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aswallowssong · 4 years

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Second Child, Restless Child

Chapter 1 - Second Child

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Dakota "Kit" Katherine Colghain likes her job as one of the FBI Academy Clinic's Head Nurses. As an academy graduate herself, she keeps her head down, works well with others, and genuinely enjoys her quiet life. She enjoys it more when she doesn't have to deal with any of the stiffs upstairs.

When she's given the chance to pilot a new program, a new position, within the bureau she isn't sure what to think. She genuinely enjoys her quiet life. Splitting her time between the clinic and a new team doesn't seem like something she's ready for. Besides, Ari is better for the job.

When she takes it anyway, she has no idea what, and who, is in store for her.

She shook out her hands as she stared through the glass double-door in front of her.

I can do this. She said to herself over and over. They wouldn’t have sent me upstairs for no reason.

Regardless, that’s exactly where she stood for seemingly no reason. She’d stepped off the elevator and taken a maximum of four steps before she’d planted on the spot. A few people had walked around her in the three minutes she had been standing there, trying to get a grip.

Ari and Monty are going to give me hell when they find out I spent my afternoon talking to some stiff about something hush-hush.

The nurses in the FBI Academy Clinic, lovingly placed on the very bottom floor of the building, really disliked going upstairs. The “stiffs” more often than not had a low level of respect for the agents, yes agents , that worked to keep the new recruits in tip top shape. She liked her job, so she didn’t care what they thought, but she could already see Ari’s raised eyebrow, and hear Monty’s loud groan.

It was going to be a long night in their apartment before Ari went to work his night shift.

Before she could waste anymore time, she wiped clammy palms against her navy blue scrubs and pushed the door open. It was the middle of the day, just after her lunch break, but there was still a level of activity happening inside the bullpen. This activity just happened to stop as soon as the intruder started to move across the carpet, towards the stairs that led up to closed offices with open blinds. This was her destination, and she moved according

The office she was looking for allegedly belonged to a Supervisory Special Agent Aaron Hotchner. He was the Unit Chief for the Behavioral Analysis Unit, or the beloved BAU. He was also rumored to be no-nonsense and incredibly stern. An impeccable combination.

Eyes darted to her and murmurs started, low enough that she couldn’t hear what was said, but loud enough that she could tell they were saying something. If her goal was invisibility, she had failed miserably.

A shaking hand went to tug at the short sleeve of her scrubs, the word “Head” embroidered like some sort of brand calling out her supervisory position.

Are they looking at me, or the scrubs? She wondered, though she supposed that if she saw a nurse that far up in the building, she would stare, too.

Her hand moved to pull at her braid, and then the other, antsy fingers pulling gently, dark green nails moving against crimson hair. Suspicion hung in the air, as well as curiosity. She breathed it in and let the air out slowly, trying to keep it away from her own anxiety. She could feel them, sure, but she didn’t have to take them in. She wasn’t going to let herself.

She knocked on the office door and had three seconds to take a breath before it was opened. Standing there was a stern looking man in a crisp suit, and she could hear Monty’s shrill laughter in the back of her mind. She didn’t let it show on her face how surprised she was at how tall this man was, or by the fact that his stern demeanor was offset by his kind eyes.

“Special Agent Dakota Colghain,” he said simply, glancing at her badge to confirm himself instead of posing it as a question.

She had to stop herself from physically cringing at his pronunciation of her last name. While she was impressed he’d gotten as far as ‘Collin,’ she wished he’d just have asked her to say it. In Gaelic there was the slight of the ‘h’ sound and a much more open vowel, at least the way her father had always taught them to say it as small children. She wasn’t going to correct him.

She tended not to correct anyone, much less the stiffs she’d met.

“Yes, sir,” Dakota said evenly, articulation clear.

“Come in.”

It wasn’t a question. Dakota walked into the office and sat as she was directed.

Agent Hotchner sat at his desk, staring at her for a moment before opening a file.

“You’ve read the proposal?”

What?

“No, sir,” She said quietly, “I was told to come here after my lunch break. I assumed that someone in your unit requires medical attention that would keep them from coming downstairs, but Section Chief Ramos told me to report directly to you.”

Hotchner looked confused by that, but only for a moment. He didn’t allow it to show on his face, but that didn’t mean Dakota was unaware of it. He was nervous, which she noted as he spoke next, folding his hands on top of his desk.

“The bureau is considering a new in-unit position. Over the last twelve months, there has been an influx of negative reviews across the board from local law enforcement. There have also been an increase of injuries during takedown operations in the field.”

He let that sit for a moment before continuing. Dakota assumed it was to gauge her, but she didn’t give any indication she was going to speak.

“They would like each unit to have a field certified, academy graduated nurse to round the team and create rapport with the local law enforcement, victims, and families. The director believes that the training nurses receive in bedside manner could be an asset in that area. They would also be required to ensure team health and wellness both in and out of the field. The BAU has been chosen to pilot the program, and you have been selected to join us.”

Dakota stared at him for a moment, the last sentence having all but knocked the wind out of her. She was sure he could feel her surprise and confusion, as it was written all over her face. It read like an open book, and she’d never wished she could shut it off as much as she did in that moment.

“I’m being transferred?” She asked finally, voice higher than she would ever like it, even squeaking at the end like a dog toy.

Hotchner’s eyebrows pulled together, showing that this was very obviously not how he anticipated this conversation going. He stared at her like that for a moment before picking up a file on his desk.

His eyes glanced to it for a moment, and while Dakota was glad to have his eyes off of her for a moment, it did nothing to quell the panic she was suddenly feeling. They were going to move her out of the clinic. She wouldn’t be sharing her responsibilities with Ari and Monty anymore. She wasn’t going to be one of the Heads anymore.

“You’re twenty five?”

Dakota blinked for a moment, looking up from her hands, which were pulling at each other in her lap. He hadn’t answered her, and he’d changed the subject.

Hotchner was looking back at her, and a hot blush was crawling across her face.

“Yes, sir,” she managed, though her voice was timid and confused.

“And, you’re the day shift head nurse?”

He sounded skeptical. He felt skeptical.

“Yes, sir.”

He flipped through the file, her file she realized, a little more before he looked back to her once again.

“You’ve been here nearly three years.”

Not a question.

“Two and a half, sir. I turned twenty three while I was in the academy.”

Dakota never corrected, but this man was a profiler, and if what she had heard about them was true, she shouldn’t lie or take credit for more time than she was due. She’d heard talk that it was impossible to lie to a profiler, because they always knew, and they always found out the truth. If it was just hearsay, she didn’t want to find out.

“It says here that you are an empath,” he said next, moving the conversation along in a direction Dakota wasn’t quite tracking. If she was being transferred, it was by someone higher up than Agent Hotchner. Neither of them would have a choice, so why did it feel like he was interviewing her?

“That’s correct.”

“You feel more empathy than the average person?”

“No,” she said so quickly that she found herself having to backtrack as to not sound rude. “Sorry, no, sir. I feel empathy more… effectively. I feel the emotions other people are experiencing as my own, and I feel my own emotions to a heightened intensity.”

She struggled for the words to wrap up her explanation, but all she could come up with was, “I have extra mirror neurons, and they’re hyperactive.”

