Chapter 2

Emily

You stare out into the darkness, loud music thumping in your ear drums. This music serves two important purposes. It drowns out your thoughts, at the same time preventing attempts at conversation from your colleagues.

You are furiously reading your case brief, or so you want your colleagues to believe. You can't focus, even though your eyes are glued to the pages. You can't take anything in, but you can't turn away.

Something grabs you, on the pages, something leaps out in front of your eyes, piercing your heart. You repeat to yourself the last sentence, you have to read things 2,3,4 times these days for anything to sink in. It's not like you at all. You hate yourself for slipping like this.

January 14th, the suspect has a previous conviction July 3rd 1997, and sentenced by the Judge to 3 years Juvenile detention.

The only thing that sticks in your mind is this: There are 5 "J's" in that sentence. How can one single letter make you want to cry?

It's been 6 months since you last saw her, and you can't even read without allowing her to take over your every thought process. She has completely corrupted the English alphabet, how can you escape from that? Every word you speak, every word you hear, every word you read, every word you think. It's all hers. At this pathetic realisation you slam the folder shut, a little more forcefully than intended.

Garcia, sitting across the aisle, eyes you suspiciously. You take a breath, you have to keep cool. You smile reassuringly back in the direction of her worried gaze and remove the headphones.

"I have a headache." You say finally. It takes you a moment as you review your words in your head before you speak, to ensure there are no "J" words about to depart from your lips. You rub your head for effect hoping this seems genuine to her. She only smiles; you see pity in her eyes. It disgusts you. You look away.

You lean your head on the window and close your eyes, hoping the others will take it as a sign to leave you alone. Its not like you're missing anything, they are preoccupied reading and joking around, listening to music. No one seems intently focused on the case. It's a minor case really. Something the state police don't really need FBI input for at all. The BAU only became involved because it's a convenient excuse for a mass trip to go and see her. They are thrilled, all of them, to see her again. You too. But you're also something else.

The minute your head collides with the glass and you rest your eyes you feel the panic rising. This gesture somehow makes you look vulnerable, weak, the last thing you wanted. You know you need to look strong, together, normal. One thing you can't take is pity, concern, love. You don't know how, you never experienced it before. People looking at you, seeing something not right, caring, trying to make you feel better. It's foreign to you. And the thought that one of them might get close enough to see even half of the crazy thoughts in your head these last weeks terrifies you. If any of them knew how much time you spent thinking of her,

JJ, you sing in your head. Then stop yourself. No, not "JJ". Just "J." Since that day.

You knew it would kill you inside, you went anyway. Partly for appearances sake, and partly, simply, because she asked you to. You didn't want to see it for yourself. But you love her. You saw the look on her face when you hesitated as she asked you to be her bridesmaid. She was hurt, she didn't understand, and seeing her pain hurt you. You couldn't abandon her, no matter how much it killed you. After all, without her you are nothing, so what did it matter? And she looked so fucking beautiful, so happy. You wished she belonged to you.

Even though you couldn't stand it, somehow you needed to be there, to see it up close. So that you would see, know and believe the truth. She isn't yours. She was never yours. You needed to see it, so you could have that painful image to bring to mind over and over and over to remind yourself to let it go.

She doesn't want you, not anymore. Maybe she never did. Maybe she never meant the words she said. You hate the way that makes you feel so powerless. As if you had no choice about anything. Just like this trip. There was no way you could say no, no way for you to escape.

Even if there was, how could you have resisted this chance? No matter how much it hurt. The desire to protect yourself and the remaining shred of dignity you clung to was strong. But even stronger was that desire to see her once again.

You asked yourself, if you did have the choice, what is it you would have chosen? Would you choose to be happily free? Would you choose to give up that glimmer of hope? Could you?

You try desperately to make use of your above average compartmentalising skills. You've spent your life time building up this defence mechanism. It's always served you extremely well. So you take a moment, and begin segregating facts and feeling, memories, fears. It calms you, dissociating the thoughts and events, the pieces of your life. It's soothing at first.

You begin with the trip. This trip is just part of your job, that's all. No, not job. You scold yourself for using another of those 'J' words. Your career, the case. You can't even remember a single piece of information about this case or this trip. You're losing it. It doesn't even frighten you anymore, you're so far gone.

You spent the last hour staring at the fucking file, and you can't even list one basic fact about this case. But you could tell whoever asked that there were precisely 327 occurrences of the letter J in that document.

And just like that your highly, segregated dissociated, neatly organised, strictly compartmentalised world view that rules every aspect of your life has shattered. The whole idea behind it was keeping things shut off from one another, so that one thing could not affect the other, and so that nothing could affect you. JJ succeeded in a way that you've never known anyone or anything to be able to. She's completely shattered every compartment inside you head. It leaves you frighteningly defenceless.

How could you compartmentalise her anyway even if you still had the ability? Is she a colleague? A friend? A soul mate? Someone you miss? Someone dead who you mourn for?

You open your eyes to see that Garcia has moved from her spot and is sitting opposite you. You resent the sight of her sitting there, in JJ's spot. You want to scream at her to move. Why should Garcia be there? Taking your hand? With concern and compassion in her eyes? Knowing something, knowing your deepest desires, seeing how deeply this loss affected you? How can she be there seeing all that, and JJ not? It isn't fair.

"How's your headache?" She asks you finally.

"Fine." You answer.

"Emily." She says quietly.

You can't stand to hear it. But what can you do? Your whole team is here. You want to shut your eyes and go away. But also, somehow, you want her to see.

You don't know what you want, Emily.

You want to see her. You want to run. You want her to be happy. You want her to miss you. But it doesn't matter what you want. You have no choice.

"I'm going to the bathroom." you say finally, needing to get away from Garcia's searching eyes.

You realise as soon as you get there that you can't hide there for long. You can't do what you most want in that moment; To jump out of the window and float through the clouds. At least it would be what you most wanted to do if 'jump' wasn't one of those insidious 'J' words. You suppose you could merely fall out the window, that would be suitable.

You can't scream, the others will hear you. You can't cry, they will see. So you close your eyes tight, and in the dark spaces inside your head you silently scream, scream and scream.

Everything is so confusing, so frustrating, so painful. You're afraid of her, you realise. Afraid that you'll see it in her eyes. See how little you mean to her, how insignificant you are. When you feel like she is everything to you, how can it be that you are worth nothing to her?

You take a breath. Don't be afraid to look her in the eye, you silently encourage yourself. You've seen it before. You've survived it. You'll be alright. Emily, get a grip, please. She has moved on, she has a husband, a baby. You've moved on too.

You laugh bitterly to yourself. No, you haven't moved on. It was on this very jet (another j word) that she sat opposite you and told you what a good mother you'd make. You'd never seen it like that, not until she mentioned it. And since that day you've been dreaming about a family, a future. For the first time in your life you believed it could happen for you. With her.

And now you look to your future. You see that she is gone. You see nothing.