If You Can’t, Leave it Be (Casual, Aramis) FIN

[GREGORY LESTRADE]

“James Dover, twenty-three year old male, found this morning at around 11 am in a dumpster behind a restaurant. He’s part of one of the gangs down in Brooklyn, though we’ve been unable to question many of his, er, fellow members yet.”

“Thank you, Martin,” Lestrade grumbled, and waved the younger man off. To say he was having a bad day was a bit of an understatement. He’d woken up that morning with a call from his ex-wife that told him that his daughter was in surgery for an emergency appendectomy, failed to find a cab who would take him to work and so had to walk in the cold, and having not eaten anything that day from worrying about his kid, was now inevitably grumpy and felt like shit.

“Well fuck if I know anything,” Lestrade said to himself, glaring at the file as if it had done him personal wrong. Later that afternoon, he was still glaring at the paper, because not only did he knew very little about the NYC gangs, he knew very little about the case in general. He was half-tempted to just go home regardless.

“We’ve called in one of the guys to help you out with this, sir.” Martin again.

“I don’t need help,” Lestrade snapped at his coworker (who left quickly, following common sense), though common sense and protocol told him that he really did, of course he did. His wife had texted him to tell him his daughter’s surgery had gone fine, but he was still on edge, frustrated that she was too many states away for him to just leave work to see her.

He didn’t usually get this peeved at everything – rarely acted so petulant – but really, it was his daughter, he couldn’t not think about her! Running his hands through his hair, making the messy grey mass stick up even more than it did naturally, he let a frustrated noise escape from his mouth. He decided to just give up on figuring anything else about the case out until the guy from the other department, whoever he (or she, he reminded himself) was, arrived. In the meantime, he settled with texting his wife, trying not to sound angry, and bashing the keyboard of his cell pretty damn hard.

Eventually, there came a knock on his door. “Finally,” Lestrade muttered, setting his phone on the desk and said loudly, “Come on in.”

[DETECTIVE PETER ARAMIS]

Peter Aramis was having a less than interesting day.

Between paperwork, phone calls, and throwing paper at Gerry, things were pretty dull and everyone seemed rather ‘blah’ for lack of a better word. If he had to blame it on anything, it would be the weather outside. It was a dull, dreary, cold, wet day. He felt like he and Gerry were the only people not falling into the humdrum, even if they did have stacks of reports to finish. So that was how he happened to be stuck behind the mountains of paperwork he’d put off for the past week or so. Being a Detective, especially when you were a third grade, was a lot of paper work. He didn’t honestly mind, especially with the combination of cold and wet starting to make his shoulder twinge. By the next morning, he’d probably be in a world of pain, so he was trying to get as much done as he could before that happened.

He was scribbling out his signature on an open case file when one of the older detectives wandered over to his desk, telling him to go upstairs and find Inspector Lestrade. He didn’t bother to mention what it was about, but Peter was used to that. He figured at some point he would be filled in. He frowned over at Gerry, having never heard of Lestrade.

“What do you think he...or she wants?”

“Lestrade? Dunno. He’s a fairly good guy,” Gerry offered. “So it’s definitely not to bust you back down to traffic duty for fumbling up that crime scene last week.”

Peter rolled his eyes, tossing a paperclip across the desks at his grinning partner. “You have one pen explode at one crime scene...”

Gerry waved him off and he paused long enough to tuck a pen behind his ear and a note pad under his arm before making his way upstairs. It wasn’t until after he’d been pointed in the direction of Lestrade’s office that he noticed he wasn’t wearing anything on his feet. He’d put his foot through a puddle on the way to work that had soaked through the sneaker and half way up his right pant leg. The pants he could deal with, but he’d felt lop-sided with one shoe being soaked, so he’d just taken them both off. Since he’d been at his desk all day, it didn’t really matter, but now that he was upstairs...boy, that looked real professional.

Peter sighed, figuring it was too late to go back and put some on, so he knocked on the door, waiting until he was beckoned in.