He stared for a moment before looking through the file some more. He seemed to be weighing something in his mind, and he looked at her again before he said, “Is it related to your Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder?”

Dakota’s eyes snapped up to meet his as her blush desperately crawled down her neck and up to her ears. For a moment, she couldn’t have found her voice if she wanted to. Was he being patronizing? She couldn’t feel any sense of that. He didn’t feel annoyed or judgmental either. When it came up, that’s what most people felt. His stoic curiosity confused her.

“Possibly,” was all she said. There wasn’t concrete evidence of it, and she wasn’t going to talk about her ADHD with a stranger. Especially a stiff like Agent Hotchner.

She wanted to go back to the clinic. Desperately. She wanted to get away from this man and his kind eyes and his less kind questions.

She repeated her question.

“SSA Hotchner, am I being transferred?”

It was a moment before he spoke again, taking time to consider her. When he did speak, it was almost as if he were sighing.

“Part time,” he said. He pulled a piece of paper out of the file he was holding and slid it across the desk at her. “You currently work five, eight hour shifts a week. Is that correct?”

Dakota nodded without hesitation.

“Yes, sir.”

“You would be working six. Three in clinic, and three here as a part of my team. I should mention you’ll receive a raise if you accept, and you’ll require a new badge.”

It was a moment before Dakota looked down at the contract in front of her. Contract. A contract that would mean everything would change. She would be working with stiffs.

Stiffs, dear God. Monty and Ari will never let this one go.

When she looked up next, her voice held much more distrust than she intended. She found the words from her mouth to be, “If? As if I have a choice?” instead of, “Do I have the choice?” The latter would have sounded better, in hindsight.

Judging by the way Agent Hotchner’s eyes widened the littlest bit, he was thinking the same thing.

“Of course,” he deadpanned after a very pregnant pause. “If you decide that you don’t want the position, they’ll find someone else to take it. However as you were the one they selected, you are obviously the best choice.”

Me? The best choice?

She couldn’t believe that. Ari was the best choice. Ari was always the best choice. He was the best of them, anyway, and he always had been. Monty was more open and less clinical. Less guarded at first. While Dakota was definitely friendlier in the long run, she tended to shield herself. To try to keep objective, especially when emotions got involved. It made her a great nurse, and a great friend, but not always a great first impression. Maybe not even a great second impression.

Not to mention she was unsure of herself. She continued to fidget with her hands, not allowing herself to pull at her hair in the presence of this very stern man with very kind eyes. Ari didn’t fidget. He didn’t have ADHD. He wasn’t an empath. She had no idea why anyone would put the responsibility of piloting a program on her very shaky shoulders.

Sure, she was very highly qualified. She and the others had been fast tracked much earlier than was customary. but she was young and nervous to be even sitting here on the sixth floor. Important people sat on the sixth floor.

“Why me?”

There was a moment where it looked as if Agent Hotchner didn’t understand her question. His silence was thick, as if he was trying to come up with an answer he didn’t have.

“I’m not sure,” he said simply. “You’ve impressed someone in charge of this decision, and you are the correct choice for this pilot.”

She signed the contract. Agent Hotchner explained the wording, disclosing that he’d been a prosecutor for many years before he’d moved to the BAU. Dakota could tell that he wasn’t lying, and that he genuinely had her best interests at heart as he walked her through the basic idea that her hours would change, and her obligations would be new.

“We’ll go through all of that on Monday morning. Section Chief Ramos assured he would send all official documentation once you had decided to accept the position. This is… an experiment of sorts. It isn’t going to be widespread information until we’ve worked through it, trial and error. I’m sure you understand.”

She nodded, chewing on the inside of her cheek before saying, “Yes, I do.”

“Great. I was assured that they didn’t need you back downstairs, so if you’d like to meet the team now, it might make this transition easier for everyone,” he said, standing up from his desk and slipping the contract she had signed back into the folder. Her folder. The one that told him about her ADHD and her Empathic diagnosis and probably about the Vyvanse she was on. It probably laid out all of her fallacies for him to see.

Dakota stood up to follow him, allowing herself to have one moment to tug at her braids anxiously while he had his back turned. Everything was changing so rapidly it was as if she had no control, but also, that she had all of the control.

It dawned on her as she followed him, her scrubs still horribly out of place, into a conference room with a round table and seven chairs, that she would be piloting a program. There were no expectations and nothing to live up to. No older siblings who had done it before. No Monty or Ari who had done it better, or faster, or with more attitude and sloppier mistakes. There was nothing to lose and everything to prove. There was almost no way to fail.

Her hand continued to twist around her braid, tugging gently at the bottom as she thought through what this new position, this new job would mean. Agent Hotchner had left, she assumed to get the rest of the team, and she took a moment to look around. There was a screen mounted on the wall, and a whiteboard by the door. There were windows, and even a couch on the wall near her. They spent time there, she noticed.

She would be spending time there, too, probably. Everything about every other workday was about to change, and she had no idea how. No idea what her actual role was going to be.

Why did I agree to this? I have no idea what my expectations are. Also, what if they hate me? What if they think I’m guarded, or weak, or stupid? These are profilers, and I’m a nurse. It doesn’t matter how smart I actually am if they perceive me to be an idiot before they can even -

“Special Agent Colghain?”

Dakota shook her head quickly, dropping her braid and folding her hands in front of her. She was still standing near the couch, and Agent Hotchner was being followed by a group of people. He had an eyebrow raised, and gestured to the chair closest to her.

“I asked if you wanted to sit?”

“Yes, sir. Thank you,” she said quickly. She pulled out the chair and took a seat, watching as everyone else did the same. The only one left standing was Agent Hotchner, but he was also the only one not staring at her as if she was an intruder in their home.

Suspicion. Confusion. Mistrust. Dakota tried to breathe calm into her lungs and not let them change the way she felt. At least Agent Hotchner seemed comfortable now, though she didn’t know if that made her feel better. Had she made him uncomfortable before? She couldn’t be sure. It was all so new.

-----

“Team,” Agent Hotchner started, eyes looking at everyone except Dakota, “This is Special Agent Dakota Colghain. She is one of the Head Nurses at the Academy Clinic.”

Silence followed his statement, but he didn’t seem perturbed. He continued with ease, his eyes never changing from kind. “The BAU had been selected to pilot a new program for the bureau. The intention is for every unit to be given a nurse, trained in the academy and with experience both in the field, and in victim and family support.”

“Isn’t that what JJ does?” said a woman with dark hair and striking eyes. She was slender, with sharp cheekbones and a mistrustful look directed towards Dakota.

The blonde next to her spoke quietly, her voice much more kind. “I’m the communications liaison, Elle. My job is a lot more than victim support.”

“As is Agent Colghain’s. She will also be responsible for in-unit health and wellness, as well as an in-field medic as needed. More details will be given to us now that the position has been accepted.”

“Wait, accepted as in, a member of the team?” asked a muscular man that was across the table from Dakota. He was curious, but confused. She noted that as he kept going. “We just got Elle. Why are we the ones?”

“This is Director ordered, Morgan.”

