Disclaimer: I don't own a thing! *sobs*
A/N:Truck load of tissues were delivered today... who wants one before we start?
I promised you a second update, you're getting it =)
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- This Time Won't You Save Me? -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
Telling the team gave Penelope some strength, she felt less like she was sinking fast and more like she could live day to day and live them to the fullest.
She sucked up the courage and rang JJ later that day, asking her when she was free next, that she needed to talk to her as soon as and she didn't want it to be over the phone. JJ having heard Penelope's tone made a date to be back in Quantico that Wednesday until Thursday evening, there she could catch up properly.
Now Penelope sat opposite Kevin in a little restaurant that they all frequented, the team were sitting up the back, out of the way, she didn't want him to worry straight off, she knew how sensitive he was and the last thing she wanted was to ambush him.
"What we eating?" He asked as he looked over the menu, when no response came he looked up, "not hungry?"
"No," Penelope said and slipped her hand onto his, "We need to talk." She told him and his eyes grew wide, he looked confused and terrified all at once.
"What about?" He asked as he set the menu down and sat up a little, "I mean, we already said that we were never going to get back together, so what's happened? Are you leaving?" He joked lightly, that childish grin that caught her every time beaming at her.
"In some sense," Penelope said and felt the lump in her throat form, "You know the headaches I've been getting?"
Kevin nodded, his hands fumbled together with building nerves, he was biting the inside of his cheek with apprehension.
"Well we found out what's causing them." She tried to smile, as though doing so would soften the blow of telling this story again, "the doctor found some brain tumours," now the silence happened.
When she looked up at Kevin she saw the ultimate look of terror, fear feeling his every feature, his eyes larger than before, the tears building.
Kevin would be the 5th man to cry in front of her in the space of three days, and it never got easily to watch.
"Is-is it permanent?"
Penelope laughed a little at that; she just squeezed his hand, "gonna live the best two months with me?"
Kevin seemed to choke on the air he inhaled then, "t-tw-two months?" He stuttered and looked at her to see the joke, "Is that all?"
Penelope looked down and nodded a little, "roughly that," she finalised and looked back up, "so whatcha say, my gorgeous tech side kick?" She shook his hand, "I need you more than ever for a little while longer."
"You mean until you die? You need us until you die and we're left with a memory?" Kevin said angrily, Penelope didn't expect this, but then she'd' seen everyone react differently, she had to allow this.
Knowing that though, didn't stop her heart breaking any.
"Kevin," she tried but he snatched his hands away and stood up, climbing out of the booth they were in.
"I-I just need s-some air." He told her and near enough ran for the door.
Penelope ran a hand over her head and into her hair, shaking hard. It didn't even take a moment for Emily to sit next to her hand put her arms around her tight as Hotch, Rossi and Reid all sat opposite her.
Penelope looked up just to see Derek marching for the door and she sniffed, "where's he going?"
"He knows exactly how Kevin's feeling right now," Hotch told her and smiled comfortingly, "but our biggest worry is you, you were doing good."
Penelope shrugged, "I thought he'd react, I mean he has every right to, but that was not what I was thinking." She told them and put her head on Emily's shoulder, "how's JJ going to react?" She then shot up a little panicked, "I mean how do I tell her I'm going to be dead and Henry's not going to have a Godmother, how do I tell her that?"
"The same way you told us, Kitten," Rossi told her calmly, "it's JJ, she'll cry, you know that, but she won't turn her back on you." He continued and saw Penelope relax a little, "she loves you, like we all do. We stick in this together."
"I don't know how the hell I'm supposed to do my job and sort things and prepare myself for this, I just keep worrying about you lot."
Hotch crossed his arms over his chest, "you let us worry about us, and you let us lower the amount of sorting for you, we're a family, you aren't alone."
Penelope's eyes watered again at that.
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- This Time Won't You Save Me? -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
"Hey man, you okay?" Derek asked as he found Kevin pacing heavily outside, he could see Kevin showing all the emotions he was hiding away, "I know it's a lot."