“Inspector Lestrade? I’m Peter Aramis. I was told you wanted to see me,” Peter greeted, closing the door behind him.

The guy looked stressed, grey hair mussed in different directions. Peter was instantly on guard, feeling the tension in the room and wondering what this man could possibly want with him.

[GREGORY LESTRADE]

Lestrade was a sociable person at heart, if not the most skilled at speaking publicly or casually, but even the most friendly men’s tempers raise at times, and so when a super young guy who Lestrade recognized as Peter Aramis, the stupidly-fast-promoted third level who this week was the stuff of gossip for ruining a crime scene recently, he definitely wasn’t very pleased, to say the least. He’d been hoping or Gosmer, or Ichiban, one of the more experienced workers downstairs, not damn Aramis. The guy was a baby! Lestrade knew better than to judge quickly, by look or rumour, but at the moment, he didn’t really care.

“Inspector Lestrade? I’m Peter Aramis. I was told you wanted to see me,” Aramis said cheerfully and closed the door lightly. Lestrade let himself slide on social niceties for once and groaned, squeezing his eyes tight and rubbing the carpal bones of his hand up his forehead and back down again, lifting his head to glare quite pettily at Aramis.

“Yeah, I know who you are,” Lestrade snapped, “And I most definitely don’t want to see you. So if you could be so kind,” Lestrade motioned to the chair behind his desk, “Sit down, read this and shut up.” Shoving the case file across the table and completely ignoring his precious protocol, Lestrade glanced at his phone on the desk, wishing the screen would light up with a text from his ex-wife. Aside from a few drunk nights when he was little out of his mind, he’d never really blamed Lena for anything, took full responsibility for their divorce. People told him he shouldn’t be so hard on himself, but really, Lena had never done anything at all except be his wife, and so he’d never done usual divorced-man things, like swearing profusely at a woman he claimed to regret ever meeting. However today, he was rather swearing at her in his head…a lot. Just because he was on the other side of the country did not mean she could just ignore him (in reality it’d only been a few minutes since he’d send his last text, but it felt like ages)!

He was perfectly conscious of how rude he was being – later he’d lose sleep over his ruthless behavior in some sort of shame– but at the moment, there was nothing more important than his daughter across the country; his work was, for the first time in ages, at the bottom of his list of priorities. There were very few things that could lower Lestrade’s obsession with his job. One was his daughter, and two was… Well, he’d yet to get to a two yet, but he was sure there was one.

[DETECTIVE PETER ARAMIS]

To say he was expecting a ...well, more civil welcome was an understatement. Lestrade looked like he would rather have had some criminal walk through his door. Something clearly had the Inspector’s feathers in a ruffle, and he really did not want to be that something. Aramis took a long breath, sizing up the man. Sure, he was used to being treated like the low man on the totem pole, but this was more than that. When Lestrade spoke, his tone was harsh and Peter worked to keep his expression neutral.

"Sit down, read this and shut up," was the order out of Lestrade’s mouth, and from the way he roughly indicated the chair behind his desk, there wasn’t any wiggle room. Knowing he should just placate the man, Peter slid behind the desk, sitting so his bare left foot was tucked under him, his right heel on the edge of the seat. He figured that if he was going to sit through all this, he might as well be comfortable. He rolled the sleeves on his shirt a bit more, picking up the file.

“Before we get into this, the whole pen incident really wasn’t my fault, and I ruined a good shirt making sure none of the ink got on anything we considered to be actual evidence.”

It had made one heck of a mess, and he’d looked like a moron dripping ink as he ran out into the apartment hallway, but he hadn’t done it on purpose. The Chief had chewed him out for it, Gerry had roughly teased him over it, and even Don had ruffled his hair a little too roughly, but he’d thought it was over and done with. Sitting there with Lestrade fuming, he knew that despite what Gerry said, Lestrade was probably going to demote him down to parade duty where he would follow the horses around with a brush and shovel.

He was about to continue talking when he actually opened the file and was stopped cold by the crime scene photo looking up at him. He glanced over at Lestrade, happy to note the man was staring at his phone. He looked back down at the photo more carefully, feeling a wave of regret crest up on him.

