Warning: Character Deaths. This ones a little sad, but I think overall happy, just give it a chance.
Maggie Flannery had a lot of memories, some good, others not so good. Today would become one of the good memories, the ones that made her forget the heartbreak of her childhood. She was smiling as she pulled her car away from the now, much less tense scene, and down the road, done with work for the day. She had just convinced a multiple rapist to release his latest victim, unharmed, and surrender to the police. Her partner had taken primary first and lost it quickly, but she used the talent she inherited from her parents, and the skills she'd developed in the academy to talk him down. Two hours with her partner, eleven with her, but he'd given in and Tessa Maguire hadn't been harmed. What made this moment even better, was that this was twenty-five year old Maggie's first negotiation as primary.
Now she still had time to shower and make it to the anniversary party, but first she had to make a stop. This was a stop she had always promised herself that she would make on the day she had her first successful negotiation. Maggie hadn't always smiled as easily as she did today, and she hadn't had an easy childhood. In fact it was this traumatic childhood that brought her to place she was visiting today.
If there was one thing Maggie could have wished she remembered more, it would be her parents. Her memories of them were limited to foggy images of smiling faces she only knew clearly from photographs. And their voices. More than their faces, she remembered their voices. Her mother singing to her, laughing as she tickled her mercilessly, soothing her after a nightmare; there weren't many memories, but she treasured them nonetheless. There were similarly few with her father; reading her bedtime stories, a conspiratory whisper as they plotted to tease her mother, and showing her off proudly at the CNU.
Then there was one of three days she'd never forget, one that frequently invaded her nightmares.
Twenty-One Years Earlier
Uncle Frank came rushing into her preschool, his still young face serious, stressed. He spoke quickly, almost urgently with one of the teachers, whose smile faded drastically the longer he talked. She asked a few questions, he gave a few answers, a struggle in his eyes as he spoke, looking away from her suddenly, as if seeing her were painful. Within minutes, he'd come toward her, and lifted her up and onto his hip, managing her four year-old frame easily. In two months she'd turn five, but in the next twenty-four hours, her life would change drastically, and a little bit of the child inside her would die.
He'd kissed her head, and buckled her into her father's car with only a quick word to reassure her. She couldn't remember what that was, and never heard it clearly in her dreams. In her mind they'd gotten to the hospital almost instantly, and what she saw as he sped through the hallways, reminded her of watching the world go by through a car window. It was a blur of colors speeding by, punctuated now and again by a doctor rushing around, startling them off their path momentarily. He finally slowed down as they approached familiar faces; Uncle Duff, Aunt Lia, and Aunt Cheryl were gathered outside two closed doors. Aunt Cheryl jumped up when she saw them, and rushed to take Maggie from her uncle's arms.
"Where's mommy and daddy?" She'd asked them, completely oblivious to what their surroundings meant.
"They couldn't come to get you from school today, baby. But, we'll find out soon." Aunt Cheryl promised, her words terribly confusing to a child. She realized as an adult that her aunt hadn't wanted to tell her about the accident until she knew if her parents would make it out.
That began the incessant waiting, which was doubly boring because Aunt Cheryl didn't seem to want to let go of her. She sat back down, but continued to hold Maggie on her lap, arms tight around her. Aunt Lia was beside her, and initiated a hand game to keep her distracted. Her aunt struggled to keep it up, even as Maggie giggled when their hands missed. When she grew tired of that game, Uncle Duff switched spots with her aunt and began playing the 'got your nose game'. They were still waiting when the window down the hall got dark, and she fell asleep in her aunt's loving arms. She woke up still curled around Aunt Cheryl, with Uncle Frank stroking her hair; her eyes closed again soon after.
The next time she opened her eyes, she was being switched into new arms, sliding again into Uncle Frank's strong embrace. She watched her aunt get up, and walk away a few feet to talk to a man she'd never seen before. Aunt Lia and Uncle Duff were behind her, listening to the conversation, and when she looked up at Uncle Frank, he seemed to be listening with his eyes. She saw Aunt Lia fall into Uncle Duff first, burying her head in his shoulder, wrapping her arms around his neck. It had frightened her, because adults don't cry. Aunt Cheryl looked over at her and her uncle and shook her head, and Uncle Frank's body seemed to sag with the weight of that headshake. Aunt Cheryl took her from him again, and sat down with her, staring deeply into her innocent brown eyes.
