Author's Notes: First chaptered PR fic, but not the first PR fic I've written. Or am writing. :/ Just taking a break from writing a long, long story that's ultimately meant to give Jazmine a backstory in as much accordance with canon as possible.

For any Naruto fans: I have not forgotten you, but I'm way behind on Shippuuden, so your continued patience is as deeply appreciated as ever.

Word Count: 8,952 (Total: 8,952)

Rating: T for language and some light sexual situations (all clothing stays on, but those who are squeamish about age gaps beware)

Spoilers: Requires having seen the end of the movie, which you really should have by now.

Date Submitted: 1/6/18

Claimer/Disclaimer: For those who don't know, Jazmine is actually legit as far as canon goes, at least in name. There isn't much offered about her otherwise except within the questionable accuracy of the novelization. I took liberties.

The Reasoning Behind It: This originally started out as a Chuck-haunts-Herc story, where Jazmine could see ghosts and mistakenly believed Chuck was harassing Herc, while Herc—who's just moved into an apartment on the same floor as hers—thinks she's schizophrenic or something and tries to avoid her. Jason ended up being added, with similar storytelling goals as in this fic. Then it became this. Just goes to show how ideas evolve. The ghost-seeing bit I stuck into something else (which may or may not be posted, because it was connected to a fanfic fanfic that I wrote in desperation when a fic I was reading suffered a long break before its final chapter).

Chapter 1 – The Girl Next Door

Herc thanks the movers and closes the door. He looks down at the unfamiliar stone floor of the vestibule for a moment to brace himself. To say a final goodbye to what had been. He inhales deeply, exhales slowly. Then he lifts his head and takes in his new home. His quiet home.

His empty home.

It's reflexive, the way he opens his mouth to call out and locate his son—make sure Chuck is nearby and safe. But his vocal cords fail to function properly, and his son's name does not emerge.

Herc closes his eyes. Inhales deeply, exhales slowly.

Lets the pain come, fill him, and fade to something a bit more manageable.

That's the whole reason he's moved—to maybe help the pain fade a little faster. Not that he has any idea what he'll do if it does. His family is dead. He's just about middle-aged. Unless he goes back to the RAAF, he has no job prospects. No job history. He can probably live on whatever money he—and Chuck, since they had put each other's name on their accounts, just in case—had saved over time, but contrary to popular opinion rangers had never received a lot of financial compensation for their work; with the shatterdome providing room and board for rangers and their families, it had not been needed. Thus a life without work would by necessity lack everything but the most basic conveniences, and perhaps one trip somewhere each year, to visit friends or the like. He's perfectly capable of living like that, being naturally frugal, but can't see much of a point.

Once again, suicide rears its ugly head. He could sell the house, his truck and his motorcycle, his furniture, donate every cent to a charity or two, stick his gun in his pocket in case it's needed, and get a ride to the edge of the outback. Then he'd go on a permanent walkabout. It's a simple plan that doesn't burden anyone with cleaning up after him; he wouldn't expect anyone to ever find his body, nor would he care if it rotted away under the sun, and he isn't religious enough to worry what would happen to his soul if his body lacked a so-called proper burial. He'd just disappear, and those who knew him best would surely figure out in time what had happened.

Suicide goes against his military training and his personal feelings, but oh, how tempting it is.

"Oh, bub," he sighs, thinking of his wife and how much he needs her natural sense of optimism, "what am I supposed to do now?"

The doorbell chimes.

Herc blinks, glances over his shoulder, and murmurs, "I guess I open the door." He turns and does so.

On his new front stoop is a young woman. Well, young compared to him, at least—she's probably in her mid-twenties somewhere. Almost half his age. She looks somewhat familiar, but he can't place her.

"Hello," she says, momentarily startling Herc with her obvious American accent. "Sorry to bother you, but everyone's been telling me that this unit had been purchased. I heard all the noise and came by to be nosy."

He appreciates her candor. "Well, I'm here. It's just me." He tilts his head. "So you live over there?" He makes a vague gesture in the direction of the other half of the duplex.

"Yes sir," she confirms. "I wanted to let you know that I have a son, and he's still young enough that he doesn't necessarily keep normal hours. I know the soundproofing is terrible along the firewall so I put his room on the far end of my unit, but if he bothers you, please let me know."

"I'm sure it won't be a problem," Herc tells her. He isn't planning on doing anything with himself for the foreseeable future, so the idea of poor sleep caused by a needy baby doesn't concern him.

"I hope not." She lifts a covered casserole dish between them. "I also thought I'd bring something to eat. I figured that whoever moved in would be busy unpacking and not have the time to cook or any interest in cooking."

Herc has brought all his kitchenware, but in truth he's a lackluster cook and hasn't been looking forward to it. "Thanks. That's helpful, really." He accepts the dish. "Looks like I could eat on this for a few days."

She grimaces. "I'm afraid I didn't know how many were moving in, so I decided it best to err on the side of caution. I'm sorry."

"Don't be," he says. "I'm awful in the kitchen. This is grand."

She's clearly relieved. "Oh, good. Uh . . . If you need help moving furniture around, don't hesitate to let me know. I'm pretty strong. And I work from home, so my time is flexible."

It'll be a cold day in hell before he bothers a young mother about helping him move furniture. "I'll keep that in mind."

A baby begins to fuss next door, old enough to very clearly call for his mother's attention. She glances that way, then refocuses on him. "Well, that's all the free time I get this evening." She inclines her head toward him in a strange half bow that seems almost like an archaic gesture of respect. "Welcome home, sir."