Dakota could feel Agent Hotchner become uncomfortable again, and he shared a look with the older man across the room.

The older man had stood from and was now standing behind his chair, holding onto the back like it was supporting him. His eyes were skeptical, but he didn’t seem unkind. There was no sense of hostility, which wasn’t the case with Morgan.

“Hotch-”

“As I said before, this is Special Agent Dakota Colghain. She is one of the Head Nurses at the Academy Clinic, and she is the newest addition to the team. She’ll be with us Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays unless needed otherwise.”

He gestured at each person now, addressing them by name as he went around the circle of her new team members.

“These are Special Agents Jennifer Jareau, Elle Greenaway, Dr. Spencer Reid, Derek Morgan, and Jason Gideon.”

The blonde was the first to stick out her hand, giving a kind smile that was quickly returned. Usually, Dakota would avoid shaking hands. In the clinic, everything was pathogens and disinfectant. That was clearly not the case here, so she took the other girl's hand.

“You can call me JJ, everyone does.”

“The other nurses call me Kit,” Dakota said in return, “It makes things easier.”

She didn’t elaborate, but a quiet voice piped in from the closest seat to the door.

“Like, a medical kit?”

It was the man Agent Hotchner had called “Dr. Spencer Reid” that spoke, though Kit was still taken aback. He couldn’t have been older than she was, there was no way, and he was way too young to be a doctor of anything. She wondered if he was even old enough to work for the FBI in the first place.

“No,” she said, shaking her head, “though, that’s funny. I’ll have to use that one.”

“Kit isn’t a nickname for Dakota,” he said, his brow furrowing together. “Common nicknames for Dakota are Kody and Kota.”

Kit gave a small smile. She was used to this conversation, especially because Ari and Monty called her Kody around all the other nurses without hesitation.

“My middle name is Katherine.”

“But-”

“Reid, leave it. People can be called whatever they want,” the girl with dark hair, Elle Greenaway, said with a laugh. She turned to Kit and gave a small smile, though it didn’t reach her eyes. “Elle. Don’t mind him, you get used to it.”

Kit shook her head quickly, making sure to smile at both Elle and Reid.

“It’s okay, I don’t mind.”

When Kit looked around a bit more she was met with the eyes of Derek Morgan. A flash of recognition hit her as she really saw his face. She’d seen him before, but he didn’t seem to recognize her. That was fine, she decided, because it meant there was equal ground.

He nodded at her, and she nodded back, though she could tell he was less than happy about her appearance in the conference room. He was the most suspicious, and probably the least likely to think she deserved a place at their table. She would have to watch that to see how it developed.

The last person to speak to her was Jason Gideon. It was a moment before he spoke, but when he did it was even and low, his eyes darting to Reid before he started.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Kit. Welcome.”

There was an awkward moment of silence before Agent Hotchner was dismissing them, everyone leaving the room in a flurry of movement until it was just Kit and Agent Hotchner again. Kit looked up at him and gave a small smile.

“Your team is nice,” she said quietly. She wasn’t sure what she was supposed to say, but that felt appropriate. It wasn’t a lie, either. Though Morgan seemed closed off and Elle seemed tense, JJ and Reid seemed at least marginally open to her. Gideon she couldn’t read, but she had time. Three days a week.

Agent Hotchner nodded, looking out the window at his team getting back to their desks before saying, “They are. You’ll get to know them, but you should know that this team is a family. They can seem closed off, but they’ll adapt. And adopt.”

“I understand, Agent Hotchner.”

“Please,” he said, “everyone calls me Hotch. Now, I can point your desk out to you, but I have case files to get back to. You can go back to the clinic now, if you’d like. There’s about two hours left on your shift.”

Kit nodded quickly, standing to follow him, hands playing with the bottom seam of her shirt. She followed, quite like a lost duckling as he led her to the bullpen and nodded towards an open desk next to Reid and across from Morgan.

“That’ll be you. If you have any questions before you go, Reid can answer them. We’ll see you at eight o’clock Monday morning.”

Kit nodded, trying not to sound as nervous as she felt when she said, “Yes, sir. Thank you, and goodnight.”

Hotch gave her one last nod before heading back to his office.

Kit was now standing in the bullpen, closest to Reid’s desk, and feeling like a lost puppy. She should go down to the clinic while she still had some time. Sure, Monty had come in to cover for her, but they were all hands on deck before she left and she was sure she could be helpful. She had resolved to do just that, hand gently tugging one braid before she heard Elle’s voice from her right.

“Excited?”

Kit turned quickly, shoving her hands in her pockets. The last thing she wanted was for them to think she was neurotic.

“Me?” she said, like an idiot. The blush that hit her cheeks must have shown she thought so, because Elle offered her a tight smile.

“No, Reid.”

“What?” asked the younger man, looking up with wide eyes and crossing his arms over his chest, like he was exposed.

Elle laughed quietly and shook her head. “I was giving Colghain a hard time. Yes, you. Excited to be, what is it, piloting?”

Kit bit the inside of her cheek before giving her own tight smile. Nerves caused her hands to pull from her pocket, playing again at the bottom of her shirt.

“Confused, more like, but hopeful. I had no idea this was going to be my day when I walked into the clinic this morning,” she answered truthfully. Profilers liked the truth, and she wasn’t going to lie to a room full of them. She liked the truth as well, so she hoped that giving them the truth would elicit truth telling back.

“You didn’t know?” asked Reid, and now even Morgan was looking up from his paperwork.

Kit shook her head slowly, taking a small step towards them.

“No,” she said, “Section Chief Ramos told me to report to Agen- Hotch after lunch. I assumed someone up here needed medical assistance. He even called in the swing shift head, so I knew I wouldn’t be back right away. I just…” she struggled for the words, but finally shrugged. “This isn’t what I had anticipated.”

“And you said yes?” asked Elle, causing Kit to nod. There was a second question there, a ‘why’ question. Kit ignored it.

“I follow orders,” she said simply.

There didn’t seem to be much more after that, and no one else asked any questions. At least, not that they were ready to say aloud. It was a moment before Reid gestured to the desk next to his and said, “That’s yours. I heard Hotch tell you. Not that I was eavesdropping or anything, but I usually pick up on my name and I heard him say “across from Morgan,” and that’s the only desk across from Morgan so-”

“Breathe, Pretty Boy. I’m sure she got it,” Morgan interrupted, and Reid seemed to curl into himself a little more before he bit down on his bottom lip, nodding quickly. Unsure of himself. Embarrassed.

“Right.”

-----

Kit had never had a desk to work at, not as a nurse, and not as Head Nurse, so she had no idea what she was going to do with it. She told this to Monty when she got down to the clinic.

“It’s so desperately clinical, Mont. More clinical than down here, and this is a clinic.”

She was rubbing at her eyes, trying to starve off the stress headache that was building. Monty, however, was laughing quietly to herself.

“I still can’t believe you’re going to be working for stiffs,” she said.

Monty was wearing identical scrubs, same embroidered title across the seam of the shoulder. She had been looking at a clipboard when Kit came back down to the bottom floor, but it was long forgotten on the counter. The counter she was sitting on was not made for sitting, and a few other nurses were milling around. The clinic had slowed considerably after the morning, so their having a conversation by the nurses station wasn't as big of a deal as it could have been.

