Author's Note: I had this idea stuck in my head for a while and yes, I know Tom's mom didn't seem this way at all but I just rewatched thepilot and decided I wanted some continuity. That and I like blaming parents for things.

Play Date

Chapter One

Ms. Joyce Booker met Ms. Margaret Hanson on a foggy October evening in 1988. Believe it or not, and as bad and terrible and pathetic as it sounds, they met at a singles group where, like in most singles groups, there were no decent men available. There were a few, of course, that had the audacity to hit on both women, to touch their shoulders or their thighs inappropriately, to assume that just because it was indeed a place for singles to meet, the singles wanted to be met, and ultimately this mistake on the behalf of the male gender led to the inevitable bonding of two fed-up women.

"My husband and I split a while ago, while all my kids were still at home," Ms. Booker said over the rim of her cocktail. She wasn't quite drunk yet, but she was getting there. Her speech and her movements were gradually slowing with each delectable sip. "Irreconcilable differences."

Ms. Hanson nodded sadly, her eyes glazed with sympathy, understanding, and inebriation. "Hard on the kids?"

Joyce rolled her eyes to the ceiling, parted her lips, harmonized every single one of her features into a look of exasperation. "Was it ever. It didn't seem so hard for the younger ones, but my Dennis… He just…he distanced himself. Became a real handful. And he could never tell me why."

Ms. Hanson took a drink, nodding. "My Tommy was a little angel from the moment he came out of the womb straight through to when he left home. Not that I'm bragging…he got teased at times for not knowing what the other kids knew. You know, about rock music and the latest fashion trends. I felt at fault for keeping him so isolated. He was the patented mommy's boy. He seemed to get over it a little when my husband died, but I don't think he fully got over it until he got away from me."

The two women sat in silence for a long time, wallowing in their self-loathing, their collective failure at motherhood. Then Ms. Booker raised her glass and Ms. Hanson clinked it.

And from that moment on, they were friends.

"Doug, give me a hand here!" Tom Hanson groused from his position on his hands and knees, attempting to collect the contents of the file that he had just spilled on the floor. He worked quickly, but it seemed the passing feet, the everyday motion of Jump Street Chapel had him scampering and reaching farther and farther for each piece of paper. "Doug!" he yelled once more, but he might as well have been yelling to his once-deaf, now-dead grandmother.

"Penhall went to Rocket Dog," Dennis Booker said casually from his desk, flipping a page of some arduous music magazine he was reading, his feet propped up on the wooden surface.

Tom clenched his fists and his jaw, heard a crack resound from his knuckles. "Why?

Dennis shrugged. "Is Penhall not human, Hanson? If you prick him, does he not bleed? If you starve him, does he not abandon work to get greasy hamburgers at bad fast food restaurants?" Sighing in an exaggeratedly exasperated way, Booker added, "How the hell am I supposed to know?"

Tom chose not to respond as he collected the last of the lost papers and shoved them into the folder.

"Hanson, you missed one," Sal Bonducci scolded playfully, coming out of nowhere and shoving the true last paper into the frazzled officer's hands.

Tom scrunched his brow, asked, "Where the hell did you come from?"

"A maintenance engineer appears whenever he is needed."

"Where were you two minutes ago?"

Sal shrugged, grinning. "Well, I wanted you to see what my job was like. Let's call it my gift to you."

Tom made a noise of frustration in the back of his throat and stomped over to the filing cabinet to put the file back in its rightful place. It was a terrible day. He was bored out of his mind and stuck doing mind-numbingly tedious work because he wasn't on a case right now and Doug, for some reason, seemed to think it okay to abandon him at any given moment.

"Hanson!"

Tom stood at attention at his captain's yell, his eyes darting to Adam Fuller's thin frame standing commandingly at the threshold of his office. He waited for the signal to come in, but instead was treated to, "Your mother's on the phone!"

The chapel seemed to go quiet for a moment before it broke out into the sound of soft snickers. Booker grinned at him tauntingly.

"Oh shut up," Tom snapped in his rival officer's direction before shuffling over to his desk and picking up his phone. "Yeah?"

A female voice came through the line. "Tom, it's Mom."

"I know, Mom. Fuller made that pretty clear when he yelled it out to the entire room. What's up?"

"Nothing really, honey."