“This is Jay Dover. The people on the streets call him J-Dee,” Peter spoke, flipping the page up so he could read over the case.

Found dead this morning and only 23 years old. It was a waste. Peter felt like cursing. The Dovers were good people who lived in his neighborhood. Their youngest, John, was one of the kids he constantly played basketball with down at the hoops. His mother worked double shifts, his father out on disability. The family didn’t need the grief of Jay being involved in a gang the way he was, and now they didn’t need the grief of being parents to a corpse.

“Any leads?” He asked, still scanning the initial report.

[GREGORY LESTRADE]

For God’s sake, was the man barefoot? He was even more of a kid than Lestrade had initially assume! Lestrade watched with an accusatory eye as Aramis sat cross-legged on the chair and rolled his sleeves up before taking the file in his hands. Lestrade rolled his eyes; such dramatics, it’s not as if he they were going to get their hands dirty by handling pieces of paper.

“Before we get into this, the whole pen incident really wasn’t my fault, and I ruined a good shirt making sure none of the ink got on anything we considered to be actual evidence,” Aramis said in a way that Lestrade took as whining.

Lestrade gave a harsh laugh, one syllable, disbelieving. “Oh yes, your shirt.” He decided not to elaborate, because sometimes leaving words up to the imagination were so much worse than actually saying them. He went back to looking at his phone with an intense concentration.

“This is Jay Dover. The people on the streets call him J-Dee,” Aramis said, and Lestrade could hear him moving papers about. Aramis’ voice sounded almost whistful, and while Lestrade had some small sympathy for him, it was overridden by the annoyance that Aramis hadn’t said anything actually useful yet. “Any leads?”

Lestrade looked up from his phone, raising an eyebrow and frowning. “Really? Do you really think I’d be calling you down here if we actually had any good ones? Which wasn’t exactly true, they’d called someone from Aramis’ department up here, not him specifically, but the younger man didn’t really need to know that. “The answer’s no, obviously. Don’t you know how to read?”

He was beginning to grow slightly more aware of how nasty he was being, but he was still at the point where he cared very little. He watched as Aramis looked over the papers, and said impatiently, “Well, what do you see?”

But any thoughts of actually caring about what Aramis did see were erased when his phone on the table buzzed once. It was on vibrate, but still, vibration did make noise. Lestrade turned his view from Ararmis to his desk and quickly snatched up his phone, staring at the text he’d received.

She woke up a few minutes ago. Shell call soon.

Lestrade let out a breath that he’d subconsciously been holding as he’d read. “Oh thank God,” Lestrade breathed out, his voice quiet. He wasn’t sure if Aramis had heard him or not, but he assumed that the younger man would ignore it; he seemed like that kind of a person.

[DETECTIVE PETER ARAMIS]

Peter was feeling more uncomfortable by the minute. His instinct was to please, but he didn't know what to do to make this man happy. At least it didn't look like his job was on the line, at least not from this guy, even if he was blowing enough smoke to make it seem that way.

When Lestrade implied he didn't know how to read, Peter wondered if the man was just trying to provoke him. Well, if that was the response he was hoping for, he'd barked up the wrong tree. Peter looked back down at the papers, skimming them for the important information. But the problem was that this was a preliminary report. There would be nothing substantial until the coroner got finished with his findings and the lab geeks went over the evidence.

"Well, what do you see?" Lestrade prodded, clearly wanting him to get out as quickly as possible. Peter didn't like that at all, but whatever message Lestrade was waiting for came right then and he could visibly see the relief flooding through the man. Peter felt for him - he'd been on the waiting end of a serious message before, and it was never fun. Maybe now Lestrade would lighten up enough to stop trying to tear him a new one.

Peter sighed, rubbing at his right eyebrow. "I don't see much of anything. No murder weapon present, killed and left behind the restaurant he bussed tables at, no witnesses, and no one from his crew has been interviewed. It looks like you don't have anything but a body and a potential fiasco trying to pin this on one of his enemies - also unlisted."