"Maggie, you know how I said that Mommy and Daddy couldn't pick you up today?"
She'd nodded, figeting a bit, sensing something bad was coming.
"That's because when they were in their car, another car hit theirs, and they were hurt very badly. Do you understand that?" Aunt Cheryl was breathing deeply and closing her eyes, struggling to maintain the ability to speak.
"Yeah, Ben Fraser was in a car accident, the doctors put a blue cast on his arm. Do Mommy and Daddy get casts?" She looked up, big coffee-colored eyes staring into her aunt's.
"No sweetie. Your mommy and daddy were hurt really badly, so much so that the doctors can't fix them." She had paused, waiting to see if the little girl understood. "That means that they died Maggie." She'd held on of Maggie's hands, and kept the other arm around her, supporting the little girl.
Maggie had shaken her head back and forth furiously. She'd known what that meant, her pet fish had died a year ago, and she'd never seen him again.
"I want Daddy! Mommy! I want to see Mommy!" She wailed pitifully.
"I'm sorry baby, you can't see them for a long time." Aunt Cheryl had told her, voice raw from trying to hold back her own tears.
"No! I want Mommy and Daddy!" She yelled, tears streaming down her face, wriggling in her aunt's lap, until she finally collapsed against her, arms her neck, face buried in her shirt.
She did know how long she cried, but she remembered feeling her aunt's wet tears drip on to her shirt, and knew for certain then, her mommy and daddy were never coming back.
Her aunts and uncles took her back to her home that night, and tucked her into her own bed, figuring it would be best for her. She'd had several nightmares that night, but Aunt Cheryl and Uncle Frank took turns running to get her. Aunt Lia and Uncle Duff had gone home to be with there own daughter, who was a year and a half younger than Maggie, and had been with Lia's mother all night.
Maggie couldn't remember how many days passed before the funerals, and couldn't even remember much of the funerals themselves. Her parents had gotten full honors from the FBI, and she remembered the gunshots; she'd hated the loud, jolting noises. She remembered meeting her grandparents from New York, two old people she'd never seen before in her life. They made a half-hearted attempt at getting custody of her, but in the few days they hung around after the funeral, Cheryl made it crystal clear that she'd fight them tooth and nail. It wasn't Emily's parents having custody of Maggie that she'd objected to, but she knew they take her back to Albany, rather than stay in LA. No one in Albany knew Matt and few remembered Emily; in LA, Maggie would have four aunts and uncles who loved her like their own, and loved and respected her parents, as well as a building full of FBI employees that could tell her stories about how wonderful her parents were. In the end, it wasn't a fight that her grandparents wanted to wage, and they'd left for Albany within a week.
She'd also met her Uncle James, who had the same eyes as her Daddy, the same chocolate orbs she'd inherited. He'd never burried the hatchet with Matt, but after his brother's death made a point to be part of his niece's life. In their wills Emily and Matt left custody of Maggie to Cheryl, a provision they'd set shortly after she was born. Matt's parents were dead, Emily's lived in Albany, Matt didn't talk to his brother, and there was no way in hell Emily would ever let Allison near her daughter. In the end it hadn't even been a question, Maggie loved her aunt, and they trusted their friend implicitly. Maggie had moved in with her aunt, who'd been unable to stomach the thought of living in her dead friends' house, even though that might have been easier on Maggie. Nothing had been easy about the months that followed anyway. Maggie had nightmares regularly, and cried for a while after them; she missed her parents terribly, and had refused to celebrate her fifth birthday.
Eventually, it had gotten better, and her aunt became a wonderful surrogate mother. Sloan's added a picture of Matt and Emily to their small collection of photographs of fallen comrades. They were sitting together in a booth, Matt's arm around his wife, Emily's elbow resting on the table, hand intertwined with his, both looking completely comfortable together, and alive. Maggie became a regular fixture at the Bureau, and doted on as the only link to her parents, who were sorely missed.