Tom waited, tapping his foot impatiently on the chapel floor, as his mother continued on about work and fixing up the house and this oh so delightful friend she had just made. Judy Hoffs and Harry Ioki were just coming in, discussing their case. Booker set down his magazine to jump into the conversation and Tom rolled his eyes. He hated the way that bastard interacted with his friends. Sure they were a little less antagonistic towards eachother now, but Tom still couldn't help feeling like a nice little doggy who had just marked his territory and trotted happily off, only to turn around and see some pitbull whizzing in the exact same spot. Pitbull. Maybe Dennis looked more like a Doberman…why was he thinking about this?

Doug came back in, a telltale drop of ketchup still on the side of his lip, and sidled up to Tom. Tom shoved the phone in his hand.

"Talk to my mother," he ordered, marching off in the direction of the group. He heard Doug ask, "What's up with him?" into the phone, and Tom really didn't know what was up with him, but his legs propelled him forward.

"Hey, Hanson!" Judy smiled. "Fun day at the office?"

"Don't rub it in. How's your case going?"

So instead of listening to his mother go on and on about home décor and middle-aged friendships, he listened to the far more interesting police babble of his good friend Judy Hoffs, and his other good friend, Harry Ioki. He liked how their eyes were on him when they talked and not on Booker, because what right did Booker have to be there anyway? Eventually, Fuller called Booker into his office to discuss the tying up of loose ends on Booker's most recent case, and Doug joined the trio and they became four and it was just like old times, like it was meant to be all along.

"You're going to your mom's for dinner tonight," Doug told him.

An incredulous look. "And I agreed to this when?"

"Well, I agreed to it for you, because she invited me along, too." And at Tom's amazed look, Doug shrugged and explained, "She's your mom, so she has to be a woman right?"

Jaws dropped. Tom hit Doug in the arm. "What are you trying to say?"

"Well I mean, I haven't had homemade food in a real long time and she's your mom. She's a woman. She makes good food."

A smaller hand hit Doug in the arm. "Oh, way to be sexist, Penhall," snapped Judy. "Women aren't always good at cooking."

"It wasn't sexism!" Doug argued. Then conceded, "Maybe it was a generalization, but hey! It doesn't make it any less true that Hanson's mom is a goddess when it comes to the culinary arts. Right, Hanson?"

Tom hesitated for a moment, but it was inevitable that he would agree, "Well, she is good…"

Five-thirty that afternoon found Dennis Booker alone in his apartment. He didn't mind it (being alone, that is) because when he was alone there were few distractions and he could sort a lot of things out. He could mentally shuffle through cases, mull over suspects, think about which leggy blond or sultry brunette to call for a night of physical company. Physical, that is, because Dennis Booker is perpetually alone in his head.

He thought about Vicky from Saturday night as he searched through his freezer for a decent TV dinner. Vicky. He could practically taste her when he thought her name. Neither a blond nor a brunette, but a cute little redhead with porcelain skin who could do lovely little things with her hands, her legs, her-

"Damn it!"

Well, some things did distract Dennis Booker when he was alone. Dennis Booker could easily distract Dennis Booker. In his memory of Vicky, he'd forgotten that his microwave was busted and had been pressing buttons for about three minutes before realizing that they did absolutely nothing.

After scanning the back of the package, he turned up his oven to 400 degrees and waited.

He thought about Mandy from Monday night while it preheated. Then he thought about Mindy from a week ago and how mad Mandy had been when he had called her Mindy while they had been, you know…engaging in some carnal gymnastics.

Right before he got to put his dinner in the oven the intercom buzzed and he irritably dropped the little plastic tray on the countertop, silently promising it that he'd be right back even though he wouldn't be.

"Yeah?"

"Dennis? It's Mom."

"Mom?" He couldn't have heard that right.

"Yes, Dennis. Can I come up, please? It's cold."

He didn't really want her up there. This was his alone time with his TV dinner and thoughts of girls he had slept with and might even call again because they were just that fun, but he buzzed her in anyway because a guy just can't so no to his cold mother and feel okay with it. Even if you were Dennis Booker and you liked yourself a whole lot and didn't like anyone else very much at all you couldn't say no to your cold mother.

And then there she was, glancing around at his untidy apartment, and smiling whenever she looked at him, which irritated him to no end.

"So…what are you doing here?"

"We don't talk enough."

Then she was sitting on his couch, her hands planted nicely in her lap and Dennis couldn't help but think that this place was no place for any mother let alone his own.

"There is a thing called a telephone, you know."

But she was shaking her head. That was his mom, always shaking her head over something or other.

"Not intimate enough. It's been too long since I've seen your face…are you going to sit down or do you really want me out that badly?"

Dennis sat.

"Just…why?"