He closed the file and dropped it back on the desk. "So you need someone who actually knew the guy, that's why they called me up. How'm I doing so far?"

[GREGORY LESTRADE]

“I don’t see much of anything,” Aramis said. Now considerably cheered by the fact that his daughter was not only okay, but also not in a coma or something like that, Lestrade felt a bit worse about the fact that Aramis looked upset because of his harshness. “No murder weapon present, killed and left behind the restaurant he bussed tables at, no witnesses, and no one from his crew has been interviewed. It looks like you don’t have anything but a body and a potential fiasco trying pin in this on one of his enemies – also unlisted.” Lestrade could hear the mild frustration at the lack of evidence in Aramis’ voice.

The younger detective dropped the folder back on the desk and continued, “So you need someone who actually knew the guy, that’s why the called me up. How’m I doing so far?” Oh. Right. That. Oops.

“Um, actually…” Lestrade said, his tone a whole lot softer than it had been a minute ago, “I mean, you knew him? I – I didn’t know. We just needed help from someone in your department, but… yeah. I hadn’t really…” …read the file all that well… He waved his hand in the air, and by now he was feeling embarrassment creep upon him, “Sorry.” He hoped that Aramis would understand that his ‘sorry’ meant more than one thing. He bit his lower lip slightly, trying not to seem too ashamed; after all, he was the commanding officer here, he had perfect right to be as nasty to Aramis as he wanted! Problem was, Lestrade didn’t want to use that right. He picked up the file, opened it and skimmed the page again.

“So, what I said before,” he tried to make his tone nonchalant as he flipped through the pages of the file, quickly reading and memorizing facts. “I-“ he cut himself off when his phone buzzed again. He quickly set the file down; the phone buzzed again, signaling a call. Protocol could go to hell. “I have to get this,” Lestrade said in a rush, giving Aramis a truthfully apologetic look before leaping up and walking to the corner or his small office, holding the cell up to his ear.

“Hello? Yep. Okay thanks… Hi my love, are you feeling alright? Yeah? Okay, that’s good. Daddy was worried about you. Ach, right, I won’t refer to myself in the third person. No, no I’m fine, of course I am, the important thing is you’re fine. Huh? Oh, right, okay, well, let the doctor have a good look at you. Okay baby, call me tonight okay? Alright, I love you.”

Lestrade was pacing nervously back and forth in front of the far wall while talking. He’d never been an entirely sentimental person, or a sap, but, well, it seems his daughter was the exception for everything because he was admittedly having a bit of a hard time holding back unexpected and unwanted tears. After he hung up, Lestrade continued to fact the wall, avoiding the eyes of Aramis, if he was looking, and quickly swiped at his eyes and took a few deep, shaky breaths before turning and walking to sit back down at his desk next to Aramis.

Clearing his throat, he tried to speak normally, “R – right then, sorry about that, I uh, important call. Er, figured anything out?” He gulped, the effort of sounding normal was rather pathetic. He looked up at Aramis, trying to see what the other man was thinking. ’Probably not about the case, if I’m being realistic,’Lestrade thought. He had just made a bit of a fool of himself in front of the same man he’d just been yelling so unfairly at.

[DETECTIVE PETER ARAMIS]

Lestrade’s entire personality suddenly shifted. He was deflated of all that hot air and seemed apologetic as he fidgeted and began to stutter his way through an apology. Peter just nodded, watching as Lestrade picked up the file to look through it again. Peter had to admit that it wasn’t the worst way he’d been treated since he’d jumped up to play with the big guns, but it seemed to be the most emotional. Before he could say anything, Lestrade’s phone buzzed again. This time it was a call.

”I have to take this” was all Lestrade gave him, before turning and having what appeared to be an emotional conversation. Peter glanced at his foot to keep from listening in. It was none of his business if Lestrade was talking to his kid or if he sounded choked up about it. And if the man was drying his eyes, then it was also none of his business.
He looked up when Lestrade sat down beside him. The man looked less than composed, but he was making an effort at it. The least Peter could do would be to play along.

