Chapter Text
“Do you think this is how Deacon felt when Matthew was born?”
“What do you mean?”
“Like everything’s just changed in this huge way,” Street continues, “and in theory it should be really great, but turns out you’re not sure yet if it’s a good thing or a bad thing.”
“I’m still not foll— oh, this is about your mom,” Chris realizes.
Street shoots her a glance across the Charger, like he’s mildly annoyed that she isn’t keeping up. “Uh, yeah. Her parole officer was over this morning, almost made me late for work counting how many kitchen knives I own.”
“Forget about the PO, how’s your mom actually doing? Almost two decades behind bars, it’s gotta be a big transition for her.”
“She’s—I don’t know, she’s my mom. She’s trying to put on a brave face, I think, but she’s scared as hell. That’s why she wanted to live with me instead of a halfway house.”
“Do you think…” Chris lets her voice trail off as she rethinks her choice of words. “How much support do you think she’ll need once she gets settled?”
“Support, what kind of support?”
“It’s faster to go straight,” Chris tells him, and by the way Street cancels his left turn signal and glides through the green light without comment, she can tell how distracted he is by all this. “And I don’t know, help getting a job, keeping a job? Keeping her head on straight out here. I mean, does she even know how to use an iPhone?”
“I’ve helped her submit online applications to a couple places and no, she hasn’t totally figured out the new phone yet, but she will.”
“But that’s a lot on you. At a halfway house they’ve got coaches to help people learn this stuff.”
“I know how halfway houses work, Chris,” Street says. “My mom, I think she’s too… proud for that. I don’t know. My dad took away all her dignity, treated her like shit for almost fifteen years. I think she wants to feel like her own person—really for the first time in her life. My parents, they got together when my mom was just nineteen. She’s never had a life where someone else wasn’t controlling her every move.”
“That’s exactly why a transitional program would probably be a good idea,” Chris gently points out. “You, saying you feel like a brand new parent with a baby…well, that’s not far off the mark.”
“No, that’s exactly why she needs to be with me. I mean, she’s my mom, and I love her. She’s the only person I have in the world—“
“Street, that’s not true and you know it,” Chris interrupts.
“—okay, but I’m the only person she has in the world. And I don’t want to let her down, you know?”
“Don’t take this the wrong way, but what if you’re letting her down by not making her get outside help?”
“That’s ridiculous,” Street scoffs. “You’re the first person to always tell me, family comes first. Right?”
“Yeah, and I get that, I do. I just don’t want to see you throw away everything you’ve done with your life because of her.”
“Isn’t that what she did for me, though? I’d be dead if she didn’t do what she did. I owe her.”
Chris sighs, hoping her voice doesn’t give away her budding frustration. “It’s fine to feel that way, but just don’t let her take advantage of that, okay? You’ve got a good heart, and she knows that, and—and I think that’s what’s making me nervous for you.”
“I do wonder…” Street clears his throat, and Chris turns her head to look at him, offering him time to articulate his thoughts. “I’m a little worried she’s hanging onto this fantasy of the life she thought we’d have together after my dad died. She thought she’d get off and it’d be her and I, just a normal mother and son, and I think she expects that to happen now. And maybe that’s what I want, a little bit, too. You know? Plus, it’s my fault she didn’t get that at the time.”
“No, we’ve talked about this. Even if she did what she had to do, it wasn’t right of her to drag you into it.”
Street continues as if he hasn’t heard her. “But then the PO handed me this paperwork I gotta get signed, telling the department that I’ve got a convicted felon living with me. And there’s weekly PO check-ins, and I can’t even keep beer in my fridge…”
“Are you asking yourself if it’s going to be worth all the—“ she cuts herself off before the word hassle comes out of her mouth “—all the extra stuff?”
“No, no,” he insists. “It’s not that. Of course it’s worth it, having my mom back in my life in a real way.”
“Next right is Hondo’s street,” Chris cuts in.
“I got it. But yeah, until she’s really back on her feet, it’s gonna be…” Street’s voice trails off as he turns onto Hondo’s street, leaning forward to locate his house through the uncharacteristically dreary day.
“Tough,” Chris finishes for him.
“Yeah,” he concedes with a sigh. “Yeah, it’s gonna be tough.”
She holds her open palm out towards him. “House keys?”
Street drops Hondo’s keychain into her hand and they both leave the car, Chris leading the way onto Hondo’s front porch. “Just be smart, yeah? Don’t—don’t let your guard all the way down just because she’s your mom.” She purses her lips, recalling the rumor that Karen pulled strings from prison to jam up Hondo — she’s heard Street’s claims that Karen wasn’t responsible, and while she trusts him, that definitely doesn’t extend to his mother. “Do what you gotta do, Street. Just don’t be stupid.”
She glances at him over her shoulder as she lets them in Hondo’s front door. He meets her gaze, face expressionless as he follows her. “Box is in the den, he said?”
“Something wrong?”
Street doesn’t answer as he brushes past Chris and out to the corridor.
Chris has never seen Street’s mom before, not even in pictures. She’s taller than Chris expected, and has darker hair. Even from here it’s clear she doesn’t share her son’s kind hazel eyes. Still, there’s no question as to the identity of the woman waving at her partner from the entryway.
