Title: The Swear Jar 17/X

Author: Romantique

Email: dolph1n

Classification: Raylan/Winona Family/General

Rating: T for language (but no worse than the show)

Summary: Raylan is a new dad. This one is a stand-alone, not a sequel to 'A Change of Scenery.'

Disclaimer: It's 'Justified' hiatus time, and I'm bored. This fic is based on nothing but my imagination and takes place sometime after the end of Season 3.

Legal: These characters do not belong to me. I'm just a fan and have not made a dime. Please email me to obtain permission to post.

o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o

It was 2:07 in the afternoon, and Raylan found himself seated on a sofa in a dingy 7th floor office of the Court House with no windows. He could tell it was a cost-cutting U.S. government office because the room now pulled double duty as furniture storage. One side of the room had metal desks stacked floor to ceiling.

Seated directly across from him was Carolyn Freid, PsyD, the shrink assigned to sometimes work at the Lexington office of the U.S. Marshal Service. Raylan had been required to see her a few times before, always following a shooting, where he was debriefed and evaluated … standard procedure before a marshal is cleared to return to duty and have his or her firearm re-issued.

While he watched the second hand of the clock on the wall slowly 'tic-tic-tic' across its black and white face, the plump, middle-aged therapist peered over to top of her stylish bi-focals and down into a folder of paperwork, as she combed through Raylan's file. Clearly by the rapid pace of the flipping pages, as she speed-read through the words in front of her, Dr. Freid was unprepared for this impromptu meeting and having to play a quick game of 'catch-up.' She appeared to be more off balance over this appointment than Raylan, and that suited him just fine.

Finally, after several more minutes, she looked up.

"So, Deputy Marshall Givens," she began, "we meet again."

"Yeah," Raylan responded, in resignation. His hat was still on his head and his hands were folded in his lap, almost as if he'd been called into the principal's office when he was a boy in school.

"However, this time, it looks like the purpose of this meeting more serious than the last time we met," she prompted.

"How's that?" Raylan asked with a quizzical expression on his face. "I didn't shoot anyone, this time."

"No, you didn't," she agreed.

She finally placed the thick file on the coffee table in front of her, giving Raylan her undivided attention.

"And this time, it was my idea to come in and speak with you," he set her straight.

"Really?" she raised a skeptical eyebrow. "According to your file, we are here today based upon the recommendation of AUSA Vasquez and your boss, Chief Deputy Marshall Mullens … as a requirement to maintain your employment with the Marshal Service."

Raylan used a pointed index finger to explain. "But it was my idea, first," he insisted. "Vasquez just needed to think this was his idea."

"So, whose idea this was is more important than the reason why you're here?" she questioned him in disbelief.

Suddenly, Raylan was reminded why he harbored a dislike for this woman. She twisted his words. She most memorably did this to him when she debriefed him for the shooting of one Layla Leann Jones, the pretty yet twisted transplant nurse who had crossed his law enforcement path. At the time, Dr. Freid tried to suggest that shooting this young woman was akin to killing the memory of his own mother. Raylan quickly corrected the good doctor by stating he shot Ms. Jones with her finger on the trigger, before she pulled it to blow his drug-induced ass away. The fact that he didn't sleep all that well, afterwards that night, had more to do with Winona leaving him than it did about shooting his first woman.

Then, he recalled that even Rachael had remarked to him that she didn't care for this woman therapist. They each lamented that she fucked with their heads.

Back in the present moment, Raylan once again tried to reign Dr. Freid in. "Look, all I'm tryin' to say is that I agreed to be here. I'm here to cooperate. I don't want to be in therapy forever and would like to roll up my sleeves and get to work, so that I can get back to my job and be an effective law enforcement officer."

"Good," she said. "That's my goal, too. Perhaps you could start by telling me exactly what you wish to accomplish in these sessions."

"Well, if I'm to get straight to the point," Raylan began, removing his hat from his head and placing it on the sofa beside him, "I'd like to no longer be perceived as bein' beholdin' to Boyd Crowder, a known criminal. You see, in between tryin' to kill me, Boyd has saved my life on more than one occasion. I've known him since we were teens digging coal together in the mines."

