Common Ground

Despite that initial firm resolve to face things right away, Jamie instead took a few more days after the dinner at Alston's with Erin and Nicki to procrastinate and wait for the right moment to approach Danny and the boys. He knew his brother likewise had an eventful week with details of the fatal shooting of the armed stalker at St. Irene's hospital filtering through the cracks to him via Eddie and his father but given the fact that it was already the weekend with the dreaded Sunday dinner looming large the next day, all bets were off since Henry had called and insisted Eddie was welcome and expected. With that in mind, after a restless night's sleep, he finally set his jaw early that morning as the light even broke over the horizon and gave her a quick kiss on the cheek in bed before rolling over to get dressed while she slept in on her day off, determined that time was up, and he had to pay the piper before this stalling made things worse.

"Jamie, seriously it's like… ugh… oh-dark-hundred," came the moaning, yawning protest from bleary eyes unwilling to put forth enough effort to read the alarm clock before her face snuggled back down in the pillow while he pulled on his jeans. "Why are you going for a run this early?" she assumed without actually looking.

"Shhh, I'm not, lambchop," he revealed quietly although that had been the norm for the past few days as he sought out the solitude of the morning to think and work out his feelings over the young girl's death. "Just go back to sleep; I'll be gone for a while," he warned as he found his wallet on the dresser and pulled on a nice tee and button-down shirt combo. "I wanted to drive into the city and pick up some flowers to take to Gina's grave before anyone else comes. They had the funeral yesterday," he advised sadly, having purposefully waited to pay his respects until now so not to intrude on her parent's grief and privacy. "Then I thought I would grab some coffee and head over to Danny's new place so that we can talk. I know he has off today."

"Really?" she asked as one inquisitive eyebrow came up, sensing his reluctance but glad to see that he had finally made up his mind to follow through. "Did you want me to come too?"

"No, I'll handle it," he promised before sitting down on the bed next to her. "I'll be fine."

"I know you will, because he's your brother, and he's going to be happy for you," she assured. "But you're thinking about this too hard. Besides, we've been out for a whole week at the 12th. What are the odds he hasn't already run into someone who told him about us? I'm sure he already knows and is just waiting for you to say something."

"No trust me… I would have heard by now if that was the case," he sighed. "Danny's not exactly patient, and besides, he had to take a few mandatory days of modified after the shooting on Wednesday night. He probably hasn't left his squad."

"Yeah, so you save a girl and get suspended, he goes in alone like Rambo without his partner or ESU and kills a perp then gets a parade… no, I'm kidding," she added at his expected huff. "That's just what the other guys at the precinct were saying. I know what he did at that hospital was no joke. I heard that guy was a certified nut job. Stalking that poor woman, and he didn't even care that he was in the pediatric ward shooting innocent nurses and doctors or scaring little sick kids. Danny did what he had to."

"That's my big brother," Jamie admitted with a sigh. "Linda always hated hearing about him taking those kinds of risks."

"Well, maybe he went the extra mile because the vic was a nurse too," Eddie reasoned as without knowing she had hit a significant nail directly on the head. "That probably made her situation more personal."

"Yeah, maybe," Jamie considered that wrinkle. Had he in fact been overthinking how his relationship with Eddie might affect Danny all this time? As hard as it had been since Linda's death, it felt weird to consider that maybe his older brother himself could one day move on that way… or had in fact, considering the lengths he had purportedly gone through for this Faith Madson.

"I guess if anything it shows he's getting back to himself. He was talking about turning in his papers for the boys' sake for a while before that," he added without mentioning that during a few of those brotherly venting sessions he had gone against the grain of the rest of the family and supported that decision. "He was afraid to leave them too."

"I don't think that's in his DNA, any more than it's in yours to toe the company line and let people like Gina get hurt by the system without somehow trying to help, even if you take the hit for it. Don't ever change, Jamison Reagan… remember, you're a good guy," she encouraged in a familiar way even as her hands reached for the edge of his shirt and pulled him closer. "And you're so good at other things, are you sure you really have to leave this early?" her voice turned sultry and teasing as a rush of blood was enough to make him forget anything else for a time. "Your brother and the boys probably want to sleep in, and I'll have such a hard time going back to bed alone since I'm up now."

"Mmm… yes, you are, and now so am I. How about you take care of that for me?" he murmured and gave thanks once more for her presence in his life as her hands lowered and she deliberately brushed up against him to quickly undo a zipper as he gave in and leaned over her while their lips met in a far more lingering and sensual kiss. "I love you, Eddie Janko."