"Thanks," he says again. He lifts the dish slightly. "I'll get this back to you—"

"Whenever," she interrupts. "I don't entertain, so I won't miss it. Take your time."

"All right . . ."

With that, she's gone, without even telling Herc her name.

Her name is Jazmine Lapierre.

"Oh, I'm sorry," she says when Herc returns the casserole dish three days later and introduces himself. She takes her turn and then adds, "Family paranoia—pretty much bred into me. Pay it no mind. Just nod and grunt and I won't notice a difference."

It's also the first time he meets her son—a charming tyke of perhaps two or three years who sits quietly on his mother's hip, one little hand fisted in his mouth, big blue eyes gazing up at Herc with all the awe of a child trying to decipher every secret of the world, too eager to be a grownup. At seeing him, Herc feels a twinge; the boy looks almost exactly the way Chuck had at the same age.

"And this is Jason," she adds, giving the toddler a gentle bounce. "Jason Scott."

Herc feels another twinge at the memory of his brother, but smiles. "Hey there, kiddo."

She looks down at Jason and surprises Herc by purring with a distinctly Australian enunciation, "Will you say 'hello' to Mister Hansen for Mummy?"

In a fit of shyness Jason attempts to turn away, but his head collides with his mother's breast. So he jams his fist farther into his mouth instead. But then he removes it and murmurs with an endearingly soft, very Australian inflection, "Hello."

The little brat is adorable.

Herc refocuses on Jazmine before he gets too attached. "You don't want him to have an American accent?"

"I daresay that no parent wants her child to have a particular accent," she counters in the American accent he's familiar with. "But in his case I'm figuring he'll more or less spend his life here, so he may as well sound like it. Fitting in will be easier for him."

And it's shameful that fitting in is even necessary. Herc can remember a time when it mattered far less, but that has changed with the kaiju. "You aren't going back to America?"

She shrugs. "Not necessarily planning to stay here, either."

That makes no sense, but he takes the hint from her sudden evasiveness and lets the matter drop.

Part of Herc's morning schedule is to go for his usual hour-long jog. If the evening isn't too hot, he takes a walk to familiarize himself with the neighborhood. A lot of the neighbors are his age or older and they take evening walks themselves, so he's able to meet them on neutral ground. And they certainly have a lot to say. He discovers a veritable gold mine of information the day he comments on Jazmine's twice-daily runs.

"There she goes again," he says to an elderly man whose home is well down the street. He's never seen her walk to cool down during her runs; she just pushes Jason in a special stroller and cruises on by with a stride that's near to a fleeing gazelle's. He doubts she runs like that without the stroller to lean on, but it's still weird as hell. He also never sees her starting or ending one of her runs—always catches her somewhere in the middle of them—so he doesn't know how long they are.

"Tires you just to watch her, doesn't it?" the man says with a chuckle.

"I just don't understand why," Herc replies. "I jog in the morning, but . . ."

"Girl drinks petrol, I suppose," the old man tells him. "Always moving whenever I see her."

"Have you known her long?"

"For a given value of 'know,' perhaps. I was here when she moved in, and there was a lot of concern that she'd be a problem, being young and all—loud music, parties at all hours—but she made nothing so much as a ripple. Takes her morning run, goes indoors until the afternoon, maybe goes to a shop, just before sundown takes her evening run, and then she's in for the night. Don't see her again until morning. Doesn't seem to ever work, either, unless she telecommutes."

Two days later, an elderly woman who lives across the street offers a less sparkling review.

"She's a rude one, that girl. And selfish. Typical American. Peter lived on the other side a while back, and she was always telling him he had his television up too loud."

"Did he?"

"He was hard of hearing, so he may have. But she started calling the police on him, even though he told me it was her baby that kept him up all night so he couldn't do anything except watch television. After he moved into a home, a young woman her age moved into his place. She was a darling, always helpful, but that little witch found ways to cause trouble, and she moved out within a year. Same with the handful who followed. Give her time, and that girl will chase everyone who moves into that house out of it."

Herc makes note of that. "Is she divorced or the like? A single mum?" Jazmine has a child, but he has yet to see or hear of the boy's father. If there is one, though, he doesn't want to be caught unawares.

"Oh, who knows? Girl doesn't talk much about herself, though she certainly likes to ask about everyone under the sun. There was a young man who used to stop by every now and again, but it's been a few months since I've seen him. She likely chased him away too. I hope she moves out before her boy gets too much bigger—I expect he'll be a terror."

Herc finds that hard to reconcile with his personal experience, and for a flash of an instant he's inexplicably angry with the old woman and wants to give her a piece of his mind. He manages to wrestle the urge down and, with a feeling akin to the sort he'd felt when he'd used his body and words to keep Chuck from insulting someone, firmly apologizes for taking up her time.

One afternoon, he finds Jazmine walking along the road. The local roads are quiet, so he slows and puts his window down, then leans out and calls to her, "Car dead?"

She seems to be almost stiff-shouldered at first, but when he speaks she looks over, and her expression is at ease. She smiles. "No. The grocery I prefer is just a few blocks this way. Don't see a reason to drive, normally."

"There's a shop up there?"

"Yep."

He'd had no idea and been on his way to a franchise a few kilometers away. "Hop in and show me."

So she tosses Jason's special stroller into the bed of his truck—before he can do more than open his door to get out to assist her with it—and climbs into the passenger seat. Jason sits quietly on her lap as she gives directions, alternately gazing around the cab and staring at him.

