"How do you do it?" JJ had asked Emily once, guilt eating her stomach and terror all over her face. Emily had leaned back, stepped back in surprise and maybe a little hurt. "How does it not bother you?"

"I'm just better at compartmentalizing, I guess," had been Emily's stuttered response, thrown by the confrontation and accusation in JJ's voice.

JJ had believed it then, long before she understood what it took for Emily to crack herself open and trust, long before she knew just how expressive Emily could be. She closes Dave's office door behind them and watches her friend's spine hunch.

"What don't we know?" JJ asks softly. "What are you holding back?"

From me.

From them.

From him.

Because JJ's eyes are no longer only made for press clippings and murder files, her gut no longer a mere annoyance, but a trusted ally. It seems plenty has happened in the six months she's been gone, if not the last six hours. She'd seen the way Emily had looked at Hotch for strength, and while the action isn't unique in it's own right, there's something different in it now. There's something different in the way they orient themselves now that JJ either hadn't been looking for or had been too blind to see.

She catalogues Emily's face now as she turns, the red eyes, the tension around her mouth, the fear that wrinkles her brow. There's nothing hidden, not in that face.

"Em." And JJ takes her hand now, squeezing, coaxing.

Emily closes her eyes, opens them again. There's so much turmoil in her eyes, the entire mess like a Greek tragedy written in her body language. JJ subconsciously braces herself.

"I loved him, Jayje," she says in a voice that makes JJ think of the pain in ripping off a Band-Aid. Quick, momentary, but it's not. It's the kind of pain that stays in all of the lines on Emily's face. It's the kind of pain that lingers.

"At least, a piece of me did. The piece that was Lauren."

JJ files the name away, makes a note to put in another call. "It's not unheard of."

"Doesn't make it right."

Doesn't make it smart is what Emily doesn't say. Not that she has to. She's been too expressive for too long and the self-annoyance, the self-hatred is clear as day on her face.

"It doesn't matter," Emily says softly.

JJ shrugs. "It kind of does. A rock and a hard place," she offers with a sad, jaded approximation of a smile. "Fake it 'til you make it."

That, at least, gets a watery burst of a chuckle. "I don't think this is what they meant."

"Maybe not," JJ concedes easily. It's not the point here anyway. "Relevant though."

"Maybe not," Emily echoes with a sarcastic smile. "For all I was his type, it turns out he was mine too."

Awareness tingles on the tips of JJ's fingers, a strange leaden weight sitting on her chest. "He loved you."

"As much as a man like that can." She sound so sure and probably hurts all the more for it. "Ian and Valhalla weren't the same."

"Neither are Lauren and Emily."

Emily drops to the nearby chair, cradles her head in her hands, presses her palms to her eye. " buried it all, Jayje. I buried it all seven years ago."

And look where it got you.

JJ doesn't voice that opinion of course, just reaches out to squeeze her friend's shoulder. "So what are you going to do now? Bury it again?"

Emily lifts her head, glares, but JJ holds her ground. They both know that's not an option anymore. So Emily sighs, a heavy exhausted sound that doesn't make JJ feel near as triumphant as she'd expected, nor as relieved. It makes her nervous.

Then the door's opening and Hotch is there, face grim.

Time's up.

"My office," he says, voice pitched just loud enough to hear over the chaos building in the bullpen. Other agencies, a makeshift, last minute task force. His face softens as he faces Emily with a look on his face that JJ files away. "We'll need everything you can give us."

"Of course." But there's a tremor in her voice, in case they'd lulled into believing all is well. They hadn't, but as JJ exchanges a look with Hotch, the heaviness in her chest squeezes. The idea, the feeling that there's still so much Emily hasn't said looms large in her mind. Trepidation and mistrust are breeding and multiplying and JJ hates it.

Sorry about missing last week. Life got in the way, and will again.

New chapter this weekend and next weekend, then it'll be every other weekend after that. Life's about to get pretty messy, so we're going to be switching to biweekly posts.

Biggest thanks and hugs to all of you who take the time to tell me what you think. It's ridiculously interesting to try and write this when all of canon's already established, but man is it fun!