chapter 8
☆ ゜・ 。。・ ゜゜・ 。。・ ゜★
8. spill
Jocelyn was doing her work at her desk until her phone rang. She didn't bother to look at it, she just ignored and kept working. Then they called again. She sees its Alejandro, her nephew.
"Hello?" She tucks her hair back as she answers.
"Tití, are you busy?" He said.
"Im at work, whats wrong? Are you okay?"
"Practice got canceled and Mama isnt picking up the phone and its cold to walk home. Dads not answering his phone and well Winona is working, you're my last hope. Can you pick me up from school?" Jocelyn immediately gets up and puts on her coat.
"Yeah, just stay inside, i'll be there as soon as i can." She hangs up and heads to Liv's office. "Hey Liv..." She says as she pops her head in. "I have to get my nephew from school, ill be back, is that alright?"
"Thats fine, is he okay?"
"Yeah, just my sister in law didn't pick him up, im going to call her. Ill be back in a bit." Jocelyn heads out and drives to the school. Alejandro hops in and buckles himself in. "I called your mom, shes a the doctor, she had to go in for a check up. Shes sorry." She drives back to the station. "So you're going to be with me for a while."
"Cool." He smiles. Jocelyn puts her hand on his shoulder as they walked into the precinct. "Woah." He's in awe.
"Peña, didn't know you got a kid." Amaro smirks.
"Shes not my mom, shes my tití." Alejandro says to him. Amaro backs up. Jocelyn shoves him a bit, letting him know to be polite.
"Everyone this is my nephew, Alejandro." They all waved at him. "This is Nick Amaro, Amanda Rollins, Fin, my sargent Olivia Benson." Alejandro waves back. "Oh and this is my partner Dominick Carisi." She smiles as he walks in.
"Just call me Sonny." He shakes the boys hand. "You play?" He takes the basketball from his hands, pretending to dribble.
"Yeah. Practice got canceled."
"What position?"
"Shooting guard." Amaro and Carisi oohed at the boy.
"Peña i think we got a future D1 in our presence." Amaro smiles at Alejandro.
"How about we go back to our work?" Liv smiles as she heads into her office. Everyone sits back to their desk. Jocelyn sits Alejandro next to desk.
"Do your homework si?" She ruffles his hair as she sits down.
"I can-" She gave him a look. The same look that his dad gives him. Which scares him. "You're right, i should start on that." Carisi laughs. "Whats this place?"
"Special Victims."
"Whats Special Victims? I thought you were in homicide."
"Dont worry about it, do your homework." She tells him.
"Just know your aunt is pretty good at her job here." Carisi praises. "You're pretty lucky to have her as a aunt."
"I know. Shes pretty cool." Alejandro shrugs. "You should see her play basketball with my dad, dunks him everytime."
"Thats because your dad has breakable ankles." They laughed. Sonny had distracted Alejandro from doing his work and took him to the breakroom to get some snacks, they were laughing and playing around in there. Jocelyn smiles from her seat.
"Jo!" Evelyn wobbles in. Jocelyn gets up and hugs her.
"Everything okay?"
"My blood pressure was down so i had to go in check it out. The baby is fine." She assured her.
"What about you? Are you okay?"
"Yes. Im fine. I swear."
"Why didn't you call me? You know i would come with."
"No, its okay. Y donde esta Ale?" (where is Ale) Jocelyn points at the breakroom. Evelyn smiles to see Sonny teaching Alejandro some moves. "Sonny huh?" She nudges.
"Not here please." Jocelyn fakes a smile as Sonny walks up with Alejandro. "Sonny, you remember Evelyn."
"Hi! How are you? The baby?" Sonny puts his hands on his hips.
"We're both good thanks." She turns to Jocelyn. "y el es muy amable." (and hes very kind) Alejandro hugs his mom. "Ready? Get your stuff, we have to go get your sister." Alejandro gets his backpack and heads back to them. "Say goodbye."
"Bye guys!" He waves at everyone at their desk. They smiled and waved at him back. "See ya Sonny, maybe you can teach me more." They shook hands.
"Let me know when your games are, i would love to stop by." Evelyn waves and takes Alejandro with her. The two sit back at their desks. "Sweet kid."
"Yeah he is."
