Chapter Text
It was a sunny sunday afternoon, and the Prentiss-Jareau family was enjoying the first day of summer.
JJ was standing on the patio, watching her children playing in the yard. Rose was running around. She was now 6 and overflowing with energy.
“Rose, honey!” shouted JJ, trying to get her daughter’s attention.
She stopped running and looked at her mother, squinting because of the sun in her eyes. “What?”
“Your hat!” said JJ, pointing at Rose’s pink hat on the grass behind her. “Put it on, or you’re gonna have to play inside”
“But it keeps falling” said Rose, pouting.
“Then stop running, it’s too hot outside, you’re gonna get sick because of the heat if you don’t keep it on”.
Rose looked at her with her fake-mad look but still listened to her mom and put it back on before running away again, this time holding on to her hat in such a cute way that it made JJ crack up.
She then looked at the toddler playing in the grass a few feet away from her, smiling. After having Rose, JJ started wishing for a third child, and lucky for her, Emily was secretly wishing that too. So when Rose turned three, they made an appointment with a doctor, and a few months later, JJ was pregnant again. And nine months later, the family had a new member : Casey, who was, in the eyes of her mothers, one of the cutest little girls in the world, alongside Rose. She was now almost a year old, and eager to discover the world. She was curious and captivated by everything. JJ couldn’t help but feel blessed to have such wonderful children.
Emily appeared behind her, with three iced-tea on a platter. She handed one to Henry, who was sitting in the chair.
“Thanks Em” he said, not taking his eyes from his phone. Henry was now fourteen, in the middle of his teenage crisis.
She then turned around and gave one to her wife, who smiled at her. “Thanks love, you’re a lifesaver”
“You’re welcome” said Emily, planting a kiss on her wife’s cheek.
Casey started laughing, which caught their attention. A butterfly was flying around her, and eventually landed on a flower right in front of the little girl. Rose noticed it and squatted next to her sister.
She slowly pointed at the butterfly and said “See how it’s yellow with black stripes? It’s called a tiger swallowtail, its wings are large, and that’s why they can navigate easily from flower to flower, it only travels in a five-mile radius. And people always say that butterflies only live for one day, and some of them do, but this one lives for about two weeks, which is still short compared to us”. Casey was looking at her older sister with admiration in her eyes. Rose was like that, incredibly smart. Every time she’d be passionate about something, she would learn everything about it. It happened with dinosaurs, stars, and now butterflies.
“Our daughter is so smart” whispered Emily.
“She takes after her mother” said JJ, wrapping an arm around her wife’s shoulders. She then looked at his son, still on his phone. He was slightly smiling, and seeing how fast he was typing, he was probably texting someone.
She whispered to Emily “I think Henry has a girlfriend”
“How do you know?”
“He’s been so secretive lately, and he smiles everytime his phone rings, and...I mean I know him, he acts like a boy that’s in love. Maybe I should talk to him about it?”
Emily noticed the look in her wife’s eyes, she could see she was now sure she needed to talk to him. “JJ” said the brunette, grabbing her wife’s arm to keep her from walking up to Henry. “JJ, I know it seems like a good idea right now, but it’s not. You were a teen once, and it’s normal to keep secrets from your parents. He’ll come talk to you when he’ll be ready. Just give him time, okay?”
Emily was right, as usual, but JJ still felt sort of disappointed. She wanted to be close to her son, she wanted to know everything about his life, she wanted to protect him from getting hurt. But she also knew that he had to learn on his own.
She looked away from her son, and turned her attention back to her daughters, both laying on the grass. Ever since Casey had showed up in her life, she felt the duty to teach her everything she knew, and Casey loved it.