“R – right then, sorry about that, I uh, important call. Er, figured anything out?”

Peter had figured out a lot, but it was all about the man beside him. Had they been at the bar, he would have poured the man a drink and tried to chat his problems out, but this wasn’t the bar.

“Yeah. I'm familiar with the crowd J-Dee ran with. I can narrow down the list of people who would want this kid dead, and I can also narrow down five kids he runs with who might know something more,” Peter explained, writing down some names on his note pad. “I don’t imagine you had any luck trying to find anyone in his gang? They tend to go to ground when something happens.”

Peter didn't blame them, even if it made his job harder. He had his tricks, though, and he was willing to use them if it got something solid on who had killed Jay. He owed his mother that much.

[GREGORY LESTRADE]

Lestrade just kept staring slightly blankly as Aramis kindly ignored his vicious bout of sentiment and started talking about the gang Dover was part of. He just couldn’t find himself particularly caring about the case yet, and he nearly followed through on his idea to hand it over to someone else. Thoughts of his daughter and shame for being rather horrible were still floating about in his head, discombobulated and fuzzy, drifting in and out… it was too confusing.

“I imagine you had any luck trying to find anyone in his gang? They tend to go to ground when something happens,” Aramis said.

“Um, no, you’re right,” Lestrade said distractedly, trying to order his thoughts back to work (and so far failing pretty badly) and recalling what Aramis had just said so it made sense to him. “Leads, ah, yes, that’s good, yeah. Write the kids’ names down then, yeah?” Lestrade asked, focusing slightly more on the case. He had yet to drop the file, and looked at the small print on the nice, white paper. The fact that it was immediately hypnotizing was probably a sign that he should actually eat something today. He shook his head slightly to clear the blurriness and quickly put his glasses from his desk on. He peered back at Aramis over the frames, wondering that though the guy seemed amiable enough – well, at least he hadn’t hit Lestrade yet, though he rather deserved it today – if he was the type to spread rumours. Not that there weren’t already a few about him, as ‘the weirdo who actually talks to Sherlock’ and ‘the random Irish dude who came out of nowhere,’ but those weren’t exactly unkind.

He glanced at the clock on the wall: nearly two o’clock. Hmm. No wonder he was hungry. But he’d already caused Aramis enough reason to hate him, he didn’t need another, and so ignored the faint ache in his stomach to say, “Do you have any other information on the gang that might be helpful?” He was pleased he sounded a lot more confident than he had about twenty seconds ago. “General feuds around this guy, important histories, that sort of thing?” Looking at Aramis, Lestrade realized two things. One, was that he’d really only ever seen the man from quite a few yards away before, and two, was that he as pretty sure he knew that pretty face from somewhere else before. Where he wasn’t quite sure, but he was confident that he wouldn’t have forgotten a face like that in all its sparkles and fireworks. Whatever, maybe he’d ask later. Or maybe he was just really, really hungry.

[DETECTIVE PETER ARAMIS]

Lestrade sounded distracted when he asked Peter to write down the names of people in the gang. In fact, he sounded like he was having trouble getting his thoughts together. Peter knew it was probably caused by the adrenaline crash. A man could only be wound up so tight before he came down, and from what he’d witnessed, Lestrade was pretty worked up.

“Yeah, these names might get you somewhere,” Peter sighed, writing them down.

It would be getting them to cooperate, even enough to give a statement. These guys were tight knit. They didn’t talk if they didn’t have something to gain. Guys like Lestrade were strangers, they didn’t know the ins and outs. So even with the names, he wasn’t so sure they’d get anywhere. On his own, he could get the information, but he doubted Lestrade would go for that, so he'd do what he could.

“Do you have any other information on the gang that might be helpful? General feuds around this guy, important histories, that sort of thing?”

