New Fic: Stumbling Blocks

[princessacadra.livejournal.com]

Title: Stumbling Blocks
Category: Delinquent AU (aka ATF Teen AU), 5th story
Characters: Vin, Ezra, Buck/Chris, JD
Rating: R
Warnings: Slash, mentions of child abuse, profanity
Summary: Sequel to "Delinquent", "Substitute Dreams", Uncomfortable Decisions, and The Right Path with the Halloween side stories/prequels Halloween Tales part of the Delinquent Universe which is a spin off of Mog’s ATF universe. The path is very rocky for this would-be family and they still have many obstacles to overcome.



Chapter One

Ezra managed to get up by ten o’clock the next morning and spent some time with Vin and Casey. Then Ezra surprisingly volunteered to help Miss Nettie with lunch and remained inside afterwards playing cards with her. Once or twice Casey and Vin joined the games, but they lost so badly against both of them that there didn’t seem to be a point to sticking around.

“Why don’t you go outside and play or are you too old to play?” Miss Nettie had made coffee and they were both sipping from identical mugs. Neither Casey nor Vin cared for the taste of coffee and though Ezra did not feel particularly grown up by drinking it there was a certain nostalgia that coffee brought to him. There were a lot of “grown up” things that Ezra had done over the years, but most of them weren’t ones he wanted to remember. A fonder memory for him had been when he was four and sitting at a little diner counter somewhere in the deep south with his mother, drinking coffee and feeling special. That had been a short-lived feeling.

“There’s not really anything to do outside. We can’t ride the horses without supervision, we can’t leave the yard, there are no unattended weapons to play with so what’s the point?” When Ezra lifted his gaze from his cards to continue his train of thought he stopped when he saw the sparkle in Miss Nettie’s eyes and couldn’t help but smile back.

“That’s one way to look at it, I suppose.”

Ezra nodded in agreement even though he wasn’t entirely sure what the joke was or if there was even a joke at all. He decided he liked Miss Nettie and for a moment he felt compelled to tell her more than he should. That urge was ruthlessly repressed because he was sure it was only an illusion of comfort that he felt with her. “Would you like to try the best chocolate chip cookies in the world?”

Miss Nettie looked surprised which threw her enough off balance that Ezra was able to gather his own wits about him. “The best? I suppose you know how to make them?”

“Assuming they have all the ingredients, yes.”

They spent the rest of the afternoon making cookies, Miss Nettie seemingly impressed with Ezra’s ability to recall recipes. The first batch of cookies was sampled as the second batch was cooling and Miss Nettie agreed that they were very good cookies. It all went well until after they’d retrieved the last batch from the oven and Miss Nettie said, “Your mother must have made you a lot of cookies. These are wonderful.”

Calmly Ezra set the cookie sheet on top of the oven, shut the oven door and turned the oven off. The oven mitts were set on the counter and then Ezra said, “My mother never made cookies for me.”

There was no calling Ezra back when he left the room quickly. Ezra didn’t hear the guilt in Miss Nettie’s voice for the sound of his own heart beating in his ears. For some reason he could never escape from reality for very long even though he continually tried to. It was safer in the dark, in the quiet, in the very back of his rather crowded closet behind his very expensive suitcases.

#t#

Chris glared at the computer screen in front of him, feeling his eyes beginning to cross and he was starting to think that a break sounded like a good idea. It was only Tuesday which meant there were three more days until Buck was officially retired and he accepted the promotion. That possibly what was causing his current stress level or possibly the fact that not only was Vin’s birthday coming up and he had no idea what to get him, but the final adoption hearing was creeping closer. While Chris didn’t think there was anything to worry about with the adoption it was still something that bothered him. The “what if” this or “what if” that he couldn’t reasonably predict.

All those thoughts were swirling around in his head along with the more dominating thought of “I need a break” and just as he was leaning back in his chair to give himself a moment to relax there was a knock at his office door. “Come in!” Chris figured it was one of his team, but that was not who entered from the bullpen. Immediately Chris was on his feet, a confused scowl on his face. “What can I help you with?”

“Agent Larabee, I’m Deputy Peyton with the Sheriff’s Office – ”

“What’s this about?” They often dealt with the police and sheriff’s office on cases, but this was one officer that Chris didn’t recognize.

