AN. I do not own Criminal Minds nor associated characters.
Just me blowing off a little steam in between writing for Needing Emily, which should be updated soon.

Emily Prentiss is not the woman they think they know - she has secrets, habits that they are ignorant of and would never understand. When she has a rough day at the office, Emily reaches for the only comfort she knows.

Trigger Warning - Mentions of Self Injury

Emily Prentiss stumbled through the doorway of her apartment, dropping her satchel at her side and slipping her feet from her boots. Sighing, she pushed the door shut behind her and padded down the hallway, dragging her slender fingers through her dark hair, feeling her bitten nails on her scalp. Out of habit, she paused at the side table and deposited her gun and badge in the first drawer and, out of habit; she headed for the wine stash in the corner of her kitchen.

She'd had another bad day. Things had caught up with Emily Prentiss. Emily Prentiss; the strong one, the clever one, always so together… She actually laughed a little, choking on her wine. Oh, if only they knew. Profilers, she scoffed, they didn't even know the woman they'd worked with for years on end, day after day. Emily Prentiss, they said, the queen of compartmentalisation. Oh, they had no idea.

Sighing, Emily returned her thoughts to the case files she'd laboured over from dawn till dusk – to the victims and the murderers and the murders and the rapes. Her eyelids slid across her glassy dark eyes as they scrutinised the air in front of her, sightless. In her mind, she examined the photos of dead girls and women, the crime scenes, the suspects all over again.

Her thoughts turned to the team, the joke Spencer had played on a grumpy Derek Morgan that morning, the way she had laughed – the way she had joined in, acted up so brilliantly to her reputation as the woman who made compartmentalisation an art-form, the witty, funny, clever Emily and not the sad shadow of a woman she knew that Emily covered for, lived for so the other Emily, the real Emily, could hide away.

She tucked her legs up beneath her on the plush sofa, tossing her dark head as she reached for the remote. She knew the destructive path she was on, the way this evening was going, all too well. She needed distraction, something to pull her out of her sorry existence and plant her in the midst of some made-up woman's drama.

The button clicked and there was a flash as the screen came to abrupt life. Emily's dark eyes fluttered against the glare in the room that had grown dark around her. She had no idea what time it was, did not care. Ah, a grim smile graced the sad face of the profiler, a crime drama. Perfect. The wine glass was empty and Emily rose with a sigh, planting her socked feet upon the wooden floor gracefully. Oh Emily was always elegant. Slim, tall. She paused on her way to the kitchen, overcome with just how crap this day had been. Another crap day in a long line of crap days going back, oh – as long as she could remember.

A sigh. A feeling of utter hopelessness. Emily crept gently through the rooms to her bedroom. She perched at the side of her bed and a small smile graced her lips at the sight of the tidy room. This room was the room of the FBI agent, Emily Prentiss. Maybe, this was some part of the real Emily. She didn't know. She leant forwards, reaching beneath her bed. This was habit, as much habit as dropping her credentials in their drawer and heading for the wine. This was her habit. Slender fingers snuck between the Star Trek DVDs and the empty Xbox game cases, and met the small tin box she had known they would meet.

Emily extracted her arm and reeled in the bounty, bringing the tin up on her lap. She knows there is a similar tin at the bottom of her work bag, for 'special occasions', another in her ready-bag for backup. But this, this is her home-tin. Her favourites are in here.

Emily bit her lip momentarily, as she did in moments of hesitation, before popping the tin open. She did not throw the lid back immediately, instead relishing the ritual. She was so close, so close to letting it all go. Slipping a slim finger between the hinges, Emily opened the case carefully. The metal gleamed in the dim lamplight, the razor edges sharp enough to cut the silence. But cutting silence was not what they were for, Emily thought as she dragged back the sleeve of her blouse, smudging the makeup she applied each morning. The scars across her forearm were white in the light, the newer ones a thick pink stripe in her pale skin. Hot tears spilt from her eyes and rolled down her cheeks, across the pallid skin of her face as she prepared herself to be free, free for just a few moments – and maybe, maybe this time she'd remember what it felt like to be happy.