When the two women get almost to the bottom of the steps they hear a very unhappy Henry.
"MOOOOMMMMMYYYYY!" he wails.
JJ gets choked up. "Oh, my sweet boy." She jumps down the last three steps, startling the adults in the kitchen. "Hey, Little Man."
His wails turn to a happy holler. "MOMMY!"
JJ walks over and, ignoring his banana covered hands and face, lifts him out of his highchair. "Hey, Henry, did you have a good breakfast?"
He kisses her cheek, smearing banana across it. "Love Mommy."
She just holds him close, drinking him in. "I love you, too, Henry. I love you oh so much."
Elizabeth puts a hand on JJ's shoulder. "If you keep him corralled a moment, I'll get the banana off his hands and face."
JJ eases him back a bit so her mother-in-law can get to him. "No problem. Was that a good banana, Henry?"
"Mmmm!" he answers happily.
She smiles. "Are you sure? Looks like you're wearing more than you ate."
He just cackles. Finally Elizabeth has him cleaned up. As JJ sits down at the table, Henry in her lap, her father puts a cup of coffee in front of her.
"Thanks, Dad."
"No problem, Sports Star. Did you sleep well?"
JJ nods. "Yeah, I did. Felt so good to be in my own bed."
Mark grins. "Not to mention cuddled up to your wife, right?"
JJ blushes and looks to Emily. "Yeah, that definitely helped, too."
Emily lifts her cup of decaf in toast to her wife. Gerald walks over and leans on the counter beside his daughter as JJ starts to answer questions from her family about her time overseas.
"So, is she really okay?" Gerald asks compassionately.
"She will be. I know she and Morgan both want to make appointments with Dr. Westfallen. And I will pay whatever it takes to make them both feel better about what they did and saw over there. Her physical injuries aren't too bad." Emily turns and stares into her father's eyes. "Had she not had that chest plate on, she'd have been killed, Dad. Thank you for finding the best stuff not yet on the market. Anything less and…"
Emily's voice just fades out. She still can't even contemplate how close she had come to losing the love of her life. Gerald wraps an arm around her.
"I know, sweetheart. I know. I am so glad it worked. I can't imagine a world without Jennifer Prentiss in it. It would suddenly be a very dull place."
Emily smiles and nods. "You sure have that right."
At 4 that afternoon the Jareau's all finally start towards home. JJ promises to come up in a couple weekends, work permitting, just so they can see how she's doing. Elizabeth and Gerald leave soon after for their condo in D.C., promising to be there in no time if the ladies need them for anything.
JJ goes with Henry into the backyard to play with Alaska as Emily starts dinner. They would be joined by Declan and Tom. Knowing Tom still has to be careful about germs, they had decided on him waiting to see JJ until after everyone left. Hotch had offered to pick up Declan but the boy wanted to wait for his father.
With dinner in the oven, Emily gets out a strong disinfectant spray and cleans the table and countertops carefully to make as sure as possible the house was clean for Tom. As she goes to clean the downstairs bathroom, JJ sees her.
"What are you doing?"
"Cleaning everything before Tom gets here. He has to be careful about germs still."
JJ takes the cleaning supplies. "Young lady, I don't know if you're aware of this or not but you're pregnant."
Emily feigns surprise and looks at her stomach. "You mean…this isn't from eating a chocolate cake everyday?"
JJ laughs. "Well, some of it might be. Let me do this. You really need to avoid breathing in these chemicals. You didlet the cleaning service do this while I was gone, right?"
"Yes, I did. This is just a touch up in deference to Tom."
"Then you play with Henry. I'll get this done."
Emily gives her a kiss. "Thank you, baby."
"My pleasure, honey."
Emily heads into the playroom and sees Henry is building some grand creation with his blocks.
"Can I play, Champ?"
He smiles up at her. "Mama play."
"Thanks." She eases herself down and helps him stack and unstack all the blocks. When she finishes the bathroom, JJ makes her way back to the playroom. Her heart swells with love as she watches the two most important people in her life play together. She wipes the tears that slip down her cheeks. She loves them so much. For 9 weeks she had felt empty inside. Now she overflows with emotion.
"I love you both so much," she says.
Emily and Henry turn, seeing her for the first time. Henry stands and walks over to her.
"Boo, Mommy?"
JJ kneels down. "Yeah, Henry. I have a boo on my heart. But a Henry Hug will make it all better."
He throws himself into her arms. Emily just smiles as she sees her wife soaking in the love from their son.
"…and then we went to this memorial for everyone who had tried to cross the Berlin Wall. It was really sad but really cool, too. I'm going to have some neat stuff for my world history class next year," Declan finishes.
JJ nods. "That's great, Dec. I'm glad you were able to get out and see some sites."
The boy shrugs and glances at his dad. "Well…some days Dad was just too tired to put up with me beating him at Scrabble and Rockband."
Tom chuckles and punches his son's shoulder lightly. "Get real! I just pretended to be tired so I didn't damage your psyche by beating you so many times."
JJ and Emily laugh at the Colter's picking on each other. JJ looks back at Declan.
"How was lacrosse camp?"
"It was fun. I learned a couple of cool moves so if that jerk comes at me next year he'll be on the ground legally wondering what hit him."
"Uh…good, I guess?" JJ says uncertainly.
Declan nods. "Really good. No way am I going to risk that guy making me miss any games with his cheap shots."
"Okay. Just make sure you don't attack him first," she cautions.
"I won't. Promise."
JJ nods. "Good." She looks back at Tom. "Hope you don't mind me feeding his sports addiction."