“That’s what I was trying to tell you. I’m coordinating with several other departments on a child pornography – ”

“Hold that thought.” Chris stalked to his door and yelled into the bullpen, “Buck!” He turned back to the deputy, sizing up the man before asking, “This about Ezra?” A little part of Chris feared that it had something to do with Vin and he almost hated himself for being relieved when the deputy nodded in agreement.

Buck poked his head inside Chris’s office. “Yeah?”

“Buck, close that door and sit down. Deputy, have a seat, please.” He took a breath as he returned to his chair behind his desk, trying to regain his composure after feeling like he’d been thrown off a roller coaster ride. “Uh, deputy, this is Buck Wilmington, my partner. The deputy here was just starting to tell me about something involving Ezra and… child pornography.”

Deputy Peyton nodded. “This has been an ongoing case for some time and the identity of the child, Ezra, has only recently been discovered, mostly because of the murder case involving his mother, Maude Barrett. The perp in question has been in prison now for several years and thanks to the testimony of some of the earlier victims will be there for a while. Not long enough in any of our minds, however, which is why we have been trying to ID the previously unidentified child that we had the most evidence on.”

It was all very technical and straightforward almost to the point that Chris wanted to scream because Ezra was not “the child” or a “victim” he was Ezra. Just Ezra. Not that Chris could fault the deputy knowing he had used the same types of terms to distance himself from cases, especially cases that hit him a little too hard. “What kind of evidence are we talking about here?”

“Pictures, varying from fairly tame to extremely explicit. There are also extensive videos, as well. I’m told in the very beginning of the investigation it was difficult to determine the gender of the child. In the videos the child was referred to as ‘Elly’ and also introduced himself as ‘Elly’, as well. It wasn’t until some of the later videos where – well, the child was often in girl’s clothing and the perp had a tendency to leave the outfits on when… you get the picture.” The deputy leaned forward out of his seat as he took a folder from his brief case and removed two pictures which he placed on Chris’s desk for both of them to see.

Chris immediately focused on one picture where the only thing he recognized clearly were large green eyes staring expressionlessly at the camera. There was nothing in those blank eyes. His view widened onto the child’s hair, on the longish side and in that androgynous stage where it could be a boy or a girl and the large red bow proclaimed it was a girl even though Chris knew better. The child’s face was caked in makeup, red blush, a child’s pink lipstick and dark eyeliner making the child appear like a fancy little doll. The dress was frilly and pink like the delicate layered material of a flower girl’s outfit for a wedding. Perfect little shoes peeked out from under the dress, the child being seated on a bed with his legs sideways, almost demure.

What ruined the picture was the small, delicate hand clenched into the dress’s hem that had pulled the skirt up to reveal one of the child’s legs and a hint of the child’s undergarments. Instinctively Chris knew that this was probably the tamest picture of the lot. The other picture was much the same, a little lighter on the makeup and a different, less frilly dress, the child leaned against the same bed and poised in a provocative manner that a child should not be in. It was obvious in both pictures that the child was tense, placed in a very specific pose that he had been told to do.

“That’s Ezra.” Buck’s voice was hard, his jaw clenched. “Who did this? You said there was evidence – you know for certain who it was?”

Deputy Peyton nodded. “His voice is on the videos and he was in several of the videos with the child.”

“Raping him?” Buck pushed for clarification and the deputy nodded in confirmation.

“Shit.” It took Chris a moment to realize he’d spoken out loud and even when he did he still felt disoriented. “God damn it. That’s – it’s good evidence, but Ez… shit.”

The deputy was silent for a moment before breaking in again with, “In answer to your earlier question, the perpetrator was Peter Ackland. He’d been evading the authorities for some time until some of the victims stepped forward to testify. As I was saying he’d been sentenced in those cases, but we are hoping that he’ll never see the light of day, with Ezra alone – ”

Chris laughed. Well, it was more of a humorless bark, but it was close to what a laugh could be if the situation had been at all funny. “You’re saying you want my boy to testify? He’s not even ready to…”

“Our boy,” Buck interjected. “He’s only been in counseling for a short amount of time, there’s no way he’d be able to testify in court.”

“Not immediately, no,” the deputy agreed. “But I wanted to make you aware of the situation so that we could keep in contact and get in touch with Ezra’s counselor to determine when it would be possible. We have several years, but the sooner we can get this to court the better it will be.”

