OOM: Calling Brennan

[argyle_princess]

Hannah spends the last few days of 2008 doing a lot of thinking.

And she spends them at her mother's house.

She puts the whole thing firmly out of her mind on New Year's Eve, and goes to the party Sam's parents are throwing, and has a very good time. (Officially, their first anniversary is the sixth, but New Year's Day is the day she sent a certain e-mail and is an anniversary in its own right, too.)

She sleeps late that morning, and then gets up, and decides it's time to stop thinking and start figuring out what to do.

She starts by making a phone call.

Comments

[argyle_princess]

"I'm . . . fine."

It sort of lacks conviction.

"How are you?"

[dr_temperance]

"I'm fine."

Brennan gets comfortable in her favorite chair.

"Dad's here. Trying not to burn down my apartment." She peeks over the back of the chair just to confirm, and then sinks back.

"Is everything all right? How's Neptune?"

[argyle_princess]

"Neptune is Neptune."

Always.

"Do you have a minute? Or probably a lot more than a minute? Because I don't to interrupt anything with you and your dad."

[dr_temperance]

Brennan frowns. It can often be hard to glean impressions of mood simply from voices, especially transmitted voices, but there's a note in Hannah's voice that sounds troubling.

"I have time. He's not letting me help."

"Is something wrong?"

[argyle_princess]

"Dads are good at that," Hannah says.

"Um, I don't know. I mean, I kind of think so, but I'm not sure, and I'm not sure even if something is wrong that I know what, or why or . . ."

[dr_temperance]

"Clearly something is bothering you," Brennan says reasonably.

"You're equivocating."

[argyle_princess]

"My dad is . . .

"I don't know. He's got this horrible girlfriend, and he's acting all strange, and I'm . . . I'm worried.

"But I don't know if I really should be worried, or if I'm just completely overreacting."

[dr_temperance]

"Is he using again?" Brennan asks.

Hannah's father has been clean for a while now, but drug abusers sometimes have a habit of sliding back into bad habits.

"How erratic is his behavior?"

[argyle_princess]

"I don't think so," says Hannah.

"He's drinking. Not getting drunk, at least not that I've seen, but he had stopped all together.

"And it's not so much erratic as it's . . . he's just kind of thoughtless? Careless? I don't know.

"I'm explaining this really badly."

[dr_temperance]

Brennan nods, even though Hannah isn't there to see.

"Perhaps presenting the evidence in chronological sequence will help?"

Brennan glances up at her father, who has emerged from the kitchen long enough to hold up a crude marker-on-scrap-paper sign. Trouble?

Brennan shakes her head, and Max retreats to the kitchen.

[argyle_princess]

Hannah sighs.

"You remember how bad the weather was the weekend before Christmas? My flight was about six hours late getting in, and Daddy was supposed to meet me, and instead he went to dinner with his girlfriend -- who I knew nothing about until I found her in his house in her robe one morning, by the way -- and asked Sam's parents to bring me home, which they did, I mean, it's not like he left me stranded at the airport, but still.

"I get worried when he doesn't tell me things. And that he has a girlfriend? That he's had a girlfriend since early October?

"She, for the record, is a total bitch."

[dr_temperance]

"He's been dating since October?"

That makes Brennan raise an eyebrow. Hannah has been home between October and Christmas.

"Can you explicate what makes her a 'bitch'?"

Brennan's wondering if it's the woman herself, or the woman's association with a negligent Dr. Griffith that has earned her that term.

[argyle_princess]

"She described me as 'the kid' and asked me what the hell I was doing in my father's house.

"Also, there's the fact that she's a bitch.

"I really don't think it's just that she's the first person to date one of my parents."

[dr_temperance]

"She sounds highly unpleasant."

There is always adjustment when there is the shift in the structure of the family. For all Brennan knows, she may experience it herself now that her own father is able to live open and above board.

But adjustment does not negate the fact that sometimes the shift is just plain negative.

"I take it that your father has been less than communicative on the issue?"

[argyle_princess]

"I think dating her for three months without telling counts as 'less than communicative,' yeah," says Hannah.

"I don't like her. She's bad for him. Or he's bad for him, and dating her is just a symptom of that. I don't know.

"I just . . . I worry that he's going to . . . maybe I should have stayed closer to home.

[dr_temperance]

"Hannah. You cannot be responsible for your father for the rest of your life."

She said. Peeking over the back of her chair at Max.

Okay, maybe she isn't the best person to be dispensing that bit of advice. But that doesn't make it any less true.

"Is he serious about her? Or do you think it's just a passing relationship?"

[argyle_princess]

"God, it better not be that serious."

Please.

"And I know, I know that can't be responsible for Daddy for the rest of his life, but maybe I should have stayed closer a little longer.

