Title: when the water hit the setting sun
Author: Shannon
Rating: PG
Warning/Spoilers: Post-ep for 5x13 Risky Business.
Summary: Maybe her sister is still there.
A/N: For the Awesome Ladies Ficathon prompt of 'Sisters'. Title from 'White Daisy Passing' by Rocky Votolato.
when the water hit the setting sun
When they touch down after Evanston, JJ grabs her bag and is the first off the plane. She's walking to the car when there's a touch on her shoulder, and JJ almost groans. They've got the next two days off and she just wants to get to home, to hold her boy, have a bath, maybe call her mom to touch base (to remind herself that she's not alone in this). She takes a small breath, prepares her game face and calmly turns around.
Game face was too slow. Emily tucks a piece of hair behind her ear, hesitant smile on her face, and shifts the bag on her shoulder. "Hey, sorry to stop you, but I just wanted to catch you before you left."
JJ's game face slips to a half-smile that's not quite fake. "Sure, Em, what's up?"
Emily takes a breath. "Well, Garcia and I were talking on the plane-" she glances over to where Pen's arguing with Morgan over how to put her computer hardware in the SUV, "-and we decided we're entirely overdue for a girls' night. Kevin's out of town this week, and so Miss Penelope Has Decreed-" JJ can almost see the capital letters and Pen doing the talking, "-that this week would perfect for such a day."
"Are we talking a 'going to a bar' girls' night or-"
"No, we're talking chinese take-out, bad movies, and wine. You free tomorrow night?"
JJ closes her eyes for a moment and tries to think of what they had planned for the next day. Groceries in the morning, park in the afternoon, and she and Will and Henry were going to one of Will's friends' places to watch the game. If she didn't go, all that would happen is that Henry would end up wearing the entirely wrong colours. She can deal with that for one day.
JJ opens her eyes and her smile is more genuine. "Add in some rum and disaster movies, and I'll be there."
At her response, a wide grin breaks open on Emily's face and her shoulders visibly relax. There's a pressure again in JJ's chest and she almost sighs.
Oh, Em, when will you realise you're one of us?
But she doesn't say a thing, just smiles and says goodbye, turning and heading to the car.
"Oh, look at the little ducklings. I just want to squish their little cheeks."
JJ frowns, lifting her head off the sofa arm rest and glancing down to where her feet are plopped in Penelope's lap. "They're velociraptors, Pen."
Emily sits back down on the floor in front of them, placing the extra naan bread and vindaloo down as well – they'd gone for Indian, not Chinese food – and grabs the bottle of red wine, refilling all their glasses. "And they're trying to eat the children."
"Yes, but they're fake and they're hungry and they don't actually get to eat the small children and so that makes them adorable."
Emily's grinning and she raises an eyebrow as she passes JJ's glass back to her. JJ laughs and shakes her head in return.
She takes a sip from the glass, then glances back at the TV and Jurassic Park, to where the two kids are fleeing further into the kitchen, terrified of the velociraptors (and she muses that sentence over for a second, trying to decide which would be worse: serial killers or dinosaurs). The little boy is huddled under his big sister's arm. JJ reaches for her necklace to fiddle with, and sighs.
Pen and Emily glance at each other, and JJ closes her eyes.
"Hey, precious, you know you can talk to us, right?" Penelope says, lightly squeezing one of JJ's toes. Warmth and pressure around her palm tell her Emily's there too.
Wordlessly, JJ nods, trying to fight through the brick in her throat. Emily's hand disappears and the movie stops playing – she must have paused it – and a minute later, a glass of water is pressed into her hand. JJ sits up and crosses her legs, then takes a sip, catching her breath, and places the glass on the floor.
This is the moment, and if she were truthful, she's been waiting for it since Emily stopped her outside the plane the day before. Or maybe even since during the case, with all their worried glances.
She reaches out to Penelope with her left hand and Emily with her right. They hold her tightly and JJ smiles through her tears, looking at the two of them and realising.
My sister died and I miss her but I think she sent me two more.
And then she begins to tell them.