Just a little one-shot I threw together about my new favourite couple after a burst of inspiration. Hope you like it!
Disclaimer: I don't own Criminal Minds or any of its characters
"Emily, can I ask you a question?" JJ asked nervously from the couch, twiddling her thumbs for want of something to do.
"Of course you can." Emily replied, sitting down next to JJ and handing her a glass of wine which JJ accepted with a nod, grateful to have something in her hands to stop the fidgeting.
"It's um...it's kinda personal?"
"Okay well I'll do my best to answer it as best as I can. Is everything okay?" Emily was starting to get worried. JJ wouldn't meet her eyes and was playing with the glass in her hands. JJ was a confident person. She didn't play with things.
"How did you.." JJ trailed off as she put her glass on the table and put her head in her hands "God how do I even?" she whispered absent-mindedly to herself.
Emily pulled the blonde's hands away from her face "Hey, talk to me, what's going on in that head of yours?"
The two made eye contact and JJ blurted out her question with the momentary confidence she gained from the deep brunette eyes "Emily how did you realise you were gay?"
Emily wanted to ask what had brought on this question but she sensed that this wasn't the time, JJ needed answers, not questions. "Some people know all their lives that they're gay, some have a moment of relisation, for some it's a person that makes them realise. But for me it was different, none of those things happened to me.
"It crept up on me. I would always look at guys and think 'He's nice.' or 'I like him.' But then I started looking at girls like that too. It never bothered me, I don't think I even relised what it meant myself, it was one of those things where if I didn't acknowledge it then it wasn't a thing."
"Then one day I made a joke to one of my friends about thinking an actress was pretty. I meant it as a joke and he took it as one. But that moment, sitting on the floor in my kitchen, played on me for a while and eventually I realised why: I hadn't been joking. I did think that actress was pretty.
"It was like someone had hit me in the face after that. There was no stopping it. I started seeing how much I thought girls were beautiful and how I was attracted to them. It eventually got to the stage where I never looked at boys anymore and girls just fascinated me." Emily stopped talking and looked over at JJ only to see a tear rolling down her face.
Putting down her own wine glass she moved over to sit beside the blonde. Taking JJ's hand in her own she asked "Are you okay?" When another tear slipped down the shorter woman's face Emily couldn't help but wrap her arm around her best friend's shoulder.
"I'm okay, is there, just..." Emily hadn't ever seen the talented media liaison struggle for words like this before. "I don't know... was there ever a time you doubted it, doubted yourself, your feelings?" JJ eventually whispered, trying to keep her voice even as she rested her head on the brunette's shoulder, relaxing somewhat.
Emily was starting to see where this was going but she continued none the less, knowing she would have benefited immensely from a conversation like this. "For me, it was like an explanation for all the sadness and hurt I'd been unable to make sense of in the years before but yes, I did doubt myself. All the time. I wondered if it was just a phase. Everytime I came out to someone, especially a family member, I wondered if I'd be coming back to them at some stage in the future and telling them that I had been wrong about myself. About a major part of my life.
"But looking back on my life up to that point it was like 'How did I not know sooner?' and then there was a series of realisations."
At this JJ lifted her head to look at Emily "Realisations?"
"One day I was in school, I was just walking down the hall and I was having one of my moments of doubt when it hit me. I would give up marriage and kids just to be able to be with the woman I loved. Luckily it's not like that anymore, but at the time it was. Same sex marriage hadn't been legalised and I realised that would be okay. If I had the woman I love, that would be enough for me."
"You had more of these moments?" JJ was sounding almost hopeful as she waited for Emily to continue.
"I kissed a girl and it all just clicked. My heart was pounding in my chest and my breath just caught in my lungs and I knew."
"That you were going to spend the rest of your life with this girl?"
The brunette let out a breathy laugh as she continued "God no, I wasn't feeling the sparks with this girl but rather with girls in general. I knew that I hadn't been kidding myself. I knew it wasn't just a phase. I knew that this was what I wanted for the rest of my life. Kissing girls. It was so different to anything I had experienced up until that point. It didn't last long with that girl but I knew that there was no going back for me.
"The one that really sealed the deal for me was that now I felt like a teenager. The teenager I had always been told I was going to be."
