JACK IN THE MIDDLE

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"I don't know Pen," Emily said with a sigh. "Jack hasn't given us a date yet."

"Em, I need to know. Derek wants to go out to Chicago."

"I know," Emily promised, twirling the phone chord around her finger. "Jack's supposed to let us know as soon as he talks to Haley about it."

"Haley? I thought Christmas was already ironed out.

"Every other year it has been, but Jack turned sixteen and Aaron thought it was a good idea to let him make some of the decisions for himself. He's old enough."

"How is that going?"

"Usually well. This is the first time Jack hasn't been able to give us an answer right away," Emily replied. "Haley's always been good about the holidays so I'm hoping this has nothing to do with her."

Penelope's sigh was audible over the phone. "Let me know, okay?"

"As soon as I know you'll know, Pen."

"Alright!" She was back to her perky tone of voice. "And Gabi wants AJ over tomorrow night."

Emily hummed as she glanced at the calendar. "Tomorrow's a PA Day.... I have the kids at the dentist tomorrow at three, so I can drop AJ off on the way home."

"Gabi's got the day with her father, can we do later?"

Emily laughed. Something caught her eye, and she recognized Jack's bright orange t-shirt. She smiled to herself. "When did life get this complicated?"

"When we all started having families," Penelope laughed. "I can pick her up."

"No, no. Kate has vocal, so I'll drop her off before I run Kate down to her vocal teacher's," Emily contradicted.

"Sounds good to me. Someone'll bring her home Saturday morning."

'Goodnight, Pen."

"Night Em."

Emily hung up the phone and waited. Jack was lurking and had been for the better part of the last two weeks. Emily knew the tactic because his father did the same thing when he had something he wanted to talk to her about, but wasn't sure of her reaction or wasn't sure how to bring it up. So, she waited patiently, knowing Aaron was up with his girls and Seth, leaving her and Jack on the main level. She moved into the living room, relaxing on the couch with a book and settling in to wait. Eventually, she looked up and saw him waiting in the doorway. "Hey, Jack. Everything okay?"

"No," he answered after a moment. Relief was heavy in his voice.

Emily tried not to smile. She wasn't getting rusty in the slightest. "What's wrong?" She stuck her bookmark in her book and patted the cushion beside her.

"It's Mom," Jack said slowly, still nervous.

Haley wasn't often brought up in the Hotchner household, not because of anything bad she'd done but because she wasn't brought up and no one knew how anyone else would react. Haley hadn't affected Emily's relationship with Aaron, but he'd always been uncomfortable talking about his ex-wife. Jack had simply absorbed their reluctance and never brought up his mother.

"What happened?" Emily asked.

Jack still looked unsure, biting his lip. "Are you sure?"

"Of course I'm sure," she replied with a smile. "If there's something wrong I want you to feel like you can come to me, if you're not comfortable talking about it with your father, even if it's your mom."

"It's Christmas!" Jack exploded. "Mom has deliberately planned everything so that I can't fit in what I want to do! And just when I think I have a compromise, and I tell her about it, she gets depressed, or acts like it."

She sighed. Apparently Haley had caught onto the system and for the first time, had started exploiting it. "When?"

"Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, Boxing Day... Everyday Dad and I talked about having Christmas with the family," Jack replied.

"And you don't want to disappoint her?"

"She makes me feel so guilty about spending time here. So she's invited everyone I want to see and scheduled them in so that I miss all of my favourite parts of Christmas here. Grandpa and Grams are supposed to come on Boxing Day for dinner and presents. Aunt Rachel is supposed to be staying over until Christmas Day."

Emily nodded. Rachel was Haley's sister and Jack's favourite aunt. Unfortunately, she lived in Montana and Jack didn't get to see her and his cousins as much as he wanted. She knew how important it was for him to see her. "What about Christmas Day?" she asked gently.

Jack blew out a breath. "I don't want to have to choose between opening presents with my cousins and opening presents with Annie, Katie and Seth. I want to be here for presents with you guys, you guys are my family and Seth is still young enough that Christmas is always a surprise and even Annie still loves opening presents. They get so excited."

Emily could understand that. "Your mom doesn't live that far, Jack, I'm sure between me, your mom and your dad we can get you here late Christmas Eve and back in time for Boxing Day."

Jack nodded slowly.

"There's something else," Emily said knowingly.

"I just... I don't understand why she makes this so difficult. Before, when it was AJ's birthday or Seth's... there was never a problem. Even for Kate's recitals or soccer games... So why is this Christmas so difficult?"

Emily smiled grimly. "I wish I could give you an answer for that, honey."

"What did Dad do?" Jack asked.

Emily felt her breath catch. She hadn't prepared herself for any extended period of conversation about Haley with Jack.

"You know Seth asked if I'd be able to stay up with him to watch for Santa this year, just like every other year? I had to tell him I wasn't sure if I'd be able to make it," Jack said, his voice almost tortured. "Do you know how hard it is to disappoint a five-year-old?"

She had some idea, but she didn't need to tell Jack that the disappointment he often felt when his father hadn't been able to make some of his events was the same disappointment she'd heard in the voices of her own children. And it tore at her heart every time. "He'll still stay up. And maybe you guys can make a new tradition instead. He's still a kid and he's pretty flexible on most things," Emily reassured him.

Jack sighed. "I just feel like this was easier before I had to make the choices."

For Jack, maybe but Emily knew she and Aaron hadn't always had a party in dealing with scheduling issues. There had never been an official agreement, mostly because there was no resentment or hatred between Haley and Aaron. Haley understood that his job was something she could never understand and Aaron understood that Haley was better off without him. There had been angry phone calls anyway, things that Emily certainly wished above all else she could fix. But Aaron had sworn in the beginning that he wasn't going to put Jack in the middle between his parents. And now it seemed that despite all of his hard work, Jack was going to be in the middle anyway.

"Jack, if you want your dad to step in he will," Emily said. "You can go back to the way things were before your birthday."

"I don't know," the sixteen-year-old admitted. "I understand why Dad thought this would be a good idea, but it's hard. I don't want to disappoint or hurt anyone."

Emily smiled wryly. "Sweetheart, I wish I could tell you that it would always work out. Unfortunately, someone is always going to be hurt or disappointed. But your brother and sisters understand that you have to spend time with your mom too. They understand you can't always be there."

"But Mom knows I have two families. She knows that I want to see Aunt Pen, Uncle Derek, Aunt Jenny, Uncle Spencer... And Eric seemed so excited about having dinner with all of the kids, you know? And the crackers," Jack explained.

"What do you want to do?"

Jack met her gaze. "I want to spend Christmas Eve with Aunt Rachel, open presents with my cousins, then come here, stay up with Seth until he falls asleep watching Rudolph and then wake up the next morning to open presents with everyone. I want to have dinner with our wacky family with Aunt Pen and Uncle Derek throwing innuendoes across each other at the dinner table and then, the next day, I can go back to Mom's and see Grandpa and Grams."

"Okay," Emily said. "Aaron!"

"Just putting Kate to bed," her husband called back. Sure enough, two minutes later Aaron came down the stairs. "What is it?"

"We're talking about Christmas," Emily filled him in. "We're having a few problems."

She smiled as he perched on the arm of the couch where she sat, his hand sifting through his hair even as his attention focused worriedly on his son. "What kind of problems?"