real_gun_hand | Kersen

Kersen

Hotch had been trying to get out. He'd never been the sort to just go out for the sake of going out, but in London he knew so few people and the town itself was a mystery. He'd taken it to heart that he should find at least one new place every week and this week he'd found a lovely restaurant that served Asian food. Of course he had had Chinese in mind when he heard 'Asian' and was surprise dwhen he arrived that it was Indian cuisine. He'd enjoyed a delicious meal and then had started off to the tube when he spotted a bar. He could have one drink, he thought, and had made his way inside.

A piano bar, neatly appointed and apparently popular. Hotch took a seat at the bar and ordered a scotch, then turned to watch the pianist. He didn't recognize the song, but that was no shock. It sounded jazzy and that really wasn't his specialty.

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It wasn't the most popular song and Hotch was duly impressed that Kersen seemed to know it right off. He moved to the piano with his drink and listened, smiling softly as Kersen sang.

It was only then that he decided he was definitely a man. Not that it mattered in the scheme of things, but Hotch liked to deal with certainties. He didn't like unknowns.

When the song ended he put his glass down so he could clap.

"Nicely done."

"Well thank you, honey," Kersen said pleasantly, and plucked up his glass of wine again. "It's a beautiful song... sometimes your own worst enemy in love is yourself."

"I think that having it done on the piano made it significantly more melancholy than the original. Though, to be fair, most Eighties music doesn't sound melancholy," he chuckled. "Too many synthesizers."

Kersen thought of how he'd played 'So In Love' for Hani, and how it had sounded more melancholy than usual as well... maybe it was just something about the way he saw love songs recently.

"If you liked it then my work here is done," he said, smiling.

"How many years have you owned the bar?" he asked, curious to know more about Kersen. He seemed quite the interesting character. Certainly not like anyone else Hotch knew.

"A few," said Kersen pleasantly. "I wouldn't want to date myself. Makeup is magic."

Hotch chuckled lightly at that.

"I wouldn't know. But it looks good on you," he replied.

"Does it?" There was a twinkled in Kersen's eye, a touch flirtatious. "Because it's a lot of work to look this good."

"How long have you been a drag queen?" Hotch asked, taking a calculated risk. If Kersen actually was a woman...well, part of him braced to wear that wine...

The fact that Aaron might have been taking a risk didn't even occur to Kersen, though it would have amused him greatly. "Since I was... oh, nineteen, I suppose, was when I began to dabble," he said. "I was doing some acting and then just sort of fell into it."

"I was in college at nineteen," Hotch said, thinking back to those days so long ago. "Pre-law. I'm not sure I can even call it pre-law, I was just starting out."

"And what were you like as a strapping young co-ed?" Kersen asked him.

Hotch thought back to those days and a far-off look took him over.

"My wife and I hadn't married yet, but we were living together. I went to school full time and had a full time job, too. It was a busy time. Looking back, I can hardly understand how I did it. But I did. We made it work."

Kersen's eyes flicked down to the wedding ring. Perhaps he shouldn't flirt quite so much, though he appreciated that Aaron was a good sport.

"It sounds as if you didn't have much opportunity to be young," Kersen said.

"That's never been my lot in life," Hotch said. "I grew up quickly after my father passed away. I wouldn't know how to do anything else."

Kersen considered this for a moment and then admitted, "I left home when I was fifteen. So I guess I didn't either."

"Hmm...I did have my mother and brother, but I had to become the man of the house," Hotch said, suddenly struck by how easy it was to open up to this man who was virtually a stranger.

Maybe it was the scotch loosening his tongue.

"And I imagine you took to it very well," Kersen said. "After all, look at what you've done with your life... you take care of people."

He thought of how Hannibal thought of him as a therapist at times. Maybe there was some truth to that.

"I try," he replied, though the truth of it was that he shot a lot of people and only haphazardly held his team together...or had, until it had all unraveled a bit.

Kersen almost said, I imagine you're a good husband too, but on consideration, decided it was pretty likely that the man was a workaholic. Not that that meant he wasn't a good husband, but there was always the possibility it was a sore subject.

"Do you have any kids?" he asked.

"I have a son. He lives with his mother," Hotch said. "His name is Jack."

He didn't say they were divorced, but with one subtle sentence he knew he'd revealed quite a lot. His mother instead of my wife. The implication they were still in America rather than here in the city with him...

Kersen did indeed pick up on these things. Wow, good call on not making that comment he'd been thinking.

"Sometimes I wonder what it might to have a child," he said after a moment, though it was just a statement of fact, not something wistful or heavy.

... though he didn't mean it in quite the same way. He was referring, instead, to the fact that he'd never turned another vampire. He had no progeny.

"Mine's only four so...sleepless. And always sick," he said, chuckling fondly.

Kersen smiled at him. It was sweet, the way the man spoke of his son. "And I'll bet he thinks you hang the moon."

"Something like that," Hotch said softly, turning to his drink to wash away the sting of the memories of Jack. Haley was wonderful and Skype was a blessing, but the time difference made things difficult.

"You've got plenty of time to start a family, I'm sure. If that was ever the direction you saw your life going."

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