Karen.
Street glances back at Chris as his mother speaks to him— she’s excited about something, judging by her body language, but they speak in hushed voices that Chris can’t hear clearly. As Street turns back to Karen, Chris knows the polite thing would be to look away, but she can’t bring herself to do so completely. Leaning on the table to watch as discreetly as she can, she clocks Street’s anxious, defensive stance and it worries her that Karen seems utterly oblivious.
Karen hands Street a folded piece of paper from her purse, and loud enough to hear, she insists that she’s not here to cause trouble. Street starts to herd her away with an outstretched arm and Chris can’t hear his response. The whole interaction has Chris on edge — seeing Street interact with his mom like this cements for her the fact that despite his insistence to the contrary, Street has to have lingering reservations about this whole arrangement. And he should, Chris thinks, if Karen feels she’s entitled to waltz into restricted areas of HQ just to say hi in the middle of a shift.
Chris knows she’s cynical, courtesy of the scars her own mother etched into her soul. Most of her can’t understand why Street would even want his mom in his life, given that she made him a murder accomplice in the seventh grade. But if she digs deep, there’s a twinge of jealousy within her, too. Not of Street’s traumatic upbringing, of course — not his years of abuse or the time he spent in foster care after that. But of the happy memories he must have, somewhere, of his childhood before. Chris can tell that there had to be twelve years’ worth of beautiful moments, however fleeting, however marred by his father’s constant shadow — it’s something Chris never experienced with her own mother, whose main parenting strategies were alcohol and absence. But she’s sure Street and Karen once found light in each other amidst the darkness around them. Without that, she doubts that Street would be doing all this for Karen now.
It’s an impossible combination for her to reconcile, as an outsider. A pang of empathy courses through her for Street, and his position in the center of it.
Chris sees Street watch Karen leave, apparently making eye contact with her one more time before he strides back into the room, and Chris is back to demanding answers.
“Street, was that—“
“Yep,” he replies, without looking at her.
Chris moves closer to him as they both lean the heels of their hands on the table. “What’s she doing here? Did you know she was coming?”
“No, I didn’t.”
“Then how’d—wait, did she sneak her way in past security?” Chris exclaims in a hoarse whisper, incredulous.
Street’s silence is all the confirmation she needs.
“Listen, I’m worried she’s putting you on thin ice with the boss. You gotta tell her she can’t just show up here.”
“I know, I got it, okay? I told her it can’t happen again.”
“Make sure it doesn’t,” Chris hisses.
He finally looks at her, eyebrows raised in a wordless challenge to push the matter. Effectively silenced, Chris blinks away the red flags dancing in her periphery and picks up another of Hondo’s files.
(21:19) Chris: What’s going on? Is it your mom?
(22:03) Chris: Where are you?
(22:21) Chris: Are you coming back to HQ?
Her texts go unanswered, so Chris is both surprised and relieved to find Street already back in the locker room with Hondo by the time she and the others have finished processing the scene and dealing with the evidence. Both men appear at ease, and Hondo leaves Street with a fist bump before ducking out.
Everything’s fine, it seems. She should keep her nose out of it.
But as far as Street goes, when has that ever been her approach?
She takes her time changing and packing up her locker, hoping that Street will linger too — a natural chance to talk. But he’s the first one dressed and he only waits for Tan, just behind him, before they head out of the locker room together in silence. But she’s made up her mind against dropping this, so she hurries herself through tying her shoes in the hope she can catch him.
She does, exiting the building just as he waves to Tan across the parking lot, helmet still under his arm.
“Hey! Wait a sec.”
“Sorry, gotta get home.”
She jogs the last few feet of distance between them. “No, wait. Street.” She drops her voice to a whisper. “Why’d you ditch us after the op? It was your mom, wasn’t it.”
“Chris—“
“Street, don’t you see it?”
“See what? Don’t tell me you wouldn’t have done anything for your mom—“
“Hey, we’re talking about your mom, not mine,” Chris snaps, and it vaguely occurs to her that after almost a year of working together, she’s never told Street about her own disaster of a mother besides the basic fact that she’s dead. Her mom isn’t exactly a welcome topic of conversation at the Alonso family barbecues Street’s been coming to. “She’s already causing problems for you. Twice in one day—this can’t keep happening, or somebody’s gonna notice.”
“Looks like you already have. But everything’s fine, okay?”
“Someone with more power than me.”
“Is this about you getting in trouble that time…? I promise, I won’t let that happen again. This has nothing to do with you.”
“No, it’s about you getting into trouble, and that does have to do with me. Look, I know she’s your mom and you feel like you’re responsible for her, but—“
“ But nothing, Chris. It’s fine, it’s under control. It’s just growing pains, is all. The transition is — it’s hard but it’s under control.”
“Under control,” Chris echoes. “You saying that to convince me, or yourself?”
He flattens his lips into an unimpressed line before pulling his helmet over his head, breaking their eye contact. “I’m done talking about this. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
Without another word, he swings his leg over his bike and revs the engine. Chris tugs her bottom lip between her teeth, biting down hard to distract herself from the disconcerting unease simmering in her gut. By the time he’s through the gate and out of sight, she tastes the metallic twinge of blood in her mouth.