"I don't know.

"Right now I don't even want talk to him."

[dr_temperance]

"I do believe, based on past evidence, that your father does respect your opinion, Hannah."

"He went into rehab because of you. He cut a number of questionable ties because of you."

Even if there had probably also been a healthy dose of fear of legal ramifications.

"There's no reason to think that that has completely changed. Not in four months."

[argyle_princess]

"So far what he's had to say on the subject is that Monica is his girlfriend and I have to accept that.

"And he's keeping secrets from me, Brennan. Like her whole existance.

"And that . . . that leads no where good."

[dr_temperance]

"No. I agree."

There's a pause.

"I suppose you could check his phone logs. Hack into his email."

She is partnered with a cop. Investigative contingency plans have become second nature.

[argyle_princess]

"You want me to hack into my father's e-mail?" Hannah asks, incredulous.

A pause, and then a confession.

"I already checked the phone."

[dr_temperance]

There is such a thing as a healthy level of suspicion.

"How hard could his password be to guess?"

The man is a plastic surgeon.

"Was there anything alarming in the phone log?"

[argyle_princess]

"He calls That Woman a lot. She calls him a lot.

"But I didn't see any calls to the people he used to buy his drugs from.

"Hacking into his e-mail seems a little more wrong than looking at the caller id log, or even looking at incoming and outgoing calls on his cell phone. Somehow."

[dr_temperance]

"You do know where is best to draw that line," Brennan concedes.

"The worry over resuming drug use may be preliminary at this point. It's unpleasant, but your father is not the first middle-aged man to make highly questionable dating decisions. Often it's an attempt to regain youth."

"Is she significantly younger than he is?"

[argyle_princess]

"He's forty-seven. She's thirty-five or so, trying to look twenty-nine, and therefore looking about forty-one.

"She's not quite trophy girlfriend material, but it still would have been a felony if she'd been my mother."

[dr_temperance]

"An obsession with retaining the physical qualities of youth and beauty in spite of natural aging is one of the signs of a declining society."

Anthropological lesson for the day.

Brennan refrains from adding that for males, establishing relationships with woman who are younger or appear younger, is a means of trying to prove their sexual prowess to other males.

There's no need to kick a friend when she's down.

"Does your mother know he's seeing someone?"

[argyle_princess]

Yeah, Hannah really doesn't need that particular kick right now.

"Yeah. I think she heard from someone who saw them somewhere or something, and then asked him about it.

"But I kind of have a rule where I won't talk much about one parent with the other, so she didn't know that I didn't know."

[dr_temperance]

"I can see where that would get awkward."

Brennan tucks her feet up under her in her chair.

"Can you arrange for some time to see your father alone? That would seem like a reasonable request."

[argyle_princess]

"I can try.

"Mostly I've been avoiding him, since our disasterous let's-get-to-know-each-other dinner."

[dr_temperance]

"I think that, if you're going to put your mind at ease, you're going to have to talk to him."

Brennan sympathizes, though. She knows that avoidance feels much easier.

[argyle_princess]

"Yeah, I know.

"Do you think . . . do you think there's actually something I should be worried about here? Or am I just being over-sensitive and childish?"

[dr_temperance]

"I'm not good at making those sorts of judgments," Brennan says.

"Perhaps a little sensitive. But based on past behavior, I can understand why you'd have concerns."

"And he should have told you he was seeing someone. Especially before you stumbled onto it yourself."

[argyle_princess]

"Yeah. And maybe this is totally self-centered, but I kind of think he should be dating someone who cares whether or not I like her.

"And That Woman doesn't, that I can tell.

"And I don't like that he's dating someone like that."

[dr_temperance]

"It would certainly facilitate more enjoyable holidays."

"We've all made questionable relationship decisions. Myself included."

Brennan's track record is pretty dismal in places.

"There's nothing to say that he won't make a better one after this. And, perhaps, seeing her in context with his child will alert him to the fact that she is a less than optimal partner."

There is a pause.

"And if she doesn't like you, she is stupid."

[argyle_princess]

Hannah, slightly startled, laughs.

"All right, I'll talk to him.

"I should let you get back to your dad, shouldn't I?"

[dr_temperance]

Brennan cranes her head to look over the back of her chair again.

"I think I see smoke."

That's probably a 'yes.'

"You'll call me? Tell me how it goes?"

[argyle_princess]

"You should check on that," says Hannah, who can now hear Brennan's smoke detector going off 3000 miles away.

"And, yeah, I'll call.

"Thanks."

[dr_temperance]

"You're welcome."

Brennan's voice it pitched to be heard above the shrill beeping.

"It'll be okay, Hannah."

[argyle_princess]

"I hope so," Hannah says.

"Happy New Year, and I'll see you next week."