###

"Officer Reagan?" a soft voice beckoned from behind as Jamie made a hasty turn to try and take his leave without being noticed after spotting Gina Walker's parents standing at their daughter's grave a few hours later that morning.

"I didn't mean to interrupt," he tried to assure while regretting the fact his morning interlude with Eddie had seen him running later than intended as he continued to back away and retreat to his car, a spray of colorful flowers clutched in his hand, and another larger bunch bought impulsively still laying on the front seat.

"Are you here to visit Gina?" her father asked.

"I came to drop these," Jamie tried to explain apologetically. "But I understand you wouldn't want me here."

"Come over here," Mr. Walker insisted in what appeared to be more the tone of an order than a request.

"I'm sorry," Jamie approached tentatively while shaking his head.

"Please, don't apologize," Gina's mother insisted as she held her husband's hand.

"Aren't you in the middle of suing the department?"

"No, not anymore," she revealed with a resigned tone and a glance down at her daughter's grave. "But it doesn't matter, really. Blame's not going to bring her back."

"I'm so sorry, what you must be going through," Jamie empathized, having stood in this same way over far too many freshly disturbed mounds like this during his relatively short life… especially for those like Joe, Vinny, Linda, and now Gina who had been taken too young with so much promise ahead of them. Mrs. Walker was right; in the end, blaming himself or anyone else for those losses had done little to help.

"Officer Reagan…"

"Jamie, please. Call me Jamie."

"Jamie, I've been wanting to thank you," Mrs. Walker added sincerely. "If it weren't for you, we wouldn't have gone to see our little girl before she passed away… wouldn't have been able to touch her… to hug her… we owe nobody but you for that."

Nodding his thanks and overcome with relief at that admission from the two grieving parents, Jamie laid the flowers down; his heart now mended slightly with the knowledge his actions had indeed made a difference for someone, even if things had not worked out as hoped. With a tight smile, he stood up and took his leave since there was another stop that needed to be made not so far away from here now.

###

"So, what do I owe you for those?" A loud, unexpected, gruff voice interrupted his thoughts and made Jamie jump as he knelt on one knee in quiet contemplation in front of a familiar row of headstones in a nearby Bay Ridge cemetery, the newest now adorned with a lovely arrangement of bright flowers initially purchased for someone else but repurposed for this spontaneous stop.

"Jesus," he gasped as his chest thudded in surprise before he stood up and turned to face his brother who likewise had arrived clutching a much smaller bouquet of some of Linda's favorite blooms. "How about some warning next time before you give me a heart attack?"

"What's the occasion?" Danny ignored the request with narrowed eyes and seemed intent on discovering just why his youngest sibling was here alone this morning in front of his wife's grave instead of elsewhere with a certain other blonde as reports of Eddie and Jamie's open admission of their relationship had reached him just as she assumed they would. Despite the family's assurances that he would take the news well and be happy for the young couple as was everyone else, at this moment Jamie could not detect a hint of that sentiment given the stark, almost certain accusing stare he was receiving.

"Nothing," Jamie insisted with a swallow and raised eyebrows as he studied the look and puzzled over its intent. Was that a projection of anger, jealousy or guilt that was being directed back? "Just stopped for flowers to take to Gina's… the girl who OD'd at the precinct this week," he tried to explain figuring that news of his latest suspension had at least been shared by someone else. "They had her funeral yesterday. Thought it would be nice to bring some here too."

"Just for Linda?" Danny pointed out, still set in that cold demeanor that frankly was giving his younger brother the heebie-jeebies and a chill up his spine as he remained locked in that glare.

"No, I… uh, left some for Mom and Grandma too," Jamie defended as he pointed to where he had pulled a few of their favorites out of the bunch and placed them at the base of their stones, as well as exchanged a coin for Joe, something he had taken to doing just as a reminder of his visit. Sometimes the one he's left previously was still there, sometimes not, but he would carry another for luck in his pocket, anyway.

"Yeah, but you gave her the most," Danny noted irritably, now feeling inadequate too on top of everything else as he added his own smaller stems to the display and paused for a second to close his eyes and say hello to his departed love. "Feeling guilty for somethin'?" he accused even though he was most definitely expressing the same sentiment.