The good doctor was surprised by Raylan's uncharacteristic cooperation in meeting the Service's goals.

"Are you saying that you feel you owe this man something?" she asked, scribbling notes to her pad. "Or are you saying the perception is wrong?"

"Well, yeah," Raylan stated the obvious. '"I owe him my life, several times over. But that doesn't mean I wouldn't haul his ass to jail. So, I'd say it's both."

Dr. Freid leaned over to pick up Raylan's file again, and quickly rifled through it, finally finding what she'd read only a few moments before.

"You shot him, too," she said, still reading, in an even tone, "almost mortally so."

Raylan gave a tight smile. "Yeah. And then there's that."

"Art Mullens wrote in his report at the time that you were trained by the Service to shoot a suspect square in the chest," she continued to read from the file, placing her hand against her chest for emphasis. "Even more so, you're a certified firearms instructor and know to always shoot a threatening, armed suspect square in the chest. And in Mullens' words, not mine, "And yet, he missed."

Looking up from the file, she added. "You're a crack shot, Marshal. You don't miss."

Well versed in Raylan's 'on the job kills,' she added a well-placed, "Even I know that."

"Yeah," Raylan acquiesced and then, looked down into his hands that were placed on his lap. "At the time, I didn't mean to not shoot to kill."

"Are you saying that you were not aware you missed?" she asked. "At the time?" she added.

"It does seem that way to me now, in hindsight," Raylan admitted.

Looking up at him and placing her pen on top of her pad, she asked, "How do you explain that?"

He then went on. "I suppose Boyd also owes me for his life, too. Although for about a year, he credited my miss to God's will. Then, after he sobered up from his religious bender, it's like we've had an understandin', a kind of a truce or a stalemate on killin' one another. We both know what the other is capable of doin'. It's been an unspoken agreement between us that we won't."

"Does that ever make you feel compromised on your job?" Dr. Freid cut straight to the chase.

"It never did before," he sighed, "not until I saw him down in Nashville. It's all there, in the file," he motioned with his hand. "I didn't feel so much compromised as I felt used. Don't get me wrong, Boyd's not been above tryin' to use me before, but never so blatantly when it comes to my career."

"Can you see how your superiors, your co-workers might think you are compromised when it comes to this man?" Dr. Freid asked, returning to scribbling on her pad.

"I can," Raylan responded, raising an eyebrow. "That's why I'm here. I want to get this all straightened out." Then, under his breath, he muttered, "Especially, now that it looks like he'll be returned to Kentucky."

That statement was not lost on Dr. Freid.

"Do you think Boyd thinks it pays to know someone in law enforcement?" she asked, scribbling notes.

"I don't think Boyd looks at it that way, at least not entirely," Raylan tried to explain his relationship with Boyd that really made no sense to himself at times. "I think he looks at it like we go way back. He sees us as almost like family. And he thinks nothin' of askin' me for help or for a favor."

"And you don't think anything of granting him help or favor?" she asked.

"I try really hard not to grant him favor," Raylan said. "In fact, I'd walk a mile not to grant him favor. Unless it's a win-win for him and for the Marshal Service."

"Tell me what you mean about the two of you bein' like family?" Dr. Freid asked.

Raylan shifted in his seat. "You read in the file about my Daddy."

The good doctor nodded her head.

"Boyd started lookin' out after my old man when my Aunt Helen was murdered," he recounted.

"Because you didn't?" she asked.

"Me, take care of Arlo?" he asked in astonishment. "Uh, no. That was never gonna happen."

Again, rifling through the file, Dr. Freid interrupted his story. "Your father admitted to committing two murders after your aunt died. I'd say Boyd didn't do a very good job of takin' care of him."

"And I'd have to agree with you," Raylan nodded, "but you didn't know Arlo. Arlo's mind was goin' for a long time, even before Helen died. In his twisted mind, he thought he was protectin' Boyd."

"From the State Troopers?" the good doctor asked for confirmation.

"No," Raylan answered directly, "from me."

"I don't understand," she said. "Were you going after Boyd?"

"At the time, no more than usual," he stated. "The reason you don't understand is that no sane person could understand what was goin' on in Arlo's head."