Herc never would have found the place if she hadn't guided him. It's obviously a shop, but tiny.

"It's locally owned, and specializes in fresh local stuff," she says with pride. "I get all my food here. It's all organic. Good for my baby. I come by every few days. Don't get much, which is why I don't drive."

The place has a healthy patronage, with most of the "aisles"—comprised of long tables of produce rather than towers of shelving—having one or two people foraging in them. Herc finds he likes the place; it's smaller and somewhat darker than a franchise, offering a sense of privacy that's entirely absent in the bigger shops despite the fact that everyone there can see everyone else, yet still has plenty of light to read and examine by. It almost seems as though the place is supposed to mimic the inside of a barn, but it smells perfectly clean and fresh.

Herc grabs a cart that's smaller than the usual sort and follows Jazmine and Jason up and down the aisles. Around them, patrons chitchat and joke with each other, interacting in ways they never would have in a bigger shop. Herc sees just how different the shop is about fifteen minutes into his visit, when he hears a pager go off. He looks toward the sound and sees a man checking one, then watches as the man turns and runs out the doors. Herc's about to go back to his shopping when he notices the way literally everyone else in the shop—even Jazmine—is watching the doors. A sedan roars past a moment later.

Someone points dramatically at the man's abandoned cart and shouts, "Get that list!"

Both of the women in the aisle with the cart dive for it, and after fumbling around one flings her arms into the air in triumph. She's holding a long piece of paper. "Got it!" The other woman takes hold of the cart, and some of the remaining patrons start racing around, repositioning themselves for some upcoming event.

"You're good," Jazmine tells Herc. "Stay put."

"Why?"

She grins. "That man is with the fire brigade. Firefighters, EMTs, and policemen—and I presume military servicemen, but they don't tend to get called away like this—always get ten percent off their total bill for shopping here. If they have to leave before they finish and happen to have a list, anyone who helps finish their shopping gets five percent off."

Five percent isn't a lot when you're buying something in small quantities because it'll go bad if it sits too long, but in a world that tends to both worship and hoard the almighty dollar, Herc is still impressed by the owner's willingness to do even that much. In a city the size of Sydney, there's bound to always be a fire or some other crisis in need of dealing with, and that creates a big potential for lost revenue if a responder happens to be visiting the shop at that time. "So what do I do?"

"Just watch. You'll figure it out."

The woman with the list reads an item from it. Immediately, another woman a few aisles down raises her hand and calls, "Here!" The woman in control of the firefighter's cart takes it to her, and she sets the item gently inside. The woman with the list reads off another item, and the process repeats itself. No one moves; everyone has put their own shopping on hold to participate. It's not very long before the fun is over—and it is fun, even though all Herc ends up doing is watching—and a smiling employee emerges from the back somewhere to claim the cart and presumably stick it in a refrigerator to keep the produce chilled. Then, just like that, everyone goes back to their own shopping as though nothing happened.

"How do you know how much he wants?" Herc asks.

Jazmine shrugs one shoulder. "Since there isn't generally any measurement, we choose based on the price per bushel or whatever." She points at the sign over the apples. "We get just one of anything. We know that, and if this has happened to him before then he knows it too. If he wants more or less, he makes the adjustments whenever he returns. One of the employees will return whatever he doesn't want to the tables, and if it can't go back out for some reason it gets donated to the needy."

That makes sense.

Upon making his purchases a short time later, Herc isn't so surprised that the cashier recognized him and he received the ten percent off without having said anything, but he is surprised to discover that he also gets the five percent off, even though he never actually contributed. When he brings it up, the cashier waves him off with a smile, says that no mistake has been made, and begins to ring up the next customer.

"You can't know what's on anyone's shopping list," Jazmine says from ahead of him, where she and Jason are waiting for him. "But you were willing to simply inconvenience yourself for the sake of someone who risks his life on a daily basis. That's all that matters."

Herc decides he really likes the place.

Since they're heading the same direction, Jazmine acquiesces to a ride home in the truck. Herc waits until she's safely in her half of the duplex with her groceries and stroller and son and has closed her front door before he steps into his own home. It's dark and silent and lonely.

He hates it.

"Do you mind dogs?"

Jazmine blinks. "Dogs?"

"I'm thinking of getting a dog."

Max has been gone for months—back with the family he originally belonged to, who were forced to leave him behind during a kaiju raid and never able to find him after they were displaced by a new exclusion zone that encompassed their property and home. Chuck apparently encountered them at some point, because they possessed a note written in his hand that Max was to be returned to them in the event of his death. The adolescent children were a little disappointed when their mother offered Herc the chance to keep the dog—the agreement, she said, had been made under the assumption that Herc would have died as well—but he really hadn't wanted the good-natured ball of wrinkles around anymore, for a couple of reasons. So he went home, gathered all of Max's things, and turned them and the bulldog over.

Sometimes he regrets it, but not often. Max is the sort of creature who will always be young at heart, a trait that had worked wonders for Chuck but would have been wasted on Herc. He figured that if he changed his mind about having a dog he could adopt an old one no one wanted, or perhaps a retired police or military dog. Something that is as old or older than he is, in dog years, so that if he goes downhill and gives up, he won't have to wait long to be free and clear to do whatever he chooses. He thinks he'll still go with an old or retired dog, but for the moment it'll be to just give it a nice home before the end.

