I haven't had much time to write, so it might take a while for me to update this story. But I wanted to get it out there, just so that I would get going on the writing again. I hope you enjoy. You'll tell me right?
"Here we are. It's not much but it has two bedrooms and a sweet bathroom with a bath you could fit two people in instead of one."
Emily grinned and I smiled at her despite my nerves. The apartment building was on the other side of town from where I lived but she had lived close to it for a year.
"He won't find it?"
I glanced around, everything practically bare and empty but it seemed just big enough for the both of us. The living room probably had just enough space for a couch and a TV.
"No. I detoured my mail to go to a mail box in the city and he won't find where you live because of me. I think for now all you and I can do is be careful and make sure you're not alone when you're out, or when you're at work."
"At work?" I frowned, realizing how little I had thought about the next steps. "I didn't even think about that."
"I realized that when you asked for help and then said you wanted to leave today. I started making calls right away." Emily pulled me toward the two chairs that had been left and gently pushed me down. "I made sure that you have a safe place to go to even though we have to fix it up some while we're here. I can give you some money for what you need in the meantime and then when everything is working again, you can pay me back because I know you wouldn't want to feel like you owe me."
"You profile me?" I asked, feeling violated by that knowledge.
"Well it's not something I can turn off Jayje. We all profile each other in a way, even though the rules say we can't. But not saying what we see is one of those things we can do to keep things good between us." She looked at me, genuine concern on her face. "It's not on purpose, okay?"
I nodded my head, feeling better knowing that she and probably the rest of the team did the same thing to each other. "So I'm going to get my paycheck back, and in two weeks I'll have my first...but that won't pay for anything at the moment."
"You have your travel back so that will be there too. And I have made up a schedule for us considering payments and stuff. You can pay for groceries and for a new phone for yourself. Or at least a new plan with a new number."
"I can't help you with the lease," I said, getting stuck on what I couldn't pay her back right away. It felt wrong asking her to help me like this, and just as I was about to get up and walk out of the house that already seemed better than Bryan's place, when Emily shook her head and took my hand in hers.
"That's why I thought it would be a good idea to talk about things but not right now. I think that right now, we need to go back to the office and get to work. When we get back here later we'll both have a bed in our rooms, okay? And you don't have to worry about the things that I paid right now because guess what? I didn't actually pay it, my mother did."
"How did you manage that?" I asked, impressed with her all over again. She was so open about it now, but time had been different for her and especially when she just joined the team.
"My mother offered to help. She called me, doesn't happen much but she chose the perfect time to call and well, she said that she would feel better if I let her help me. I didn't tell her a thing about why I needed a place so quickly...she's been absent for so long that she won't even question anything that I do anymore but you know, she wanted to help." Emily grinned at me and I smiled at her.
"I'll still pay you back. It doesn't matter that you got the money from your mother."
Emily had told me to drive back my car, because that would be one of those things that would only help Bryan find me. I parked it in front of the apartment building even though I really wished I could keep it, and got into the car with Emily.
"We'll carpool for a while and you can buy your own car after a while. I get that it's hard, and I get that you just want to be free to go where you want when you want...I'm just not sure he didn't have something put in there to know where you are."
"I get it, don't worry."
"And if you want to do somewhere you can take my car," she added and I smiled. She thought about everything that I needed and I felt stupid for not thinking of all those things that she had. I had been the one leaving an abusive relationship, but she had been of so much help already that I didn't know how I could ever pay her back.
"You're helping me more than I expected...but you're also thinking about everything that I didn't even think about. I don't know how I can thank you enough, Em..."
"Thank me by staying out of his reach, okay?" She was quiet for a moment, concentrating on the road so that she could get us to the office safely and I just leaned back, closed my eyes and sighed. "You know there's enough we can do with that place. We can do one of two things—we can wait until you have some money so that we can buy some stuff, or we can buy some stuff and you pay me back later."
"I like that first one better but don't you have your furniture still?" I asked, keeping my eyes closed. I had slept fine the night before but I think the stress was getting to me, the fact that I was finally out of his grip and I worried that he might find out sooner than we had expected.
"Yea, I can bring over some of the things. My bed won't fit in the room, but my couch might. It's a big L-shaped one and the living room is just big enough for it I guess. And I can bring over my TV. But we're living there together now and I want you to feel like home too."
"Of course," I said with a smile. "I will, as long as I can relax there it'll be fine. I think that I can still buy some things, I have two hundred dollars. Something like that."
"You should use that for the stuff you really need. And maybe a picture frame or something. You have pictures of your parents right? And some other people in your life?" Emily glanced at me and then back to the road and I sighed again.
My parents. I hadn't seen or spoken to them for a year and I missed them. I know they had tried to reach me, a couple of times even in the beginning but I had heard the way Bryan had told them that I was busy and I would call them when I had time for them, and I knew that they'd been hurt. I had to make that right.
