AUTHOR'S NOTE

Hello everyone. I'm back! This is an idea that's been floating around in my head for some time and I finally got to finishing it. It's pretty long (15 chapters total) but I really enjoy it. This follows my first story, The Truth is in the Lie but I don't think you HAVE to have read that to understand this.

I will be updating once a week with a new chapter. Thank you for reading and I look forward to your reviews.

CHAPTER ONE

Blue eyes dance across the soccer field looking for the object of their affection. Upon seeing the dark haired beauty, they darken slightly, taken aback by the beauty before them.

"Jeez, are you still obsessing Henry?" Dustin Sims asks coming up behind the teenage boy and smacking him on the shoulder roughly. He hands his friend a water bottle which Henry gladly accepts, guzzling a few sips before smiling.

"I'm not obsessing," Henry responds, his eyes still not leaving the brunette who is sitting across the soccer field on a bench, reading something Henry can't quite make out from the distance.

"Have you ever even talked to her?" Dustin asks curious as to why his friend would be so into a girl he had never even had a conversation with. Henry shakes his head side to side sadly, recalling the last time he had gotten the nerve to speak to her but had been stopped by the sudden appearance of his group of friends at his side.

It was a nice day out, but soccer practice for the past two hours had made it seem almost unbearably hot instead. Sweat drips from Henry's shaggy blonde hair down from his forehead to his cheek and he finally moves his eyes to look at his friend by his side.

"I'm just waiting for my moment," Henry admits, starting to gather his stuff in his bag. He couldn't tell the guys he was terrified to speak to Claire Hastings. After all, he didn't want to seem like a wuss to all his soccer buddies.

"Man, if you wait that long you'll never talk to her!" Dustin remarks with a laugh just as the rest of their friends make their way to their side.

"What's so funny?" Max Filmore, Henry's best friend since middle school, asks panting slightly from his last lap around the field before the end of practice. Kyle Thompson, the last of their group taps Max on the shoulder and points out Claire sitting on the bench across the way. Max nods knowingly and throws a supportive arm around Henry. "I say go for it man."

"Yeah, what have you got to lose?" Kyle asks.

Henry visibly stands up a little straighter at the words of his friend. He sucks in a breath, trying to find some composure.

"Alright, I will," the young man remarks, picking up his bag, tossing it over his shoulder and starting to make his way to the bench where the girl he had secretly had a crush on sat.

Dustin, Max and Kyle watch him as he walks. They make their way toward the parking lot, careful to watch their friend but also careful that Henry won't notice them watching.

"Uh, hi," Henry says as he finally approaches the dark haired girl. She glances up immediately at the sound of his voice and closes the book she'd been engrossed in just a few seconds before.

"Hi," the young brunette responds carefully.

"I'm Henry. We are in the same History class," Henry says, sticking out his hand to shake hers. The proper way to introduce himself he had always been told despite his godfather's dislike of the habit.

"I'm Claire," she says shaking his hand with a smile. It helps him relax a little and he even is able to smile too despite the thumping of his heart inside his chest. "How was practice today?"

"Not too bad."

"You looked pretty good out there," Claire says with a nod of her head in the direction of the soccer field and once again, Henry smiles.

"You were watching me practice?" he asks.

The blush creeps on her face almost immediately and Henry is starting to regret asking the question in the first place.

"Well I wasn't watching you in a creepy way," Claire finally replies and the playful nature behind the words allow Henry's reservations to be put on the back burner again as he laughs. She smiles brightly when he does. "I used to play soccer, before I moved here last year," she explains. "But I tore my ACL so I don't anymore."

"Really? My mom used to play too, in high school and in college," Henry admits as he sits on the bench next to her.

"Is she the person who got you into soccer then?" Claire asks.

"Yeah, she started teaching me when I was pretty young."

"What do you think she's saying to him?" Max asks glancing over at Henry and Claire now both sitting on the bench. Kyle shrugs but Dustin laughs.

"She's probably rejecting him," Dustin chuckles out.

As the three boys watch their friend over their shoulder while waiting for their rides home, they are startled slightly by the sound of a horn honking in the lot and they all turn to see that familiar black Federal issued SUV pull up beside them.