Jazmine shakes her head. "My parents each had a dog—large breed—when they met, so I grew up around them. I like them just fine, so long as they behave themselves." She frowns a bit and looks at the back yard, in which Jason is rolling about. "I wouldn't want Jason and any sort of dog to interact unsupervised, though, so I guess we'd have to put up a fence somewhere."

Herc doesn't want to have to deal with an inner fence whenever he mows the lawn. Trimming along the boundary fence is bad enough. Before he can say anything, though, an egg timer goes off in her kitchen.

"'Scuse me a minute," she says as she gets to her feet and goes indoors, leaving Jason to his own devices. She reappears in her kitchen window and glances out, then vanishes again. She isn't gone long before she returns to the porch and sits down again. "I'm really sorry," she says, sounding mortified. "I don't know what I was thinking, leaving Jason out here so you had to watch him."

Herc shrugs. "No harm done. And never mind about the dog. It was just a thought."

She looks at him, a bit distressed. "Are you sure? Jason doesn't need a lot of room yet."

"You're right that they couldn't be unsupervised, but I don't want to mow around more fencing. It's fine." Maybe he'd adopt an old cat instead.

"I'm sorry," she says again. She gets to her feet. "Here, come inside and let me feed you . . ."

Herc wants to say no, but he has no plans for feeding himself yet. When Jazmine collects Jason and takes him inside, Herc follows without protest. She instructs him to wash his hands and have a seat, and disappears with Jason for a few minutes. When she returns the boy's hands and face are clean, though his clothes are still stained with grass. Herc likes that—that she's protective of Jason but not to the point of keeping him so clean the shine from his skin would blind an airplane pilot. She sets him in his high chair and buckles him in, puts a little bib on him, then washes her own hands and doles out the most delicious-looking BLTs Herc has seen in years.

"What do you want to drink?" she asks. "Tea, lemonade, or water?"

"Beer?" A beer would go great with the BLT.

"Sorry, I only drink wine."

Oh well. "Lemonade's fine." Herc isn't a huge tea-drinker.

The lemonade doesn't quite match up to the ambrosia that his wife could produce, but it's still damn good. The BLT is of similarly high quality. The accompanying chips are clearly store-bought, but not over-baked and are lightly crisped on the outside but gloriously soft on the inside. Herc is very glad he didn't fight her about where he'd be eating, and he's very disappointed when it's all gone.

Jazmine looks at his plate, a touch startled. "Good?"

He isn't going to lie. "Ripper."

She smiles. "I'd offer to get you more, but I'm not that well-bred. Fixin's are on the counter."

Herc doesn't care about her breeding. His legs aren't broken.

The second BLT isn't quite as good as the first. He can tell Jazmine added something to the first one that he left out of the second one. "Something's missing," he reports.

"Let me see," she says, and leans across the table. He pulls the sandwich apart for her, and she surveys his work. "Oregano?"

Never heard of it. "What-o?"

Jazmine gets up and goes to the counter, slides a shaker from the herb and spice rack near the preparation area, and returns to sprinkle a sampling over his tomato and lettuce. "Try it now."

He puts the halves back together and takes a bite, then nods. That's it.

She sets the shaker on the table and sits down to finish her own meal. Herc glances at Jason, who was given his BLT as a dry salad instead of a sandwich; he's made a mess with it, and is actively attempting to make a bigger one. Jazmine watches a shred of lettuce flop down next to her plate, then sticks a chip in her mouth. He is trying to eat, though, Herc sees—he just isn't coordinated enough to be as accurate about it as they might like.

Herc turns to Jazmine. "What were they like?" he asks. "The people who were over there before me." He gestures at his half of the duplex.

Jazmine raises an eyebrow. "You've been speaking with Miss Llewellyn."

He doesn't know who Miss Llewellyn is, but from Jazmine's tone he can make a guess. "And if I have?"

She sighs. "Mister Dillon was fine, except for the fact that he grew senile and kept trying to come into my home. That wouldn't have bothered me so much if he hadn't accused me of breaking and entering into his place and called the police on me. For being in my own home. Then when Jason was born he cried a lot, of course, and that made Mister Dillon very angry; the man could barely hear anything else, but apparently he could hear an infant crying crystal clear. At first he just left his television on at all hours with the volume cranked up—he claimed it was 'to drown out that noise'—but then he started threatening to beat Jason if I wouldn't."

She shrugs. "I drew the line there. My house stayed locked, and whenever he began rattling doorknobs I called the police. I didn't know why he was out there, but I couldn't risk him hurting Jason. Because if he had been able to, I would have killed him. Eventually, the police contacted his family—who as far as I can tell never checked up on him or otherwise knew his condition—and he was moved into a facility for the elderly."

Herc doesn't blame her. Even an old man could kill a baby. He doesn't see what else she could have done, other than take a cricket bat to the man, and that would've landed her in court for assault and battery.

"After him was a woman with connections to the BuenaKai. I didn't want her around Jason."

Herc grimaces. "Preachy?"

"No," she says. "That was why she was so dangerous." She points at the sheer curtains over her windows. "She was very sweet to everyone, even me, but I watched her snoop during the day. I put up some infrared cameras and discovered that she was snooping at night, too—trying the doors and windows. Particularly Jason's window. It was obvious she didn't want anything from me, but she sure as hell wanted something from my son."

