Undercover Family

I would love to hear your opinions and look to working further on the story.

I do not own or have connection with the "Criminal Minds" program or its characters.

Chapter 7.

It seemed that morning came all too quickly; momma wakes up and begins a load of laundry before heading upstairs to wake the children. Passing by Penelope's door with just a knock, she arrives at the girls' room and heads in. She turns the light on and gets out the clothes she wants the girls to wear for their first day of school. Gently she nudges JJ and then Emily awake. Emily heads to the bathroom and JJ goes to check what clothes they are going to wear today. Momma heads to the boys room and gets out their clothes. She then gently wakes the boys up, Spencer goes running to the bathroom, but Emily is still in there.

"Hurry up, I really gotta go."

"I'm almost done." She opens the door thirty seconds later, he goes rushing in and she has barely moved out of the way before he closed the door. Momma walks out and heads back downstairs.

"Ten minutes please."

Downstairs, momma heads to the kitchen and begins to make oatmeal for breakfast; she gets the juice and milk out. Placing bowls and spoons on the table, when the kids come down, they each grab a bowl and spoon and she ladles oatmeal in to the bowl, they sit at the table in the kitchen and eat up their breakfast. Meanwhile, Aaron begins to wake up and calls out to momma; she heads to the bedroom and gets him out of the crib, changes his diaper and dresses him in a pants outfit. She then feeds him his morning bottle.

After Aaron finishes his bottle, the agents gather in the dining room to discuss the day. Aaron begins by reminding them that the purpose of what they are doing is to gather information, so they can discover who is taking the children. They have put themselves in the danger zone for being abducted themselves. He and momma will begin by checking out the families of the abducted children and asking them questions about the children and their last day seen and who saw them. "Today, momma will be taking each of you to a school where you will be enrolled in a grade appropriate to your age. You will then get to know the children and see if they remember the missing children and if they have unfamiliar people around. You are there to make friends and learn. Do not try to make yourselves more intelligent than the children of the age you represent. There are no genius's here." He looks pointedly at Spencer. "Do what they other kids do, do not make yourself seem smarter, but don't make yourself stupid either. Are we ready to go learn?" There are several nods of assent, they get and pick up their book backpacks and head to the car.

The car first travels to the Jr. High School on Garfield St. The principal there is Ms. Floeter and there will be two of the kids in the school. The school has four grades: 5, 6, 7, and 8. JJ will be enrolled into the sixth grade and David will be enrolled into the fifth grade. Momma hands the permanent records that were created for these two students to the principal and gives the emergency information as well as who can pick them up from school, if they need to leave early. She fills out the information for medical needs and pays for their lunches for the remainder of the year. She does not pay for breakfasts there, because she will always make sure they have a good breakfast before they come to school. The kids are then taken to their respective classrooms after getting a big hug from momma. She reminds them that she will pick them from school for the first few days and then they can work transportation out.

She leaves with the rest of the kids to go to the next school which is Central School on Division St. This is the school that Derek will be attending the second grade. She hands his file to Principal Holland and all relevant emergency, health, pickup and any other needs that is requested. She pays for his lunches and hugs him when he heads off to his classroom.

The last school that they go to that day is the Washington School on Hutchinson Street. She will enroll Emily into the kindergarten there, which is set for daily half days. She puts her in the morning session. Momma will also be enrolling Spencer into the pre-kindergarten class which is also set for daily half days. He is also put into the morning session. Momma hadn't originally planned on putting Spencer into a pre-school, but having learned more about him and who he is, she feels that the socialization with young people might be beneficial for the young genius. He spent most of his childhood with older children and adults. He learned more about adult books and knowledge. He needs to learn about how to be a child; he was never really treated like one before. I think pre-school will help him explore his imagination and learn how to make-believe. After giving all the necessary information to Principal Jones, momma gives both of her young ones a big hug and Emily goes to her class. Spencer did not want to go and begged not to. Momma said, "Spencer, this is going to be a good experience for you, I really believe that. Plus we need you to talk to and protect the children." He hung his head and quietly agreed to do it. They took him to his class.

"I'll pick you up in a few hours."

Momma leaves the office and actually bumps into another mother dropping off her kindergartener. She is Mrs. Nolan and they talk about the children and about the fear of the missing children becoming one of theirs. She tells momma about a group of women who have been visiting the families of the missing children to keep up their spirits and let them know that their supported. She invites momma to meet with them today. They are going to visit Mrs. Gonzalez , she has a missing six-year-old girl. Of course, momma jumps at this chance to meet the families of the missing children. She agrees to meet them at the location at 10:00. The ladies separate to their own cars.

At the car, momma straps Aaron into his car seat and then gets into the driver's side.

"What do you think of the group, Aaron? Do you think it might be a good way for us to get and check out the families?"

"Actually, I was kind of wondering how we were going to be able to do that. Without badges, we couldn't just knock on the doors and ask questions. It may take longer because you can't ask pointed questions about it, but you should be able to get a few questions, each time we go. I can look around the houses and see what the families are like."

"What if they don't just let you run around?"

"What do you mean?"

"Well, they might put you in with the other babies, probably in a play pen."

"I don't want to be in a play pen, do you think that there might be a way that I wouldn't have to be."