☆ ☆ ☆ ☆ ☆ ☆
Time to leave. Everyone heads to their own way out, going home, getting ready for dinner, relax with their friends or families. Jocelyn heads her way to see her therapist, one that Dodds provided for her to see. He made sure that he wanted nothing like that to happen and he made it clear after he heard about what happened when Liv told him.
It was her first time meeting this Dr. Johnna. Supposedly shes good, but we have to see about that. Jocelyn didn't tell anyone, her family, especially her mom that she was going to talk to someone. Typical hispanic mom. But she never saw it was wrong but she rather not say anything about it just in case.
"Jocelyn Peña, its a pleasure to meet you." Dr. Johnna greets Jocelyn as she walks into the small office.
"Yeah, same here." She sits on the couch. Dr. Johnna gets up and moves to the chair across from her, crossing her legs, ready to write.
"I got a look on your file, looks like you didn't really show up to your last appointment back home."
"I kinda felt better, i didn't feel like i should've gone, plus the doctor wasn't as good. Always kept telling me to its done and i shouldn't feel bad about it. So i stopped." She shrugs.
"Lets get to the point if thats okay? I want to know more about you, your job, why you're here." Jocelyn told her the basics, the family, the job, you know. She went on about Lang and Bruce, the old crew. "What about here, NYPD, your new partner? Your new sargent?"
"Bensons great, shes been pushing me to go out of my comfort zone, she made me do this undercover job a few weeks ago. Shes pretty good, i trust her." Jocelyn sits back, crossing her legs. "Carisi, we call him Sonny, but i like to call him by his name, Dominick sometimes, but hes my partner. Hes no Bruce but he's got my back, i couldn't ask for another man better."
"You trust Sonny?"
"I like to think so. I mean hes been trying to help me out since i came here, he keeps me busy. Great guy." She writes down. Jocelyn just sits there, waiting awkwardly for the next question to come up.
"You're divorced right?" Jocelyn hums. "He used to work with you?"
"We actually went to the academy together, dated there and we still were together when we got assigned to where we were going to work at, and we ended up getting the job in homicide detectives together."
"Jensen Rogers." Jocelyn nods again. "Was this a falling out? A mutual agreement?"
"It was more his decision than mine." Jocelyn rubs her eyes. "We had different ideas about our relationship, i wanted kids, he didn't because he wanted to focus on his career as a homicide detective. Moving to a bugger place, he rather stay where we were because houses were expensive and the drive to work was insane. I think what sent him over the edge was me taking the sargents exam behind his back."
"Why?"
"My lieutenant, Ethan Lang, he wanted me to take the exam, he saw potential. So i did. I found out that Jensen was taking his because there was an open spot, and when we found out my score was higher, few days later i was served with divorce papers at my job." She claps. "The reason was that I was dragging him down, that he worked hard for what he wanted and i made him a fool when i did not do anything, supposedly."
"Did he say anything about you coming here?"
"Nope. I didn't say anything about coming here. Bruce told me that he was upset about it because i didn't tell him. Who can understand him." She chuckled.
"It says here that your father died, you and your partner arrived at the scene." Jocelyn moved uncomfortably. Talking about her father on the first day was insane. But anything to get this out of the way and not have Dodds breathing on her.
"It was a slow day at the unit." She tells. "Everyone was talking about the latest baseball game or heading to bother the other units. I decided to hit up my dad, to have dinner. He hadn't seen me a while since I've moved out with Jensen, and well, i became a detective. He was happy to even sit with me for a few minutes. My dad, he said he'll pick up dinner and head to the precinct." She choked on every word she said. "Couple minutes went by and we got a call, a stabbing and shooting, guy was in his late 50's early 60's, on his way to the hospital. Lang wanted me and my partner Bruce to head out. I kept calling my dad about to cancel the dinner but he didn't answer. The drive was only 20 minutes and when we got there, a bunch of bystanders, officers taking witnesses statements and tape. Bruce and I head up to the scene and looked at the bloody ground."
Flashback:
"Son of bitch is lucky to be alive." Jocelyn said she squatted down. She looked up at Bruce who was checking the place out. "Anything left behind?"
"Just the knife and phone."
"When you're done, I wanna see that phone, maybe we can get something. Hows the guy?"
