A/N: So this started out as a one-shot of Emily and JJ's first thanksgiving together but I've come up with a few more ideas so now it'll be a full blown story of sorts. Most of the ideas I have planned out could be read alone but it makes more sense to me to compile them all together. I hope you enjoy.
Our First Thanksgiving
My first published Criminal Minds fic, I have one that I haven't published cause I think it sucks. Anyway, I've found room in my shipper heart for Jemily and with today being Thanksgiving in the US, this happened. I hope you like it.
"I'm really sorry, Mom, but between this storm and all the last minute paperwork from our last case, I'm not gunna make it home for Thanksgiving." JJ had her cell phone pressed between her ear and her shoulder as she shuffled through the ever growing pile of paperwork on her desk. "Mom, just because I'm not the media liaison anymore doesn't mean I don't have paperwork to do. We've had 5 cases in the last month. I'm sorry."
Emily had appeared next to JJ's desk, asking if she was ready to head home. JJ held up a finger, letting Emily know she'd be another minute.
"Yes, Mom, I will be home for Christmas. I promise." JJ went quiet for a minute, listening to her mother speak, "Yes, Emily will be with me."
"I will be?" Emily whispered with a confused look on her face.
"Ok, Mom, I gotta go now. I love you. Give everyone a kiss for me and tell them I'm sorry I couldn't make it."
Emily eyed JJ as she hung up the phone, "Did you just volunteer me to go to Pennsylvania for Christmas?"
"Oh, I'm sorry; would you rather not meet your girlfriend's family?" JJ put her phone in her pocket before turning back to Emily, "Or did you have plans to sit home with Sergio and eat leftovers? Or can you just not handle big families in small towns?"
"Which one will get me in less trouble?" Emily asked with a chuckle.
"Neither. Now, since we have two whole days off, can we please go home and not even change out of our pajamas?"
Emily grabbed her girlfriend's hand and headed for the elevators, "You bet your sweet ass we can."
"Sweet ass, huh?"
The two women laughed all the way to the elevators.
"Woman, if you don't get those ice blocks you call feet off my back…" Emily let the rest of sentence linger as JJ giggled and pulled her feet away.
"But you're so warm!" JJ whined as Emily got out of the king size bed they shared.
"There's this cool new invention, they're kinda like blankets for your feet. I'm pretty sure they're called socks. Try 'em."
JJ was about to say something when she was smacked in the forehead with a pair of her fuzzy, mismatched socks. Emily stood in front of the dresser laughing as JJ sat with a shocked look on her face.
"Emily Elizabeth Prentiss, I suggest you start running because it's safe to say, I'm gunna kick your ass!"
Emily ran from the bedroom while yelling, "Come on, it's Thanksgiving. We're supposed to be peaceful and all that crap!"
"Peaceful my ass, the Pilgrims committed genocide!"
Emily had made it downstairs before JJ and decided to hide in the pantry. She could hear JJ calling for her and walking around the main floor of the apartment.
"Marco!" JJ yelled from what Emily assumed was the living room.
"Polo!" Emily yelled back.
Emily heard JJ's feet shuffling across the kitchen floor, "Marco!"
"Polo," Emily didn't yell this time in hopes that JJ would think she was in a different room.
After a few seconds of silence, Emily slowly emerged from the pantry, only poking her head out to look for her girlfriend. After she was sure that JJ wasn't in the room, she walked into the kitchen only to hear a little chuckle. Before Emily could fully register what happened, a bucket full of ice cold water was thrown at her.
"Jennifer."
"Pay back is a bitch, my love." JJ laughed at Emily, "Go take a nice, hot shower; I'll make us some breakfast."
Not to be out done, Emily gave JJ a tight hug, successfully soaking the blonde as well, "Guess you better shower with me."
After spending close to an hour in the shower doing much more than simply getting warm, the two women decided to make a quick breakfast and spending the morning watching the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade.
"I always wanted to actually go to the parade. It looks like so much fun." JJ spoke with a mouth full of French toast.
"Could you maybe swallow your food and try that sentence again?" Emily asked with a laugh.
"I hate you and I hope you bite your tongue."
The two were silent for a few minutes before JJ spoke, "We're really not gunna have turkey today?"
"You don't even like Thanksgiving. Why does it matter if we have turkey or takeout?"
"I don't know, it's tradition and all that. Without the mass genocide, I mean."
Emily smiled at her girlfriend, "Did you really think I was going to let you have a Thanksgiving without turkey and all that? Go check the fridge."
JJ jumped up from the couch like a child on Christmas morning, she slid across the hardwood floor of the living room on her fuzzy socks, almost missing the door way to the kitchen. The blonde made the 4 or 5 steps into the kitchen to the refrigerator and pulled the door open.
Emily had stayed in the living room, watching the parade and eating the last of her breakfast. Not more than 20 seconds after JJ left the living room, did she come sliding back in and jump on her girlfriend's lap with a smile.
"You got turkey and potatoes and sweet potatoes and cranberry sauce and Jesus, I love you!"
"Like I'd let you not have a Thanksgiving." Emily placed a quick kiss on the corner of JJ's mouth, "Wanna help me cook?"
"Oh. My. God," JJ leaned back on the couch and took a deep breath. "That was incredible."
"Yeah, I'm pretty good at what I do." Emily smiled as she stretched out on the floor in front of the couch.
"Almost a full year we've been together and I never knew you could cook that well. I'm never letting you order take out, again."
Emily slowly stood from her spot on the floor, "There is more where that came from. I may or may not have hidden your favorite dessert in the freezer."
Emily didn't give JJ a chance to react before she walked into the kitchen. JJ heard the freezer open and then close. She heard a few things banging around and a thud before Emily let out a string of curses.
"You ok in there, babe?"
"Dropped the stupid wooden cutting board on my fuckin' foot," Emily spoke through gritted teeth. "May have broken a toe."
JJ forced herself off the couch and into the kitchen where she found Emily leaning over the counter by the sink with one leg bent slightly, keeping the weight off her foot, "Aw. Do you need ice or something?"
Emily put a little weight on her foot, to feel it out, "Nah, I think I'm good. But, since you're in here…"
Emily twisted her upper body to reach the top shelf of the cabinet over head. The older woman felt around for a second before she felt the soft, velvety box under her palm. She pulled the box from the cabinet before turning back to face her girlfriend.
"So, this isn't exactly how I wanted to this to go but my foot really fuckin' hurts and I don't feel like hobbling myself over to the living room."
JJ looked confused, "This isn't how you wanted to do what? Get me a slice of that amazing looking Wattamelon roll you know that I love so much?"
"God, you're so blonde sometimes," Emily chuckled before slowly dropping to one knee. "Jennifer, I know we haven't been together very long but I think I've loved you before I even knew you. You're an amazing woman, you strive to help everyone else and always put others before yourself. Well, now, I'm hoping you'll let me put you before everyone else."
JJ was crying now, clearly they were tears of joy but she was crying none the less. She loved Emily with everything in her; she had never known a love like this. No one made her happier than Emily Prentiss.
"Jennifer Lynn Jareau," Emily opened the box to reveal a white gold ring adorned by a large blue stone with two smaller diamonds on either side, "Will you marry me?"
JJ couldn't speak, the lump in her throat and the tears in her eyes wouldn't allow it, all she could do was nod before pulling Emily to her feet and kissing the taller woman with all the love she had in her body.
This had turned out to be the best Thanksgiving of her life, despite that fact that she didn't get to spend it with her family.
