(( fixed it ))

A tired Emily Prentiss laid defeated against her couch. It had been a long night— scratch that, it had been a long week. The brunettes muscles ached, her head was pounding. Aside from the strain of her new job and her new life, there was the emotional pain. The loneliness.. The twinge of hurt she felt every time she phoned her old friends, no, her old family from the BAU. Sometimes Prentiss would feel as if she was on top of the world, and then there were nights like these... The feelings came in waves, they did. And tonight... Tonight it felt like a certain brunette was drowning.

2:35 am. On these nights it was almost impossible for emily to get any sleep. And if she did the restless tossing and turning was almost as unenjoyable as no sleep at all. It seemed as if minutes dragged on like hours, and no matter how desperate Emily was for sleep; even for just a measly hour, sleep would not come. No matter how she laid, no matter what she did, or what she tried, her sleep deprived brain just seemed to keep on running. Almost in a taunting way. Her mind seemed to tease her. The longer she was awake the longer the brunette was running from her demons. At least when she was asleep she had a while before they woke her up again and she was forced to face what she so desperately wanted to escape.

As she laid on her side, with her knees pulled to her chest, Emily glanced at the alarm clock on her bed side table. 3:52 am. Her desperation for sleep was evident, but her mind was whirring. she felt numb, yet so... hurt, all at once. How was that possible? How could the former profiler understand how everyone else felt, except herself? And that's when they came. the flashbacks, that is. To dinners at Rossi's, late night phone calls with JJ, messing with Reid and joking with Morgan.. She'd lost herself, and somewhere along the lines, she lost her family, too. That's when she remembered a certain conversation with a very special agent hotchner... It was funny, really, how the one person who held her heart made it ache so much at the same damn time.

" I want you to make a deal with me. " Hotch declared, looking towards the brunette who was hurting, yet who didn't even know it herself. Pushing the feelings back wasn't going to help, and he knew no matter what he did now emily would just continue to compartmentalize. All he could do was be there for the agent, the one he loved, later on. " You're going to go weeks, months even feeling fine. And then you're going to have bad day. Just let me know when you do. " He told emily, wanting nothing more than to reach out and hold emily in his arms, and tell her everything would be okay, eventually. Because he knew that now she wouldn't be. But with time, and by being with people who cared about her, she'd be okay. Family could fix the most broken of people; that was something Hotch had learned himself. He wanted nothing more than for Emily to be his, but he couldn't say anything. Sitting here on this plane he knew he couldn't be selfish enough to put his happiness before Emily's, and jeopardize their friendship. Because honestly no matter how much it may hurt Aaron, having Emily as just a friend was better than not having her at all.

" And that's it? " questioned Emily, looking over at her boss— who she desperately wanted to be more than just her boss, but of course, she couldn't say anything. She couldn't risk losing the family she'd just got back. She couldn't risk aaron not feeling the same way, and losing him again. She just couldn't.

" That's it. " Aaron answered, looking at Emily right in the eyes.

The brunettes answer was simple, but something that meant a lot to the both of them.

" Deal. "

And although no one knew what the other was thinking, Aaron was sure he was in love with Emily; and Emily was sure she was in love with him.

Emily had promised. And even though she'd had her fair share of bad days, she never once picked up the phone to call aaron on one of them. That is, until now. The brunette sat up in bed, grabbed her phone off her nightstand, and typed in the number she now knew by heart. As the phone rang, emily's heart raced. she knew it was late in Quantico, even though it was later where she was. She also knew no matter what time, Hotch would answer her call. And she couldn't help but hope it was for the same reason she would always answer his, no matter what time or place.

" Emily? " A tired Aaron asked, clearing his throat and rubbing the sleep from his eyes. Emily's words were caught in her throat, leaving her slightly choked up. She ran a hand through her hair, sighing. " Hey, aaron.. " She trailed off, her voice cracking. " I'm uh, im having a bad night. " she told him, softly.