“If Jay was having problems with someone, I didn’t hear about it.” Peter shrugged, picking up the list of names. “All these guys have tough reps, but J-Dee was probably the least threatening out of all of them. They had their little part of the neighborhood and they hung out as friends. They weren’t into extortion or protection or anything like that,” he explained. “They all carry guns and knives, though. And before you ask, yeah, I’ve had them hauled in for the weapons a few times, but they just get new ones.”

Peter glanced over at Lestrade, catching the odd way he was looking at him. It was almost like he was trying to place who he was, but for all his intense focus, his eyes were a tad unfocused. Definite adrenaline crash.

“Inspector...are you feeling alright?” Peter asked, breaking his own rules about leaving Lestade’s business alone. “You look like you could use a glass of water or maybe something to eat.”

And this was why Peter wasn't a doctor. He didn't know if those suggestions even made sense. All he knew was that Lestrade needed something.

[GREGORY LESTRADE]

Aramis seemed a bit resigned to writing the names down for him, but Lestrade put that down to annoyance at his inconsistent personality today. He continued to stare over the thick plastic frames of his glasses as Aramis spoke, finally giving some useful information on the victim. Lestrade intertwined his own fingers and clenched his hands tightly, more concentrating on the sensation of faint pain between his fingers, rather than deducing much from Aramis’ words.

“Weapons…” he muttered quietly under his breath, and tried to think solely on the case. The kid wasn’t threatening, not much. That leads to the possibility that he had angered one of the more violent kids, or perhaps it had something to do with a girl. More often or not it did. The gang that Dover was part of was not one of the more conquering or dominant ones, they were generally more friends than partners in crime, so the rest of his gang members were probably just as young as he were, if not younger, hoping solely to just barely survive and still manage to have fun in that brutal world of NYC gangs. They kept themselves armed though, defensive, though since Lestrade hadn’t really heard of the gang before, he assumed they didn’t often murder people, if they did at all. So, a low key, young-persons’ gang, generally affable as far as gangs go. Which leads to the conclusion of… nothing. Right, his twenty-five seconds of analytics were completely useless, then.

It was then that he noticed that Aramis was looking at him a bit strangely, and though Lestrade wasn’t unsuspecting – after all, he’d be staring too – but it was still a bit uncomfortable to not know what the kid was thinking.

“Inspector…”Aramis started, as if he were hesitant to say what he wanted to, “Are you feeling all right?” Lestrade blinked blankly at him. Well, that wasn’t what he was expecting. He was thinking Aramis might say something more along the lines of ‘you’re an idiot why the fuck are you inspector,’ though that wouldn’t exactly seem in character for the younger detective.

“You look like you could use a glass of water or maybe something to eat.”

Oh gosh, did he look hungry? He hadn’t meant to screw up his face or anything; was he still doing it? Subconsciously he made the effort to look more natural, though he didn’t think he’d been looking all that strangely before. Though, god, he was hungry. Couldn’t he just use this opportunity to go eat something really quick? Aramis was being so unnecessarily kind, after all. But then, maybe it was because the guy was so kind that Lestrade didn’t want to take advantage of him. Well, any more advantage than he’d already taken today.

Lestrade realized he’d probably paused in his answer just a bit too long to be part of a normal conversation to give his answer and forced himself to say, “What? No, I’m, um, I’m fine.” Yes, very convincing. “Just…worried about my daughter is all. But, she’s fine now. I’m fine. Sorry, no, right, the case.” Well, that was a crap excuse. He was feeling a bit queasy himself now. He wondered briefly is stress vomiting was the kind of thing that people developed or if you were born with it. He was sure, but was counting on the fact that it was the latter. He decided to go with ’I’m being too overdramatic and shut up.’

[DETECTIVE PETER ARAMIS]

When Lestrade only blinked back at him blankly, Peter wasn’t so sure he should have asked the Inspector such a personal question. He wasn’t Gerry – Peter wasn’t allowed to treat him like his big brother. Lestrade made a noted effort to look more...neutral. He didn’t answer after a while, and Peter wondered if he should try to fill the silence between them.

