Episode: Ashes and Dust
"A separation, a loss."
Emily glanced quickly over at her boss, analyzing him for a moment, studying his behaviour with a finely honed skill. His words were heavy with underlying meaning and some kind of sadness that she couldn't grasp. Her eyes flitted back to the screen, where pictures of the crimes swam before her eyes. Emily knew something was up with Hotch and she was determined to find out what.
OoOoOoOoOoO
It was devastating, listening to Charlotte talk about the fire. Despite the fact she had done this before (although not this exact situation) Emily almost wanted to punch a wall and scream as she listened to the woman crying out for someone to help her. She suddenly understood Derek's need to tackle UNSUBS. It was to give them a moment of shock and pain to make up for the hell they put the whole BAU through. One look at Hotch told her he felt the same way and was barely holding on.
"Can you tell them I'm not ready?" The woman pleaded, a nervous look in her eyes as her gaze darted from Hotch to Emily.
"Agent Prentiss will tell them. Call Morgan and Gideon." He added as Emily left the room. For a moment after leaving, she stopped and leaned against the door, hoping that on the day she died, it wouldn't end like that.
She knew Hotch had seen her face and had guessed that she was too nervous to handle the last moments Charlotte Cutler had left. She knew his telling her to leave the room was his way of explaining that she had nothing to be ashamed of. Emily wondered if he realised that he was probably feeling worse than her.
About 10 or 15 minutes later, Hotch left the room, silent as he stripped the yellow poncho- like clothing off his suit. With a quick glance at Emily, he murmured out the words she had both been expecting and dreading.
"She died. Just now. I ... She fell asleep and didn't wake up. I didn't get any more information." His sentences were monotone and emotionless, and Emily reached up and ghosted a hand on his shoulder, realising how hard he had taken her death but not understanding why.
"I'm sorry to hear that. I'll tell the nurses, you warm up the car."
Hotch was grateful to Emily as he turned and walked down the hallway, shaking slightly as he turned the handle to open the hospital doors. His mind flashed to the argument he and Hayley had had earlier, which had ended with her blurting out the words he had been waiting to hear for the last month or so,
"I think we should separate."
Even thinking about it, his stomach flipped, a feeling of nausea and sadness rising to kill all feelings of hope that had remained in the wreckage of his marriage. Sure, in the last while he had never said it was a strong marriage, but that didn't mean he had no feelings for his wife, no cherished memories and never-to-be-forgotten moments in their lives.
But she wanted to forget them. She wanted to erase him from her life and start over.
With Jack, probably, Hotch thought, bitterly. Shaking these thoughts from his head, he opened up the dark SUV and slid the key into the ignition, flipping through radio stations and landing on one that was playing 'Across the Universe' by the Beatles.
Leaning back in his seat, Hotch began to take in the lyrics, mulling over them in his head until he heard the car door open and smelled a faint whiff of some kind of perfume. It was Emily, obviously, but for a moment he listened to the lyrics of the song, the words almost giving him physical pain as he realised how they applied to his life.
Pools of sorrow waves of joy
Are drifting through my opened mind
Possessing and caressing me
Emily waited patiently, pretending to text someone as Hotch mulled over things in his mind, thinking of Emily. She caused the waves of joy in his life, not Hayley. The thought made him wanted to ball up in a corner and rock away the emotions.
Straightening up, he let out a sigh, then cleared his throat and buckled his seatbelt, showing Emily that he could do his job. The song switched to some other old rock song and Hotch's mind emptied of thoughts of his wife and of Emily, forcing him to return to the present.
OoOoOoOoOoO
"You want Abbey or the ex-wife?"
"Abbey." Hotch replied, stepping immediately forward and passing Gideon and Emily to go back to the safe haven of the SUV. Emily cast a quick glance at Gideon, both of them realising something was wrong. The man had just realised he was a murder suspect and was probably panicking, and Hotch had just offered to sign on for hours of following him monotonously in a car.
Gideon nodded to Emily quickly and she dashed after him as fast as she could in heels, trying to catch up to her swiftly moving Unit Chief. They rode in silence for a while after Abbey, until they stopped and Hotch mumbled out that he needed to call Hayley. Emily took this as a sign to start fake texting again, which she did so, readily.
"Aaron."
"Hayley." Hotch breathed, aware of the woman beside him, but trying to ignore the fact.
"Are you coming back soon?"
"Honey, I don't know."
She didn't respond with any indication that she had heard the term of endearment, just answered with a, "We should talk. Try and get back as soon as you can."
"I will, and I promise I'll make it up to you."
"Just come back soon."
"Ok, I love you too." He added the 'too' in to try and get her to say it. To try and guilt her into saying the words to him. She hung up instead, had hung up before he had said 'I love you, too.' But Emily didn't need to know that. Without even looking at her, he knew she knew something was wrong.
"Everything ok?"
Always there to pick up the pieces. To reshape and reform the great Aaron Hotchner after Hayley ripped a piece of him away.
"Yup." He responded, trying to sound like he wanted her to think he was. But it didn't work. She saw right through him. Instead of building on it, though, she steered the conversation away to Abbey, purposely trying to think of a time to bring it back up.
She did so on the ride back to the station.
"So Charlotte dying... that must have been pretty rough."
"Take a right here, I think. And innocent people dying is, but it's the nature of the job." Emily took the preferred turn, then slowed to a stop and turned to Hotch.
"Alright, what's going on with you?" She demanded, but not in a harsh tone. She didn't want to threaten him.
"Nothing. Why are you stopped?"
" Because you've been especially quiet, had a bad conversation with Hayley, lied to a material witness and then watched her die. Hotch, it's safe to say something's up and nobody expects you to be totally on top of your game right now."
"Do you actually believe I trust you less than I do Derek or Reid?" Hotch asked, surprising Emily.
"I did, but I don't anymore. I feel a part of this team. But Hotch, you hold us all at arm's length and it's not going to end well for you if you do that," Emily paused, biting her lip unconsciously as she wondered how to proceed. "Let us help."
He turned away from her, looking out the window and up at the sky. "Hayley wants a trial separation." He responded, dully. Emily sucked in her breath and reached over, touching his arm slightly.
"I'm so sorry."
"No, I should have seen it coming, in hindsight it wasn't a secret." He looked so defeated, so sad and defenceless.
"After this I'll convince the team to go out and we can grab some drinks, ok?"
"I can't, I promised Hayley we'd..." Hotch pressed his lips together tightly and looked down, then back up, staring straight ahead. "Talk."
Emily winced at his words but dipped her head slightly, realising she couldn't press him for any more information. She turned the car back on, motioning silently that Hotch could change the station. He did, to some obscure one that Emily had never heard, but enjoyed in the silence of the car.
As they drove back to the station, Hotch stared out the window, the music on the radio a replacement for conversation. He stared up at the sky, he stars appearing to move forward quickly as they drove down a street. He wished that Hayley would see reason. He wished that Jack wouldn't have to grow up split between two homes.
He wished that someone could show him what to do.
Wow 1,500 words. I'm actually so proud of this one, even if it may be a bit OOC. Tell me if I'm straying too far from the characters and I'll try and make them more similar to their tv counterparts. But for now, RATE, REVIEW, FOLLOW.
BUT MOSTLY REVIEW. Seriously, I have nine atm and I actually adore reading them, so even if it's just a short little one, or if it's a long paragraph, I will love you for it! Feel free to give me any kind of suggestions or tell me something you want me to work into the story. If I get enough votes for something, I'll add in a bit of another ship, if that's what people want.
Song: Across the Universe – The Beatles