“And we all want to see justice done, but I can honestly tell you that I don’t know whether Ezra will ever be ready to face what happened to him. Not in court. Not in front of a jury. With all that boy’s been through it would be like victimizing him again.” That was a thought Chris could barely face so how would he feel if he’d lived it himself? “The perpetrator, this Peter Ackland, he would be at the court hearing? This was one of Ezra’s step-fathers, correct?”

“Yes, on both counts. There were few records on the child or his mother – Maude has managed to fly under the radar, whether accidentally or intentionally. Multiple moves, name changes like she didn’t want to get caught. Gathering any information on her was nearly impossible and if not for Ezra’s school records, which were also difficult to trace, we may never have pinpointed them.”

They discussed who Ezra’s counselor was, how many sessions he’d been to and how the deputy could get in contact with them. There was little else to do but say that Ezra was going to continue with his counseling sessions and that they’d have to see what help, if any, Ezra would be able to contribute to the case at an indeterminable future date. Buck leaned against Chris’s desk as deputy Peyton left the office, closing the door behind him. “You want to call John?”

Hell, no, Chris didn’t want to call John anymore than he wanted to remember those pictures of Ezra, but they were burned into his brain now. The boy probably hadn’t been more than seven, maybe eight years old in those pictures. “Yeah, I’ll give him a call.”

“You okay there, pard?”

“No.” The day had already been heading in a bad direction and now this. Chris was pretty sure something in his brain had been deep-fried, at least whatever was left of his brain. “Don’t worry about it. Promise I’m not homicidal. At least not enough to break into a prison to do it.”

Buck smiled. “I think I’d be more concerned if you weren’t at least a little homicidal. That’s our boy, Chris. We can’t do anything about this except keep doing what we were doing and give him the support he needs.”

“Yeah, okay.” Seven. Adam never quite made it to that age. If anyone had even looked at his boy the wrong way - his boy. Buck had always corrected him when he'd said that about Adam and now he was saying it about their boys.

After Buck left the room Chris spent several minutes with his forehead pressed against the cool wood of his desk. Then he blindly reached for the phone and dialed a number he had memorized, having dialed it so often. The voice that answered on the other line was as familiar as the number itself and Chris felt himself calming down immediately. As John was not in session at the moment he was able to give him the details of what the deputy had just informed him of – John suggested that, if it was possible, he could start to see Ezra even more than he already was. Twice a week. Chris figured that it certainly couldn’t hurt anything and if there was even a remote chance that Ezra could face what happened and ensure that no other children were put in danger, then all the better. Even if Chris knew, almost without a doubt, that he never would have been able to do that if he were in Ezra’s place.

On the drive home, as Buck and Chris had actually taken the same vehicle to work that morning, Buck asked if an appointment to fix the kittens and their mother had been made. Chris said that it had been scheduled. As far as either of them knew none of the kittens had names, though they both suspected the boys had named them all. The adventuresome kittens all tended to claw their way onto Ezra’s bed in the night and that morning Chris had found a particular little orange fluffball curled under Ezra’s chin.

“We could have a couple of the kittens stay indoors.” Chris glanced sideways at Buck to gage his reaction.

“Oh? Why’s that?”

Chris almost shrugged it off until he remembered those vivid amber-colored eyes gazing up at him from the safety of Ezra’s arms. “I thought the boys might each want a kitten.”

“That a fact, huh?” A lazy grin spread across Buck’s face as he leaned back in his seat. “Damn, baby, we’re going to end up with five housecats. You know that, right?”

Chris scowled at Buck, or at least as much as he could scowl at him while he was concentrating on not running them off the side of the road. “No, we’re not. And don’t call me ‘baby’.”

“Fine, Blondie. We’re going to end up with five housecats.”

“Why do you think that?”

Buck made a “hmm” sound as if he were really thinking the question over – a tactic that Chris knew all too well was just designed to annoy him. After all, Buck knew what he meant before he ever opened his mouth to make that statement. “Can’t rightly separate mama Maddy and her babies, now can we?”

When they arrived back at the house Casey was sitting outside on the front porch by herself. She was kicking at the porch as if it had done something wrong, which didn't bode well. “Aunt Nettie’s inside.”

“Thanks, darlin’.” Buck pushed in through the front door expecting chaos, but the house was still. They found Nettie in the kitchen tidying up and she gave them both a measuring look that made them feel two feet tall despite her smaller stature. “Tough day? What did our boys do?”

