his limits, and to deal with it when it got to be too much.
Maybe it was time to change that approach. Because this just wasn't working anymore. Sam wasn't content with just being a spectator anymore. And Callen wasn't just his friend. He was family. Sam had never really admitted it, out loud or to himself, but Callen was like a brother to him. And it killed him to see his brother hurting so much, and being unable to do anything about it.
So Sam walked over and sat down next to his brother. He said nothing, simply copied the other man's position, and looked up to study the view that had his partner so captivated.
The light pollution from the city severely cut down on the amount of stars they were able to see, but if he strained, he could make out a few.
Callen knew when his partner had joined him – he kept putting off greasing the hinge on that backdoor, mostly because it warned him of company – but he made no sign of recognition until the ex-SEAL had joined him on the grass. After a few minutes of silence, Callen sighed loudly, leaning back so that he was lying down, hands cushioning his head as his eyes closed briefly, pushing back the dark thoughts until they were barricaded behind the wall he had erected so many years previously.
"I was fourteen."
It was soft, a muffled statement that barely made its way passed the hand he had been rubbing across his face.
Sam looked down at his partner, but didn't speak. He sensed a changing tide, some shift in his friend's thoughts, and realized that whatever happened tonight, it would change their whole dynamic. Whether for the better or worse was yet to be determined, and Sam knew he would have to tread carefully. Just because Callen had decided to share, didn't mean he was out of the woods just yet.
Speaking quietly, haltingly, and hesitantly, Callen began to tell his partner, his friend, his brother, about the final nail in the coffin for the child that was G. Callen. He had dealt with a lot of shit before then, but he had still been able to retain just a little bit of the youthful innocence most children had. Until Dekkar.
"I was the oldest. Karen was twelve, Noah eight, and William was six. Donald was…" Callen paused for a moment, trying to gather himself, feeling suspiciously like he was coming apart at the seams. He took a shaky breath to steady himself. "He was a bastard. I knew it within five minutes of entering his house." He closed his eyes now, the memories coming fast and hard and threatening to overwhelm him. But he clamped down and pushed it all back, as much as he could. He had started, and damn it, he was going to finish. "It was the first time I was put in the big brother role. Before that, there was always someone older than me. I had had some experience protecting younger kids, but I had learned by that point that foster parents who were inclined towards that type of behavior tended to go for the oldest kids, the ones who were more likely to be defiant and troublesome. Dekkar didn't even need an excuse. He liked to drink. A lot. And while he didn't have the best disposition sober, when he was drunk…" Callen shuddered again, as one particular memory surfaced, and he remembered the long night he spent trying to find a position to lie in that wouldn't aggravate the two broken ribs, or the dislocated shoulder. He had popped it back into place himself, but it wouldn't stop throbbing. In the bed beside him, little William was crying, and trying hard to hide it. It had been the first time Callen had deliberately put himself in the warpath, in order to protect someone else.
Sam listened as his partner spoke, horror growing quickly, starting in his gut, and moving up until he thought he might throw up. He listened as Callen talked about throwing himself in front of a flying lamp, as he deliberately provoked a drunk asshole so that an eight year old boy wouldn't get hurt, as he struck back, for the first time, threw his first punch, so that a twelve year old girl wouldn't lose what remained of her childhood. His stomach dropped horrifically as his best friend said the one thing he had been hoping he wouldn't hear, that he had never even thought might be a possibility, until now.
"He told me to choose." Callen swallowed, and a tear threatened to fall, the first since that night, all those years ago. "He said it was either me or her. And I felt like her protector, I didn't want her to have to go through that. Karen was still innocent. Dekkar was her first foster home, and I didn't want her to lose her childhood just yet. Not like that." He paused for a moment, as the tear fell, down the side of his face and disappearing into the grass. More tears followed; for the first time, Callen felt safe enough to let it out. He felt like he was ready to let it go. He sighed, and his breath hitched, before he managed to get it under control enough to continue speaking.
"I was actually going to let him do it," he admitted softly, ignoring the sharp glance Sam threw at him, but unable to disregard the pain and fear in his partner's gaze. "Until we got to his bedroom. He locked Karen and the boys in their rooms, and then he took me to his room. He hit me across the face, and I fell to the ground. When the spots cleared, he was unbuttoning my jeans. I just sort of snapped. I started fighting back, but he was stronger… I didn't really stand a chance."
