A/N This started out as an entry for the death fic challenge, where I got Emily, but as I discussed with a friend we came up with a lot of different one-shots so I'm making this a series of one-shots. I want to thank my friend Susanna(MsSuzette on fanfiction) for helping me to correct my mistakes.
Starting with this one: Emily is having recurring nightmares from a childhood she remembers nothing about. As these nightmares plague her nights and days she decides that she needs to find answers, but the ones she gets is nothing she could've ever prepared herself for.
WARNING: There's a pretty big chance that someone will die(hence the death fic challenge)
Hope you enjoy.
Someone once said: "When I wanted to forget, it killed me to remember and when I wanted to remember, I had the good fortune to forget"
He was sitting in her bedroom, on her bed, only a white t-shirt and boxers on. She didn't know what to do. There was no way to get him out of there, she knew, when he had decided he wanted her. Her mother was not home, but even if she was she wouldn't have stopped it. She never did. Either because she was so preoccupied with herself that she didn't know about her husband sneaking out of bed during night to go into their only daughters bedroom and get his sexual relief or she just didn't care about it.
The 7 year old had been sitting by her desk when he came in, busying herself with some school project about American heroes. Her project would be about Harriet Tubman. Her father didn't want her to continue her project that day, even if it was due two days later, he just needed her body. He patted the empty space next to him and she gulped when she went to sit there. It had happened so many times before, but it hurt more each time he did it. The old man would get more aggressive, thinking that his daughter got bigger and would love it harder.
It started the same way as it always did. He moved his hand through her dark brown hair and leaned in to smell it while he took her hand and moved it to the bulge in his boxers. As so many times before he pushed her down to the bed and lay on top of her. She could smell is body, it stunk of sweat and her father's special odor. It made her sick to her mind.
It didn't take long for him to rip her clothes off, tears already staining her cheeks. She was so scared. With one move the most excruciating pain hit her and...
Emily bolted up in bed, breathing heavily and sweat running down her forehead. These dreams kept coming back to her, but she had no idea what it meant and when she woke up she could only remember bits and pieces. The only clear thing was the pain she felt when that man... He was blurry now; Emily couldn't see his face anymore. She never could after these dreams. Why did she even have them? The case before the last had dealt with pedophiles, but why did she keep having these nightmares? They didn't only come when she was sleeping, they plagued her all day long. It had felt so real too, like this actually had happened to her. But shouldn't she have remembered?
She didn't dare to go back to sleep, afraid of what would come and hunt her. Reaching out with her hand to the bedside table she turned on the light. The alarm clock read 3.45am, way too early to get out of bed, but she'd rather be awake at this moment.
Emily stepped out of bed and grabbed some clean clothes before heading for the shower, hoping the warm water would calm her down. It usually did and afterwards she would allow herself to sleep again for only a couple of hours before the alarm would ring.
The same thing happened this day.
She was still a little on edge when she walked into the office later that morning. Something was definitely wrong with these dreams or suppressed memories of some sort. Truth was that she didn't really have many memories from when she was a kid and during her years working on all kinds of cases she knew that it was easy for someone to forget. Then why hadn't her memories come back earlier? What was different with this last case?
Emily shook her head and rested it in her hands. This thinking was giving her a real nasty headache.
"Are you okay?" She heard Reid's voice next to her and she looked up to see him place his bag on his desk.
"Just a headache. It'll be okay soon."
Reid nodded and sat down on his chair. "You know you can talk to me right?"
Emily sighed. Yes she knew, but she didn't know if she was ready. "It's just that I've been having these dreams and I don't know what they mean." She said without revealing too much.
"Dreams? Of what?" Reid pushed.
"Of me as a kid, but I don't know if it's actually me or just silly dreams." Emily confessed, surprised that she was telling him that much.
"I see." Reid nodded and thought for a second, trying to get into the older woman's mind. "Maybe you should talk to your mother or father to see if they can tell you what they mean."
Emily stiffened. Could she really? It made sense, but would she have enough courage to go through with it. Her mother was in town for a awhile so she could visit her later tonight. Emily's father was in D.C. He always was, working at a dealership of some sort . Her parents got divorced when Emily was younger. She had no memory of when they did it, but it had to be somewhere before she turned 20, which was the earliest memory she could recall. Before these last couple of days she hadn't had any problems with not remembering; she hadn't even thought much about it.
"Thank you. I will email my mother." Emily said with a small smile and took out her phone to send out a quick message. Being closer with her father, she didn't want to burden him with these stuff when everything was great.
Her mother answered only minutes later that she would have dinner ready at 8 pm. Emily just hoped they wouldn't get a case before that.
She glanced towards her younger colleague who was already engulfed in a case file. Yes, this was going to be a long day.
At 7.55 Emily parked the car in front of her mother's house. She walked slowly up to the door and rang the doorbell. Her breathing was heavy, the nerves getting the better of her. It was the maid who answered and Emily said a small hello before entering the hallway.
"Emily, it's so good to see you." Elizabeth Prentiss said and gave her daughter a kiss on each cheek.
"Hello mother." Emily said shortly.
