Second Chances – chapter twenty three

June 2015

Emily resisted the urge to throw her phone at the wall. She stared at the offending object for a moment before hastily wiping away the tears she felt welling in her eyes. Emily didn't know why she had expected anything different. Maybe it was because her relationship with her mother had been better than it ever had, though not perfect. There were still those occasions when there was an awkward silence, those moments when they were both too stubborn to back down. Elizabeth had shown her softer side as the preparations had led her to revealing those early days with Emily's father, when they were in love, before the arguments, before the bitter divorce.

There was a knock at her office door. Looking at the clock on her computer screen, Emily saw it was lunch time. "Come in Rossi," she called to the closed door, wiping her eyes again. The older profiler poked his head around the door.

"Hey Kiddo, you promised me lunch for this favour," he said. Emily rolled her eyes at him good naturedly. She had asked him to give her team a seminar in interrogation techniques, which he had agreed to.

"How was it?" Emily asked.

"You've got a good team. Hopefully this morning has sunk in, still got a few bits to cover this afternoon." Rossi sat in the chair opposite Emily, regarding her.

As she found herself on the end of his stare, Emily tried not to shift uneasily under his scrutiny, but she knew it was useless. He knew her better than most people. He could probably still see the tears in the corner of her eyes, but Rossi didn't mention it. He would wait till they were somewhere more private before launching a sneak attack. And even though Emily knew it was coming, she wouldn't avoid it.

"That's good." Emily started gathering her things and shutting down the computer. "Where do you want to have lunch?"

Rossi chose a small Italian restaurant a few blocks away. They settled into a corner booth, and were given menus by the waiter. It was after they ordered when he pounced.

"How's the wedding plans going?"

She stared at him for a beat, considering her answer. "It's going well, I'm thankful it's small. The hardest thing I've had to do was reign in my mother and Penelope." They had taken on some of the planning aspects, and their enthusiasm was starting to take its toll on Emily.

"Have you gotten hold of your father yet?"

Emily sighed, inwardly wincing. 'He's good.' She thought to herself. "Just before you came to meet me for lunch." It had taken her three months to get hold of him. For the first two weeks she had tried the last number she had for him, before going to her mother for his current information. His assistant had given her the run around several times. He had finally called her back this morning.

'Hi Sweetheart, how are you?'

'I'm fine, how are you?'

'Extremely busy, you know how work is,' he was obviously distracted by something. 'I was wondering why you had left me so many messages.'

'I'm getting married,' Emily told him, trying to be cheerful despite her father's attitude.

'That's nice,' he turned away from the speaker and mumbled something to someone next to him.

'I was wondering if you wanted to walk me down the aisle.'

'Sweetheart,' her father sighed into the phone. 'I'm very busy, I'll be working. I have to go, I've got a meeting.' With that her father hung up and she was listening to the dial tone.

"He didn't even ask when it was," Emily mumbled as she sniffed back the tears. While they hadn't set a proper date yet, they were thinking of February next year.

"Then he doesn't know what he's missing." Rossi told her, holding back on what he really thought of the man he had never met. Rossi would never think of rejecting any child let alone his own when she was so excited about getting married. "Have you thought about asking your mother?"

"I don't know," Emily wiped a stray tear away, grateful her mascara was waterproof. Rossi gave her a reassuring smile. "I shouldn't have expected anything different. The last time I properly spoke to him was before he and my mother divorced and that was when I was thirteen." Since then their interaction had consisted of the occasional phone call on birthdays, Christmas, graduations, even rarer visits. Their conversations growing shorter and less frequent over time.

Rossi shook his head lightly, feeling for his young friend. During the time he had known her, Emily had become the daughter he never had. She had been one of the first to reach out to him, during his own torment; she had been the first to confront him over what was bothering. Emily had been his sounding board when Carolyn had asked for his help. "I'll do it," he said. Her eyes snapped back to his, wide in shock. "If you want," Rossi offered her an out.

Emily's eyes softened as she maintained eye contact. "Are you sure you want to?"

"Of course," he said with a twinkle in his eye. "I'd be honoured to call you my daughter." She gave him a shy smile as their food was set down in front of them.

"I'm not sure many people would agree with you," she said taking a bite of her mushroom tortellini.

"Well they don't know like I do," he told. "Besides, you can match me shot for shot, almost beat me at Rock Star, and curse in Italian better than I can." A twinkle appeared in her eyes as he listed her 'qualities'.

"Okay, but for my mother's sake please leave that out of your speech."

…...

November 2015

Spencer sat opposite Emily in their living room, a chess board set out on the coffee table between them. They were waiting for Morgan to return from his latest property so they could go to the cinema.

"So," Emily's voice broke through his concentration on the board. "Is Helen coming?"

Spencer blinked at her in surprise, before realising what she was asking. "Yes, I asked her last week. She's looking forward to the wedding." He paused for a moment, moving his rook. "I thought all wedding talk was barred today." Spencer said looking up at Emily, his lip quirked into a smile as she made a frustrated growl.