Like other religions, BuenaKai is a broad term for the thousands of kaiju-worshipping cults that sprang up all over the world when kaiju began appearing regularly. Some of these cults interact but many don't, and because they follow local culture and tradition there's always at least one cult willing to do something the others won't. The BuenaKai cults that abduct children for conversion or sacrifice tend to exist mainly in Africa plus parts of Asia and the Middle East, but there is nevertheless a branch or two in theoretically "more civilized" places like Australia and the Americas and Europe. Herc feels a chill of furious alarm at such a close call, but tamps it down. The woman is gone and Jason is clearly safe.

"After that was a series of flakes. Jason was sleeping all night by then, but he did cry during the day. Most of them didn't have a job unless they telecommuted, and some of those stayed out partying until four a.m. and then came back screaming because they were blitzed and had no self-control, but they all wanted me to know how much my baby was keeping them from getting their beauty sleep and making their hangovers worse. They all moved out without me having to do anything except sit here and put up with them."

Jazmine smiles. "And now you've moved in. I hope you stay."

Herc is beginning to think he wants to.

Herc is less resistant the next time Jazmine offers to feed him lunch, and even less so the time after that. At some point he just starts showing up at approximately the right time, and she simply puts a plate in front of him. She then begins to see him off with the leftovers from the previous night's supper, which taste pretty good even reheated. He discovers for sure one morning that there's no way or reason to fight it.

That morning he goes on his usual jog, and as he returns home he notices that one of Jazmine's car's doors is open. He thinks that odd—because he's literally never seen Jazmine actually start her car, let alone drive it—until he realizes someone's rummaging around in the vehicle. He bristles at the intrusion, but as he's turning to go up her drive and confront the person, Jazmine straightens with something in hand.

She sees his movement and spins around to face him, visibly startled and angry to be caught by surprise. When she recognizes him, though, she smiles, waves, and says, "Breakfast?"

He jogs right past her and into her house.

He starts having breakfasts at her house too. She continues feeding him lunch and giving him her leftovers.

The food in his refrigerator goes bad. He throws it out without feeling much about the waste.

In fact, he's starting to feel . . . happy.

One afternoon, Jazmine runs a hand into her hair and sighs. "You know . . . would you just like to come by for every meal? If it's necessary I can add another serving to whatever I make, no problem; as you know, most of the time I'm wrapping something up anyway. And that way you don't have to worry about feeding yourself unless you're out somewhere. You can keep guy snacks and beer in your refrigerator."

Herc blinks. He doesn't mind the idea, but for some reason it seems sudden. Maybe because he didn't have to think about it or ask. "I . . . suppose I could do that . . ." He also doesn't know what she means by "guy snacks."

"Good! Breakfast is always anywhere from seven to eight in the morning, depending on how cooperative my son is. Lunch is around one, and supper is at six or seven. Usually closer to seven."

Herc decides he doesn't care what "guy snacks" are. He's sold. "I'll be there."

Of course, he just about ruins it on the very first day, when he says over supper, "Do you mind if I ask about your husband?"

She lifts her head, surprised. "What?"

He drops his gaze to her left hand and nods. He'd noticed quite some time ago but hadn't felt comfortable asking because he'd never seen anyone—let alone a man—visit her. He still doesn't feel comfortable asking, but if he's going to be eating every meal at her house he doesn't want things to get any more awkward than they have to be should her husband suddenly walk in after being away on a business trip or the like. "I noticed you're married."

Jazmine lifts her left hand and looks at the gold band circling her ring finger as though it's something alien, then begins to twist it around her finger with her thumb. "Oh. Oh, no. It's . . ." She pulls in a deep breath and blows it out slowly. "It's just an engagement ring."

It's curiously plain for an engagement ring, but Herc fails to see any difference. Either way, a ring means attachment. "Still, he won't mind?"

She shrugs. "No. He'd worry, bless his little dickheaded heart, but he was perfectly aware I can take care of myself. Besides, he's . . . Recently, he . . . fell. He has bigger things to worry about now."

Herc frowns. 'Fell' is a term used primarily by the military and law enforcement. Since he doesn't know of any conflicts the Australian military has entered into—her fiancé had to have been a citizen, for her to be willing to stick around after his death and even coach their son's speech—he assumes law enforcement. "I'm sorry."

She shakes her head and smiles wanly. "He knew the choice he was making." The smile fades and she lets her gaze drop to the table. "So did I."

Herc decides immediately that he doesn't want to go there. Therapy, for him or anyone else, is not part of his quasi-retirement. He feels for her, but the girl is on her own if she needs someone to talk to—the best he can do is direct her to a psychologist friend of his. He looks up at Jason, who's the usual bundle of good cheer, and says simply, "It's time to be brave."

She takes the hint with grace and nods, though her voice is touched with bitterness when she says, "There hasn't been a moment when it wasn't."

He wishes he doesn't understand what she means.

Eating his meals with other people—even strangers, even a mother and child who remind him of what he's lost—makes life easier. In exchange, he takes over keeping her half of the lawn trimmed; there's no fence between them, so it hardly requires effort to cross the imaginary divide and go on mowing. And when he's done, she always has a glass of water or lemonade ready for him. That's a nice bonus. He offers to take out her garbage, too, but she refuses, only to probe pointedly for details on the sort of handyman he is. He becomes her consultant and spokesman even if he can't fix whatever it is.

"I have a natural distrust of people like that," she explains. "Even on top of the learned paranoia. The best I can do is empty out the u-bend in the sinks when they get clogged, but otherwise I don't have the faintest clue as to what I'm looking at, so I'm very aware that someone might be ripping me off. The possibility drives me nuts, even when the bill is reasonable—it just makes me suspicious that the job wasn't done right. If you could handle that it'd make my life a hell of a lot easier."