He stopped again, unable to continue as the tears started to flow, fast and thick. Sam made a motion to move closer, but stopped before he had gotten two inches. Instead, he settled back, and waited.
After a few minutes, Callen was more in control, and Sam felt it safe to speak. "What happened next?"
Callen shrugged. "I was pretty out of it, so I'm not exactly sure. From what Karen told me in the hospital, she had used some skills I had taught her, and picked the lock on her room. She called 9-1-1, and the police showed up while Dekkar was doing his best to make me one with the floor." He glanced over at Sam, noting the rigid posture, and the worry written clearly across his tense shoulders. "He didn't get a chance to do anything more than beat me up," he assured his partner. "I spent about two weeks in the hospital, and Dekkar was arrested. We were all shipped off to different homes, and I never saw any of them again. I did look Karen up though, a few years ago. She's a prosecutor now. I thought about actually seeing her, but I chickened out."
"Why?"
Callen shrugged again, just one shoulder lifting slightly. "After it all happened, I just wanted to forget. I figured, she'd probably feel the same way. I didn't want to bring that all back for her."
Sam did move forward now, and lay down on his side so that he was facing his partner, propping his head up on one hand as the other idly played with the grass in front of him. "G, you saved her. Surely, she'd want to see you again."
Callen grimaced. "Maybe," he acquiesced, but he didn't sound like he believed it.
Sam let it go, for now. "What made you decide to tell me now?"
Callen made an expression that was half smirk, half grimace. "You've never asked before," he replied.
And there it was. So simple, and yet so complex. Because Sam hadn't asked. He had always just assumed that his partner would share whenever he was ready. But maybe Callen had just been waiting for someone to look a little deeper. Maybe he had been waiting for someone to show him that they cared.
It made total sense, in Sam's mind. Callen wasn't the type of person to share. He had obviously learned early on in his life to keep his emotions locked up. He had probably had that lesson beaten into him. Sam mentally winced at that thought.
He had probably locked it all up behind a barrier and done his best to forget about it. Sam was surprised it had worked this long, but he knew his partner was a stubborn bastard.
Callen was always surprised when people showed him they cared. He didn't know how he, with his SEAL mentality, and Callen, with his lone wolf tendencies, had managed to work together for so long, but he knew he would never be able to find a better partner. He had known for years, about Callen's upbringing – well, knew in general terms, because apart from a few particulars, he had never really heard any specifics – but it had never interfered, unless you counted those aforementioned lone wolf tendencies, so he had been content to leave it at that. He felt like an idiot.
"I'm sorry," he tried to apologize, but Callen shook his head.
"I'm glad you didn't ask. I probably wouldn't have told you, anyway. We've worked together for years, and I trust you more than I've ever trusted anybody - except Hetty, but that's different. But trusting you with my life, and trusting you with my past are two completely different things. I've never really gotten close enough to anybody to really and truly believe that they wouldn't leave, if they knew the truth. Until now."
Sam swallowed against the threat of tears. He had never felt as honored as he did in that moment. Every medal and commendation he had received paled in comparison to hearing that his partner held that level of trust in him. So clearly, he must have been doing something right.
He didn't think a 'thank you' was the right thing to say here, so instead, he said the only other thing he could think of. "I'm always here, G, if you want to talk."
Callen smiled slightly. "I know," he replied, turning his head slightly to look at his partner. "I don't know when, or how long it'll take, but I think eventually, I'll be able to tell you more. I appreciate you not pressing, Sam, more than you'll probably ever know."
Sam nodded. "However long it takes, I'll be there. And I promise, G, I'm not going anywhere."
Callen's smile widened. "I know," he said again, turning back to look at the stars again.
And Sam, still watching his partner, knew for the first time, that his best friend actually believed that he wasn't alone. He knew that Callen had finally taken that last step towards healing. He was letting someone in. Not all at once, and maybe not completely for a while, but it could only go uphill from here.
And for the first time in four years, he truly believed that his partner would be all right.
I think my Sam and Callen are slightly OOC, but it's what came out, so I didn't try to fight it.
This story took almost a year and a half to write, mostly because I kept hitting walls, or coming up with other ideas for stories that took over, but it finally happened! I hope you all like it, and please REVIEW!