Monty's reaction had been exactly as Kit had predicted, and shook her head at the other girl.

“No, Mont, you’re still not understanding me. I’m working with them. On their team. I am going to be a stiff. I got reassigned, not offered out.”

Monty shifted to face Kit, her jaw dropped just slightly as the realization seemed to stick. A spike of panic shot through Kit’s own chest, and she took a deep breath.

“Chill out, Monty, you’re palpable.”

“Oh, sorry, it’s just a huge piece of news. You’re… leaving the clinic?”

“No!” Kit said in what was a too loud voice for their environment. They were definitely going to get in trouble. There was a reason Kit, Ari, and Monty all worked different shifts, and it had almost nothing to do with the fact that they were all Heads.

Kit took a breath before she said, “It’s a partial. Half time here, half there. It’s a test run of a new program and Ramos chose me.”

“Over Ari?”

“That’s what I said.”

“What unit?”

Kit sighed, rubbing at her eyes again. “The BAU”

Monty gasped, tugging out her bun and wrapping it back as she all but lost her mind as she said, “What?! The BAU?! That’s where the profilers are! They’re assholes!”

“Mont, múchadh!” Kit quipped, knowing their section chief wouldn’t take too kindly to her yelling at Monty to shut up in English for all the academy cadets to hear. “They’re… fine. It’ll be fine. I need you to tell me it’ll be fine.”

There was a quiet moment before Monty looked at her, a mirror reflection, and nodded. She put a hand gently on Kit’s arm and squeezed, giving not a smile, but a look so sure that it couldn’t help but settle Kit’s anxious heart.

“It’ll be fine. Promise, cúpla.”

Twin.

Kit nodded and let out a breath. If Monty’s spirit could calm, so could hers.

“Thanks. Now, I need to borrow your slacks.”

"No scrubs?"

"Business-wear."

“Oh no."

Montana and Dakota were identical. Two of three, their brother Arizona, or Ari, rounded out the Colghain triplets. All three were heads of the three different rotations at the clinic, and they tended to do ‘big things’ all together. Graduating high school early. Graduating college with degrees in nursing, scattered minors in chemistry and psychology and sociology, as quickly as possible. Working at the same hospitals. Joining the FBI Academy.

Kit and Monty had long ago agreed that Ari was the best nurse. He was organized and clinical. Monty was a confident tornado. Kit was their feeler, always friendly, sometimes dragged into Mony’s hijinks, but normally calm. Passive. She was the only empath of the three, and Monty and Ari knew their job affected her more than it did them. Ari was born first, and Monty third; Kit was the second child.

Kit reflected upon this as she sat on the metro, willing the stop to their apartment complex to come faster. After she got off it was still a five minute walk, and she really needed to be in a place where her emotions were entirely her own for a while. She had some things to sort out.

A large man sat next to her, allowing her vigilance to spike, and it allowed her to consider what Agent Hotchner - Hotch - had said when he introduced her to the team. They wanted field certified nurses, which as they’d all graduated from the academy, wasn’t an issue. However, Kit knew her field assessment scores were better than her siblings, and her weapons assessments the same. Not by a large margin, especially the way Monty handled a glock.

I don’t want to turn into some upstairs stiff. She thought to herself, standing and waiting for the doors to open at her stop. They already hate me anyway. Tight smiles and passive questions don’t change the fact that I’m an outsider. An ionróir.

One of the good things that came from being one of three, but really one of two, was that Kit could often hear Monty's voice monologuing back to her. They had, in essence, the same voice. The reach wasn’t that far.

Maybe you surprised them, came Monty’s voice. Of course, it wasn’t Monty, but thinking about it that way always helped. Maybe they feel just as uncomfortable as you do. Maybe they were caught off guard.

Caught off guard? Of course.They didn’t know I was coming.

It was natural that they were treating her with hesitation; they’d probably been just as caught off guard as she had been. If she wanted them to give her the benefit of the doubt, she had to give them the same.

She laughed aloud, eliciting a few strange looks from others exiting the metro car, but she didn’t care. A new spring was in her step as she bounded up the stairs and into the open air. Her walk home was lighter than she expected as she allowed some of her disgruntled fear to ebb away.

-----

The door to their apartment swung open as she pushed, nearly toppling over. Ari must have fixed the hinges, which only made her smile a little wider. Kit could hear him singing quietly over the sound of the shower, something in Gaelic she couldn’t place right away. He hadn’t cooked anything, which was fine, but after a quick rummage through the cabinets it was clear she wasn’t cooking anything substantial either.

They really needed to go to the store that weekend.

In the end, a freezer pizza was all she had to offer. Ari would be fine and fed for his shift, even though it wasn’t the epitome of health. They’d survive.

“Oi, deirfiúr, cad é sin?”

Hey, sister, what’s that?

Kit wheeled around, giving him a shy and guilty smile. Technically, if they were going to get takeout, it was her turn to pay. He obviously thought this was her effort at biding her time.

“Pizza,” she said, trying to save face.

“Wow, Kody, amazing. Really went all out this time,” he chided back, running his hands through his slightly damp, equally as red hair.

Kit knew he was joking. Ari, while the most stoic of the three, loved poking fun at his sisters almost as much as he loved nursing.

“Ah, múchadh. I had a stupid day.”

He raised an eyebrow at her, elbows resting on the counter top and head cocked to the side at her.

“Stupid day?”

“Yes.”

“Deirfiúr-”

“No, deartháir, it’s fine.”

It wasn’t that Kit didn’t want to talk about it. She desperately wanted to talk about it, but there was pity rolling off him. Kit hated pity. It didn’t make her feel any more capable, which was her new fear as the pity settled over her.

Damn.

They were both quiet for a moment, the only sound in the room coming from their incredibly old oven as it tried to cook the pepperoni covered, value brand masterpiece. Their apartment wasn’t nice, per say, but it was quaint. It was home for the last two and a half years. The triplet’s little slice of calm in the bustling of The District around them.

“Big feelings?” Ari finally asked, moving past her to take the pizza out of the oven. The shrill timer went off, setting things just over the edge in the room for Kit to have a full blown meltdown.

Ari always could tell when Kit was overwhelmed before she could tell herself. The pity, the heat of the oven, the sound of the timer, and the self doubt that had consumed her so quickly crashed together. Before she knew what was happening he’d pulled her into a hug, tears pooling and blurring her vision.

“I got reassigned,” she admitted after a moment, her voice tight. The tears had started running down her cheeks, but she wasn’t sobbing. They ran without any effort at all.

Ari pulled away and grabbed her by the shoulders, looking down at her. Kit and Monty had always been short like their mother, but Ari was tall like their dad.

“What?” He said, obviously surprised. Kit could feel the shock coming off of him the way it had come off of Monty. “Reassigned from the clinic?”

“No,” she said, trying to wipe at the tears that were effortlessly streaming. “I’m splitting time. Some new program for the bureau. I was chosen to pilot it.”