Before she could continue, JJ interrupted her. "The teenager you had been told you would be?"
This time Emily let out a genuine laugh "When you're a teenage there's this perception that you're just going to be sex crazed and horny. This had never been the case for me, I had never understood it. I had tried to make myself feel it. I pushed my feelings and hormones in the vain hope that I would feel like I was told I should. I mean I got pregnant trying to feel something, anything!
"But of course it doesn't work that way and I just felt worse. I tried to feel it with guys. But I thought that I could happily have a relationship without sex or anything more than kissing. I chalked it up to my age and decided that I was just too young and it would eventually happen for me.
"And it did. When I realised I was attracted to women. The longer it went after I realised I was attracted to women the more I felt like that teenager I was told I would be."
"So basically you were horny and that made you confident you were gay?" There was a moment of silence before both women burst out laughing. Both at the hilarity of JJ's statement and as a release from the heavy topic of conversation.
The pair sobered up quickly though and Emily took an awkward drink from her glass before asking "JJ, why are we having this conversation?"
JJ took a gulp of her drink before she replied, buying herself precious seconds to think of how she was going to phrase her reply. Looking into Emily's eyes she tried to convey how much she didn't want to have this part of the conversation "Emily..."
"No JJ, what's wrong? You know you can tell me anything right?"
"I know, I do, it's just..."
"What's her name?" Emily asked, trying to keep the pain out of her voice, trying not to convey the longing for the beautiful blonde at her side.
JJ's head snapped up at the question and tried unsuccessfully to keep her voice from shaking "Wh...what are you talking about?"
"Jayj I know you. I know you're not just asking these questions to make conversation, you're asking them for a reason. There are very few reasons people ask these questions. Taking into account your reaction and the terrified look on your face I'm figuring that you're asking them because you have feelings for a woman and you're struggling with this fact, am I right?" The profiler asked.
"Sometimes I forget you're one of the best profilers in the world." JJ whispered to herself with a sad laugh. "You have to understand," she said, this time talking to Emily. "where I grew up, being attracted to someone of the same sex was looked down upon, if someone came out, it was hushed up and they had to move out of town. It was awful."
Emily wrapped her arm around the shoulders of the woman she had feelings for. No, that wasn't the right way to put it: the woman she was in love with. And had been for some time now. She tried not to let her heart soar at the idea of JJ being attracted to woman and reminded herself that her best friend was hurting and struggling right now and needed her to be her best friend, not a hopeless romantic.
"Can you see how wrong that way of thinking is? That there is absolutely nothing wrong with having feelings for someone no matter their gender."
"Yeah I can. I always knew that but I cant help but worry what people will think, it's just hard to dismiss the things I've witnessed and been told since I was a young child."
"I know it is but I'll never judge you for how you feel or who you love. Ever. Neither will the guys. And could you ever imagine Pen being like that towards anyone,let alone you?"
"You think?" JJ asked in a quiet voice, barely above a whisper, refusing to make eye contact with the older woman.
"No, I don't think. I know. It's okay Jayj. Who is this mysterious woman who has you like this? Do I know her?"
"Oh maybe you do, I'm not too sure." JJ replied with the most confidence she'd shown since the start of the conversation, making Emily's heart stutter.
"And what would her name be?" Emily asked hopefully.
All of the confidence seemed to leave JJ as she looked into her lap and dropped her shoulders. Emily, worried, took one of JJ's hands in hers. Blue eyes met brown and the world seemed to stop. Nothing else mattered.
They we're barely a foot apart and then they weren't. Looking back neither would know who leaned in first. Who kissed who. But all of a sudden hands were in hair and on hips. Lips were touching, tentative at first and then more confident as both women realised that this was what the other wanted.
Emily's breath caught in her chest and a tear rolled down JJ's cheek but none of that mattered because they were both finally kissing the other.
Emily's tongue brushed JJ's bottom lip and JJ didn't hesitate in deepening the kiss, both losing themselves in it.
Neither knew if it was minutes, hours or mere seconds later when they pulled apart, resting their foreheads together, but when they did they were both grinning.
"So I might know her huh?" Emily asked and the two laughed, genuinely laughed as they moved in for another kiss.