"Hey boys, you seen Henry? I could have sworn I was supposed to pick him up," Emily asks rolling down her windows as she approaches the teenagers, not seeing him standing with his friends like she expected.

They all point down by the field and Emily follows with her eyes to see Henry now standing up by the bench, a smile on his face as he talks to a brunette girl.

"Well, I really have to get going, my mom is here," Henry says upon hearing the honking of the car horn and glancing to see the vehicle in the lot. He picks up his bag and tosses it on his shoulder again.

"That's your mom?" Claire asks, standing up as well and glancing at the SUV not that far away in the distance. She sees a brunette woman sitting in the driver's seat and Henry's friends now leaning on the passenger side window, talking with her. "I never would have guessed, you guys looking nothing alike."

"Oh yeah, well, that's one of them," Henry answers as the two of them start to walk toward the parking lot. "That's my mom, Emily."

Henry had never been shy about his family. After all, there was nothing to be ashamed of. Of all the kids he had ever met, Henry knew he was lucky because not only did he have 2 incredible parents, who somehow, despite all odds, remained great friends after their separation, but 2 extra mom's in the spouses of each parent. Sure, he was the only person he knew who had 3 moms, but he also was the only person he knew whose life was as full and filled with love as his.

"Two mom's huh? That's pretty cool," Claire says.

"Three actually."

"Wait, now you've lost me," Claire says with a giggle as they continue to walk, though slower than Henry usually would have done it if he had not had her by his side. Almost as if the longer they take, the longer they can spend together.

"Okay so my mom and dad were together when they had me, but they were never married. Then they split up because my mom fell in love with her partner, Emily, who she later married. My dad remarried too, so I also have Ashley, who's my other mom," he explains, thinking he's done so properly but without too much detail.

"Well Henry, that is honestly, one of the most interesting stories I've heard in a long time," Claire says just before they get too close to the parking lot and his friends. "Thank you for coming over to say hello."

With that, she turns, planning on heading the other direction but Henry, after the conversation finally has the guts to do what he's wanted to do since that day he first saw Claire.

"Hey Claire?" he asks and she spins around quickly stopping to look at him. "I was wondering, would you, I don't know, maybe want to go out with me on Friday night?" the young boy asks, his fear of rejection slightly evident in the tone of his voice and the shakiness of it.

"I'm actually not allowed to go out on dates," Claire says quickly and Henry can almost feel his heart being crushed inside. "But, you know, I could use some help in History, since we have that big test coming up. If you wanted, maybe we could get together and study sometime this week?"

"Really?"

"Yeah, but it would have to be at your house, my mom doesn't like it when people come to ours," Claire explains quickly. There's something strange about the way she rushes the words out but Henry isn't quite sure what it is and he chooses to ignore it, just thankful she wants to hang out with him at all.

"You can come to my house. I'm sure my mom's wouldn't mind."

"Alright, how about tomorrow after practice then?"

"That works," Henry says unable to hide the huge smile now across his face. "I'll see you tomorrow then."

With that, Claire turns back around and starts to make her way toward her house. Henry watches her go for a few seconds before finally turning to the parking lot and practically running to the waiting SUV.

Dustin and Kyle are gone, their rides having come to pick them up and Henry is silently thankful he won't have to put up with their banter about talking to Claire before he leaves. Max is the only one remaining and his best friend just slaps him a high five as Henry swings the car passenger door open with excitement.

"Looks like that went well," Emily remarks as Henry jumps into the car next to her. When he doesn't say anything right away Emily then turns her attention to Max still outside the door. "Need a ride Max?"

"No thanks, my mom just pulled in," Max says pointing at the car pulling up behind Emily's. She waves in the rear view mirror and Max's mom waves back. "Text me later Henry!"

"Alright," Henry says just before Emily puts the car into drive again and starts to move through the parking lot.

"So who was that?" she asks the young man beside her.

She couldn't remember when he had gotten so old. Sometimes when she thought of him, he was still that little boy that dressed up as Reid for Halloween and liked to watch cartoons with her on the couch on Sunday mornings while wearing Spider-man pajamas. Now here he was, taller than she was, just a month away from getting his driver's license.