They’d transitioned fully into Gaelic now, the language they’d always spoken at home. Growing up with immigrant parents meant they’d spoken Gaelic in tandem with English, both languages swirling together effortlessly in their formative years. They tried not to use it in public so much, especially in the nation’s capital, but every so often it was nice to.

Here at the apartment though, they allowed themselves to just be.

“Piloting a program?” he asked.

“Yeah. A field certified, academy graduated nurse in each department part time. I guess injuries and stress are up, and rapport with locals is down. They’re just starting with one unit to see how it goes.”

“Local?”

“I think I’m going to have to do sensitivity training with them. Like I do for the nurses once a quarter.”

“What unit?”

“BAU.”

A grin lit up Ari’s face, eyes going wide. His delight was not unnoticed by Kit, and she tilted her head. It wasn’t that Ari was so against the stiffs, but he wasn’t their biggest fan. Not to mention the reputation that profilers had.

“With antibiotics guy?”

Ah.

Kit rolled her eyes and shoved at her brother’s shoulder. Not hard, but hard enough for him to know she meant it.

“Ari-”

“What’s his name? Mason or something?” Ari was nearly giddy now.

“Morgan. Lay off, I can already tell they don’t like me…”

Kit sighed and ran her hands down her face, placing a hand on the bottom of each of her braids and tugging gently. She could feel her meds wearing off, and she desperately needed to eat some of the passable pizza she was smelling.

“I’ve got a desk, Ari. I don’t even know what to do with a desk. I don't know what I’m doing. I’m supposed to get an email tonight and read over it by Monday and I was wearing my scrubs today and my headband. They think I’m an outsider and too young and-”

“Dakota.” He grabbed her shoulders again as he stopped her spiral.

Kit looked up into his eyes, their eyes, and she couldn’t help herself from asking the one question she hadn’t even let herself dwell on.

“What if they think this is way out of my league?”

Ari considered that for a second before leaning close to her, right in her face. His eyes were serious; a mirror staring back at her.

“You prove them wrong.”

#Brenna writes things #or at least she tries #Second Child Restless Child #SCRC #criminal minds #criminal minds fanfic #fanfic #fanfiction #gaelic #OC #female OC #BAU

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writinghurtsmybrain · 2 years

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It Begins

So, you might be thinking: “Why the heck are you WRITING a blog then?” Honestly, I’m not sure either. However, I think I just want to.

To introduce what my blog may be, if I ever actually remember to post anything again (lol), it will basically just be yet another stream of consciousness from one of today’s ‘troubled youth.’

Btw, content warning for mental health related issues, a lack of a filter, and poorly (un)disguised curse words.

As it is for many of us college zombies, I am currently struggling through the beginning of exams, and am in the midst of pretending I don’t have an exam tomorrow that I am not at all prepared for.

In the spirit of ignoring that exam, I will instead talk about one of the other things weighing on my mind: (one being that every time I use a semicolon or colon I constantly worry whether I am using it correctly, you suck brain) completing makeup assignments.

I’ve struggled with mental health issues for a good long while. I have all the greatest hits: major depressive disorder, generalized anxiety, and attention deficit and hyperactive disorder. Oof that’s a lot of big words. Basically, I’m constantly going ‘ooh, shiny thing (aka this blog)’ while trying to not hate myself and worrying about that I hate myself and that omg I said that so that person definitely hates me and thinks I’m weird now, and I definitely failed that class and I’m going to end up with a horrible job that can’t pay the bills and I’ll have to bother my parents and live off them forever, will I ever be able to function normally, etc etc.

Wow, I’m not sure how that felt to read, probably disorienting and confusing, but for me, with every word I wrote I could feel my chest tightening, feeling as if a vice was squeezing the middle of my chest harder and harder.

I’m sure everyone has had that feeling. What makes it different from anxiety though, I like to think, is intensity, length, and causes. With anxiety, you feel fear and uneasiness more intensely, about more things that it doesn’t make much sense to feel anxious about, and the feeling lasts much longer, oftentimes not dissipating even if the ‘problem’ or thing driving it has been resolved or ‘fixed.’

Similarly, depression is different from sadness for the same reasons. Sure, we’ve all had those times (at least I have) where we burst into tears because our buttmuffin brother had the rest of the almondmilk, and now you can’t eat your cereal and you don’t have time to make any other food before you have to get to school (ah, high school). Though I guess that may be both depression and anxiety, cause those two lovely things like to do tag-team attacks that pummel you into the (metaphorical) ground. Anyways, I personally feel that my depression (as it feels different for everyone) can generally be categorized into three (shitty, and often co-occurring) flavors: numbness, futility, and full on omg-theres-a-knife-stabbing-me-make-it-stop. However, I think that’s a convo for another day (I mean, I gotta give both of us a reason to come back here, right?).

I’m sure this felt like all of my thought processes do. My dad describes it as ‘a racecar with bicycle brakes’ but I prefer to think it more strongly resembles ‘trying to sprint without ice skates across a field of ice to a certain point indistinguishable from anywhere else that you arbitrarily chose, only to fall on your ass and slide and spin around, arriving somewhere and unable to find where you initially wanted to go, much less where you started’ (see, even my description of my thought process is an example in and of itself).

So thanks for reading, or skimming (I wouldn’t blame you; this is way too long). I’m going to do my best to (hopefully) get some work done.

Here’s to hoping I make it back here in a day or two, cause I’m sure there must be so many waiting with bated breath for my next post (not lol).

Toodles (omg, as soon as I wrote that, I thought, but more explicitly, ‘who the fudge says toodles.’ Me. I guess I say toodles now. Welp, at least it fits the overall oddball mishmash of elements this clustercluck of a post was. Time to try and load as many tags onto this puppy that I can that can be reasonably associated with what I wrote. Toodles)

#first post #mental health #fuck exams #stream of consciousness #random #ramblings #idek bro #rip me i guess

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drukhari · 7 years

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hey do you have any tips on getting fitter?

Absolutely, though by getting fitter it depends on whether you mean losing weight in general, or building muscle mass so I’ll post some tips for both goals and I apologize if this gets long winded, it’s a broad topic lol.

(Also, just a content alert for anyone who is trying to avoid content that specifically discusses exercise, nutrition, or caloric intake. We’re gonna get into all of that below, so while I will try and tag this after the fact, since the app isn’t letting me do it ahead of time, just scroll on by if that’s subject matter that you’re trying to avoid!)

Generally, losing weight or gaining muscle requires consuming calories at a deficit or a surplus (respective to those two objectives). There’s a lot of info out there promoting unhealthy ways to lose weight in particular so don’t be drawn in by anything that tells you starving yourself is a good idea! (In fact, doing so will shoot your fitness goals right through the foot in the long run and could even kill you)

One thing I’d recommend to help with that is using the myfitnesspal app to help track your daily caloric intake rather trying to do math in your head all day because nobody’s got time for that kind of headache.

Knowing what your maintenance calories are before getting started on a fitness plan is super important too, because then you’ll be able to safely and accurately reduce or add calories to your maintenance without unintentionally going to extremes. There are a lot of ways to calculate your maintenance calories, but a very quick formula I’ve found (that’s based on how active your current lifestyle is) would be:

-a regular, somewhat sedentary lifestyle: 12-13 calories/lb-a more active lifestyle (active 3-5 days out of the week): 14-15 calories/lb-highly active lifestyle (active 5+ days a week): 16-17 calories/lbSo for example, a moderately active (3-5 days a week) individual who weighs ~140 pounds, their maintenance calories would be roughly ~1960-2100 calories.