"What? No!" Jamie insisted as he grasped what this display of anger was most likely about… his brother knew and was feeling betrayed as feared. "So, you heard?" he assumed with a frown, as much as he'd hemmed and hawed over having this conversation, in all honesty, he hadn't really expected that it would come off this way when the cat was out of the bag, yet here they were facing off with each other in the worst possible place.

"Yeah, imagine that," Danny scoffed as he stood up and stared out into the distance over the rows and refused to meet his eyes. "You got lucky on the worst night of my life, and then didn't even have the balls to mention it to me all these months… My own brother sat there listening to all kinds of my personal shit, and I had to hear about this from that asshat Billings in the squad at the 12th, not you."

"Danny!" Jamie gasped, his stomach dropping as if he'd been sucker punched in the gut at that accusation. "It wasn't like that!"

"Yeah? So, what was it like then?" his brother demanded as he turned to face him. "Tell me!"

"Not here!" Jamie hissed as he glanced back down at the headstone before him which summed up Linda's life and death as a 'Beloved Wife and Mother' in the all too shortened space between two inscribed dates, the other side of the marker empty and waiting for another sad day in the future… one that he had feared might come sooner than expected when his brother confessed to some dark thoughts in those early days when the pain of her loss was nearly too much to bear.

"C'mon, what's with you?" he demanded strongly as he noted the pair of eyes now staring back at him were bloodshot and puffy. For a moment he worried that Danny had found solace from whatever was bothering him in the bottom of a bottle again, then had driven over here in this state on top of that. "There's something else, isn't there?"

"Just came to talk to her," came the blunt admission as his brother's gaze dropped and Jamie caught what he thought was a look of intense guilt. But for what? Surely not this thing with him and Eddie… this reaction seemed out of place and over-the-top even for that. None of this was making any sense.

"Me too, Dan," he acknowledged more softly and tried to use that opening as a way to ferret out the true issue just as he had done patiently for the last few months whenever he had sensed the need. To be honest, he had often felt Linda's presence strongly in all this as if she had been asking him to look over her husband and help him move on, and there had been several one-way conversations with her in this very place asking for guidance in dealing with his brother's grief. "I wanted her help to tell you… I was on my way to your place right after this."

"You really believe in all that, don't you," Danny frowned as he backed down in timbre and stared off again as if he didn't dare look down to the ground where his wife lay. Of all the Reagan siblings, Jamie had always shown the most conviction in that regard, not unlike the what their mother Mary and even Linda had shared, something that Danny himself had found impossible as of late. "That there's some kind of plan behind all this? That you can come here to ask them things you can't get from anyone else, and you really expect an answer, don't you?"

"Of course," Jamie answered matter-of-factly. "You do too, or you wouldn't be here right now, either. You have faith, Danny… I know you do."

"Huh, I almost did," his older brother huffed softly at that irony and shook his head sadly at the comment given the encounter the night before with a particular woman that had set him off on this downward spiral again. "If you only knew how close I came, kid," he murmured under his breath.

"What are you talking about? Just say it, Danny," Jamie urged. "If not to me… then to her. I'll walk away."

"I can't," his brother replied. "Not about this… it's too soon…" he trailed off.

"What is? Are you really mad about Eddie and me?" Jamie questioned. "Because it wasn't like… that," he insisted, trying to explain how the two had finally come together. "She just knew I needed her, and this time I couldn't let go… then things happened later…"

"The way they were supposed to," Danny sighed as he completed the thought and regretted coming off that way since he had known all these years that the two had carried a torch for each other. "No, I'm not mad for that… it's just… Couldn't you tell me? After it happened, you asked me to trust you, and I told you some pretty bad stuff…"

"Yeah, you did," his younger brother agreed as he thought back to some of those deep conversations held over pitchers of beer, ballgames, a pizza, or nights at the shooting range. "And that's why I couldn't say anything back," he admitted. "You needed someplace to get that out, just like I did when Joe…" he stopped as that caught in his throat and there was a long pause until he continued as he revisited some of his own demons. "Syd never listened to me back then… not really. She never let me say everything I needed to, and because of that, I held it in since it upset her whenever I brought it up, especially after I decided to be a cop. That's why I couldn't tell you about Eddie… it was too soon, and I was afraid," he stopped.

"You were afraid I'd stop talking to you, and go ahead and do something stupid… Kid, it was just that one night, and I was drunk," he tried to explain a comment made in grief that had put Jamie on high alert for months. "I have the boys… I would never leave them too."