When she and JJ finally got together after so many years of hiding their relationship, he was still just a little kid. He didn't seem to understand the depths of what was going on between Emily and his mom, all he knew was that his mom was happy. Emily had been slightly concerned about the transition when she first moved in with them about six months later. Henry had just turned 5 and was about to start school and the brunette knew she had no experience with kids, let alone raising one. She, JJ and Will had all talked in depth about what Emily's role would be in the house when it came to Henry, and Emily had been grateful at the time that the conversation had taken place.

They had agreed it would be best if she just continue to treat him the way she always had. As a kid she loved and adored. JJ and Will seemed sure that it would all work itself out if they didn't mess with it or try to force it.

He had grown up calling her Aunt Em, the title of aunt or uncle going to every member of their BAU family the second the blonde boy had been born. For the first few months after moving in, he continued to use that moniker every time he talked to her, about her or called for her. It was like he was getting an extended sleepover with one of his friends and he was really none the wiser about what it meant that Emily shared a room with his mom.

It wasn't until three months after Emily had moved in with them that things shifted, out of nowhere. It was open house night at Henry's school and JJ and Will were planning on going together. But Will had gotten stuck on a case the night of the open house and JJ had used those beautiful blue eyes of hers in order to convince Emily to join her and Henry at the occasion.

Henry was excited, showing them around his classroom, talking a mile a minute and dragging JJ by the hand. Emily had just smiled and tried to stay in the back of the room, not wanting to get in the way and watched them. She got temporarily distracted by another child in the class knocking over some books on a table nearby and went to go help pick them up. But before she could get there, young Henry had latched onto her hand and pulled her toward the art area.

"Mom, come see!" he had shouted, excited, taking off toward what he wanted her to see and back to where JJ was already standing. Emily stood there for a brief second, stunned at the use of the word 'Mom' toward her and even JJ paused, her eyes going wide as she looked from Henry and then up to catch Emily's. "Mom, you coming?" he asked a second time, confirming once again, the usage of the new word in reference to her.

From that day on, Henry had always referred to her and JJ both as 'Mom'. There was no distinction between the two, however somehow they always seemed to know who he was actually calling for or talking about. The first few times he called her that, it always surprised Emily, but it didn't take long before the name 'Aunt Em' had disappeared from her memory. Somewhere along the way, Emily stopped seeing Henry as just JJ and Will's son and instead started to see him as her own.

"That was Claire," Henry responds to Emily's question, making her jump back from her memories of him as a young boy and remember the young man seated next to her. Emily nods, not wanting to push for further information but dying to know it all at the same time.

"She's pretty," Emily remarks. "Is she new, I don't remember seeing her before?"

"Yeah," Henry remarks still clearly lost in thought about his conversation with the girl. Finally he turns to face Emily. "I asked her out."

Emily was so very thankful that she had been at a red light in that moment because if she hadn't she most certainly would have crashed the car carrying them both. It was just another reminder that he was growing up and it hurt her heart just a little.

"That's great bud," Emily manages to say without sounding too freaked out. "What did she say?"

"She said that her mom won't let her date yet," Henry explains and Emily glances at him briefly before focusing again on the road in front of her. "But, she did ask if we could study for History together, tomorrow after practice at our house."

"Well sounds like she said yes to me then," Emily smiles at him and a smile finally creeps on his face too when he realizes she doesn't have a problem allowing the plan he had set into motion to happen.

"So do you think that's okay? I mean, can she come over tomorrow?"

"As long as we don't get called away for a case it's fine with me, but you have to talk to Mom about it too."

"Can't you?" Henry practically whines.

He had always gone to Emily for things like this. It was one of the best things about having so many mom's in his life he thought. Emily had always been the one that went with the flow. As long as Henry was happy, she was and she rarely told him no unless she knew for a fact it would get them both in trouble.

Emily can't help but laugh at him from her seat as she makes the turn into their neighborhood. She pretends to think about it before letting out a sigh and relenting.

"Fine, I'll talk to her," she says as she pulls into the driveway of their house. "But this means that you have to do all the chores she's been asking you to do this week right when you step foot inside the house."

"I will, I swear," Henry says unbuckling his seat belt and leaning over to give her a hug. "Thanks Mom!" he shouts as he exits and shuts the door, practically running into the house before she can blink.

Emily smiles, leans back against the seat and watches him go, thankful for her life and the boy that decided to call her Mom.