If you’re trying to lose weight and need to reach a deficit, you’ll want to start out slow and reduce your daily intake by ~10-12% of your maintenance calories and then monitor your progress on a weekly basis (same in reverse for gaining muscle, increase by 10-12% and monitor weekly). Don’t evaluate using daily weigh-ins because those aren’t an accurate determinate of health for a number of reasons. Honestly, if it’s not distressing to do, I’d recommend using pictures throughout the process to track how you’re doing as well, because when you see the visible results of how far you’ve come that makes for a great motivation boost! If after 2 weeks or so things are going well, then reduce/add another ~5-10% from your maintenance and see how you do from there. It may seem slow going at times, but results will be gradual so you just need to remember to be patient and stick with it.

What kind of calories you’re taking in matters too, not just the amount, and for that you’ll want to keep track of the %macros you’re consuming(i.e. carbs, fats, protein) and ensure that those levels are in line with your goals (i.e. consuming a greater % of protein in your daily diet if you’re trying to maximize muscle gain, making sure you are taking in enough carbs to give your body the energy it needs to exercise, etc). The myfitnesspal app can calculate your macros for you based on what you’re eating and that will make it easier to track those.

When it comes to exercise, I can’t stress enough the importance of finding a way to be active that you don’t absolutely despise. For example, I hate running. I can make myself do it if I have to, but I get really bored regardless of whether I’m running outside or on a treadmill, so I integrate my cardio into my lifting routine using cardio acceleration (basically 1 min bursts of moderate-high intensity cardio after each lifting set and in between exercises). It introduces enough variety that I’m constantly moving and don’t get bored. Even if you don’t have a way to be active that you love, finding something you are content to do on a regular basis is a key component to a good fitness routine, because no one likes having to mentally berate themselves to go be active 3-5 times a week.

If you’re trying to build muscle, you’ll usually want to do some kind of weight training, whether that is lifting or body weight exercises (like push ups, pull ups, etc). If you’re trying to lose weight, cardio is gonna be your best friend.

There’s a lot more info out there, this is just kind of a “crash course” type answer with the stuff that I used as a foundation when I really started getting serious about my fitness routine. Last point I’d want to make, and I fail at this sometimes admittedly but I’m definitely getting a lot better with it, don’t fall into the trap of comparing yourself to others, whether at the gym or just in terms of results. Everyone is different, and it’s impossible for us to know the circumstances of someone else’s fitness journey, so wasting time comparing yourself to them will only hurt you in the long run.

We all start somewhere, so no matter how fit someone else may look they weren’t always that way, and some day you could be the person that someone else is looking at and thinking “I want to look like that person”

Best of luck to you, anon!

#fitness cw #food cw

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junker-town · 5 years

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The 5 most fireable NFL coaches of this season

Jason Garrett’s days with the Cowboys are likely numbered after a disappointing 2019 season.

Whose seats are hottest after disappointing seasons? The answers ... probably won’t surprise you.

The NFL’s most embattled head coaches have just one week left to state their cases. Dec. 30 will be the last day of employment for most of the playcallers who wind up fired.

This year’s Black Monday may be a slower day than usual. While last year’s preferred firing day claimed six head coaches, some of this season’s least promising sideline generals have already earned support from team ownership. The Jets will keep Adam Gase around for year two. Matt Patricia’s done enough in his 3-11-1 season to oversee a third year in Detroit. Even Doug Marrone, now free from Tom Coughlin’s tyranny, could get another chance to restore the Jaguars to “not bad.”

Before we get to the list, let’s deviate from the way we’ve sorted these coaches in the past few weeks. Typically, “fireable” doesn’t mean a coach is necessarily going to be fired. It refers to how poorly those coaches performed in a given week and any recent trends working against them. For example, Frank Reich made last week’s list after the Colts allowed Drew Brees to have the most accurate game in NFL passing history. He’s not getting canned, but Reich’s team has failed to live up to its potential while coming off its fourth straight loss.

This time, in honor of the upcoming season finale, we’re looking at all-around resumes on top of what happened in Week 16. Let’s zero in on the five guys most likely to be looking for employment. That means coaches who probably deserve to be fired, but won’t (Gase, Patricia), escaped the final rankings. Secure coaches who brain farted their way to a loss on Sunday are safe as well ... until we come back to these rankings next fall.

So who’s on the chopping block after a trying 2019?

5. Dan Quinn, Falcons

Atlanta was 1-7 after Week 9, good enough to give Quinn the shortest odds of a midseason firing in the NFL. Since then, he’s gone 5-2, including wins over two of the NFC’s top teams (the Saints and 49ers). That hot streak added another victim Sunday when the Falcons dispatched a sputtering Jaguars squad.

It’s been a significant turnaround on both sides of the ball. The Falcons’ offense has become more efficient, while their defense has tightened up to create opportunities over the last seven weeks.

So what will team owner Arthur Blank do about his head coach? No one’s really quite sure!

Quinn has three factors working in his favor; the recent surge that shows off his ability to adapt, the continuity that comes with standing by a five-year veteran at the helm, and a locker room that, per a former Falcons’ public relations executive, still listens to, believes in, and respects him.

On a plane back to LA and just wrote this. I’m gonna share it bc a couple years back @ZachKleinWSB did something similar and this is my 2019 version to everyone who’s followed me over the years. I’m sure I’m gonna get a lot of great comments but I hope it gives you perspective pic.twitter.com/iCJ1zT3Et9

— Brian Cearns (@BKCearns) December 23, 2019

Quinn’s put in the work to keep his job over the back half of the season, even if 2019 will be remembers as a letdown for a talent roster. The question is whether his late-season progress will be too little, too late.

4. Doug Marrone, Jaguars

Will Marrone be held accountable for his team’s continued collapse from 2017’s lofty perch? Or will Tom Coughlin’s firing give him the leeway needed to earn another year in Jacksonville?

That’s the question owner Shad Khan will have to ask himself this week. Marrone got the Jags closer to the Super Bowl than all but one other coach in franchise history ... and that was Coughlin. The old-school disciplinarian oversaw a franchise that was responsible for one-quarter of the grievances filed by the NFL Players Association in the past year. He chased away talent like Jalen Ramsey (traded for two first-round picks) and had issues with Jaguars both former and current.

This limited what Marrone could do as a head coach, but Jacksonville’s issues go beyond mismanagement at the top. This year’s team has only been marginally more efficient through the air than it was in 2018 when Blake Bortles was playing his way out of Florida. Leonard Fournette’s stellar start to the season (791 yards, 4.9 yards per carry in his first eight games) has ground down to mediocrity without the threat of a high-impact passing game (361 yards, 3.5 YPC in the seven games since). A defense that had been a top-10 staple now ranks 29th in defensive efficiency, per DVOA.

Khan was mum on Marrone’s future after Week 15. That non-endorsement gave way to reports he’d be retained for one last go-round to see what he can do free of Coughlin’s influence.

