AN-I really enjoy writing this story, so I hope you do too. Let me know what you think, or not :)
The next day wasn't any easier. I sat in bed all day, trying to entertain the unwanted visitors that kept popping up. They all said the same words, they all wore the same face of pity and sympathy, they all did the same thing ,and it was downright mundane. I hadn't pictured life in a hospital bed much, but I had always thought that being confined after an accident would be a little more entertaining.
I tried my best to keep my thoughts off of Will. It was easier to pretend that nothing had happened than it was to wallow. Not that I knew that from experience. I was determined not to wallow, I wasn't going to let myself. I read about how acceptance while difficult was cathartic from the pamphlet of the grief cycles that everyone kept giving me. While I appreciated the thought, I remained a bit skeptical. If I really was drowning with sorrow, wouldn't I need something a little bit more thorough than a pamphlet? It didn't matter, I wouldn't have read it if there had been a longer version. And despite the fact that I was now the proud owner of at least a dozen said pamphlets, I wouldn't read it anyway.
Apparently I was in denial, which I didn't believe. I felt too lethargic to be in denial. The brightest part of my day was when I finally got to see my son.
Garcia brought him over and though it sounds funny, I felt awed at how much he looked like himself. He didn't exhibit any trauma, any outside signs of grief. He didn't even seem to notice that his dad was dead. Maybe it was a genetic thing, like my biological mark in Henry was the one thing keeping him from grieving. I tried to reason with myself. NO, he's two. Two year olds don't notice these things. But I couldn't help but wonder at what point he would notice
With my shoulder, I couldn't hold my son--a fact that although it disgusted me, I was slightly grateful for. Garcia placed him on my bed for a few precious moments, but an angry nurse immediately sensed her precious monitors may be tampered with, and Henry was relegated to Garcia's arms.
Suddenly the doctor walked in, a short man with a superiority complex. Honestly, I couldn't stand the man, but luckily in my job, I had dealt with worse.
"Hi Jennifer, how are we feeling today?" He asked, making me want to cringe. I hated the way he talked down to me, like I was some child who had scraped her knee. What a jerk!
I would have shrugged instead of answering, but I had tried that earlier and my immobile shoulder didn't want to cooperate. "Fine." I answered noncommittally.
"Your tests all look good, and your friends have assured me that you have someone to look after you for the next couple of weeks, so let me sign the rest of this paperwork and you are free to go. Which I'm sure you're going to be happy about." He said, smiling brightly. I couldn't stand his smiling, doesn't he realize that I just lost my soul mate? The only man I ever loved and who ever loved me? How can I be happy about that?
I knew that it was ridiculous, not the entire world was dealing with the feelings I was. Maybe why I was so angry for others not being upset was because I was among them. I was trying to grieve, but my mind was still protecting me from the trauma I was going to go through. I hadn't felt grief yet, but I was sure that I was in for the ringer when it came. I both dreaded and anticipated it. I longed to be the girlfriend--the wife--I should have been. Why wouldn't I marry him? The regret washed over me like a wave on the beach.
I looked over to Garcia, who nodded with more passion than I was currently capable of. I could see how badly she was torn, but I wasn't sure why. I waited for a moment until she muttered what was on her mind. "That's good. You'll be home in time."
"In time for what?" I whispered.
"The funeral." She choked out with a pained voice. "Will's-its tomorrow. The funeral is tomorrow."
My heart dropped deep inside of me. This didn't feel real. I couldn't possibly be about to attend the funeral of the man I loved. This could not have happened. There was no way.
The doctor seemed to be indifferent of how I felt emotionally, humming softly to himself as he continued his work. He just continued checking my charts, ignoring the dialogue between me and Penelope. I lived--now that my body was going to be alright, I was no longer his concern.
How could I go on? How could Will have just left me and Henry behind? He wouldn't have done that to me, I rationalized. He couldn't have. This was all just some big mistake.
"Jayje? I'm going to go call Hotch and the others and tell them you're being released." Garcia said carefully, as though the words themselves might crush me.
"Whatever." I dismissed, sure that soon I would wake up from this nightmare. Garcia quickly left, but was almost immediately replaced by a thin spunky nurse that I vaguely remembered from the night before.
"Okay, Ms. Jareau, we're going to get you into this change of clothes that your friends brought and then we can get you into a wheelchair so that you can be on your way." The chipper nurse said as she began disconnecting me from the different monitors.
"Oh, goodie." I said, trying to keep the sarcasm out of my voice, but failing miserably.
By the time I was dressed and in the wheelchair, Garcia had returned with Hotch in tow and both were receiving instructions from the nurse. It took far more energy than I had realized, and for a task so simple, I was already shaking from exhaustion. I suddenly realized how helpless I was, and it didn't help the matter as she began handing me several slips of paper. "These are your prescriptions for your pain pills and physical therapy."
I looked up at Hotch for the first time since I became his charge. When I peered up, I saw the concern in his eyes and froze. So this is how it was going to go. Hotch would take upon himself to protect me. While I knew that Hotch would take a bullet for me, for some reason, I thought he would be far less emotional about this situation. He didn't often get sentimental, I expected for him to be the most hands off about this whole situation.
