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Of things I'd rather keep in silence, I must sing. - Comtessa de Dia
Emily Prentiss sang in the shower, loudly.
She wrote all of the songs, no top 40 hits for her. All of her innermost thoughts and feelings transformed into music, and she loved every minute of it.
It all began in Paris when she finally accepted her solitude. Soon after, she found herself humming an unknown song while washing her hair. Then, a few days later she noticed she was mouthing words to another mystery tune while she was shaving her legs. Eventually, she let her voice take over.
The next few weeks were filled with off-key renditions of “Fucking Doyle”, “I Wanna Go Home”, and her all-time favorite “Oh, What Did They Bury?” She didn’t care if her neighbors heard her because none of them spoke English well enough to really understand the lyrics. But she soon realized the walls to her apartment were thinner than she thought when she heard the young daughter of her next-door neighbor humming the tune to “Fucking Doyle” while hopping down the stairs. Emily laughed out loud at the absurd cuteness.
A few days later, Emily bought a leatherbound blank journal and began writing down her songs. She spent the better part of a rainy weekend thinking of the ways being in France reminded her of her team. From this contemplative set arose the pop song “Baguettes as Tall as Morgan” and the jazz number “Rossi’s Next Wife Wears Designer Clothes”. Ironically, the last song from her time in Paris was a French-style ballad called “France Be My Home” that she finished writing two days before she was transferred to Italy without warning.
After she moved to Rome, Emily began delving into the world of music composition. She spent early afternoons taking voice lessons and late evenings researching in dusty libraries. Once, she even found a 12th-century piece that reminded her so much of how she believed Doyle felt about her that she took a two-week break from music.
Over time, Emily’s voice gained some real strength and her songwriting skills improved dramatically. Again, she bought a journal and let Rome and her creativity lead her music along. She began with “Mr. Writer Italiano” as a tribute to Rossi; she was in Italy, after all. A fairly sexually-frustrated night prompted a soulful, deep tune she called “A First Step”, which was about what it would be like to have an impromptu night with Hotch. An unseasonably cold night brought up an energetic song named “Boiling”, all about Morgan’s high body temperature. Three days of museum-hopping compelled her to write “Facts and Figures” and “Da Vinci Who?” but after a couple of weeks with no inspiration, she decided to change her hobby.
A recommendation to an online Scrabble site filled her time nicely. Emily still sang the old favorites in the shower, but her composing went on the back burner as she connected with the user named Cheeto Breath. Soon, her music journal became a word bank, but she did end up with a rap song called “Triple Letter”.
Life in Rome was good for the most part, and she left Italy with a sad, fairly controlled aria called “Oil and Marble”.
Her time in Barcelona was short, but she managed to find some music in the experience. Like she did twice before, Emily purchased a journal to hold her music and, for the first time, more traditional journal entries. She created a club song called “Electric Color” that reminded her of Garcia after an impromptu night out at a club with too many young people. She taped the entry bracelet into her journal and wrote four pages about how much Spain had changed since she was last there as a teenager. If she had a guitar, her ode to Seaver, “Tal Vez Mi Hermanita”, would have been a danceable experience. She cried as she wrote letters to each member of her team into her journal to ensure that she would never send them off. “Morena” came about while thinking about people who may not even know she was dead. Emily spent a good five days writing down the names of all the people she left behind. A sunny day at the park made her think about the good times she had with her BAU team. Emily wrote “Make Me Smile”, a song that still made her cry, and “Loco Locals”, a song that made her laugh so hard she could barely breathe. She was just finishing “Don’t Think About It” when she got the call to come back home.
The day had been rough and Emily wanted to sing about the uncooperative locals and the stress her team was under. But they were staying in a motel and the walls were thin. Pushing down her embarrassment, Emily took a deep breath, got into the shower, and began to sing.
She decided to leave out the words and just go with the melody of “Loco Locals”, “Fucking Doyle” and “Don’t Think About It”, smiling at the way her voice sounded in the small bathroom. For a moment, it felt as if she was back in Spain once more but the still-healing bruise on her hip from last week’s case was a jolt back to reality.
When the rest of the team showed up for breakfast the next morning, no one mentioned her late-night concert. She wasn’t embarrassed anymore, just curious. Emily wanted someone to say something but no one seemed to have an opinion.
But then, when she was driving with Hotch to speak with a new witness, she could have sworn she heard him humming to himself. At lunch, Reid started on a rant about late in life musical lessons. JJ joined in to say that while not every adult is made to sing, she did know someone who had a decent voice. After they finished the case, Rossi joked that screaming at the unsub could really mess with her vocal cords. As they drove back to the motel, Morgan mentioned a club that had an open mic night every Wednesday. While packing up for the trip back home, Emily made a call.
“Garcia?”
“Yes, pop princess?”
“Do you have any recording equipment?”
“I am getting it all ready for you now,” Garcia said. She received a low-quality recording of Emily’s singing that morning and was determined to find a way to hear the real thing.
“Thanks a lot, Garcia,” Emily replied. She was not angry. She had been dodging questions about how she got through her time in hiding, and she finally realized she had the perfect way to answer. But she was going to leave some songs out for the sake of the team’s sanity.