"I know, at least I hoped I did, but I was worried if I mentioned what was going on with Eddie, that you'd be afraid to tell me stuff too… and I was scared we'd lose you. I just couldn't Danny… I couldn't lose another brother."

"God! Did you ever tell anyone else about it? Is that why Dad made this big show about getting me out of the house?"

"No! I never!" Jamie insisted as he looked back down. "You made me swear not to… not even Ed knows," he promised. "The only one I ever told was… here."

"And now?" his older brother probed sadly.

"Now, I think you're going to be okay," Jamie admitted honestly. "I really do. You've taken steps. You have a new house… a new start and the boys are…"

"Ready to move on?" Danny asked as he considered his recent moment of weakness. "I don't think they are. Sean's still angry with me because she's the one that died, and I don't do stuff like his mom, and then…" he hedged.

"What?"

"This vic, from the stalking…"

"The nurse?" Jamie prodded, suddenly sure of where this was going.

"Yeah, she's a widow too, her husband was on the job… narcotics. I drove her back to her house after the ex-boyfriend tried to run her off the road to make sure she was safe… and she invited me for a beer to talk…" Danny paused and started to breathe harder. "I left, but after the shooting, she came to the squad, and she asked to see me again, and for a second…"

"You were tempted?" Jamie pushed. "C'mon… get it off your chest, man. Tell her," he nodded back at Linda's stone. "She'll understand. You're feeling guilty because you were attracted to another woman, and it scared you."

"I just… she was pretty and interesting, but I'm not ready, kid… I don't know if I'll ever be ready. It's weird, but I still feel like I'm married, you know, and the boys…."

"It's not weird at all, Dan… she seemed familiar and someday it'll be okay when you decide to start again. Dad was able at some point after Mom, and we were all good with it," Jamie asserted before modifying that comment when his brother returned a dubious look. "Okay, so maybe not Erin, but you and I were, and she came around."

"But I don't want to be ready. Maybe in another lifetime when I'm a bit better at dealing… with certain things…" he trailed off with the pain in his heart and mind evident. "I just want my Linda back," he finally broke down and sank to his knees in front of her. "I'm so sorry, honey… I'm sorry I even thought about it for a second, it's... it's just that sometimes I miss being part of a couple."

"She knows that, Danny," Jamie assured softly as he watched his brother let out some of those pent-up feelings in front of him again. "And it's another reason Eddie and I kept it quiet all this time. We didn't want to hurt you. None of us were there yet. I miss her too."

"You're the only one that lets me do this," Danny finally acknowledged as he sat back on his heels, shaking his head. "Dad and Pop keep asking what they can do to help… Erin too, but I can't say this stuff in front of them. Maybe Mom was right; you missed your calling," he finally huffed and wiped his tears.

"Me? No way. Even Dad says I would never have lasted as a priest."

"Why do you say that?"

"Because I've got the conscience, but not the humility… besides, there are a few other things I would miss," Jamie admitted with a smug smile as he considered the morning's most satisfying bedroom venture and the potential for an afternoon recap. "And one of them is waiting for me at home. I promised to take her to the movies later. Are you okay hearing about stuff like that?"

"Yeah," Danny nodded as he finally stood up, definitely feeling as if a weight of guilt and anger had lifted. His brother was right; it had honestly helped opening up to Linda here. Maybe someday in the future, he would find himself at that same place in a relationship again... that exciting part at the beginning full of exploration and introductions, even for a couple who had known each other for years. It was a start at least.

"I'm good," he declared with a deep breath. "Don't keep her waiting, kid… it's about time the two of you were together. I know the boys will think so too, and we'll see you at dinner tomorrow, okay? Let's fill another chair back up instead of putting so many of them away."

"We'll be there," Jamie promised as he clapped his brother on the shoulder, relieved now that this conversation had happened here where it needed to. "All of us."

So, things are sorted between the brothers, and I felt like Danny needed some closure on Linda's passing and that encounter with Faith Madson so he could finally start to move on. Next, my muse is telling me there has to be a way to blend together the baby delivery scene at the theatre with a first Sunday dinner for Eddie and perhaps even some mention of fortune cookies and things going on between the sheets, lol, so I'll work on that. Happy BB Friday!

ETA: Given the fact that our Jamko pair is now actually a "thing" for S9 and opened up a whole new realm of possibilities, I think I will close this particular story and carry on with some standalone pieces. Thanks to everyone for the reviews and comments along the way!