"Oh my god, Hailey!" This didn't come from my mom, it came from her partner from back in the day, 'Agent Ethan Collins'. He's my mom’s age, they were partners when I was little, and he was the dad I never had. My real dad left before I was even born, he was never anything but a low life. If I actually knew him I would still probably hate him. I really missed him -Ethan, not my real father- probably more than I actually missed her. He always told her I needed to be her first priority. He lost his daughter in a car accident. The whole thing was very tragic. A drunk driver hit his daughter and his first wife, his wife lived but their daughter died. A year later they divorced. I think him and my mom had a thing once but I’m not sure. I try not to think about my mom’s love affairs.
I was close to being tackled by Ethan. He had me in a deep hug, I thought he would never let go. Honestly, I don’t think I wanted him to. My face was buried deep in his chest. I didn’t realize until I pulled away that I was crying. This place was bringing back so many memories of my childhood, the good ones at least.
I moved around him so I could see my mom. She was just standing there, her mother slightly agape. I stared at her, and I saw a single tear escape her eye, and trailed down her cheek. But she quickly turned her face to a hard emotionless one, and said sternly, "What do you need, Hailey? I assume after all this time you need something, don’t you?" as she put her hands on her hips.
Ethan turned quickly around and opened his mouth to say something, but I stopped him by putting my hand on his shoulder and giving him a look that said, I could handle it. The guys -nerd boy and the cutie- looked super confused.
"What I need is a mother." I replied in a calm, even voice. I continued, "Maybe, we should go into your office and discuss all of this."
"So you do need something?" she said this in a know it all tone.
"In a way, yes. But I don’t need anything from you. I would like something’s, for one a mother-daughter relationship." I tried to keep my tone easy but I was quickly growing frustrated. Mommy dearest opened up her mouth to speak but was cut off by a shocked voice, "Wait! She's your mom and you’re her daughter." I turned around and saw a shocked cutie staring back and forth between us.
"You know for some so cute, you sure are lacking." I said as I tapped the top of my head for emphasis.
The cutie smiled, it was a mixture of smugness and surprise. He said, "You think I’m cute?" I rolled my eyes at his remark. Ethan was the one to say something, "Not now Parker." Ethan barked toward the cutie. He shyly replied, "Sorry Boss." Looks like Collins finally got his own team, 'Boss' really suits him.
I smiled over at him, trying to hold back a laugh, "Boss, hmmmm." Ethan just rolled his eyes.
The director was next to speak, "Yes a lot has changed." she said this smugly, obviously nonchalantly speaking of her current role here at NCIS.
"More than you know." I said, with a smug smile of my own.
"So what exactly would you 'like'?" She did the air quotes and everything. I was getting more frustrated by the second.
"Love the sarcasm by the way." I would much rather speak with her in private, it would be a lot easier, without all the extra eyes on me.
"Hailey! What do you want! I’m busy and I don’t have time for your crap!" She yelled in a demanding voice. Everyone looked shocked, but me, of course.
"Whoa! Flashback!" I said this in a sarcastic happy voice and used jazz hands to make the whole thing funnier. Hey, if she was going to irritate me, I could play the same game. She was enraged by now so I continued and answered her question, "I want a job here." I said with a smug smile.
She seriously started laughing, Ethan looked at me with a confused look and the guys just looked unfazed -they did know I worked for the FBI so they wouldn’t find this weird. "Why in the world would I give you a job? Did you even graduate High School?" she said still laughing.
This time it was my turn to laugh, "Did I graduate High School? Ladies and gentlemen the worst mother ever award goes to Shannon Young!" I applauded before continuing, "I graduated 2 years early. You never showed up to Graduation. Talk about final straw to make a girl run away from home. Don’t yeah think?" This whole thing barely bothered me anymore, I've had years to come to terms with my mother’s parenting Epic Fail.
"Damn, Shannon." Ethan said, he put his hand on his head in frustration.
Mom’s mouth opened, she was shocked. You could tell her mind was racing in a hundred different directions. She finally said, "No, you didn’t. I would have gone." she said this so confidently. This was going to be fun, she’s really going to regret not talking alone in her office.
"No, work came first always. You stayed late working on the Marshall case. This is all no different than when you missed all of my middle school spelling bees, and my mathletes meet in ninth grade or the time you didn’t go to my track meet when I got second in state. But its chill mom, I’m over all that, I've had time to deal with it all."
Ethan was sitting on the edge of the empty desk, staring at the floor with his brow frowned. The other guys were looking back and forth between all of us not sure what to do. Her gaze never left me and mine hers. "Why do you care now? And why on Earth do you want a job here? Why do you even think I would hire you? We already have secretaries and all of that basic stuff filled."
I laughed as I pulled a folder out of my purse, my resume, and dropped my bag on Parkers desk. "I don’t want a basic job, and this is why I know you'll hire me." I said matter of factly as I walked up to her, handing the folder to her. I walked back to where the guys were standing and set on nerd boy’s desk, directly in between them. Ethan had gotten up and was now hovering over my mom’s shoulder. They both looked through the pages astonished. As they should it has all my best case files in there, letters of recommendation -ones from the freakin' president!
They both looked up at me and said in unison, "You did all of this?"
"Should I take offense to that?" I said as I arched one of my eye brows, before continuing, "There are numbers there that you can call if you don’t believe me."
"She’s on my team." Ethan said smirking. I smiled at him and looked at my mom for confirmation.
“No.” she said quick and sharply to Ethan. I figured she wouldn’t just let me on without some sort of fight. Ethan and my mother locked eyes, and it held. It seemed like some power play, some struggle of who will win here. She said it again less strongly as she had before, “I said no.”
“Shannon. I have an opening on my team, and if she was anyone else with a file like that we would be begging her to come here. Just do it.” His stare got stronger as her weakened.
"Hailey Young, you will be on Agent Collins team. You were right, with a record like that you'll be better than your team’s senior field agent, Riley Parker." my mother said.
"What? You can’t be serious." Riley said. Looks like someone’s a little touchy with where they stand. I hopped off the desk and patted him on the shoulder in a comforting way and said, "It’s okay bucko. You might be a better agent than me, but at least we all know I could take you in a fight." I smiled up at him, I took Kung Fu for like 6 years, it was in my resume too. Riley stared down at me in disbelief before saying, "No way, but we'll never know because I won’t hit a girl."
I laughed at this and looked at him in disbelief this time, "Scenario 1 some chick has a gun to your head, Scenario 2 some chick is your target she’s about to blow up a building, Scenario 3 some chick is about to murder someone. Now you’re telling me in all of these scenarios you’re not gonna sock her?" I looked at him skeptically.
"T-That’s a different story." Riley stuttered.
"Okay, Riley." Collins said while rolling his eyes, he reached his hand out toward me and said, "Welcome to the team Agent Young."