"Hanging on. Paramedics said that he won't make it." She took a moment to stand away from the scene and call her dad one more time. The line kept ring and ring, then he picked up.
"Well finally, Im trying to call you! Dad, imma need to cancel dinner, I got a case and-"
"Peña." She heard from the other line. She turned around and saw Bruce holding a phone and looked at her. She shook her head. No. She felt like everything hit her all at once. Bruce ran to her, catching her as she fell to her knees.
"I need to get to him. I need to be there for him." She cried
Flashback over:
"I never drove that fast in my entire life, everything was so fast, every thought, every light. Worst of it was that there was traffic. I got to the hospital within 25 minutes, my mom and my siblings were there already. I remember I sprinted to the hospital, leaving Bruce and running 7 flights of stairs because I didn't want to wait for the stupid elevator. I felt the adrenaline pumping through my veins and when I got to my dads room, they called it." Jocelyn started to sob. "He died just as I came into the room. If I just didn't call him he'll be here. If he didn't get food from my favorite place, i would have my dad still. My dad deserves to be here. And its my fault." She wipes her tears and looks away. Dr. Johnna hands her some tissues.
"Is that how you feel when Vics shot Nico and you?" She brings up.
"I gave out the order to stay put, only i go in. I had a plan. Vics hands me Nico and he runs out, my squad will be already out to arrest him. But no, they had charge in, making that boy die." She continued to cry. "If i acted sooner, Nico would still be here. I worked hard to get him back and only to wake up to find out Nico didn't make it and that Vics is fine and now in prison doing a life sentence. Why did i survive and he didnt?"
"You can't blame this on you Jocelyn. Many things could've happened."
"So when Carisi was held at gunpoint, yeah i froze, i didn't want his death on me. I cant go through that again."
"Your father's death, Nico's death, Carisi, its not your fault. You did not know. Your father died from a robbery gone wrong. Vics was gone too far and almost killed you, he spun out of control." She takes off her glasses and starts to go at her. "Carisi is still here. You cant always save everyone. You carry too much burden on your shoulders."
"My mom has two jobs, my younger siblings are in school, barely see her, my brother also has two jobs, his wife pregnant on baby three, someone has to be there for them. I have to be there."
"I get that you are the older daughter in a hispanic household, your brother left you guys behind early to have a family, you already have enough on your plate when you had to take care of siblings. Then your dad happened, the divorce, Nico. And you are juggling to make sure everyone is happy and alive. Tell me then, you take care of everyone, but who takes care of you?" Jocelyn shuts up.
"Damn it you're good." Jocelyn sighs. Her time was up. Jocelyn sits on the edge and rubs her eyes again.
"I still want to meet, all i ask is that you need to start letting go of things you can't control. I want you to realize that you're not alone and its okay for ask for help. Dont weigh yourself down."
"Yeah. Sure." Jocelyn takes a minute to get herself together and leaves. She sits in her car for a bit, realizing that maybe she was right, none of it was her fault. Her father and Nico's death are part of her, she wants to do something to relieve their memory in a way. Her holding it in isn't going to help.
She snaps out of her thoughts as she got a text. Barba. All he said was to meet her at a location. She had nothing to do but stay home so she decided to head her way to him. She pulls up to a bar, it was lot nicer than the ones Sonny and the rest takes her. She sees Barba sitting down at the counter, drooping over his glass.
"Whats the occasion counselor?" She sits next to him.
"I just need someone who wont judge me and not say anything to me about its my fault." Jocelyn's face drops. Rafael waves at the bartender to give him another drink, he hands it to Jocelyn. "My abueltia died."
"Rafa..." Jocelyn puts a hand on his shoulder, assuring him that shes there for him. "Im so sorry."
"My mom wanted some time to heal, i cant stay at my abueltias place, i cant go home, not now." He sighs, rubbing his face. "All i thought was you."
"Want me to say a nice thing or a Jocelyn thing?"
"Surprise me." She thought of saying something clever but its not the time.
"Im glad to be here with you Rafa." She raised her glass. "To your abuelita, may she rest peacefully." They clinked glasses and took a swig.
"I really appreciate you coming here." He starts to say what has happened. How his abuelita was getting older, he wanted her to move so she wouldn't be alone and is safer for her. All he knew is that she died in the apartment he knew and grew up.
"I know how you feel."
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