“What? No, I’m, um, I’m fine. Just…worried about my daughter is all. But, she’s fine now. I’m fine. Sorry, no, right, the case.”

Peter knew the brush off when he heard it. Lestrade wanted to move on, to be normal. Still, Peter didn’t want to seem like he was just brushing off the older man’s concerns, either.

“I’m glad she’ll be alright. You must love her very much. If you want to talk about it, I don’t mind.”

That was the bartender in him. Ask about the problems, let people talk. But Lestrade seemed like he really needed to do or say something.

“As for the case, I’m going to let you in on a...little known fact. You want to talk to these guys? Call their mothers first.”
Peter reached for his notepad, writing down each mother’s name beside each kid.

“Start with Joyce Wilson. She’s the unofficial den mother of these kids. If you explain to her that Cora’s baby died this morning, and you don’t want to see any more babies die, she’ll probably help you out with the other mothers. If not, call me – I spend a lot of time with their kids.”

He ripped the top sheet off his pad, sliding it over to Lestrade with a bit of a grimace as his shoulder twinged at the motion. Yeah, this weather was killing him.

[GREGORY LESTRADE]

“I’m glad she’ll be alright. You must love her very much. If you want to talk about it, I don’t mind.” Well, that was unexpected. Something in the back of Lestrade’s mind reminded him of the rumours that Aramis had a side job, a bar tender, and OH, that was it! Lestrade must have seen him at the bar before! He’d no idea in hell how Aramis actually had time for such another demanding job – part-time, very flexible, perhaps family run establishment? – but at least that explained both his familiar looks at his casual offer to talk. Lestrade didn’t want to, not really, but it was a nice offer.

“Thanks,” he said warmly, and meaning it. It was probably the kindest thing he’d said to Aramis in either of their entire lives, which was a little depressing, but whatever. “For your concern.”

Aramis went on to tell him a very helpful fact: the mothers’ names. Yes, that was very good. A son, even a rebellious one, won’t forget their mother, even if they won’t listen to her. And having the name of each boy’s mother also gave him branches of connections through the women who didn’t hide in the shadows as much as their children did.

“Start with Joyce Wilson. She’s the unofficial den mother of these kids,” Aramis said. “She’ll probably help you out with the other mothers. If not, call me – I spend a lot of time with their kids.” Aramis ripped the note off of his small booklet of papers and gave it to Lestrade. The DI noticed something like a flinch as Aramis slid the note over, though. He watched carefully as Aramis retracted his arm, and it seemed to be hurting the boy somehow.Interesting. If Aramis started looking like he was in actual, uncomfortable pain again then Lestrade decided that he would stop and ask, but it was just a flinch. Then again, the police were trained to ignore pain. It’s what they do. ’What we do.’

“Thanks. That’s very helpful,” Lestrade said, contemplating mentioning Aramis’ arm. He decided to wait a few more minutes before deciding to ask, though he had the feeling Aramis-the-bartender wouldn’t mind all too much if he did. And it would give him an excuse to go eat. Looking down at Aramis’ handwriting, he said while reading the names (and recognizing none; he wasn’t from that part of town after all) “I heard about that. You… spending time with those kids.” He glanced up before his eyes followed his head and he said the first thing he wouldn’t actually regret when remembering this conversation later, “It’s a good thing of you to do, but… Well, you know. You might get hurt. So just… be careful. Remember the sort of things that they do in their free time, yeah?” The underlying message being ’If one of them dies, which one of them has and will again, you’ll be in pain because you let yourself get too close.’

[DETECTIVE PETER ARAMIS]

Peter heard the Inspector thank him for his concern, and then for his help. Peter let a small grin touch his lips. This was much different from the man he'd met walking through the door. This man he could see himself growing to like.

He just wished that he'd stop staring at him. Honestly, Peter knew he wasn't bad looking, and Lestrade certainly had the silver fox looks, but he just wasn't used to being looked at so closely. It was almost disconcerting.

“I heard about that. You… spending time with those kids. It’s a good thing of you to do, but… Well, you know. You might get hurt. So just… be careful. Remember the sort of things that they do in their free time, yeah?”