Now Maggie walked among the plots of gravestones, winding her way to the spot that had become all too familiar to her. She had to walk through a patch of older stones in the back, from the 1800s, passing the stone that marked the death of two infant twins in May of 1814. Then through a few rows of newer stones from the nineties, until she finally arrived at two identical plots with a joined headstone. Even after all these years, seeing that stone still made her cry. She couldn't remember much of them, and she hated herself for forgetting them. Through her tears she picked the weeds away from the stones, laying one of the bouquets she'd purchased in front of the stones instead.
"Hey Mom, Hey Dad. I did it today. I finally got the chance to negotiate as primary, and I did it, HRT didn't even have to go in. Jim Binder was there watching today, he said I sounded just like you, Mom." Her voice broke, as her tears came harder.
"But, he told me that I acted like you dad, 'borderline reckless' is what he called it. Uncle Jim told me I got the best of both of you, that you'd be proud if you could see me. I don't care if you can see me or not, I just wish I could remember you better." She wiped at her eyes, her vision growing blurry from the tears.
"The other day I was trying to remember that night you celebrated your sixth anniversary. I had just turned four, and I was in the bedroom with you while you got ready mom. Dad was still at work, stuck from a negotiation. It was funny, daddy, you didn't want to be late, so you had Aunt Lia run your suit to the office so he could get ready right from there. Even though you'd been together for so long, you were still nervous Mom. You said you wanted to look nice for daddy; you left your hair down in curls, because you knew he liked it." She took a deep breath again, struggling to continue the story through her emotions.
"Then we went out in to the living room to wait for daddy, and dad, in you come through the door. She stood up and walked over to meet you, and after six years of marriage, she still took your breath away. Then Uncle Frank pushed in the door, my babysitter for the night, and he told you to close your mouth or you'd get flies. I remember laughing at that, and then you both kissed me good night, and left for your date." She paused again, to wipe more tears from her eyes, and sniffle back a sob.
"That's it, that's the clearest memory I have of you, and it's not enough." She traced the names on the gravestone with her fingers, barely brushing the hard surface with her fingertips. It was an action was that was very familiar to her; she was surprised that the etched words hadn't become filled with her skin cells. She got up from her position crouching on the ground, and weaved her way through more of the gravestones, second bouquet in her hands. She found her way to a second grave, seven years younger than her parents, and in some ways, more difficult to visit. Like she had earlier, she pulled the weeds from around the stone, and rested the bouquet in front of it.
Her voice cracked immediately. "Hi Aunt Cheryl."
Seven years after her parents died, when Maggie was twelve, the second day she would never forget happened. But this time, it wasn't the hospital she remembered best, but her beloved aunt's funeral. She knew her Aunt Lia came to get her from school, picking up her own three children at the same time, but depositing them with her mother, rather than take them to the hospital like she had with Maggie. She remembered that they waited a long time, and she'd been very quiet. Then like a bad dream played over again, a man she'd never met came over to Aunt Lia, who'd walked a ways away from Maggie to talk to him. Then much like Aunt Cheryl had seven years earlier, Aunt Lia told her that her parent was dead. She found out later that their HT had come out shooting, wounding two HRT agents, and killing Cheryl and another HRT agent.
That was it, the extent of the detail she remembered from that day, but the funeral she remembered as if it happened yesterday.
Thirteen Years Earlier
She didn't want to talk to anyone, didn't want to see anyone, didn't want the kisses on the cheeks, sympathetic head strokes, or pitying looks. The way they all looked at her, the sad little girl who lost her mother and father, and now the aunt that had been her mother for the last seven years. She hated the looks they gave her, and pretended not to notice them looking at her. She didn't cry during the funeral ceremony, even as they lowered the casket into the ground. Her eyes were dry as everyone tossed roses onto the coffin, and she suffered through another round of the kisses, strokes and pity. Then the gravedigger had tossed the first shovel-full of dirt onto the coffin, and when she saw that dark clump of earth hit the shiny maple-brown coffin, twelve year-old Maggie broke.