"It is," she stated as she thought through her next move. "My mother just wanted to finalise numbers before she goes to Italy next week."

Emily made her move, knowing that Spencer had her in five. She had wanted a wedding-free weekend to relax and unwind. Her mother and Penelope had both been amazing when organizing the day, but sometimes they could be too overbearing for Emily's liking. She had in the politest way possible told them to leave her alone for the weekend.

Glancing up at Spencer, Emily studied her friend, seeing that he was more relaxed than she had in the past few years. She gave him a small smile before enquiring, "How's it going with Helen?" Her smile grew bigger as he blushed as he thought of the woman he had met ten months before. Helen had to go on a course this weekend for her work.

"It's, uh really nice," Spencer said with a small voice. His hesitant voice made Emily frown.

"Nice?" She asked. "What's wrong Spence?" He tucked a piece of hair behind his ear, sitting back on the sofa, giving up on the game for the moment.

"It's nothing, everything is going really well. I am happy," he paused, unsure of how to continue. "The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different outcome," Spencer quoted Einstein and Emily got the reference, realised what was wrong.

Tilting her head to the side she contemplated the best way to advise her friend. It had been a while since he had needed to talk about Maeve and the emotional fallout from her death. Emily knew his relationship with Helen had been progressing; he had told her that he was going to dinner at Helen's place a few weeks before. Spencer had been so nervous about going; Emily had guessed the significance of the evening. It had been the first time he had spent the night.

"Spencer," Emily started. "This is not the same as before. This isn't going to end the same way," she said softly.

"How do you know that?" His voice was quiet and scared.

"I don't know that, but there are always going to be monsters lurking in the dark. You know that," her voice was gentle, but firm. "But you can't let fear scare you away from allowing yourself to be happy, from allowing yourself to love, to be loved."

"Sometimes when I'm with Helen, it feels like I'm waiting for someone to jump out and rip her away from me."

"You can't think like that. You can't predict the future," Emily tried to reason with him, hoping he wasn't going to break his heart as well as Helen's. Emily liked her and she was quickly becoming part of the family.

"How are you and Morgan are able to ignore that danger despite everything that has happened?" Spencer couldn't help the pang of jealousy that crept into his voice.

"We have spent years being afraid. That feeling never goes away, but you can't let it dictate your future. It's how the monsters win. They thrive on that fear."

Spencer was silent as he thought over what Emily had to say. When he had first seen Helen in the park, Spencer had no idea how important she would become to him. Their friendship had grown tentatively, first by having coffee with one another after playing game after game of chess. Their coffee dates had become lunch and then dinner. They had begun to meet during the week, when Spencer wasn't away on cases.

He and Helen had often talked long into the night about both of their childhoods, about their relationship with their mothers, the bullying they both endured. Spencer had told Helen about Maeve, and she had supported him through his admission. In turn Helen had explained about her therapy, Spencer had accompanied her when she had attempted something new. Every time they met, he found out something new. He was fascinated by her; she was in his thoughts when they weren't together. He was falling in love.

"How do you feel about Helen?" Emily's voice broke through his thoughts.

"I'm falling in love with her," Spencer admitted quietly, a wistful smile coming over his face. After a few minutes he asked "Would you teach me how to dance?"

An hour later, Morgan opened the front door of his house to the sounds of instrumental music and his fiancé mumbling something about trainers. "Ouch," he heard Emily say.

That was immediately followed by Spencer saying, "I'm so sorry Emily."

He felt Penelope close behind him as he pushed open the living room door. The coffee table had been moved to the side, as well as the sofa. Clooney had tucked himself underneath the table for protection.

Spencer was stood awkwardly in the middle of the living room as Emily was bent nearly in half, trying to rub the toes on one foot.

"Uh, what's going on?" Morgan asked.

Both Emily and Spencer spun towards the door, wide eyed in surprise as they were interrupted.

"Reid wanted me to teach him to dance." Emily saw Penelope behind Morgan in the doorway, and the blonde held up her hands in response.

"I promise no wedding talk, just movie and dinner."

"I'm making an exception," Emily started. "He," she said pointing at Spencer, "gets to wear his converse with his suit." Emily started to limp over to Morgan, who held his hands out to Emily when she was within arms width. "I hope Helen has tougher toes than I have."

"Are you okay?" Morgan asked with concern. He looked over his shoulder at Spencer, who stood there looking mortified that he may have hurt Emily.

"I'm fine. Very happy you're a better dancer than Spencer," she gave Morgan a quick kiss. She continued on into the hallway, hugging Penelope as she passed.

"Where are you going?" Morgan asked, his brow furrowed as he watched her hobble.

"I'm strapping my toes then going to get my walking boots; they should offer me more protection while teaching Reid to dance."

Author Note – thank you for your lovely comments, they make me so happy. Let me know what you think.