Peter met Lestrade's eyes, trying to figure out what he meant by that. They were good kids, for the most part. J-Dee and his friends were a bit too old to have gotten much out of what Peter said to them. They were too close to his own age to have seen him as a mentor or taken him for anything more than some transplanted cowboy. He was working on the next generation, the ones who weren't into the same crap as their older brothers and cousins.

"They play basketball in their free time," Peter replied. "Down at the community center. I keep a set of keys on me because the regular guy can have bad hangovers. So every so often they take the train and wander into the station to get them so they can play on the court."

And every time they did, Peter fed them candy from his desk and tossed them his entire key chain. By the time he was off shift and ready to play with them, they usually were worn down enough that he could keep up with them.

"I'll be just fine, Inspector - kids who do bad things don't walk into police stations on their own."

He tucked his pen behind his ear, studying the other man for a moment, probably missing the whole point of what Lestrade was trying to get across. He didn't want to make the man feel like he was judging him or anything. The guy didn't know his kids.

"You should come by and play some time."

[GREGORY LESTRADE]

Aramis met Lestrade’s gaze, looking slightly confused and a bit uncomfortable; Lestrade wondered if he shouldn’t have said that. Or, well, realistically he’d be pretty uncomfortable if he’d just been met with his own rare wrath followed by complete awkwardness. “They play basketball in their free time,” Aramis began to explain, telling Lestrade what he already knew, “Down at the community center. I keep a set of keys on me because the regular guy can have bad hangovers. So every so often they take the train and wander into the station to get them so they can play in the court. I’ll be just fine, Inspector – kids who do bad things don’t walk into police stations on their own.” Aramis also seemed a bit proud of those boys; oh dear, this was rather sad.

Lestrade grimaced, nodding. It was a good point, most boys didn’t but some boys did. Boys like, for example, he and his brother. God, they were a pair as teenagers. Not that they’d ever committed murder, but petty theft – some not quite so petty – and simpler things like underage drinking they were guilty of. However they still spend time with one police officer, McCourt, who took them out for food when their wasn’t enough at the house, or let them sleep in his office when it got too loud at home. They’d taken it for granted, even stolen from his a few times, but still, they’d loved him like a father, or a close uncle. That is, until he was shot in the line of duty when Lestrade was in his last year of secondary school.

Lestrade watched, surprised that he’d thought about McCourt for the first time in such a long while – while the memories with the guy were good, they still led to the guy’s death, which Lestrade did not like to think about – as Aramis settled his pen behind his ear. He looked just a little off, as if there was some nagging in the back of his mind. Lestrade was fairly sure what it was. Pride, or loyalty, or a bit of both. All to some kids who were often born into families whose fate was practically sealed if they did not possess some master intelligence or wicked integrity to rise above the low expectations of them. Unfortunately, those expectations were easy to live up to, and easier to stay with; raising above them were easier said than done.

“You should come by and play some time,” Aramis said, and it almost seemed like a bit of a challenge. ’Come see then, I dare you, I want you to, and you will see just how amazing they are.’ Lestrade raised an eyebrow, a bit curious.

“Should I?” He asked honestly. It was fairly clear they weren’t discussing the case any longer, though the information Aramis had given him was sufficient enough, at least for now. He assumed that Aramis was becoming something of a father to all those boys. He didn’t want to seem like he was supporting that cause, because though it gave hope to the children, it would give them a hell of a lot more reasons to join the gangs if Aramis actually died. Which… he didn’t want to imagine.

“I’m more of a soccer guy,” he said, remembering in the back of his mind that it was soccer, not football here. “But, ah, we’ll see.” He gave Aramis a small smile and stood, clearing his throat. “Well Aramis, you’ve been pretty good. And…” he grimaced at his own previous foolishness, “I’m sorry about before, honestly. I – I don’t want to seem like I’m making excuses, but I really don’t lose my temper too often. But... it was wrong of me to at you. So, I'm sorry."