You shouldn't be here

Author's Note: Working with a prompt from Week 4 of Febressuary 2022. This is my vision as an alternate future for Ressler where he is happy and has a family post-Liz's death. I also worked with the line "You shouldn't be here"

Let me know what you think.

XXXXXXXXXXX

Don Ressler stood in the paint aisle of the local hardware store contemplating which aqua was the right aqua when he heard a familiar voice.

"Donald!" Reddington said as he sauntered up next to him.

Ressler looked around nervously.

"You shouldn't be here," he hissed. "The owner is also a US Marshall."

"The coffee shop on Griffin and King," Reddington said before he turned and quickly walked out of the store.

Ressler's eyes followed him, noting that he was surprised when he shared the Marshall information. Reddington was off his game, it seemed.

He turned back to the shelf and picked the aqua paint called Caribbean Breeze and went to the checkout to pay. He threw the paint in the trunk of his SUV and made his way to the coffee shop. As much as he didn't want to go, he didn't want Reddington doing something stupid like showing up at his house. He'd told Callie about his past with the FBI but not Reddington, that was still classified, and he didn't want to place her or their daughter at risk.

He'd met Callie three years after Liz died, after he was clean and sober, after he decided to make the difficult decision to move on, after he had decided that he had captured enough blacklisters in the name of Liz that he was free of the list now, after he decided it was better for him to leave. Callie was like the sun had risen in his life again. She was seven years younger than him and worked as a Neonatal nurse and taught nursing at the local college. She was tireless in her drive to share the latest research, practices, and therapies with her students; anything to make the lives of the tiny babies she cared for better. And yet, surrounded by sick babies and scared parents all day she was the happiest person he'd every met. She looked on the bright side of every situation, literally, every situation.

Ironically, they had met in a car accident in Rhode Island. A garbage truck had sideswiped his car, hers, and two others that were also parked on the street. Callie ended up pinned in her car and he had climbed into the passenger seat to keep her calm and make sure she was fine until the EMTs arrived and got her to the hospital. He was in Rhode Island with his mom for a family wedding and had just gone out to grab coffee before taking her to the airport and then making the long drive back to Baltimore. He had quit the FBI at that point and was living and working as a mechanic there. He hadn't realized how easy and freeing it would be to give up the FBI again, but it had been both easy and freeing.

But, as he was leaving the airport and about to head back, something drew him to go to the hospital where he knew she'd been taken and check on her. She was relatively unharmed and asked if she could buy him lunch for taking such good care of her. And the rest was history. After months of him and her flying and driving back and forth between Baltimore and Providence, he finally moved there and opened up his own shop. And one month after they moved in together they found out they were expecting, and now, one year after the birth of their beautiful daughter Maisie they were expecting another little girl and he was buying paint for the room that would be hers in four months.

Ressler walked into the coffee shop and saw Reddington sitting with two cups of coffee on the table already waiting for him.

"You know, I was really getting used to not seeing you, no offence," Ressler said. "You haven't been around for a couple of years…I liked that."

Reddington nodded.

"I've come about Harold," he said softly.

"I'm sorry?" Ressler asked.

"He has cancer," Reddington said softly. "And with Charlene already gone…you need to take Agnes."

Ressler looked at him wide-eyed and swallowed.

"I didn't know," Ressler admitted. "Aram called a week ago and I haven't had the chance to call him back yet."

"It's progressing quickly, it's a matter of weeks…"

Ressler sighed and shook his head. It was wrong that Cooper, after just losing Charlene to a heart attack last year, was now also dying.

"You still call Agnes regularly, and you visit her whenever you're in DC," Reddington said. "I know you have kept up your relationship with her. Would your wife be…?"

"We're not married," Ressler corrected him with a chuckle. "We've been too busy with babies."

Reddington chuckled. "Well, you'll get to that in your own time. But Agnes…"

Ressler nodded. "Of course, but she has friends, she's almost 15, I'm not sure Providence will be easy."

Callie knew about Liz and about her daughter Agnes that Don had a special bond with as a bridge to his past. She knew about his past issues with addiction, his downward spiral after Liz's death, and the rebuilding of his life. She would accept Agnes into their family like she did everything else in her life; with grace, positivity, and love. He didn't doubt for a second when he said they'd take Agnes into their family that Callie wouldn't agree in a heartbeat.

"It likely won't," Reddington nodded. "But you are the best choice, you'll be a good father for her, Donald."

"I thought you'd want…"

"I'm old Donald, and a criminal," Reddington chuckled sadly. "As much as you blame me for Elizabeth's death, know I want nothing like that for Agnes. Your family is what she needs, a mother and father, a home, siblings, stability, love."

Ressler nodded.

"When can you come to DC?" Reddington asked, gathering his hat and starting to stand.

"I can come in the next few days; I have to talk with Callie and we need to get a room ready so Agnes has a bedroom when the time comes…"

"I hear Callie is expecting again? Wasting no time, I see?"

"She's 41 this year," Ressler chuckled. "And I'm not getting any younger."

"You're still young Donald," Reddington smiled at him. "And now your family will be growing by two girls."

Ressler nodded. Of all the things he expected Reddington to come and talk with him about, this was not it. And, when Don walked back to his SUV his mind was swirling with a lot of thoughts about Cooper, Agnes, Liz, Callie, Maisie and the new baby that was coming in a few months. He thought of their small 3-bedroom home and the aqua paint in his trunk—he hoped Agnes liked aqua because it looked like his two youngest girls would be sharing a room and their new, older sister, would be taking the bedroom he needed to paint.

The end.