It looked like it would be me and the "Boss-man" for a while. I was sure that it was about to get interesting. How could it not? Me and my young son were going to move in with my boss and his son after a debilitating accident injured me and killed my fiancé. I felt like I was in a Lifetime movie. Now the problem was finding my way out.
When I got into the car--or more accurately, when Hotch carefully placed me in the car, I felt my heart pang involuntarily. The last time I was in a car--my thoughts had to trail off. I wasn't ready for this. I wasn't sure I would ever be ready for this.
Emily and Garcia came the next day to pick me up for the funeral. Hotch said he wouldn't be able to make it because of work, but I realized that he just wanted to give me space to grieve. While I was grateful to him, I didn't know why he felt the need to let me. I just felt so numb to it all.
As they pushed my wheelchair into the large church, it didn't seem real. It didn't seem real at all. I saw all of Will's friends and coworkers stare at me with pity. Pity that I didn't deserve. I knew he was dead, but I didn't feel it. I felt like any moment, he was going to waltz in and tell everyone that he was alright. Being Will, he'd say that the whole thing was a big misunderstanding and that they should go get drinks to celebrate him being alive. That was what felt like my reality, not the cold dark church, listening as everyone summed up his life in a few short words.
His friends called him unbreakable, though I'd seen him shed tears before. They said that he was patient, though I could tell them differently from all of the countless times he'd flip through the TV channels to find something to watch. They said that he was everyone's best friend, though I could remember when he would come home from work being frustrated and tired and angry. I remembered the good and the bad, and it seemed that no one knew the Will that I had spent a year and a half with. It seemed strange the stark differences between how they saw him and how I had.
Their impressions on the love of my life were very different from mine. They didn't mention how he used to whistle while he did almost everything. They didn't tell the congregation about how he could be a soft heart, especially when it came to his son. I was easily finding that he had let me in on the him that no one else saw. The Will he gave the public would be shared by all those around me, but the Will I knew, that Will was reserved just for me and Henry.
I wanted to cry out for all the things they were missing in this eulogy, but it felt wrong. There was no point in the woman who wasn't able to grieve criticizing those who could for doing it wrong. So, I sat there, numb to it all.
Even Henry was quiet as he seemed to know the solemnity of the situation. He would now be growing up without a father. This was so unreal.
Apparently Emily had helped Garcia put together the funeral, and they had collectively "decided" that I had experienced too much trauma to speak in my soul mate's memorial service. I still wasn't sure how I felt about that. Part of me wanted to get up and educate the audience to the man that William LaMontagne Jr was--the kind, caring man who hated shopping malls and got snippy when I wanted to look at shoes. I wanted to let them know how he would pick off the pineapple off a Hawaiian pizza, only to eat each piece before eating his pizza. However, I knew I couldn't share all of this. It was too special. I didn't know how I could explain my relationship with Will, and so I was grateful that all I had to do was sit there and play the grieving...fiancee? I definitely wasn't his wife, we had argued about that enough times, and I was more than a girlfriend, but I didn't know how to put into words everything that our relationship was. So I didn't.
I watched as they wheeled his casket out of the church, watched in an odd out of body experience as they loaded the oak box into the black herse. This couldn't be happening to me. I would wake up from this nightmare with my Will by my side.
I'm not sure how I got there, but moments later found me at the grave site with Garcia and Emily by my side. Tears began to flow down my cheeks as I made no attempt to stop them. "Why?" I cracked out as I realized I was now sobbing. Emily looked down at me as though her heart was breaking in front of me. There was no answer for it. She couldn't do anything other than place a comforting hand on my good shoulder. The few people in the cemetary looked at me with sympathy, but I didn't want their sympathy. I wanted Will. And that was something I wasn't going to get back.
Hours later, I found myself alone. Again. Was I ever really not alone? Garcia and Emily had together lifted me onto the bed of Hotch's guest bedroom on the main floor. I knew they thought I was asleep, so they tended for my small son while they waited for Hotch to come home and relieve them of their babysitting responsibilities. I wasn't about to alert them to my consciousness or the fact that it was probably time for another pain pill. The pain made me feel human, even if for a moment. I was grateful that I didn't have to deal with the faux smiles or fake promises that all would be alright. It wasn't going to be alright. It would have been better if we had both died in that car.
Suddenly, I heard the door open quietly and hushed voices trying to avoid waking me up. I strained to hear the conversation of which I knew I was the subject.
"How's she doing?" Hotch asked carefully from outside my door.
"As good as can be expected. She held up quite well at the funeral, and then struggled at the gravesite." Emily informed him.
"I just don't know how my little Sugar Plum is going to handle all of this." Garcia said sadly. "I just never thought this could happen to her."
You and me both, I thought to myself as I continued to evesdrop from my immobile position on the Queen sized bed.
"It's tragic." Hotch agreed sadly, "but if anyone can get through this, it's JJ. She is one of the strongest people I know. She loves her son, and she'll make it through, even if it is just a day at a time."
I sat in awe of his steady voice of reassurance as their conversation drifted to the sociopaths that we deal with on a daily basis. Did he really think I could do this? Because I didn't. It felt nice to hear someone had faith in me, but I honestly didn't know if I could continue. Only time would be able to tell.