84hotpockets

[84hotpockets]

𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐅𝐔𝐍𝐄𝐑𝐀𝐋.

The sky held a dim, reluctant kind of light that morning, muted grey pressing through bare branches overhead, a kind of cold that didn’t sting but settled slowly into the skin, ample with the weight of a day that shouldn’t have come. Aaron Hotchner stood in front of the mirror, knotting Jack’s tie with the same focus he used to apply to crime scene photos, but this . . . felt infinitely harder. The five year old boy didn’t squirm or fidget; he just stood there, small and solemn, watching his father’s hands, as if sensing that even the wrong twitch might bring up something deeper than the fabric between them. The suit was slightly too big on his son, borrowed, not tailored, and Hotch wondered if that was how the little boy would feel from now on, always slightly swallowed by a world that had been forced to grow too fast.

Finally, he smoothed Jack’s lapels, his touch lingering a moment longer than necessary before drawing back. There were no words exchanged in the mirror, just a brief, shared glance. Hotch picked up his own jacket with practiced movements, but everything felt heavier than usual, like gravity had found new meaning now that Haley wasn’t alive to hold part of the world up with him.

——————

He hadn’t touched the eulogy in three days. It sat folded in his breast pocket, creased at the corners from how many times he’d held it without the courage to read. The car ride had been silent and it wasn’t because there was nothing to say, but for the fact that too much had already been said in the form of unanswered prayers, panicked whispers on the phone, and one final, desperate promise made too late. When they did arrive at the cemetery, the casket was already in place, a closed one, because Foyet had taken even her peacefulness away, and the sight of it, nestled in that hollow of earth, carved a new kind of ache into Hotch’s chest.

There weren’t many chairs, just enough for family and close friends, and even that felt like too many. The Bureau had offered a formal detail, uniforms protocol, but he’d declined. Haley wouldn’t have wanted ceremony; she would’ve wanted warmth, and laughter, and people who actually knew her. People who remembered the girl who once danced barefoot through their kitchen at midnight, who sang along badly to the radio, who wore sunscreen like armor and cried at commercials with dogs in them. He kept one hand on Jack’s shoulder as the minister spoke, but he wasn’t listening. Instead, his focus was fixed on the small white rose clutched in his son’s hands, petals trembling not from the wind, but from the quiet effort it took to stay composed.

And time came, Hotch stepped forward. His legs didn’t shake, but the rest of him did, internally, profoundly, in the way a man trembles when walking through the wreckage of something that had been once untouchable. He unfolded the paper slowly, carefully, as if the words themselves might break under the pressure. And when he began to speak, it wasn’t with the commanding voice of a Unit Chief, but with something quieter, more frayed; a voice worn down by grief, shaped by memory, and held upright only by the need to honor the woman they’d all lost.

“It’s love that makes the world go ’round,” He began, and the words came heavier than he expected, not theatrical but true, as if he’d only just started to believe them again. And how late had he been — “And if that’s true, then the world spun a little faster with Haley in it.” Each sentence after that unfolded not like a speech, but like a confession careful, vulnerable . . . true. “Haley was my best friend since we were in high school. We certainly had our struggles, but if there’s one thing we agreed on unconditionally, it was our love and commitment to our son, Jack.”

He glanced toward the boy now, sitting still in the front row, his little hands folded tightly together in his lap, holding on like he understood just how easily things could come undone.

“Haley’s love for Jack was joyous and fierce. That fierceness is why she isn’t here today. A mother’s love is an unrivaled force of nature and we can all learn much from the way Haley lived her life.” He didn’t say her name like a distant echo; he said it as if she were standing just to the side of him, listening.

The wind stirred then, just once, and for a moment he let the silence stretch, not awkwardly, but solemnly, “Haley’s death causes each of us to stop and take stock of our lives, to measure who we are, and what we’ve become. I don’t have all of those answers for myself, but I know who Haley was.” There was a break there, not in his voice, but in the grieving quiet that followed, an aching gap where breath should’ve been.