Tom shakes his head. "Not at all. Like Emily I was more of a cheerleader. I'm glad he has someone that understands some of the things he's been telling me." He ruffles his son's hair.
Declan laughs. "It was actually really good when I hurt my knee to have Jennifer around. She didn't mind me waiting for the end of the game before taking me to the hospital."
Tom rolls his eyes. "Heaven forbid your health come first."
Emily laughs. "Jen, should I tell Tom some of the sports injury stories your parents have told me? You know, just to prepare him?"
JJ rolls her eyes. "Watch it, Prentiss. No need to make our friend scared of his kid."
Tom and Declan laugh. Emily winks at Tom. "I'll tell you later," she stage whispers to him.
He nods and winks. JJ just pokes Emily playfully. The Colter's stay until just after 8.
Later, as JJ stands staring into her closet, Emily walks up behind her.
"You okay?"
"I have to figure out what to wear for the first time in 9 weeks. Seems…strange."
Emily nods. "I bet. Want some help?"
JJ shakes her head. "I don't think so." She sighs and steps in, pulling down a navy suit and red blouse she often wears for budget meetings. It's her feel good suit. Emily smiles, recognizing it. "This will work. It will help me get back in the saddle again, so to speak."
"You'll do fine, JJ. You and Morgan will both have a period of readjustment. Will probably last about 2 weeks. Maybe less for you two since you have a strong support structure around you. Things will seem almost foreign at first but suddenly it will start to click for you and you will be okay."
JJ slowly turns and stares into Emily's eyes. "Doyle?"
Emily nods. "It took me longer because I didn't go back to a team and I was…someone else for so long." She pulls JJ close. "You will be fine in no time because even if no one else helps, Garcia will make sure you are fine."
JJ giggles. "Yeah, that's true. And, hey, most likely no one will be trying to kill me tomorrow so that should be a plus immediately."
Emily nods as if contemplating the thought. "Yeah, that should make things a bit better."
JJ laughs and strokes her wife's cheek. "Thank you, Emily. For everything."
"No thanks needed, Jennifer. I'm just glad you're home and I am here for you anytime the bad memories surface. Okay?"
JJ nods. "Yeah. Okay." She sighs. "It's going to haunt me a bit, isn't it?"
"I don't know, Jen. I wish I could say yes or no but I only know what you told me. And something tells me you hid a lot from me to protect me. It depends on how bad the things you didn't tell me are and how honest you are when you see Dr. Westfallen."
"Yeah, I know. I promise, Em, I will be honest with her." She runs her hand over Rocky. "I want to be whole when our daughter is born. I want to be whole for our son. And I especially want to be whole for you."
Emily kisses her wife. "Then I know you'll be fine in no time at all. Come on, let's get you to bed. You have to go to the office tomorrow."
JJ smiles. "Will be weird without you there."
Emily grins. "Will be weird to see you on the webinar. But, hey, we'll get over it."
"Yes we will. We are Prentiss' after all."
"Ah, Mother's favorite statement quoted by her favorite fellow pod person."
JJ laughs and rolls her eyes. "We're not pod people…as far as you know."
She winks and goes to get ready to bed, Emily's laughter music to her ears. When she gets back into the room, she looks at Emily.
"There's one more thing I have to do before bed."
Emily, already in bed, looks up from what she is reading. "What's that?"
JJ walks over and looks down at her wife. "I want to see the charts, Emily."
Emily sighs and sets her book aside. "To what end, Jennifer? There is nothing you can do to change the past. And I was okay most of the time."
"Most of the time. Em, I told you I want to see what this did to you. We already know what it did to me. I have a right to know what it did to my wife."
Emily stares into resolute blue eyes. She is not going to win this argument. Emily reaches into her nightstand and pulls out the ledger she had been using to chart her blood pressure. She stares at it a moment, then hands it to JJ.
JJ moves to the recliner and starts to read through it. She can see it had always been in the yellow bordering on red. There are several days where there are bad spikes. She knows what happened those days. The case in Denver. Injuries to her or Morgan. Ambushes. Leaving for Kandahar a couple times. She doesn't even know she's crying until Emily hands her a tissue. JJ takes it as Emily kneels down beside her.
"None of that was your fault or Morgan's. It's just the job, Jen. And I am so proud of you for doing what you did. You are the bravest, most dynamic woman I have ever known. You are beautiful inside and out. And I am honored to be your wife."
"But I-"
"No 'buts', Jennifer." Emily taps the ledger. "Don't blame Afghanistan for all of those spikes. To be honest, some of the spikes due to things here may have coincided with things over there. Again, it was all just the job."
"I should have been here, Emily."
"You were where you were supposed to be. I'm okay. Rocky is okay." She leans over and gives her a gentle kiss. "We're all going to be just fine."
"It's going to take me a few days to believe that," JJ warns.
Emily smiles and strokes her wife's cheek. "I'll be here to reinforce it anytime the doubts creep in." She stands and extends her hand. "Let's go to bed, Jennifer. I want to hold you tonight."
JJ takes her hand and stands up. She sets the ledger on the table beside the recliner. "I want that, too."
The walk to the bed, switching sides so that Emily can lie on her left side, spooned around her wife as much as Rocky will allow. JJ manages a smile.
"Think she'll kick me for crowding her?"
Emily smiles and kisses JJ's neck. "No way. She missed her Mommy.
JJ squeezes Emily's hand. "I missed her, too. I love you, Emily."
"Love you, too, Jen."