A/N: I had something bothering me all day. The prompts are allowing it, so... angst it is. Chelsea Lowell and Noah Finney were borrowed, with respect, from Roving Pixels, who called the other side of this from Week Two eerie. (Agreed.)
Bonus - Week Seven - Loss will never not be hard...
Squander
About six o'clock that evening, Chelsea Lowell glanced out the window to see what was going on in the neighborhood as twilight continued to deepen. As first, nothing seemed amiss, but something made her pause. What was it about the darkened windows across the street? "Noah, honey?"
Her partner, Noah, joined her at the window. "Something wrong?"
"I could have sworn I saw Pete going inside earlier when I was doing dishes, and we haven't seen anyone leave since. The lights should be on, right?"
He peered out into the darkness. "They should be. Unless Nora forgot to pay the electric bill, that is, then maybe not."
Chelsea sighed and reached down to grab a flashlight. "I'll go check on them." She kissed him on the cheek. "Be right back."
Aggregate
Checking the front door, she found it unlocked and glanced back across the street where Noah was watching on their front porch. She waved at him, then opened the door slowly and carefully, flashlight on. Finding a light switch just inside the entryway, she flipped it to the on position and frowned when the light came on. "So that's one theory shot. Pete? Nora?" Silence fell and Chelsea cocked her head to one side. Nothing.
She searched room to room, eliminating each one as she went, until she got to the bedrooms and turned the light on and gasped. "Oh!"
"Three point one four..."
She blinked, finally noticing him on the bed, rocking slightly and staring at his mother, slumped in the chair in the corner with her eyes open, fixed. Slowly, Chelsea got in front of him and bent down to really look at him, only to realize that he was staring beyond her.
"...five nine two six..."
Chelsea waved a hand in front of his eyes, but he didn't react. "Pete?"
"...five three five eight..."
Coalesce
He was still on the porch waiting for her when Chelsea exited the house with something in her arms and crossed the street to join him. He blinked when he realized it was Nora's son, mumbling numbers in an odd sequence.
"Take him," she said, and Noah quickly did, startled at how unresponsive he was. "I need to call the police."
"What?"
Chelsea nodded to the house across the street. "The lights weren't on because Pete was sitting in Nora's bedroom in shock. He found her..." She reached up and ruffled Pete's hair, looked at him intently. "I could be wrong, but that sounds like Pi. Three point one four?"
"Go make your call. I've got him." He watched her go, then looked again across the street. All this, and no one would have known, probably, until tomorrow.
"...two three eight four..."
Select prompts from UDC 9, Week Fourteen
Talk
The authorities arrived in flashes of lights atop their patrol cars, and Chelsea greeted them while Noah watched seated on their front steps with Pete still in his arms. The boy hadn't stopped mumbling numbers, but he had restarted the sequence and this was definitely Pi he was hearing. How much in shock was he, that he hadn't come around yet?
A police officer approached, regarded both of them for a minute in silence, and then joined them on the steps. "He's been mumbling numbers like this since Chelsea brought him over here."
The officer nodded. "Not uncommon after a shock like that. Miss Lowell said his name is Pete?"
"Yes. Good kid, really. I learned very quickly that he seems to love taking mechanical things apart and putting them back together."
Cry
The mumbling of numbers stopped suddenly and Noah blinked, then looked down to find Pete looking back at him with large green eyes. "Hey there. You don't need to talk, Pete. Just nod. Did you find her the way she is right now?" He nodded once and then sobbed into Noah's shoulder, and Noah looked at the officer to find him nodding to himself and writing on his notepad. "You don't need anything else from him, do you?"
"No," Officer Santos told him. "That's enough. More than enough."
Silence
In the house with the police officers as they went over it, Chelsea frowned at the book bag sitting on the floor next to the record player and went over to it. Had Pete set his bag down to play a record? She turned the record until she could read it, then frowned again at the song title. No... a nine-year-old wouldn't have been playing that one, or at least she didn't think so. "Weird."
"What is?" One of the officers asked from nearby.
She motioned to the bag at her feet. "He set his book bag down here, but the needle isn't on the record, and the player's not on."
The officer motioned her away and took a quick picture of the record and then the book bag and it's placement. "You're right. That is strange."
Smile
When Chelsea came back across the street, Noah tried to smile, but couldn't. He frowned at the two bags she was carrying. "They let me pack a bag for him, and his book bag."
"Oh." Noah glanced down, shook his head. "Cried himself to sleep. Officer Santos? Can we keep him here for the night? He knows us."
"I think he's had enough for the day without hauling him to the police station, Mr. Finney. I'll go ask my Sergeant." Santos studied Chelsea for a moment. "Are congratulations in order, ma'am?"
"Thank you, Officer," Chelsea told him. "We haven't really told anyone yet. Too soon." The officer nodded and moved off to find his superior.
Laugh
A knock on their door, and Chelsea opened it to find Officer Santos and an unfamiliar man with a clipboard. "Not that I'm not happy to see you, Officer Santos, but..."
"This is Harry Burrows from Social Services," Officer Santos explained. "Given the circumstances, the trauma of it all, he needs to assess the child."
Chelsea studied Mr. Burrows. "Not sure how much you'll be able to assess him, but come on in."
"That bad?" Burrows wondered.
"He was repeating Pi last night, only to cry himself to sleep, sir, and he hasn't spoken yet this morning." She led them to the kitchen where Pete was seated at the table, doing his homework that he'd not done the night before. "Pete, Mr. Burrows wants to talk to you for a bit."
When Pete, predictably, didn't even look up and acknowledge them, Burrows sighed heavily.