Nettie shook her head sternly. “The boys didn’t do anything. I’m not mad at them, I’m mad at myself.” She threw down the dish towel in her hands and pointed at the plate of neatly stacked cookies. “It was going well then I put my foot in my mouth.”

One of the cookies found its way into Buck’s mouth even as he was handing off another to Chris. “Mmm, these are good. You didn’t have to make them for us.”

“I didn’t.” Nettie folded her hands over her chest. “Ezra did. Then he took off when I said that his mother must have made him a lot of cookies because, well, the boy knew the recipe by heart. I just figured – anyway, he said his mother never made him cookies. He’s in his room now and Vin’s up there with him.”

“It’s not your fault Nettie, so try not to worry too much over it. We don’t even know what all is going to set that boy off most of the time.” They saw Nettie to her car and waved goodbye to her and Casey.

Chris dragged his feet on the way back to the house before he offered to see what was going on with the boys. “Nah, I’ll see to the boys.” The relief was clear on Chris’s face. “You get dinner in the oven.” There was a moment’s pause where Chris stared at Buck in confusion before Buck smiled and said, “It’s already done. You just need to put it in the oven.”

“Oh, okay.”

Buck held that surprised expression on Chris’s face and that feeling of amusement and love in his mind as he hunted down the boys, which didn’t take long. They were both in Ezra’s room, though Ezra was not clearly visible. The closet door was open and Vin was sitting in the doorway with a book propped up that he was reading from, Buck recognizing the words as one of Shakespeare’s plays. Vin was stumbling over some of the words and every once in a while Ezra, from somewhere inside the closet, would correct him softly.

“Vin. Ezra.” He eased into the room and dropped down onto Ezra’s bed where he could clearly see both boys. “Come here.”

Ezra stepped out of the closet and went toward Buck immediately whereas Vin paused and eyed him for a moment before placing his book down and moving toward him. It was entirely possible that if it had just been Vin there that he never would have approached Buck at all.

“It’s been a long day, boys. I need a hug.” While both Ezra and Vin shifted closer to Buck neither of them made any effort to hug Buck back as his arms went around them. Vin’s hands remained limp at his sides while Ezra’s arms were held up tightly against his chest, but that didn’t stop Buck from holding them. Finally Buck loosened his grip and pressed a kiss to Vin’s forehead, noting that Vin wrinkled his nose up at the kiss. When Buck shifted to kiss Ezra, the boy tipped his face up, anticipating the kiss, then stared with mild curiosity when Buck pulled away.

“Ezra, no.”

“Why?”

There wasn’t even a hint of comprehension on Ezra’s face and Buck knew that Ezra had an idea because he was smarter than that. Ezra was almost too intelligent for his own good, something that Buck had an inkling of and it hit just that touch too close to home. With his own mother’s background there had been a lot of things that Buck had heard and seen that had got him ridiculed and excluded by other children. So he had adapted to his situation just as Ezra had adapted to his own, but it was fear that ensured Ezra was stuck in an unhealthy endless loop he didn’t want to be in.

“I am not going to kiss you on the lips.” Buck tilted Ezra’s chin down and kissed him on the forehead. “I’ll kiss you here.” He placed a kiss on Ezra’s right cheek. “Or here.” He kissed Ezra’s other cheek. “Or here. But not here,” he added, tapping Ezra’s lips with the tip of his finger, “Or anywhere else.”

Vin shifted, almost dislodging Buck’s hold on him and for a moment Ezra’s gaze turned to his friend. “We don’t do that here. I already told you, Ezra. They won’t.”

The words themselves were understood, but the meaning was not clear. There were too many possibilities, too many possible scenarios all running through Ezra’s head and it all came down to one basic idea: it was all Ezra’s fault. Everything bad that had ever happened to him was because of what he did. He had wanted all of those things to happen and didn’t his behavior now prove it?

“You still with me, Ez?”

My fault. My fault. My fault. Ezra’s head jerked once in acknowledgement before backing out of Buck’s hold.

Ezra closed down completely and despite Buck’s efforts to recall him there was no reaching him. The boy did let Buck wrap his arms around him and pull him into another hug even though Ezra was even less responsive than he had been moments ago. Even if Ezra didn’t appreciate the gesture – and Buck hoped that he did – it made Buck feel better to be able to hold him.

-to be continued-