Herc is willing to do a lot to not have to cook for himself, so he has no complaints about the trade. Plus, it keeps him busy and greatly reduces the number of times he finds himself staring into empty space, missing his wife or son or both.

That arrangement suffices for a while.

Then, one day, the balance shifts.

Herc is watching television—more like dozing in front of it—when he hears a thump and a shrill, "What?!" next door. He mutes the already almost silenced television and listens to a few moments' quiet that are followed by a light pounding of footsteps. When the noise continues, drifting near and far and back again, curiosity gets the best of him. Herc cuts off the television and meanders from his unit to Jazmine's.

When he gets to her door and rings the bell, he hears a frustrated, "Jesus Christ!" from inside. After another moment, Jazmine yanks the door open. She has her cellphone against her ear. She's scowling furiously, but when she recognizes him her expression eases. "Oh. Hi." She withdraws, leaving the door as it is, and turns away. "Sorry if I'm bothering you—it won't last long. If it's about anything else, I'm a lit—"

She abruptly switches gears as Herc lets himself inside and closes the door. "Hey, Abigail? Please tell me you can take Jason on short notice. That idiot Mather called again. It's too much to explain in a short time, but I'd be happy to vent later. So can you? It'd only be for a few—" She stops moving and listens. ". . . You're sure?" Her shoulders drop. Disappointment is clear. "No, I understand. I guess I'll just take him along. Maybe Mather will get the message this time. Sorry I bothered you—I hope it goes well." She shuts off the phone and raises it like she's going to throw it, then drops her arm and rushes toward the bedrooms.

Herc waits until she reappears dressed in a stylish gray women's business getup. She's hurrying to pin her hair to the back of her head. And she's apparently forgotten about him, because when she spots him in her periphery she goes pale and draws up sharply as she pivots to face and confront him. Then recognition sets in again and she sighs. "Damn it, I am so sorry. I completely forgot about you."

"No worries," he assures her. "Seems like you're in a hurry."

She groans and goes back to fighting with her hair. "It's one of my clients. I've been trying to nail him down for a meeting for nearly a month, but he keeps putting it off. He just called me five minutes ago and told me he's going on vacation next week and the rest of this week is booked, so if I want a meeting all he has is the next hour." She makes a disgusted noise. "Idiot. He's the one who wants this work done, I can't do it because he won't cooperate, and he acts as though it's my fault! I hate people."

Herc shrugs. "Charge him double."

"I'm already charging him triple," she replies. "It's one of the policies in my contract, to keep the projects moving and the money coming in—if the client doesn't provide at least half of the necessary information in one business week from the date of my request for it, the cost for the overall project goes up. I send a reminder, and after another week it goes up again. The week after that, too. There is no ceiling. I sent him an invoice recently, so I guess he saw it and realized he had to get his act together."

She snorts. "For having a relatively small business he's a typical corporate pinhead, so I guess he figured he could screw off and I'd have to dance to his tune. He—or someone he appointed—must have not read the full contract, though, or he would have known what he was getting himself into. Or he thought I wouldn't have the guts to send him a bill." She shrugs. "Anyway, he signed the contract, so he owes me at least that for services rendered and time wasted. If he doesn't like it then he can end the arrangement and I'll send everything I've done so far to whoever he wants me to. I won't be sorry to see him go."

"You can't take Jason?"

"Well, it looks like I have to this time. It's not professional to have a kid with you to start with, but this guy is a committed bachelor. That's not usually a problem, but his reason for it is that he hates kids. Especially the really little kids. But I suppose that's too fucking bad, because at this point he's just refusing to play ball. I have no choice but to take Jason with me to the meeting."

That's when Herc's mouth opens and says, "I can watch him for you."

Jazmine, who has begun digging through a messenger bag by then, stops and looks at him blankly. Her brain catches up. "Oh, no no no," she tells him firmly, and resumes her digging. "Absolutely not. You do more than enough for me already."

He can stop there. Should stop there. He's done the polite thing and offered to do her the favor, so his duty as a member of a cooperative society has been satisfied. The fact that she's rejected it isn't his problem. His mouth, however, doesn't agree with that assessment. "A child isn't—"

"Mowing my lawn is one thing," she interrupts. "Bringing me my mail is one thing. Fixing my car is one thing. These are things everyone who lives in the modern world needs done at some point. But not everyone chooses to have kids. Kids are different. I will not foist my child on you."

"I had a son," he counters. She stops again and stares down at her bag, obviously noting his use of the past tense. "It's nothing I'm not familiar with."

She continues to stare at her bag for a bit, then closes her eyes and exhales. "Fine," she says at last, quiet and calm. "If you're willing, I can't deny it would be easier to not have to wrangle Jason at this meeting, no matter how much that moron Mather deserves it."

She shuts the bag and slings it over her head to her far shoulder. "Jason's taking his midday nap right now. He should wake up in another half-hour or so. I happened to make lunch early, so it's sitting in the fridge. Feel free to eat mine, if you like. You can take him back to your place if you want a television, just leave me a note so I know where he is. Everything else he needs is in his room—there's a travel bag on the far side of the changing table that has plenty of diapers and snacks and toys packed in it. He currently has no allergies or medical needs that I know of. You already have my mobile number—don't hesitate to call me if anything happens. I will dump this asshole in a heartbeat if necessary."