"The dinner is just about ready. Is white wine okay?" The ambassador asked while starting to walk into the dining room, Emily right behind her.
"It's just fine." Emily said quietly.
She already knew that it would be hard to bring her memories up.
They sat down opposite of each other at the big dinner table, waiting for the food to be served. Emily was nervously biting her fingernails, a habit that always had annoyed her mother.
"Emily, will you stop that? You won't have any fingernails left if you continue like that." Elizabeth scolded and Emily immediately brought her hand down to her lap.
"Mother, I need to talk with you about something." Emily said, deciding to just get it over with.
"Emily, dear, can't it wait until dinner has arrived?"
Emily knew it could, but now when she had finally mustered up the courage to bring it up she had to go all the way.
"I've been having these recurring nightmares." she finally said.
Elizabeth Prentiss looked at her daughter, a bit shocked. "What are these nightmares about?" she asked and if Emily wasn't mistaken, her mother sounded nervous.
"I... Ehm... There's this man in my bedroom and he's..." Emily looked straight at her mother. "...doing stuff."
This time it was clear that her mother was both shocked and nervous, even a little uncomfortable with the conversation.
Emily narrowed her eyes at her mother. "You know something." It was a simple statement.
"I..." the ambassador actually stuttered. Then she sighed heavily and met her only daughter's eyes. "Yes, I do. I knew this would come up some day, you can't suppress those kinds of memories forever."
"Who was he?" Emily asked.
Elizabeth looked down, not wanting to meet Emily's eyes when she told her. "Your father."
"My...?"
Emily didn't know what to say. She still saw her father on a regular basis and she would've never suspected this. He'd been a lot more interested in her life than she could ever remember her mother being. He would call and invite her to dinner and they could talk about almost everything. Was this because of the guilt he was feeling or because he still wanted to be close to her? She shuddered at the thought.
"Emily, are you okay?" Elizabeth asked.
"I... Can you tell me what happened?"
Elizabeth drank the rest of her wine, needing some alcohol to calm her nerves. "I think it started when you were four. He'd sneak into your bedroom and..." Emily's eyes widened. "I was working a lot so I guess he thought you could give him the release he needed."
"You knew, but you didn't do anything?" Emily accused angrily, her voice starting to get louder.
"No, it wasn't like that." Elizabeth said quickly. "I only found out when you were fifteen. You got pregnant." She looked at Emily sadly. "You were brave enough to tell me. I got so angry with you, but I couldn't have you doing an abortion." Elizabeth looked down to her lap.
"What happened to the baby?" Emily asked and she hadn't noticed when she had started to cry.
"Your dad found out. He figured that if you went through with the birth or abortion everyone would know what he was doing to you so he ended the pregnancy. He was so angry and started kicking and hitting you until you lost the baby. I caught him that day as he was raping you. You had to stay in the hospital for two weeks after that." the ambassador was crying now too, something Emily very rarely got to witness.
"What did you do?" Emily asked, quietly.
"I kicked him out, told him to never come near us again. He apologized and said that he just loved you so much. After that I didn't see him again. I know where he is and all, his life really picked up apparently, but I haven't seen him." Elizabeth explained, wiping away a few tears that had fallen.
The maid chose this moment to enter with the dinner. She could clearly feel the tension in the room as she looked very embarrassed. Though, neither of the women had any appetite left. When the maid left Emily looked back to her mom.
"I see him several times a month." Emily admitted.
The ambassador stared at her daughter in disbelief. "Since when?"
"Since I can remember. He even came to my graduation when you weren't..." Emily choked on her tears. "He calls me so we can meet up more than you do."
"That son of a..." Elizabeth halted mid-sentence.
"You never reported him?" Emily asked then.
"He was just gone so I saw no point in it. I just wanted to forget it and you seemed fine."
"Wait, but you knew it started when I was four?" Emily asked, narrowing her eyes in suspicion. Maybe she did know.
"He kind of told me when I confronted him. I could've killed him at that moment."
Emily took a short time to let everything sink in before she suddenly rose from the table. "I need to get out of here." she said, not giving Elizabeth any time to respond before Emily stormed out of the house, leaving her mother in tears.
Emily knew exactly where she had to go. Her vision was just a little cloudy as she speeded away from her mother's house towards her father's apartment, the tears making it harder to see. It wasn't that she was sad. The tears all came from the anger and hatred she felt towards her father. To be honest she didn't care if she crashed now with the speed she had, she just needed to get there. How could her father have been the closest family she had and them being capable of causing her all that.
She pulled up in front of his fancy apartment building. Putting the car in park, she took a couple of deep breaths before exiting the car. Emily already knew the code to get inside, having been invited to many dinners just him and her. What once had been considered a great time, now made her feel sick to her stomach and she just wanted to empty all contents.
4732, and then the door clicked open. She decided to take the stairs up, figuring that would go faster. Taking the steps two at a time, she was soon in front of her dad's door. Three knocks was all it took and then the man opened, a big smile spreading on his face upon seeing who it was. Emily didn't return the smile, immediately feeling disgusted with the 69 year old man.
"Sweetheart, it's so good to see you" he said and tried to give her a hug, but she dodged away into his very neat apartment.
