Chapter Text
And nothing I cared, at my sky blue trades, that time allows
In all his tuneful turning so few and such morning songs
Before the children green and golden
Follow him out of grace.
Fern Hill- Dylan Thomas
It would be a long time before Bill put two and two together. When he finally saw it, and couldn’t un-see it, he wondered how he'd missed it. He reproached himself afterwards. How could he have been so inattentive? He was heading a fucking unit hinging on psychological profiling for christ’s sake! It not only made him question his professionalism but his merit as a colleague and, dare he say it, friend. He should have noticed his own partner in the field struggling.
Last year Holden’s increasing cockiness had obscured it. He had really assumed it was nothing but arrogance motivating the younger agent at the time. His obsession with cases that weren’t even in their purview, that they had no business interfering with. Twice Holden had dragged the FBI into situations like that. Bill had never stopped to really ask why.
He remembered Holden defending his actions over that damn foot tickling school principal to Shepard.
“I was worried about children!”
Bill had been eager to write it off as hubris. Because Holden wasn’t a family man. He was too immature to truly worry like parent would worry.
What if some guy were tickling Brian's feet?
Bill had been genuinely angry at that - Don’t bring by kid into this!
It had pissed him off that Holden, of all people, was essentially accusing him of social irresponsibility. He wondered, in retrospect. Why hadn’t he been as worried as Holden? Because Holden was right… In a trade off between an innocent guy losing his job and reputation, and the possibility of hundreds of kids being molested…He knew, deep down, that the risk was too great...But it still hadn’t been any of their business. He had his own kid to worry about. Jesus. Back then he’d only been worried about Brian’s attitude and personality.
He had no idea what he was in for.
Six weeks after Atlanta and Nancy was finally speaking to him again and letting him see Brian. He took the kid every weekend, back to his sparse, crappy apartment. Brian hated it there and unholy tantrums ensued. Bill had no idea how to handle the kid anymore. His own dad would have clobbered him. He wasn’t going to do that, and he knew it wouldn’t help anyway. Now that the mandated therapy was over ,Nancy seemed to be in denial that there was anything really wrong with their son. “He’s just a little different.” She’d say. Reminding him of what many a well meaning parent of a future psychopath says.
Don’t think that. He’s not like them. This is something else.
So maybe he had noticed. If he was honest. But he’d been struggling too, and after Atlanta his life had fallen apart. He hadn’t been thinking about Holden, or anyone else, for a time.
It was pretty clear with hindsight that Holden did worry though. He worried a lot, particularly about kids. The Atlanta cases had taken a lot out of all of them, but particularly the youngest agent. Since the cases had been closed Holden had seemed… Shrunken… Diminished somehow. As though he’d taken on responsibility for the entire agency’s failure. He’d come to work, carry out interviews, diligently write up his transcripts, attend meetings. But gone was his flare for lateral thinking, his spark of humour.
Bill hadn’t realised that he was still suffering from panic attacks. He’d just found him on the floor of the office bathroom, hyperventilating. Curled in a ball.
“Shit! Holden!” He sat down beside him and moved Holden’s head off the filthy floor and onto his lap, wrapping his arms around the agent’s shoulders.
Holden was whimpering with each breath. “C…C…An’t… Br…Br…”
After searching Holden’s pockets for pills, and finding nothing, Bill did the only thing he could think of. He rubbed Holden’s back and spoke to him quietly. It reminded him of nothing as much as holding Brian though one of his freak-outs.
“Yes… Yes you can. You know what this is. It’s happened before… It’s just a panic attack.” Bill said in what he hoped was a soothing tone. “Just close your eyes and imagine you’re…on a… A safe, warm, beautiful beach… And the sun is shining on you.”
After what felt like forever, Holden’s breathing began to slow down and gave way to the telltale hitching that betrayed tears. Shit… What’s with you kid?
Bill looked up to see Wendy looking down at them. She must’ve heard something. Could be worse, it could’ve been Greg. All they needed was Gregg running upstairs to tattle on them. He doubted this would be something they could keep out of Holden’s file.
He shrugged at Wendy as he rubbed Holden’s back, letting him sob. A twitch of distress fluttered across her face before she turned and left quietly.
Later, in her office, a shamefaced Holden sat beside Bill, muttering apologies.
“Theres nothing to be ashamed of.” Wendy told him, ever practical. “It’s just your body having and exaggerated physiological response to stress… It’s to be expected that the work we do will take some kind of toll on our nerves eventually… I know a good therapist… If you want to talk to someone?”
Bill noticed Holden tense beside him before speaking hesitantly, not making eye contact once.
“Um… Wendy… What if it got out… You know that a member of the BSU. The people who interview killers…Who everyone looks sideways at because what they do isn’t hard science yet…Was… Well.. Crazy? I… I should resign… I’m obviously not fit…”
“You’re not crazy.” Bill told him. It’s just… The job. The stress you’ve been under… Atlanta."
At the word he saw Holden flinch slightly.
“Besides… without you this whole experiment is over Holden. We need you.”
“Yeah well… We haven’t accomplished all that much have we?” He whispered, tremors passing through his jaw.
I saw Soldiers act like this after Korea… In psych wards. Thought Bill… Here was me thinking he wasn’t affected enough by this sick shit.
“And don’t you dare say we haven’t accomplished anything! We got a killer off the streets.” He added.
Holden inhaled as though he were about to speak and then thought better of it. Retreating back into the uncharacteristic and disturbing silence that had surrounded him for weeks.
“You’ve been showing signs of depression since Atlanta.” Wendy said bluntly. “Your anxiety is obviously worse than ever… Are you still taking Valium?”
“Um… No. I was… Well… You know it’s addictive right? I could feel myself… Needing it… So I stopped.”
Wendy raised her eyebrows in alarm. “You shouldn’t stop it suddenly like that. You need to taper it off… Besides, you ought to have it just for emergencies.”
“Yeah but…”
“But what?”
“But it happens all the fucking time.” He mumbled, playing with his cuff. “I could be having ‘emergencies’ several times a day”.
“Shit Holden. Why didn’t you say something?” Bill chewed his lip, feeling a little bit of panic of his own.
“I…There was so much happening with the case and all… Then… I mean, why would I? It’s my own fault I can’t keep my shit together.”
“What happened today to set you off?” asked Bill
Holden swallowed a lump in his throat “I saw Ted Gunn in the hallway upstairs earlier.”
“Oh?”
“He has a case for us… In Maine… It’s… Fuck Bill! It’s fucking murdered kids again... little boys”
“Fuck!”
“They found one body and there’s another missing now. The don't want a repeat of Atlanta, it wouldn't look good, so they're calling us in now."
“Holden.” Wendy interjected. “Its not a good idea for you to take this on. It doesn’t have to be your case.”
“ Yeah .” He replied, getting up. “It does… Because, whether I like it or not, we’re the ones with the skills to catch this bastard and I won’t be able to live with myself otherwise.”
As he shut the office door behind him Bill and Wendy stared at each other for a long moment.
“ Well…” Bill said. “This is going to be terrible.”
“Well if it’s going to be terrible, It would be pretty selfish of me to stay behind in my comfortable office again wouldn’t it?” Wendy replied.
“You’re coming? Good luck convincing Gunn.”
“Essential field research.” She replied. “ For the future of the unit.”