She burst into full on sobs, tears streaming from her face, and took off, running from the cemetery. She ignored the sounds of her uncles and aunt calling after her, and began running through the streets of Los Angeles. She felt sick in her stomach, a familiar pain twisting in her gut, dulled only by the burn registering in her muscles as she pushed them harder. When she couldn't take it anymore, she collapsed, gasping for breath, tears still streaming from her eyes, on the front steps of the house she'd lived in with her parents. She wasn't sure how she'd ended up there, but was what she needed at that moment. She knew she'd be moving again, this time probably into a group home for children, as another addition to the foster care system. This thought both frightened her, and left her somewhat relieved. And she sat on those steps, of a house that likely now belonged to some other family, crying, until Uncle Frank found her.
"Hey kid, you scared us half to death, disappearing like that. Do you know what time it is now?" He panted, sitting down tiredly beside her. The funeral had been in the late morning, and it was dark now, LA still lit with streetlights and the blinking, flashing, scrolling bedlam that is a city.
"Don't care." She wouldn't turn to look at him.
"Yeah, I caught that. Interesting place you chose to visit." His eyes traveled, looking around at the familiar house.
"So?"
"Well, I'm going to call Uncle Duff, tell him to call off the search. You just let me know when you want to start using more than two words in a sentence." He turned away, and as promised, made that phone call, assuring the worried man that she was fine.
"When do I have to move?" He put away his phone before answering.
"Your aunt and uncle want to give you a few days to pack before they move you in. You'll be sharing a room with Ella, and she's excited to have you."
"What?"
"Well, we all agreed that if anything happened to Aunt Cheryl, Uncle Duff and Aunt Lia were going to adopt you. We aren't sending you to Albany to live with your grandparents; we'd miss you too much, and they don't know you. You'll also need a woman to be able to talk to as you become a teenager, not some bachelor like me. And, if you think for one minute we'd send you to live with your mom's sister, you're underestimating your mom's ability to come back from the grave and strangle us." As far as all of them knew, Allison didn't even know she had a niece.
That elicited a small smile from her, but her face soon turned serious again. "I'm not living with Aunt Lia and Uncle Duff."
She said it in such a firm tone it startled him. "And why not?"
"Because I'm not!" She shouted before getting up, and walking away.
"Maggie, hey stop right now, and you tell me why you don't want to live with your aunt and uncle." He demanded, surprised by her abrupt mood change.
"Because I don't okay!" She was angry and on the verge of crying.
"That's not an answer Maggie. Come on, tell me what's wrong." He crouched to her level, looked her in the eyes, and saw fear.
"I'm cursed." Her bottom lip trembled and she bit it to control it.
"What?" He hadn't expected to hear that.
"Everyone I live with, everyone who I love dies. I don't want Uncle Duff and Aunt Lia to die." Tears dripped down her face as realization dawned on her uncle.
"Maggie sweetie, you aren't cursed, and well, I can't promise you nothing is going to happen to Lia and Duff, but I can promise you that if it does, it won't be because of you. You parents and Aunt Cheryl, that had nothing to do with you. Some drunk in his car killed your parents, and Aunt Cheryl was killed on the job, a risk she knew and took. You didn't cause it, and you weren't the cause of it. Okay?" Maggie nodded at him, tears still rushing down her cheeks.
"No, I need to hear you promise me that you believe that. You can't blame yourself for this." He waited for her to promise, still looking in her eyes.
"I know, I promise. It just doesn't feel that way." Her arms were around his neck in seconds, and she was crying into his suit.
Maggie had more clear memories of her aunt that she did of her parents, and she was more conscious of her loss, better able to understand it. Ironically, the same age her father had been when his mother died. Another picture went up in Sloan's, Cheryl sitting at the bar with a half smile, and dubious expression on her face. A picture found its way into the CNU too; also taken at Sloan's, featuring a smiling trio. Cheryl was again seated on a stool at the bar, turned out, and Matt sat on the stool next to her, also turned out toward the camera. Emily stood between his legs, angled perpendicular to him, his arms around her waist, one of hers around his shoulders. It was a photo Maggie frequently found her eyes wandering to while she worked in the office.
