the moon (a rini au)

new beginnings

Ricky took a deep breath. The bottom of his lip trembling slightly, his nails digging into his right palm, left hand holding on to the side of his backpack as if his life depended on it. He took a breath again, loosening his grip and dropping both his arms to the sides of his body. 

11 years, it had been almost 11 years since he'd last been in this building, 11 years since she was gone, 11 years since he left the place he spent most of his childhood in, 11 years since he'd seen her friends her colleagues; 11 years since her portrait was put up in the corridor on the second floor, east wing, next to where her lab used to be. 11 years. 

He stood there for atleast fifteen minutes before he convinced himself to walk towards the sliding glass doors. He walked into the main lobby at 8:15 am, over an hour before his introductory class this morning. His eyes glanced over to the main desk, a few familiar faces blended in with new ones. The computers upgraded to newer models, more plants surrounded the area but the walls were still the same pale blue, slightly silverish; he found himself standing there soaking in everything, every single detail of the place, oblivious to all movement around him.

"LITTLE RICHARD BOWEN" a voice beamed from the side, causing Ricky to snap out of his trance and turn around.

"Maggie" he muttered under his breath, momentarily shocked.

An immediate feeling of joy and warmth overtook him and he ran over to the short woman in a pantsuit, her receptionist badge pinned to hear coat, hair in box braids tied into a bun, standing there with her arms open. She pulled him into a hug, squeezing the life out of him.

"Oh honey look at you! you've gotten so tall" she exclaimed. This made Ricky chuckle.              "It's Ricky now Mags" he said still smiling ear to ear looking down at her. "You'll always be Richard to me kiddo".

"Christina's been waiting for you since she got your application you know, she's missed you." Maggie said, a sweet smile on her face. Ricky let out a nervous laugh.

Christina Cho, or as he called her so affectionately in the past "CiCi" was his mother's other half. They started at the department together as trainees, the worked together ever since. Ricky hadn't seen Chris since Elizabeth's funeral, they never kept in touch although he was sure Mike occasionally spoke to her.

(A/N - Christina Cho (usually referred to as Chris or CiCi) is based off Christina Yang from greys anatomy (Sandra Oh), she's about 47ish in this story and now teaches at the institute along with leading her own projects.)

-Ricky's POV-

I must have been lost in my thoughts for a while cause I feel Maggie lightly slapping my shoulder. "Sorry" I manage to mumble out. She looks at me knowingly and says "Its gonna be okay, go see her before the rest of your class gets here". 

I nod and give her another hug, she says "it's good to have you home" so softly I barely hear it. I let go and give her a small smile and start to walk towards the elevator.

Home.

I pull up my schedule from my emails, ROOM 304 it says in bold next to "Professor: Dr. C. Cho.". 

I walk through the corridor slowly passing the doors. ROOM 315, ROOM 314, ROOM 313, ROOM 312, ROOM 311, ROOM 310....

I wonder if she's still the same

ROOM 309, ROOM 308...

Will she recognize me?

ROOM 307, ROOM 306, ROOM 305..

Almost there.. breathe Ricky breathe

ROOM 304 

I turn the door nob hesitantly, not making much of a sound and step into the classroom. There she is, her back towards me, tall in a leather jacket and jeans looking through a stack of paper spread across her desk. I stand still with my hands buried in my pockets, I want to speak but the words just won't come out. 

She turns around nonchalantly, "Good Mor-"; and then she sees me. She's standing there frozen, while I stand here dumbfounded, my vision flickering between her and the floor.

She looks like she's going to cry, her eyes are glazed over and slightly red. I've only seen her cry once before, the night mum died she sat on the living room couch with dad after they thought I had gone to bed, and they both cried, gut-wrenching sobs and muffled voices was all I could hear from the top of the stairs, I peered through, crying myself but I never went downstairs, I just stayed there.

"Rick.." her voice cracks, which brings me back to reality.

"CiCi.."

We're both just standing here staring at each other, she isn't a hugger, never has been, but still we hug for a short bit. When I pull away she straightens my jacket. "look at you" she says, more composed now.

"look at me what?"

"look at you, Richard Alexander Bowen, all grown up."

I smile. She grabs her papers and her bag, walking over to the door. "Lunch?" I ask hesitantly and she nods

"next time don't show up a whole hour before class" she taunts, causing me to giggle "both of you, Roberts I'm looking at you"

"yes ma'am" a gentle voice says. Only then does it register to me that there's one more person in the room.

Cici leaves and my gaze returns to small figure sitting on a desk by the window, engrossed in a book. Hair falls down the side of her face, there's a ribbon in her hair.

that's rare, a ribbon.

Shes's humming lightly, all her focus on the book in front of her. I sit down on the opposite side of the room, near the door. I pull out my books and laptop, read up on some course material and every few minutes or so I find myself staring at her. Its probably nothing. She doesn't notice me looking.

There's just something about her...

I go back to working for the next thirty minutes in silence, before the room starts to fill with students and the class begins.

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A/N 

AHHHHH FIRST CHAPTER

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