"I'm sure I'll be fine," he says. In truth, his wife had done most of the caring for Chuck at Jason's current age, but Herc is confident that he can remember what it was like and adapt to Jason's idiosyncrasies. "I know his personality, and I've watched him before while you made supper. The only difference is that this time it'll be a little longer and you'll be a little farther away."

"It'll be half the city."

Herc checks his watch, then says, "If that's the case, you better get moving."

Jazmine's expression conveys her sense of helplessness. She blinks, frowns, then lowers her shoulders and head. ". . . All right. Thank you—you're a lifesaver. I promise I'll compensate you."

He's not worried about that, but to avoid another argument and get her out the door he nods. She goes for the door, pausing only to clasp his shoulders and pull him down to give him a kiss on the cheek. Then she's on her way, heels clicking against the concrete outside. He stays right where he is until he hears her car leave her drive, and only at that point does he move.

His first act is to secure the house. Then he peeks in on Jason. He has never seen Jazmine lay the kid on his stomach in the past, so the boy must have rolled all on his own. His breaths are reassuringly deep, even, and clean. Herc notices one half of a baby-monitoring set and goes cruising for the other, which he finds next to the computer in the office corner of Jazmine's main room. He picks it up, goes to the couch, sets the speaker on the coffee table where it will be near his head, lies down, and closes his eyes.

Jason's complaints—they aren't really crying—awaken him about an hour later. Herc gets up and goes to the boy's room, wondering with a touch of trepidation how the child will react to seeing the neighbor but not also his mother.

"Hey there, kiddo," he greets as he steps into the room, figuring Jason might have a better response if Herc doesn't abruptly lean over the bassinet and startle him. "Your mum had to go out for a bit, so we're going to have a boys' day." He peers into the bed and finds Jason gazing back at him with an expression of surprise. To his relief, however, no tears follow.

Jason lets out a giggle and reaches for him. Herc can't help a smile as he gathers the boy up. He finds the diaper bag and pulls it over his shoulder, then heads out to the kitchen, where he unloads everything. With the bag on the floor and Jason secured in the high chair, Herc pulls the marked lunch containers from the refrigerator and gets Jason started, then eats his own—and Jazmine's—while supervising.

After eating and a wipe-down of face and hands, it's apparently cuddle time. Jason asks, "Mummy?"

"Mummy's gone out for a bit," Herc tells him again as he picks the toddler up. "She'll be back soon."

Jason seems to find this worrying. He looks at the front door for a long time. Then he lays his head down on Herc's shoulder and sucks his thumb. This is the first time Herc has witnessed the behavior, but he immediately kneels and searches through the diaper bag anyway, until he comes up with a pacifier. He offers it to Jason, who readily accepts it as a replacement for his thumb. He still seems somewhat forlorn, but appears content to stay with Herc until he thinks of some way to track his mother down.

Herc walks slowly throughout the unit, his free hand on Jason's back. The activity is eerily familiar, to the point of causing vertigo; he's never done it before, and yet he's sure he has. He determines it to be a strange overlap from Chuck's infancy and settles on the couch before he hurts himself or his charge and utterly fails at proving that Jazmine's trust is well-placed. Jason, for his part, accepts being repositioned to Herc's chest and lies still even when Herc can't get comfortable. The toddler falls asleep, and when Herc is finally snug he does too.

Herc awakens with a start when Jazmine opens the front door, but he doesn't blame that on her—he's been on a hair trigger ever since boot camp more than two decades ago. He doesn't bother to move until she walks past the couch and says quietly, "I'm back," at which time he raises the hand resting on Jason's back to acknowledge her, but doesn't even attempt to get up. She rustles around in the kitchen then passes by again to set something heavy on a table, and after that she leans over the back of the couch and smiles down at him.

"Oh, aren't you two all buddy-buddy?" Jason hasn't stirred, so she keeps her voice low. "How'd he do?"

"He was grand," Herc assures her. "He asked after you, but he didn't fuss when I said you were away."

She smiles slightly. "He's pretty good about that. He still has some trouble with Abigail, but I think that's because I leave him at her house and he feels a bit abandoned. When I could leave him here with his father, though, I was told he was perfect. I'd hoped that even if he wasn't sure about you he'd still feel secure here."

"He seemed happy to see me when he woke up."

Her smile grows. "Did he? That's good. His father and I . . . Well, we didn't go to the trouble of socializing him as an infant, so now I have to make up for that. Want me to take him?"

"Only if you must," he replies. Jason's little weight on his chest is achingly familiar; Herc has never really considered himself good father material, especially after he managed to fail Chuck over and over, but it seems there are nevertheless parts of him that remember and miss having a child so young. Perhaps it's simply that a child this small clearly needs help and protection, and such needs conveniently provide someone like Herc—who has nothing left—with a purpose.

"Well," she says, "I won't lie—I cheated a bit. It's later than you think if you haven't checked the time yet. Even if you both slept through it, I owe you for your patience. If you have the time to continue looking after him for me, I'll make you something special for supper."

"It's a deal," he tells her.

After repositioning, he goes back to sleep. Jazmine awakens him later with a gentle touch and soft words, and he finally lets her have her son back. What he can smell from the kitchen helps him part with a child he sees every day to begin with.

She's cooked him a steak.

"You planned this," he accuses her as he cuts a chunk of the meat free and sticks it in his mouth.

"I planned steak for supper, yes," she admits. "Being able to watch Jason for me on such short notice . . . I don't think you appreciate how incredibly helpful that was."