She remembered times with her aunt vividly. Trips to the park when she was little, when in the summer they would get ice cream, and in the winter hot cocoa. Then there were those times when her aunt would take her for a visit at work, and show her off, as if Maggie were her own child, not some charity case she'd adopted. Her favorite memories were of those quiet nights at home, when Aunt Cheryl would pull out a photo album to use as visuals, and tell her stories about her parents. These of course were all G rated stories, no negotiations, no delving into her parents difficult pasts, and she never got the opportunity to tell Maggie the story of how exactly they all learned her parents were involved. Uncle Frank told her that story years later, enjoying every moment of it.
"I negotiated as primary for the first time today, and I talked him into a surrender, he didn't even hurt his hostage. I always told you I'd become a negotiator just like you and mom and dad. Uncle Jim told me I sounded just like mom, but I hope I sounded a little like you too." She looked down, watching her tears splash against the flowers petals.
"I still miss you so much…the guy who shot you was up for parole a couple of weeks ago, after only fourteen years. I had to testify again like I did with the guy who hit dad's car, tell the parole board what he took from me…I made them cry. But, I guess a sob story like mine will do that…I hope the bastard never gets out." Her voice cracked, and she sniffled.
Her phone suddenly began singing madly from her pocket, and she took a few breaths before she answered it.
"Hey, you better get on your way home, Uncle Frank is going to have a stroke he's so worried, Uncle Jim told him you left the scene forty-five minutes ago." Ella's voice hit her loudly through the phone.
"I'm fine, I just had to make a stop."
"Yeah, I expected as much. I told him you were fine, but you know Uncle Frank, he's always been extra-protective of you." Ella was the only one that knew that little promise she made to herself.
"Tell him to relax, I'll be home soon."
"You got it."
Maggie had moved in with her aunt and uncle a few days after her aunt's funeral. Her mother's parent's didn't make it to the funeral, and didn't even attempt to get custody this time. Just as Uncle Frank said, she shared a room with her cousin Ella, whom she'd grown very close to over the years. They'd grown up from that point as sisters, but it was as if the lack of blood relation kept them from fighting. Maggie lived in that warm home until she graduated high school, and left for college. That was her third memory that she would never forget, and the only happy one of the three.
Seven Years Earlier
Once she'd gotten her diploma, pulled the goofy blue cap off her red curls, and the school released the graduates from their control forever, Maggie went to find her family. Her three uncles, aunt, and three surrogate siblings had all come, and when she found them, Aunt Lia was crying. Ella smartly decided then that that was an appropriate time to take her younger siblings to the refreshment tables, and let the adults have a moment with Maggie. When they'd gotten ready that morning, she noticed her cousin had a certain amount of melancholy on what should have been a very happy day. It wasn't the first time she'd seen it, and she knew it would appear again, but figured it best if her parents tended to that void.
"Maggie, you looked so much like your mother up there," Lia told her, grabbing her face and kissing her cheeks, hugging her tightly. When her aunt finally let her go, they all saw Maggie's tears.
"Everybody else parents are here," she said simply. It was the same heartbreaking reality that she felt on all celebratory occasions. Christmas, her birthday, Thanksgiving, her prom, her middle school graduation, the awards ceremony at school, where she'd proved she'd inherited her mother's brains. Parents were supposed to come to all those events and support you, but hers couldn't even be at her kindergarten graduation. She would have even be happy to have Aunt Cheryl there, the woman who'd loved her and raised her for seven years.
"You know they'd be proud of you if they could be here." Lia squeezed her hand.
"Yeah I know, I just…" She didn't know how to explain what she felt to them; she missed her aunt, and the pain of never getting to know her parents was a sore that would never heal, but it was more than that.. Brushing her shoe through the grass, and not looking at anybody, she tried her best to melt away. Everybody had looked at her with pity as she walked to get her diploma, even this many years later, and it always pissed her off, though she couldn't figure out why. If she ever saw someone with her past, she'd probably pity them too, so why did other's sympathy bother her so much?