"I wanted you to come to dinner with me and a friend. I thought it would be a good chance to catch up." His mom seemed a little more relaxed now and allowed her hands to stray to the sides of her lap, and the next thing he knew she was holding up a pair of lacy black panties which a half-second later he was snatching out of her hand and shoving behind him.

"Um…sure, I guess." Decent food, he thought. Decent food and decent TV dinners were completely different things. "Are you paying?"

"She's cooking." His mom, still a little disturbed from the provocative female undergarments she had found on her son's couch, shifted a moment; put her arm on the arm rest.

"Ah. So she's your age?"

"Don't sound so disappointed."

"I'd be more disappointed if she were my age."

That was true, too. The last thing, and he meant it, the very last thing he needed was his mom setting him up on blind dates.

"You'd actually think I'd do that?"

"I don't know. You still might be trying to make me as wholesome as you are. Marry me off…get some grandchildren out of the deal…buy them candy and really cool gifts trying to make them love grandma more than grandpa…"

"I wouldn't do that, Dennis. You're too young to get married."

"I'm twenty-three, Mom."

"You're still young." A moment later she added, "There's something poking into my back." And reaching behind her, she pulled out a sequined red bra.

Dennis took that from her, too.

"So, dinner?" he asked.

"I'll drive," she said.

Tom Hanson was feeling slightly perturbed at his mother's house. It was like a flashback to childhood. Tommy, set the table. Tommy, sweetheart, do you think maybe you could button up your shirt? Oh, and tuck it in? Oh, honey, you really need a haircut.

His saving grace was a goof of a fellow named Doug Penhall, who punched him lightly in the arm every time he felt the need to strangle his mother. Tom Hanson loved his mother dearly. Devotedly. Unconditionally… But he thought he had left this behind.

It was one of these dinners again. With one of his mother's woman friends where she would parade him around in his buttoned-up tucked-in shirt and they would coo and say, Oh, look at Tommy. Little upstanding citizen. Helped my Billy with his geometry homework the other night. Oh, Margaret, why don't they play together more?

And Tom never had the heart to tell them that 'Billy' was prone to pushing him into lockers and threatening him with swirlies.

"You okay, man?" Doug asked. "You look kinda pale."

"I'm fine," Tom replied. "But it was a grave mistake you made. Agreeing to this."

"Goddess of the culinary arts," Doug insisted as he had insisted the past three times when Tom had told him that this had been a grave mistake.

And not wanting to talk to his mother, Tom led his partner to the living room, to the piano, and proceeded to teach him to play Chopsticks. Eventually, the music turned into a terrible cacophony which led to his mother coming in with a camera saying disgusting things like, isn't this sweet, and taking many pictures of grown-up Tom with his grown-up friend, Doug, sitting on a piano bench.

And then the doorbell rang.

"Oh, they're here," his mother said.

"Oh, they're here," Tom mimicked when she was out of earshot, then looking to Doug, derisively reiterated, "Grave mistake."

And instead of the normal reply, Doug whispered, "Your mom's usually pretty cool, Hanson. What's with her?"

"She wants to impress her friend."

"Meaning?"

"I have to be perfect."

And with a glance, a split-second of steady eye contact, Tom knew that Doug now understood fully the moment he had first stepped into Jump Street Chapel decked out in his police garb with shining shoes, and initially his longing to be prep school material, the detailed notes he took on each case, the i before e except after c on each case report.

"I guess we better go out there," Tom said after a moment, hearing voices come from the dining room. He moved to get up, but Doug's hand brought him back down.

"Wait a second. Do I have to be perfect?"

Tom snorted. "Doug you and the word perfect are kind of like…the result of you and me playing Chopsticks on the piano. You just…you're too much of a jarring sound to be actual music."

"I'm not music?" Doug Penhall sounded hurt.

Tom patted him on the head in a demeaning way, but his smile was playful.

"To me, you're a symphony."

"Awwww." Doug clutched his heart, batted his eyelashes coyly. "Really, Tommy? I always knew you liked me. Honestly, always."

"Shut up."

And with that, they rose and made their way to the dining room.

Where Dennis Booker was sitting in a chair. A chair placed before a plate that Tom had set down with his own hands. A plate that sat between a knife and a fork which he had carefully laid out to match the setting across from it, fork on the left, knife on the right, glass above the fork, Dennis Booker was sitting in his mother's house about to eat his mother's food and Tom Hanson had been preparing himself to be perfect but like hell was he about to be perfect in front of Dennis Booker, that bastard that liked himself too much.

"Shit, you've got to be kidding me."

TBC...

Reviews are nice.