"I don't know about that, why don't you think about what you can do to prevent going into a play pen?"

A few minutes before 10, they drive onto the street that Mrs. Gonzalez lives and park a few doors down. She gets Aaron out of his car seat and lets him walk with her to the house. She lets him push the doorbell and the door is answered by Mrs. Nolan.

"Hello, Rebecca, come on in and hello to you Aaron." Nodding at Aaron, he blushes and hides his head in momma's legs. Both women smile at his seeming shyness. Mrs. Nolan lets Rebecca and Aaron in the room. Aaron begins to look around the room and sees how the family lives. They are not wealthy, but a lower middle class, there were a lot of caps hanging on the wall and the furniture looks well-used but clean. Momma is introduced to the other ladies there: Mrs. Gayle Smith, Mrs. Loretta Stone, Mrs. Maria Alverez, Mrs. Anita Garza and Mrs. Josephine Gonzalez, the mother of the missing child. Mrs. Nolan is known as Brenda. The women then just call each other by their first names. Rebecca is invited to sit down. Gayle brings in coffee and Loretta picks up Aaron to take him to another room, which is where they are keeping the children and letting them play. He screams and tries to get down. He wants to stay in this room and to listen to what the women talk about. She puts him down and all the women look at him while he runs back to momma.

"He's a little needy right now, today we put the others in school and since his father died, he just wants to stay with me. I hope you don't mind, if I just hold him. He'll be quiet while we visit. He crawls into her lap and puts his thumb in his mouth while looking at the women. Gayle mentioned about maybe using a pacifier instead of letting suck his thumb. Momma says that she prefers the thumb than a piece of plastic, that's why she doesn't give pacifiers. He is her seventh child and the others are doing well. The women begin to talk about their children and how they can work to protect them. Josephine really begins to talk about her little girl who is missing and that she was at the park with her brothers and then they just couldn't find her. She disappeared. It was uncanny. There are no cameras or anything which would show what happened, so they can only guess. The women talk for quite a while, until it was time for them to get the young kids from school. The women agree to meet at Mrs. Helen Norris's house tomorrow at 10:00 am. They go to their cars.

In the car, Momma mentions to Aaron, "I think you're way of staying with me was interesting. Was it planned?"

"No but I didn't want to be separated and not hear what the women were saying. I thought I could learn more from just listening to them. I hope you don't mind that I acted real infantile and babyish, but I really wanted to stay with you."

"I understand and you played your role to perfection. They will probably allow you to stay with me every time we go to one of the ladies homes." They arrive at the school and wait for the children to come out of school. Emily comes out first and then they see Spencer. He sees them and takes Emily's hand and pulls her to the car. He seems to be really excited. When they get to the car, momma puts them each into their booster seats. She gets in and drives home. Spencer doesn't seem to be able to stop talking excitedly.

"I didn't realize what we actually do in these classes. We played in active time and then there was quiet when the teacher had us all sit around and she read us a story about a penguin name pip who wants to be as big as another one and she explores why some things are big and some are small. It was really interesting."

Emily says, "Didn't your mother ever read children's books to you?"

"No, she read great literature and good books like that, nothing that was simple or easy like that. I really had fun today. I didn't think I would."

Momma asks "How about you Emily, did you have fun?"

"I wouldn't say fun but it was okay, hopefully it will get better for me."

"I hope so too sweetie."

They get home and momma fixes lunch while the kids play on the porch. After lunch, she lets them play a little more before having them lay down for a nap. While they nap, momma finishes the laundry and cleans the house. A little while later, the two older ones are awake and play out on the porch. Momma asks Penelope to watch the kids while she went to pick up the other kids from school.

At Central, she sits waiting for Derek and watches the kids come out and go to their parents' cars or walk home. Derek comes out and gets in the back.

"How was your first day of school?"

"School is different than when I first went. They are more security oriented and it feels more like a prison than a place of learning. But it was okay, I just hope that I don't have to go forever."

"Well, there's always hope." They both chuckle.

At the Junior High, David and JJ are outside waiting for momma to show up and upon arriving they get into the back. School was interesting to them as well, but they stayed quiet on the way home. At home the kids start doing homework at the dining room table. Momma brings them an afterschool snack of crackers and kool-aid. While she was picking up the kids from school, Aaron had awakened but he wouldn't let Penelope change him. He kept telling her that he would wait for momma to come back. Momma changed his diaper and sets him in his high chair for snack. After snack time, the kids did their homework or played on the porch.

Dinner came later and after dinner, the agents sat around the table and discussed what they learned today about the case. There wasn't much but it was still a day that was not usual for agents of the FBI. They finished their briefing and momma had them go to bed for school the next day.

_____________________________________________________________________________

The story that the teacher told to Spencer in preschool was Little Penguin
by Patrick Benson
Philomel Books, New York. 1990
Grades: Preschool–1
Little Penguin is the story of Pip, an Adélie penguin, who wants to be as big as an emperor penguin. As Pip playfully explores the snow, ice, and water of her Antarctic home, she wonders why some animals are big and some small. This story ties in beautifully with the activities on relative sizes in Penguins And Their Young. The children can use the illustrations to compare the appearance of Adélie penguins with emperor penguins.