From @NFLGameDay: There is a "good chance" #Jaguars coach Doug Marrone and GM Dave Caldwell return in 2020 following the firing of EVP Tom Coughlin, sources say... and Tony Khan could take on an increased role. pic.twitter.com/85Jw7YE4MX

— Ian Rapoport (@RapSheet) December 22, 2019

Marrone led the Jaguars within one quarter of Super Bowl 52. That bought him a redo after a disappointing 2018. Now he may get one more if Coughlin truly is the scapegoat he’s made out to be.

3. Pat Shurmur, Giants

Shurmur got what he needed from Daniel Jones Sunday: a historical five-touchdown performance and a win over Washington. Under his guidance, Saquon Barkley had the best day of his career and one of the most productive games of 2019 (279 total yards). So why is Shurmur back on the list despite a two-game winning streak?

Because ...

a) it came against Washington and

b) the Giants’ issues outside of their inconsistent offense may be too much for him to overcome.

New York gave up a 14-point fourth-quarter lead, allowing Case Keenum to go 99 yards on Washington’s final drive of regulation to tie the game at 35. While Jones was able to rectify that problem by leading his team to a game-winning touchdown, Week 16 failed to dispel the fatal flaws that could lead to Shurmur’s ousting after two years.

The Giants let Keenum and Dwayne Haskins — who left the game with an ankle injury — throw for three touchdowns and nearly eight yards per pass (a 125.1 passer rating). That undermanned defense has given up more points than all but three other teams. It also ranks 29th when it comes to opponent passing efficiency.

That’s all led to a 4-11 record lowlighted by a nine-game losing streak in the middle of the season. New York’s only wins have come against 3-12 Washington (twice), the 4-11 Dolphins, and the 7-8 Buccaneers.

On the plus side, Shurmur’s built camaraderie within the Giants’ locker room — he’s even got Jones and Eli Manning partying together in the dorkiest way possible — and appears to be every bit a players’ coach.

Shurmur on the Giants night of flip cup celebrations: “they’re grown men and they look after each other and they were celebrating a victory, they should have invited me!” *laughs*

— Madelyn Burke (@MadelynBurke) December 23, 2019

Though the team’s dream of adding Chase Young to its pass rush probably died with Week 16’s win, defensive help is still likely on the way. If the Giants believe they can patch up the blocking and secondary issues that have plagued them, Shurmur may get one more chance to prove he can turn Jones into a legitimate franchise quarterback.

Of course, owner John Mara could just look at his 9-22 record over the past two seasons and decide to gamble on a different quarterback whisperer instead.

2. Freddie Kitchens, Browns

Cleveland had the ball and a 6-0 lead at the two-minute warning in the second quarter against the Ravens. Kitchens found a way to turn that into a 14-6 halftime deficit.

Granted, some of that collapse was thanks to Lamar Jackson’s otherworldly play, but Kitchens did his offense few favors with too-cute playcalling and some regrettable clock management. His halfback pass on third-and-1 fooled nobody, and the fact it went for an 8-yard loss may have been the only thing that kept him from going for it on fourth down from his own 28.

Freddie Kitchens on the sequence at the end of the first half, throwing on third-and-10. (He also confirmed that the Hunt third-and-1 play the drive before was a halfback pass, and that they would’ve gone for it on fourth-and-short) pic.twitter.com/aiQ87JLdcm

— Jake Trotter (@Jake_Trotter) December 22, 2019

The Ravens, out of timeouts, scored on the following drive. And they scored on the drive after that because three straight incompletions only ate up 18 seconds of game clock, effectively daring Jackson to burn them once more. It was another brutal gut-punch in a season full of them for the erstwhile AFC North favorites.

Confusing clock management is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to Kitchens’ problems. The first-year head coach’s promotion was predicated on his ability to turn Cleveland’s turgid offense into one of the league’s most dangerous units. He made Baker Mayfield look like a borderline MVP candidate after taking over as interim offensive coordinator. Then he took that team and added All-Pros Odell Beckham Jr. and Kareem Hunt (for half a season).

And the Browns have gone from ranking 12th in the league in weighed DVOA in 2018 to 23rd in 2019.

Beckham, still fiercely committed to the team that freed him from New York last spring, took notice — one week after Jarvis Landry had a similarly public discussion with his head coach over playcalling.

I'm sure OBJ is fine pic.twitter.com/o7t8hywE0l

— CJ Fogler (@cjzero) December 22, 2019

Kitchens is losing on the field and potentially losing in his own locker room. That all spells disaster for his hopes of returning for a year two. But maybe team owner John Dorsey will chalk this all up to rookie mistakes and give him the runway to learn from and fix those issues.

1 Jason Garrett, Cowboys

Garrett may have seen his last shot to keep his job march off the turf as the Eagles celebrated the 17-9 win that moved them to the top of the NFC East. The underachieving Cowboys, stuck in a feedback loop of botched calls and big, meaningless performances, dropped to 7-8 and out of the playoff picture.

That may signal the end of the Garrett era in Dallas. The 10-year veteran is staring down what could be only his second losing season as the Cowboys’ head coach, but the lingering sense he always could have done more will ultimately be his undoing. None of his teams embody that more than the 2019 edition.

Even though the Cowboys have all the talent of a contender, the combination of a tough schedule and a crippling inability to step up a big stage has dropped them to the periphery of the playoff race. By most metrics, Dallas should have clinched its division in a down year for the NFC East. It ranks first in the NFL in total yards, eighth in scoring, and eighth in yards allowed per play.

Advanced stats love the Cowboys. Not just DVOA. They're a top-ten team by DVOA, by @pfref SRS, by EPA. But the point of the game isn't to do well in advanced metrics. It's to win. And they didn't do that enough.

— Aaron Schatz (@FO_ASchatz) December 23, 2019

Instead, Jerry Jones’ team needs to beat Washington and hope the Giants upset the Eagles in Week 17 just to sneak into the postseason. Sunday’s loss in Philly dropped Garrett to 2-6 against teams with winning records in 2019.

Dak Prescott’s breakthrough season — he ranks among the NFL’s top five in passing yards, passing touchdowns, and QBR — is about to go to waste on the worst team, by record, of his career. A defense that got its best-case scenario in terms of injury (only Leighton Vander Esch has missed more than four games this season among the team’s starters) held the Saints, Patriots, and Eagles to 17 points or fewer this season and lost all three of those games. It hasn’t been all roses for that unit, which ranks 20th in defensive efficiency, per DVOA, but it still has given the ‘Boys several opportunities to win big games.

The gap between potential and production in Dallas is sizable. There’s one man who’ll shoulder the blame for that disparity, and it’s the same guy who has come under fire each time the Cowboys make an early playoff exit or struggle down the stretch. Garrett can still save his job by carrying Dallas to a surprising postseason run, though he’ll need the stars to align.

And if he does, all signs point to the Cowboys blowing it. That’s what they’ve done throughout 2019.

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junker-town · 5 years

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The case for Kawhi Leonard as the best basketball player alive

Photo by Chris Elise/NBAE via Getty Images

The title of the best player alive can’t pass in December. It’s earned in June.