"It's expensive." She bought tenderloin.

She scowls. "These are the first steaks I've bought since I came to Australia. Shut up and eat."

Herc wishes for the strength of will to resist the lure of the steak.

He fails.

Herc glances up at Jason. Jazmine has taken a fork and shredded samples she cut from his steak and hers—which he approves of, seeing as Jason's stomach is too small for a whole steak and the boy would just make a mess with it anyway—and the toddler is very interested in what is clearly a new food. Within a few seconds it's clear that Jason has carnivorous tendencies.

"Jesus," Herc says, watching the boy gobble the shreds of filet.

Jazmine smiles and props her chin on her hand. "He's his daddy's boy. And mine," she concedes. "If I ate nothing but rabbit food I'd starve to death in short order."

"Hear hear," Herc murmurs. He appreciates the theories behind a meat-excluding diet, but at the same time doesn't see what difference it really makes. Being a vegetarian didn't keep his wife or any of the animals she didn't eat from dying prematurely and under horrible circumstances.

As far as Herc is concerned, the steak makes the meal. He savors each bite, and by the time he's done he feels as though he's spent an hour on the whole six-ounce cut. A glance at his watch says it hasn't quite been that long, but it's damn close. He sits back and sighs, satisfied, only to be surprised by a belch. "Sorry."

"That's what I like to hear," Jazmine says, sounding entirely unoffended. She's been savoring her steak too, apparently, because she still has a few chunks on her plate.

"That was the best steak I've had in a long time," he tells her. "I've had sirloin occasionally in the past few years, but it's usually dry."

"And sirloin isn't tenderloin," she adds. "Different cut. Not as . . . well, tender."

He nods.

Herc could leave, but he prefers to sit tight and wait until Jazmine and Jason are finished eating. It offers an illusion of the past—of a time when he felt it necessary to stay at the table because his wife or son or both had been chattering instead of eating.

When Jazmine determines that Jason is done, she wipes him down. "Well, time for a bath and then time for bed— Oh." She stops just before picking the boy up and pulls from the back pocket of her jeans something that she offers to Herc, who's getting to his feet. "Here. For your trouble."

It's a one hundred-dollar bill.

Herc tucks his hands into his pockets. "I appreciate the sentiment, but you don't have to."

"But I want to!"

He frowns. "I don't want your bloody money, woman. I have enough of my own."

"I don't want to take advantage of you!"

"If I ever think I'm being taken advantage of"—which would be never, because he's one step from being a retiree with nothing to do on a given day and certainly has the time and patience to tolerate the imposition of a quiet young woman and her well-behaved son—"I'll damn well let you know."

She growls, grabs the collar of his shirt, folds the bill over it, then lets go. She turns away and stomps off to see to Jason. Once she's out of sight, Herc spots her messenger bag lying on the computer desk and snoops through it until he finds her wallet, which couldn't have been anywhere else considering the clothes she'd been wearing for her meeting. He tucks the hundred carefully inside the wallet and does his best to make the bag look as though he hasn't touched it.

"I'm using the back door!" he announces, injecting exasperation into his voice. Which isn't too hard, really, since he's annoyed by her insistence on paying him when he told her not to.

"Okay!" she answers, clearly already absorbed with looking after her child.

Her back door has a lock in the lever as well as an aftermarket deadbolt, the latter doubtless installed as a precaution against old man Peter. There's nothing he can do about that one, but he locks the former on his way out and tests it once he's pulled the door shut. Certain the door is as secure as it can be until Jazmine flips the deadbolt, Herc steps down into the shared yard to get around the dividing privacy wall between the two porches. As he steps onto his own porch, he wonders if Jazmine would be against knocking out that wall. It would offer them a measure of convenience, particularly in adverse weather.

He resolves to ask in the morning and walks into his dark home. It's still unpleasant and lonely, but a bit less so than before. The realization brings a lightness to his heart that causes him to smile.

To Be Continued in . . . Chapter 2 – The Son's Choice

Herc stares at the two images, baffled and—if he's being honest with himself—a bit hurt.

"They're his prints, mate," Derrek tells him, apologetic. "Almost one hundred percent certain. And if you look at the whole . . ." He clicks around until the entire sheet of notepad paper is visible. Small computer-generated ovals indicate the locations of the fingerprints. "You can see that he was holding the paper down with his left hand while he was writing. It wasn't just something that was handed to him and then taken back."

"He was twenty-one at the time," Darryl adds gently, sympathetic. "Evelyn sent me a copy of the video she showed you, and the discussion of Hong Kong dates the image more reliably than the video stamp ever could. Since he was a legal adult and in good mental and physical health, you have no official recourse."

Answers To Questions You Didn't Even Know You Wanted To Ask:

For flavor, I do use a little Australian slang, but surrounding text should provide context for non-Australians. That said, if any Australians who happen to read this fic see that I've misused the slang, then by all means correct me.

Also, I don't usually write in the present tense, so there may be errors there as well. Just a heads up for everyone.

—

Unless he goes back to the RAAF, he has no job prospects.

RAAF = Royal Australian Air Force. Not to be confused with the UK's Royal Air Force (RAF). For those who maybe didn't pay attention in world history class—or just forgot because it has zero impact on your life—here's your reminder that Australia is a constitutional monarchy; to oversimplify the matter, Australia is a sovereign nation largely independent of the UK, but still recognizes the royal family as figureheads.

—

If you find this fic to be somewhat fine, please take the time to drop me a line!

~RN (LS)