"Yea, I have some pictures."
"And you know...I was thinking maybe, you could buy me one too while you're at it. I could use one for a picture I have. And when we go out we'll buy some nice deco stuff. It'll be awesome." Emily parked the car in front of the building and turned off the engine. I turned my head to look at her and smiled.
"You know that's not going to be nearly enough to pay you back."
She grinned and shrugged. "It was worth a try, and you can keep count and pay me back however you feel like you can at the moment. That picture frame is going to be a start." She got out of the car and I followed her lead, my hands shaking and my heart pounding in my chest as I glanced around to see if he had found me yet.
It was going to be a while before I could let that go.
Emily took care of the team and telling them what we had come up with about us coming in together and actually, about us living together. She didn't tell them anything about Bryan, only that he had left and I didn't have a place to stay.
They were all very sympathetic and while I'd taken care of my paycheck and where it would go, she had taken care of the team and Hotch. I think that she had told them that they needed to leave it be for now, because they watched me but said nothing.
With no active case, I had more than enough time to think between sorting through cases. Emily was a champ, because she kept interrupting me to ask me about something for the house, and it helped me let go of the worries for a little while.
"So we should buy some stuff for your room," she said as she stuck her head around the doorpost. "Curtains and stuff."
"That doesn't have to happen right away right?" I asked. She grinned at me as she came into my office all the way and nodded her head.
"Yea, it kind of does. I told you you'd have a bed but you don't have any pillows or covers. I mean, I don't even have those, because the bed in my old apartment was twice as big so we do need to do that right away." She sat down in the chair and looked at me. I looked back at her, a frown on my face because that meant spending even more of her money and I couldn't even keep up.
"How much have you spent on me in the past two days, Em?" I asked her softly, my eyes burning.
"Jayje...don't worry so much okay? While you're getting back upon your feet, you don't have to worry about the money. You can do that later when everything has been done and you have some happiness back in your life." Emily stood and made her way around the desk. "I'm not going to tell you what I've spent for you because you're going to freak. But that's because you haven't had anything, not even your own hard earned money. And so when you've had a couple of paychecks I'll tell you what you owe me...I think. I haven't made up my mind yet on how that'll go."
She chuckled and I leaned back in my chair, my chest tight.
"It's going to...am I going to be able to pay it back?" I asked, and she grinned again and nodded her head.
"Fact is, I think you could pay me back in three weeks but I'm not going to let you do that. You'll get your money next week and I want you to buy yourself something you really like for your room, or even for the house. And then at the end of the month you can pay half of the rent and groceries and everything. It'll be just fine."
While I was with Bryan I got money for groceries, and he would pay the bills and rent. I always had just enough for the things we needed and if I came home with different things, Bryan would get angry.
It had been a while since I'd gone shopping with money. Of course, it wasn't my own money and I had to pay it back but something that Emily had said earlier had stuck and I was okay with that.
After having bought covers and pillows Emily took me to one of those stores where they sold all kinds of different bedding and told me to pick out two or three sets so that we didn't have to wait. She did the same for her bed and I actually had fun picking out what I liked instead of what Bryan liked.
"There's a framing shop right around the corner if you want to get your frames now." Emily said after she'd put her bags in the back of the car.
"Sure, that sounds great." I looked at my watch and felt a tremor in my hand but I took a deep breath. It was six and I hadn't even thought about dinner yet.
"Oh, we'll get some take out today. You can decide what but I'm not feeling like cooking." Emily closed the door after I had put my bags in the car and smiled at me. "And for the next week you're not allowed to cook."
"What if you're not home?"
"Jayje, if I'm not home you're not either. We have the same job and I think now that Hotch knows you're single he won't let you stay behind."
She smiled at me and we made our way to the little shop selling amazing frames. I picked out three, and let Emily pick out one for herself. She was reluctant, but got a nice one anyway.
"Now you understand how I feel, right?" I asked when we left the shop, and she shook her head at me. "What?"
"You did that on purpose!" She grinned at me then and I smiled. "I'm sorry for forcing my money on you, but you know you need it and there's no other way. Or would you rather sleep under a bridge? Or worse, sleep in the office?" she shuddered, but I could see she was teasing.
"You're right. I need your money right now. But you know you're getting back every cent as fast as I can."
"Okay, but until then I am forbidding you to talk about money, or to worry about it. You've talked about money all day and it hasn't gotten you anywhere." She winked at me and I smiled.
"Deal. Until I have the money to pay you back I'll stop talking about it." I rubbed my stomach, rumbling beneath my hand. "Let's go home...I'm hungry."
"Well, what are we waiting for?"
Sure, Emily wouldn't be someone I'd decide to live with before I met Bryan. We weren't very much alike, and there were some things that I had noticed that I didn't like about her. But she had helped me with so much, that I decided from this point on, she would be my closest friend. There wouldn't be anything that could change that.