The MVP is cool, but Kawhi Leonard is the best player alive

Early in the fourth quarter of last Thursday’s showdown between the Milwaukee Bucks and Los Angeles Lakers, Giannis Antetokounmpo hit a three over Anthony Davis that forced Frank Vogel to call time. As the telecast went to a commercial break, Antetokounmpo pranced toward his bench, repeatedly slamming an imaginary crown atop his own head.

The gesture was powerful. In Antetokounmpo’s eyes, along with many others who watched his Bucks win, LeBron James was getting supplanted as the NBA’s official Head of State. All this is subjective, yes. It’s also presumptive. The Bucks indeed look indestructible with Antetokounmpo on the floor. He earned his first MVP last season and is on track to win another.

But when it comes to coronations in the NBA, team success in a playoff setting still matters. You can’t skip steps. This brings us to Kawhi Leonard, the most complete basketball player alive, who, on his way to the second Finals MVP of his career, pummeled Antetokounmpo’s Bucks four straight times in last year’s Eastern Conference Finals.

It’s not that Leonard isn’t a mainstream figure, but for most of this season it’s felt like he exists in a universe that’s three centimeters to the left of every other player. Despite being in his prime as the best player on a championship favorite, averaging 25.5 points, 7.8 rebounds, and 5.1 assists while making 42.4 percent of his threes over the past month (AKA since Paul George’s debut), Leonard isn’t a serious MVP candidate — Basketball-Reference’s tracker currently ranks him 10th, behind Nikola Jokic and Bam Adebayo — or someone widely accepted as the best player alive.

The checks against him in both discussions are well known. Leonard is the face of load management, a movement that treats the regular season as more of a burdensome means to an end than the inherent value proposition the NBA sees it as. April 5, 2017 was the last time Leonard played on zero days rest, and heading into Christmas Day he has appeared in seven fewer games than Antetokounmpo and played 407 fewer minutes than James Harden.

In no way should anyone doubt the health-related rationale for resting as often as he does — a long-running degenerative quadricep disorder led to his battle against knee tendinitis during last year’s postseason — but it comes with an explicit whiff of indifference towards the 82-game schedule that damages his overall standing in a complicated way. To be clear, this isn’t a call to recognize Leonard as a legitimate MVP candidate, but instead an attempt to acknowledge how moot he makes the honor feel.

His statistical resume is impressive — featuring the highest assist and usage rate of his career, along with a current fourth-place standing in real plus-minus and 538’s RAPTOR metric — but doesn’t quite stack up with Harden, Antetokounmpo, James, or even Luka Doncic. Taking it another step, Leonard’s value is undeniable on both ends, but even though his on/off net point differential is in line with those aforementioned superstars, the Los Angeles Clippers would not collapse without Leonard the same way the Rockets, Bucks, or Lakers would. Those teams were constructed around their stars. Leonard elevates a roster that already had a competitive identity before he got there.

This is instead about status and impact and how one informs the other. It’s about the bewildering Best Player in the World debate that LeBron’s perceptible albeit slight decline has allowed. It’s about deciding what actually matters, and weighing night-to-night dependable excellence beside a blatant commitment to prioritize June over January. It’s about remembering what happened six months ago and seeing an even better version of that player today, operating with a whole new set of teammates, in a different environment. It’s about respect.

I decided to write this column because for the past two years I’ve thought Leonard was the NBA’s best player, and do not understand how anyone who watched last year’s postseason can be so quick to move on from it and declare a different heir to James’ throne. Last year, Leonard led the playoffs in minutes, points, steals, offensive rebounds, free throws, and Win Shares. He was a hobbled Hercules, slaying one favored opponent after the next with the precise all-around dominance very few have ever summoned on that type of stage.

He bounced home the most meaningful non-Finals shot of my lifetime — the 39th, 40th, and 41st points of a masterful Game 7 victory over the Philadelphia 76ers — then helped curb Antetokounmpo in the final four games of the conference finals while simultaneously grinding Khris Middleton down to a nub (Milwaukee’s second all-star only averaged 13.7 points per game in that series, in large part because he had to track Leonard on the other end).

After the championship — a series in which he averaged 29 points, 10 rebounds, four assists, and two steals per game — Leonard’s free agency was ascendancy on display. He courted Paul George to Los Angeles one summer after James failed to do so, a genuinely masterful flex that can’t be overlooked.

I would not choose any other player to navigate the final five minutes of a tied game, or lead a team back from a 2-1 deficit, or, frankly, be on my roster for the next three or four years. (Leonard is 28 years old.) Basketball is a team game and this isn’t at all meant to be a diatribe about RINGZZZ. But until Leonard actually stumbles in a meaningful playoff moment, it seems silly to prefer anyone else. He’s a surgical scorer from all three levels, with a handle and playmaking chops that seem to improve every month. His defensive peak is no longer worthy of the award he’s already won twice, but reverberates with a disruptive force few can match.

Also, there is no shot a defense wants Leonard to take. He’s comfortable in every square-inch of the floor, makes those around him better, can dominate with the ball, overwhelm the opposition without it, and, like all great players, is impervious to scouting reports designed to slow him down.

A few years ago, defenders knew he’d liked to pull up on drives to his left and attack the rim on drives to his right. Even though he takes more shots that are analytically undesirable than any franchise player in 2020 should — 41.6 percent of his field-goal attempts are pull-up twos, which is a career high; only 41.4 percent of his field-goal attempts are at the rim or behind the three-point line, which is third-lowest in the league among all players who’ve logged at least 500 minutes; and he leads the NBA in contested long twos — Leonard’s approach would be more concerning if it was all he could do. Extra threes would be nice, but he’s potent from everywhere; mid-range jumpers in the regular season will transform into more taxing forays into the paint when it’s necessary for him to do so (i.e. the playoffs). Elsewhere, he’s as confident as ever.

Whether operating a pick-and-roll, isolated on the wing, or posting up on the block, Leonard is like an airplane programmed to land at specific coordinates without deviation. He thrives on autopilot, surveying the floor and computing what the most direct route to points should be. His arsenal is a bottomless reservoir of counters, pivots, and exclamation points. Leonard can dunk on your head, but would rather stop on a dime, juke you into the air, then politely send himself to the free-throw line. He’s the most balanced, disciplined, unbothered scorer in a league that’s full of them.

I understand those who look at Antetokounmpo, Harden, or James, see history being made on a nightly basis, and believe one of them is the best player alive. I also admit that siding with Leonard in spite of all the magical things they’re doing is somewhat visceral. But I also think his very existence brings to light an uncomfortable question about the regular season’s actual value.

By treating it as he does, Leonard subverts awards — the MVP race, All-NBA teams — and other historically relevant markers that tell us who/what matters. In other words, he might not be breaking the system, but he does live outside it, governed by his own rule book.

I won’t assume Leonard will lead the Clippers to their first NBA title, but it wouldn’t be right to diminish his previous accomplishments before time affords him the opportunity to try. Sometimes being the best player alive doesn’t require daily verification, and the label is too consequential to get passed from one player to the next in the middle of December. The playoffs are where crowns are snatched. Nobody knows that better than the man who currently wears the largest one.

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