"A lot, Derek?" Kevin said and laughed, "She's dying!" He yelled, "out of all the people that it could happen to and they make it her!"
"I know," he sympathised, "I know big time, Kev, but she really needs us because if we sink then she sinks faster."
"How are you so in control right now?"
"Because I was there when they told her." Derek told him and Kevin stopped pacing for a moment then and looked at him, "I was with her through all the tests, I sat with her as the doctor told her the cause of her headaches and I was there as he told her there was nothing they could do to save her, it's inoperable and offering chemotherapy would only prolong what's going to happen anyway."
"So why didn't you make her go for that option? Why didn't you make her take the chemo and give us a little longer?"
"Because it's her life and she didn't want to die like that, she needs some control right now Kevin, because otherwise she's gonna have it all snatched away from her completely and then who's that fair on? Penelope or us?"
Kevin saw his point and his eyes saddened, the anger began to disperse through his body more and his demeanour broke.
"We have to respect what she wants and what she wants is the best in life." Derek confided, "Even if it means that the inevitable is going to happen. We can't run from this now, Kevin, she needs us both more than ever."
Kevin nodded and Derek thanked the heaven's above that he and Kevin became friends the moment Penelope broke up with Kevin. This would be a lot harder if they were at one another's throats, still calling one another by their surnames, shooting icy glares. They were friends now, buddies even, they did things together, talked more, and all because Penelope was their link and always was.
The pair knew that when she was gone they'd have one another because they'd lived the best moments of their lives with her. They had that common grounding.
"At least we can grow old saying we knew the best tech ever right?" Kevin relented as his eyes welled up fully, "I mean, no one in this lifetime is going to beat her, she's set the bar too high, and trust me I should know..."
"You've got a goal to reach now, to try and out do her." Derek said as he sat down on the window ledge outside of the restaurant. "She told me she loved me this morning."
Kevin turned to stand in front of him, he could hear Derek's sadness, he now realised that whatever anyone else lost, Derek Morgan was losing so much more.
"And I finally kissed her, because she deserves the one wish she has in life." He looked up at the man, "she wished she'd known the man that was so in love with her it hurt to even think of a life at her and I'm breaking, man, because I don't know how I'm going to survive her being gone."
"Well, you have back up I guess, I mean you were planning on telling her, just when you finally got her alone long enough." Kevin then sat next to her, "we've been planning it for a while."
"Well I wanna do it sooner rather than later, I need her to know that I'm not doing this because she's dying, that it was in the works, that I was just being too cowardly to actually tell her."
Kevin laughed a little, "Ironic really, that we kinder switched partners."
"Krysta looks good on your arm, she wasn't my type." Derek told him jokingly.
"Penelope is." Kevin told him, "but what I'm saying is that when I said I'd help her see, I didn't mean it as an empty gesture. She was in love with you well before I came along and then when we broke up she admitted that she was in love with someone else and straight away I knew it was you and I wasn't wrong." He shrugged a little, sniffed away the tears threatening to fall again, "I'm just glad we didn't become nasty to one another, I'd rather have her forever as a friend than not at all."
Derek looked up at Kevin and smiled.
"She said the same about you."
"That woman says a lot, but I think I need to apologise and start the whole shenanigans of the best two months ever."
"She's gonna want to know about you popping the question." Derek told him and put his hands up in the air, a smirk on his face, "I'm sorry, I just know my baby girl."
"Well then that's gonna help you win her heart before..."
Derek smirked, sadly, boyishly, emotionally, "before the heavens take their angel back."
That made Kevin laughed, "Ultimate cheese Morgan, I'm so telling her that." He told Derek and got up and walked back into the restaurant.
Derek just sat shaking his head as all his emotions settled again.
Then he went back in.
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- This Time Won't You Save Me? -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
A/N: Expecting that of Kevin?