“She was the woman who died protecting the child we brought into this world together, and I will make sure that Jack grows up knowing who his mother was, and how she loved and protected him, and how much I loved her. If Haley were with us today, she would ask us not to mourn her death, but to celebrate her life. She would tell us . . . she would tell us to love our families unconditionally and to hold them close, because in the end, they are all that matter.”

𝘗𝘳𝘰𝘮𝘪𝘴𝘦 𝘮𝘦, 𝘵𝘩𝘢𝘵 𝘺𝘰𝘶 𝘸𝘪𝘭𝘭 𝘵𝘦𝘭𝘭 𝘩𝘪𝘮 𝘩𝘰𝘸 𝘸𝘦 𝘮𝘦𝘵.

For this part, his eyes didn’t blink. He couldn’t afford to.

“I met Haley at the tryouts of our high school’s production of The Pirates of Penzance. I found our copy of the play and I was looking through it the other night, and I came upon a passage that seemed . . . appropriate for this moment.”

When he reached this final part, his voice changed slightly. Softer. He unfolded the last portion of the paper, but he didn’t need to read it. “Oh dry the glistening tear that dews that marshall cheek . . .” It was an old memory, worn smooth by time, and yet recited with such clarity that for a moment, the years between that stage and this grave collapsed into nothing. He didn’t cry as he said it. He didn’t need to. The grief was in every pause, every tremor beneath the surface, every flicker of his gaze toward the boy sitting in the front row. “Thy loving children here in them thy comfort seek. With sympathetic care, their arms around thee creep. For oh they cannot bear to see their father weep.”

When he stepped away, he didn’t look at the crowd, he looked only at Jack, and reached for his hand. Together, they approached the casket. The earth around it was damp but firm, holding steady beneath their feet. Jack stared at the coffin for a long moment, quiet and contemplative, then gently reached out and placed the white rose atop it, his fingers lingering for half a second longer than they needed to.

Hotch followed suit. He placed his own rose beside his son’s, one for love, one for loss, and something wordless in between. No prayers. No goodbyes. Just a father and a son, standing beside the woman who had given them everything, offering the only thing left they had to give.

[84hotpockets]

[84hotpockets]

4x01 | 11x09

[84hotpockets]

CRIMINAL MINDS 4.06 'The Instincts'

[84hotpockets]

Happy Father’s Day — Aaron Hotchner 🩵🩵🩵

I believe in my heart Aaron was a good father even if work kept him away most of the time he was wonderful father in I hope he knows that he deserves love ….

Ib @ssamorganhotchner my bestie I couldn’t pass the opportunity up to wish him a happy Father’s Day my self …

[84hotpockets]

[84hotpockets]

"[Hotch] heard the ticking of the clock at all times, which is I think why he didn't feel there was any time for small talk — because he either had somebody to catch, or someone to save, or both."

THOMAS GIBSON, on Aaron Hotchner

[84hotpockets]

[84hotpockets]

so soft talking about Gideon

[84hotpockets]

Happy Hotch has the biggest place in my heart 😭🧎🏾‍♀️‍➡️

[84hotpockets]

Aaron Hotchner in every episode of Criminal Minds:

Season 7, Episode 4, ‘Painless’

Masterlist ✰

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PENELOPE GARCIA & AARON HOTCHNER CRIMINAL MINDS | 4.09 '52 PICKUP'

[84hotpockets]

AARON HOTCHNER in 2x03 ‘THE PERFECT STORM’ Criminal Minds (2005)

[84hotpockets]

[84hotpockets]

characters apologizing for things they have no control over. mumbling sorry while losing consciousness. feeling ashamed of a bleeding wound. embarrassed when an infection sets in. deep seated feverish guilt when they need to be carried, when their legs won't keep them upright anymore and they lean heavy on a friend, slurring apologies..........

[84hotpockets]

[84hotpockets]