He had never found a new wife after Emily's mother and Emily was beginning to see why now. This visit when looking around at all the photographs he had of her made her sick rather than happy. She had thought that these pictures were a symbol for a loving father, but now she knew how it really was. There was one picture of him and her at the graduation, there were pictures of her during ordinary christmas celebrations they'd had together, pictures from when she was a lot younger, sitting in her father's lap or ones in bikini during a vacation. In those pictures Emily had looked like a healthy happy kid, but they never told her what was hiding beneath the surface.
"What's the matter, sweetie?" he asked, nervously, sensing something was wrong.
"Don't sweetie me." Emily said angrily as she turned around. Her father gulped and packed away.
"Calm down, Emily. What's going on?" he chuckled nervously and Emily couldn't help to roll her eyes.
"Don't pretend that you don't know." Emily started to pace the room. She just couldn't look at him right now. "You molested me." she whispered, willing herself not to cry. "You sneaked into my room at night and you..."
"I don't know what your mother has told, but it's not..."
"I've started to remember. I know what you did." Emily wiped a tear away angrily, cursing herself for letting it fall. "You've ruined my mind. It's all I see now."
"I loved you, Emily." her father explained desperately.
"What kind of love is that? How could you touch something so innocent and pure?" Emily really didn't want to believe that she was talking about herself, it made the whole thing so much more real. "How could you get satisfaction from the body of a child?"
"It was pure love, Emily. I have never loved anyone as much as I loved you."
This time Emily looked at him and saw that the man in front of her, a man she'd always referred to as father or daddy, really believed in what he was saying. Emily shook her head. "You're sick." She started for the door.
"Where are you going?" he asked desperately.
"I can't look at you anymore. I need to go." Her father took her hand, halting her movements.
"Don't go, stay. I like your company."
Without even thinking twice about it Emily swung her free arm and connected with his face. He stumbled back, holding a hand above his already reddened cheek. The older man seemed surprised that Emily could hit that hard.
"I would rather drop dead than spend time with you. What you did... it's sick. Mother should have reported you back then, but she didn't. I won't be as nice as she was. I'll go to the police... If they can't charge you, I'll make sure this gets on the front page of every newspaper. You'd be lucky if you ever got a job again."
With these words she left the apartment, slamming the door after herself. She took a deep breath before fishing up her cell phone from her pocket and walking towards the elevator this time. Three missed calls, all from her mother, but she didn't call her back. Instead she scrolled through her contacts, stopping by the letter R. She didn't want to be alone tonight. She really needed someone to talk to so she pressed call.
"Emily?" Reid's tired voice answered. Shit, was he sleeping already?
"Sorry, did I wake you?" she asked.
"No, no, you're fine. I was just reading a little." If it was a lie or not, Emily couldn't tell. "What's wrong?"
"Can I come over?" she asked, biting her lip. The elevator stopped on the first floor and she hurried outside in the cold.
"Has something happened?" He was worried now and she would've been too if this call had been made to her.
"I just... Yes." There was no point in lying now. "I will tell you everything when I get there, okay?"
"Okay." Reid said and Emily was ready to hang up, but Reid's voice stopped her. "And Emily, drive carefully."
More tears sprung to Emily's eyes at her friend's caring words. "I will."
That was the last thing she ever got to say to him.
Emily rushed to the car and fumbled with her keys to get the right one. She could've never predicted the pain that made her whole body go weak seconds later. Sure, if she'd been calmer than she actually was she might have suspected this and been more on her guard.
The pain only got worse as her attacker pulled out whatever had penetrated her body and plunged it into her once more. Emily dropped her keys and her phone on the ground, feeling with her hand the open wounds in her abdomen. The large object was pulled out and thrust back in for a third time, cutting her hands a little as it went through her body.
Her legs didn't want to carry her anymore, but she forced herself to turn around. He wouldn't let her. Instead he pushed her up against her car as he stabbed her a fourth time with the knife. She could feel the blood taste in her mouth and to not swallow it and risk throwing up, she opened her mouth and let it drip down her chin.
As her vision became blurry, her hearing increased. She both felt and heard him breathing by her ear. "This all could've ended so differently if you just would've stayed." Her father's raspy voice told her as he pulled out the knife again. "I'm sorry, sweetheart."
He gave her a kiss on the cheek and stepped away from her, letting her body slide down the car and land on the ground. This was it. It was really happening. Not in a way she had pictured. She had wanted a husband by her side, a kid and maybe even grand children. Even if she was 40 she still dreamed of this. Just someone to grow old with.
That wasn't the case, she knew as she looked up into the starry sky, fighting to stay alive. If she'd been strong enough she would've reached for the phone that had gone under her car and called 911. If her voice would've been stronger and all the blood didn't choke her, she would've screamed for help. Yes, if Emily could've done something, she wouldn't have taken her last breath in that parking lot.
"No man chooses evil because it is evil; he only mistakes it for happiness, the good he seeks."
- Mary Wallstonecraft
A/N Sorry about this ending. It was really hard to kill her off, but that was my assignment. I'll be back with another one-shot in a universe where this one never happened.