"Not even when you're saying your father intended to kill his own son?" she asked, probably with more sensitivity than she'd ever shown to Raylan.

"I didn't take it personally," Raylan said, as a matter of fact. "The man is 'Looney Tunes.'"

Again, not fully understanding the dynamic, she asked, "Why didn't your father plead guilty by insanity?"

"Because his crooked lawyer, hired by Boyd, had a fool for a client," he answered. "Arlo wouldn't let her enter such a plea."

"And as his son, you didn't intervene on his behalf," she muttered.

"Why should I?" Raylan asked, his tone remaining nice and easy, as if he was just telling a story. "My father was a criminal, a life-long criminal. A tiger doesn't change his stripes. He belongs in prison. He may be crazy, but he knew what he was doin' was wrong, when he did it."

"You harbor a lot of hatred for your father," Dr. Freid observed.

"I wouldn't call it hatred. There's no love lost between either one of us," Raylan explained. "We were never close, even livin' in the same house when I was growin' up. It's unfortunate I had a son-of-a-bitch for a father, but I did. It happens."

Then, extemporaneously and under his breath, he muttered, "Shit, I owe the Swear Jar another two bucks."

"The Swear Jar?" she asked, thinking it was something they had at the office.

Raylan tightened his jaw. "I'm tryin' to clean up my language. I have a new baby daughter," he explained.

"You sometimes refer to your father in the past tense," Dr. Freid picked upon what Raylan had said. "Is he dead?"

Raylan let out a sigh. "No, but he might as well be. He'll die in prison. We've said everything we need to say to one another. I'm at peace with it."

Dr. Freid continued scribbling, noting the finality of Raylan's statements in that he did, indeed, appear to be at peace with his decision to be done with his father.

"How do you plan on parenting your daughter differently then you were parented by Arlo?" she asked, pen to pad, pleased he brought up the subject.

"That's easy. As far as Arlo's concerned, I ask myself, 'What would Arlo do?' And then, I do the 180 degree opposite," Raylan stated, as if he'd given a lot of thought about this question before. "And that's been true of child rearin', the way I make my livin', treat Winona, breathin'."

"What do you think made you different from your father?" she asked, staying with the subject.

"That's another easy one," he offered. "That would be my mother. And then, her sister, Helen, after her. Those women gave me a good foundation of what is right and wrong, how to care about someone other than myself. Arlo never had any of that. He's a primitive, unevolved, criminal."

"Is there anything good your father gave to you?" she asked, knowing full well the importance of the father-son relationship.

"I get my gift of gab, my ability to tell a good story from Arlo," Raylan lamented. "We share a quick wit, a sense of humor. If he hadn't been such an SOB and a criminal, I might have even liked him. Others did, just not anyone close to him."

"Are you suggesting Boyd was really not that close to him?" she continued to pry a little deeper.

"Probably not," Raylan answered, never having the thought before. "Then again, if you'd had a daddy like Boyd's? I can see why Boyd looked at my daddy as a substitute father. Plus, they were in the same line of work. They ran the Harlan weed business for a while after the Bennett's reign ended. As you may or may not know, the Marshal Service is no longer interested in the weed business."

"So let me ask you a simple question," Dr. Freid asked, glancing at the clock. "Why is it that you can be done with a criminal like your father, and yet, you still have a connection with Boyd Crowder? You are so 'cut and dry' with Arlo, and yet with Boyd, I don't see that at all. In my view, I don't see much difference between the two men, and yet, you do. Why do you think that is? Why is your perception of the two men different than mine?"

Raylan looked at the therapist with a sudden hunch. "You know the answer to your own question, don't you?"

"I have my suspicions," she replied.

"Well, then why don't you save both of us a lot of time and clue me in?" he asked, gesturing his hand between Dr. Freid and himself.

"I can't do that, Marshal," she said. "It has to come from you. But I can tell you that it has to do with you."

The puzzled look on his face showed Dr. Freid that he was further away from the answer to his question than she thought.

"That's all the time we have today," she said. "I'll leave you to ponder that question for our session next week."

"It's the million dollar question," Raylan whispered, under his breath.

(To be continued)