A/N: Here's my contribution to the Challenge From The Other Challenges. The prompt I received was, 'Hotch decides it's time to spend more time with his team', and the pairing is Hotch/Rossi, coming originally from the New Year's Challenge.

This will be slash (no smut), and AU in that I'm ignoring the existence of Beth and the triathlon storyline for the purpose of this story.

Disclaimer: Criminal Minds and its characters don't belong to me, I'm just borrowing them.

This Year's Going His Way

Chapter 1

The year 2011 was turbulent one for Aaron Hotchner and his team. The "death" of Emily Prentiss, the return of Jennifer Jareau to the unit, temporary and permanent reassignments, and ultimately Emily's "resurrection" left a mark on them all, on the group of people who considered themselves as much a family as they were colleagues.

Aaron knew that with the decisions he had made surrounding Emily's faked demise, keeping secrets from his friends, he needed to work hard to get their full trust back.

Which was the reason why on New Year's Eve he made the first resolution in longer than he could remember. It was also the only resolution in his adult life that he managed to keep.

Dave Rossi, his closest friend and confidant, had convinced him to spend the last evening of 2011 together when he had realized that they both were the only ones without plans for the night.

At a quarter to midnight Dave had decided it was time for resolutions and that had resulted in Aaron declaring to spend more time with his team outside of work.

It was a good idea. Dave thought so, too, and Aaron hoped it would help them all, but especially Morgan and Reid, get over their trust issues towards him.

So, the first time he put his plan into action was a couple of weeks later when they'd returned from a particularly long and hard case.

It was a Friday night and they all knew they needed to do something to unwind. Garcia suggested going to her favorite bar, exchanging glances and smirks with JJ and Emily, which should have alarmed Aaron right away. True to his word to Dave, though, he didn't hesitate to come along and almost regretted his decision to ever have made this resolution when upon their arrival it turned out the quirky tech analyst had signed them up for the bar's weekly Karaoke night.

In the end, he had no reason for regret.

They had a wonderful time and he had to admit that he hadn't had that much fun since before his divorce. He and Dave were the highlight of the evening with their almost perfect rendition of Sonny and Cher's 'I Got You, Babe'.

Well, them and Reid, whom the three women had managed to get drunk within the first hour and well before his turn on stage. Then he had to sing Lady Gaga's 'Born This Way'.

And thanks to Garcia he was going to be able to show his future grandchildren a video of how much fun he had that night.

Reid's misfortune, or rather, lack of talent, was the highlight of the team's next night out as well, when they went bowling together.

This time Ashley Seaver also tagged along, and so it was decided, with Garcia and Morgan being the driving force behind it, that the women would team up against the men.

If it hadn't been for Aaron, who had to confess that bowling had been his favorite hobby during highschool and college, the guys would have lost by a mile. Instead, the women only won by a few points in the end.

And poor Reid could add a video of his attempts at this sport to the growing collection he'd be able to show his hypothetical kids.

The next time they went to dinner together to one of DC's finest Italian restaurants, thanks to Dave's connections getting them reservations at the place that was normally booked out for months.

It was a nice, relaxing evening with interesting conversations, fantastic food and even better wine.

Afterwards it was Aaron, who suggested concluding the night at a bar, and he and Dave ended up staying much longer than anyone, getting drunk together.

They somehow managed to get into a cab, driving them to Dave's mansion.

The next morning they woke up in Dave's king-sized bed, extremely hung over, wearing nothing but their boxer shorts, entangled in each other's arms.

Not being able to remember how they got there or what happened, if anything at all, they both swore to lay off alcohol for a while.

Still, Aaron couldn't help but feel disappointed when Dave suggested never mentioning this to anyone. It had felt amazing lying in his arms, safe and comforting, and even through the blur of his hangover induced headache Aaron noticed how incredibly right it seemed to be.

They didn't speak much for the rest of the morning, both lost in their thoughts.