Then it hit her like a runaway bus, as she stood there, her family surrounding her. Sure, she'd had it rough over the years, and occasions like this were bound to hurt like hell as they brought her loss to the surface. But, the truth was she was lucky as hell, maybe even the luckiest person she knew. She lost her parents and had an aunt to save her from foster care, and love her like she was blood. When her aunt died, another aunt and uncle stepped up to take her, saving her from the LA foster system again. They gave her a brother and two sisters, two adults who treated her as a fourth child. She had two uncles who adored her, and never let it forget it. On top of all this, she could walk in the CNU floor of LA's FBI building, and be embraced by the people there. People who respected her parents and her aunt, and who never tired of sharing stories of them. Sympathy and pity should be saved for those who need it.
She threw her arms around her aunt, and each of her uncles in turn, moved by her realization. "Thank you for being here for me."
"We wouldn't have missed this for the craziest HT in California," Uncle Frank grinned at her.
Today she walked into the house she'd spent six years growing up in, which was packed to the brim with the party in full swing. She had helped plan the party with her three surrogate siblings and Uncle Frank, and was supposed to have been helping with last minute preparations hours ago. Unfortunately, she was talking her HT at that time, and had to skip it. Now she was swept into the room filled with familiar friendly faces.
"Hey Maggie, Jim told me you were great out there today, would have made your parents proud." Drew Temple raised his glass to her, as she thanked him and continued walking.
"You know he's right," a familiar voice answered cockily, pulling her into a hug. "You made us all proud today, kid."
"Thanks Uncle Frank. Were Aunt Lia and Uncle Duff surprised?" He'd kept the couple busy while their children decorated the house to celebrate their twenty-five years of marriage.
"Floored, in fact I think we better scratch the surprise part for their fiftieth; they'll be way too old to weather that shock." He grinned.
"Yeah, and you'll be even older," she teased him.
"Aww, Maggie you beating up on your favorite uncle?" He grabbed his heart in mock pain.
She smiled an rolled her eyes, before kissing him on the cheek and heading deeper into the house, in search of the couple they were celebrating. She found them sitting on the loveseat in the study, her uncle with his arm around her aunt, who was holding a framed eight by ten. Tears were rolling down Lia's cheeks and Duff was wearing a pained expression as they examined the photo. Maggie recognized the frame and knew what it was immediately; a beautiful, clear shot taken on their wedding day. The frame held a candid of the wedding party smiling and laughing in between shots, enjoying the sunny weather and happy occasion. It would have been a challenge to find a day where they were all happier than that one.
Lia and Duff were a step above gleeful to be celebrating the love they shared with all their friends. Frank had already made a date with one of the wedding guests, and had a smile that couldn't be erased. Emily had been thrilled to find she'd slimmed down enough to fit into a nice dress, her baby fat gone after only a few months. Matt was happy beyond his wildest dreams to be a husband and a father, and had engineered a few surprises in the 'Just Married' Beamer that he knew the bride and groom would enjoy. And, Cheryl couldn't believe how close they'd become over the years, and was on cloud nine with a new boyfriend. But now, twenty-five years later, half the wedding party was dead.
"Oh sweetie you made it," Lia wiped at her eyes, and got up from the couch, embracing her 'fourth child'.
"Yeah, I had my first time as primary today…" she suddenly looked puzzled. "or last night I guess. We got called a little after midnight."
"And it went well?" Her uncle asked as he wrapped his arms around her.
"Yep, the hostage wasn't harmed, and the HT surrendered." Maggie suddenly found herself nervous, eyes staring at her shoes.
"Oh, so that's what Frank was beaming about." Duff commented matter-of-factly, as his wife took on an expression of sudden understanding.
Lia's eyes started to water again, and she pulled Maggie close to her again. "If only your parents and Aunt Cheryl could see you now…Maggie I'm so proud of you."
Her aunt placed a soft kiss on her head, and stepped back to look at her, hands over her mouth like a mother overcome with pride in her child. Uncle Duff took her place, holding tightly to the young woman who had been born his niece, but become his daughter. Maggie felt a few warm tears hit her shoulder, both joy for her accomplishments, and sadness for the people who'd never see what she'd become turning him emotional. Maggie released the breath she'd been holding, and felt her body relax; she was secure where she was right then. With her family.
Not much to say here, like I said, a little sad, a little happy. Hope you all enjoyed, thanks very much for reading, and please review!