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i.
When she steps out of the bar, the icy wind hits JJ like a truck. The night is cold and clear, and she wraps her puffy coat tighter around her still-warm skin. The outfit she'd chosen for tonight is skimpy, especially given the weather, but she'd chosen it for a reason. The reason in question is a half-step behind her, gluing herself to JJ's side once they've both made it onto the sidewalk.
Elle Greenaway is beautiful in every light, but between the moon-bright glow of the winter night and the warmth spilling out from the bar behind them, she's radiant. She hooks her arm through JJ's as they set off down the block, destination unspecified, but JJ doesn't care so long as she's with Elle. The two of them have been seeing each other for a few weeks—not dating, she'd emphasized to Penelope—but there is definitely intention behind these nights they spend together. And as much as JJ has tried to downplay things to her best friend, she cannot deny that every time she and Elle are alone like this, she wants to kiss her so badly that it drives her to distraction.
"I can hear you thinking," Elle murmurs, her voice quiet and close. JJ turns slightly to meet her gaze, her knowing smile. "Talk to me, bella."
JJ's heart stutters; every time Elle throws around pet names, it turns JJ to mush. Ducking her head, she pushes her shoulder against Elle's. "I'm just…thinking about us."
"Oh?" Her voice lilts, surprised. "What about us?"
A million possible answers flit through her mind. How happy Elle makes her. How natural it feels to be this close. How much fun she has when they're together, even if they're not together. How, maybe, JJ wants them to be. This close to Elle, her brain just the right amount of fuzzy from the alcohol, JJ thinks she might have it in her to be brave. To say the other thing that she's been thinking about, and for much longer than just tonight.
Her feet stop moving of their own accord, pulling Elle to a stop with her. When she turns to JJ, frowning lightly, that desire surges through JJ again. The words spill from her lips before she can tell herself to think it through: "I want to kiss you."
Elle's frown melts away into a grin, her eyes glinting with more than just starlight. "Then why haven't you?"
Any remaining hesitation JJ may have had dissolves at her words. Stepping fully into Elle's space, JJ slides her free hand into her hair and kisses her deeply. Elle's arm tightens around her waist, and JJ can feel her warmth even through the layers of coats. JJ isn't aware that she's pushing Elle forward until her back hits the brick wall of the building beside them, and the brunette's quiet oof breaks their kiss before they both dissolve into giggles. "Sorry," JJ says, releasing Elle's arm to cradle her face with both hands. "Got carried away."
"Please, get carried away more often," breathes Elle, her grip steady on JJ's hips despite her blown gaze. JJ grins before leaning in again, capturing Elle's lips in another heated kiss that chases all thoughts of the winter night away. If it weren't for the fact that they're in public, or that they both have to breathe, JJ would be happy to stand there and make out with Elle until the sun comes up. When she reluctantly pulls away, chest heaving, she meets Elle's dark gaze and feels electrified.
"Tell me this doesn't end here," she whispers, the warmth of her breath ghosting across Elle's lips.
When she smiles, JJ's heart flutters. "After you kissed me like that? There's no way I'm letting you go, pretty girl." She buries her face in Elle's neck, feeling the blush burn through her from both the endearment and the implications of Elle's words. Elle holds her close for a long moment before she reaches up to JJ's cheek. "Jay, look!" Pulling back, JJ follows Elle's pointed finger up toward the sky. A curve of light flashes overhead as the shooting star streaks past them. Still held in Elle's embrace, secure and warm against her chest, JJ hears her next words easily. "Make a wish."
I want this to last forever.
It's too big a wish to say out loud, and certainly not this soon. Besides, as Penelope loves to remind her, if you say it out loud then it won't come true. But as JJ nuzzles further into Elle's embrace, and as the brunette's arms tighten around her body, she thinks that maybe, if she's lucky, she isn't the only one who made that wish.
ii.
Out of the corner of her eye, JJ notices the clover patch in the grass: slightly darker than the rest of the lawn, spreading into the sidewalk cracks.
She doesn't want to be here. She doesn't want to be at this crime scene, even though she was the one who had talked to the one girl's mom and convinced Hotch to take the case. She doesn't want to be with the team, who are all floating around each other as if Elle's absence is a physical presence they have to avoid. She doesn't want to be on the receiving end of all of Gideon's concerned looks that read her more closely than she'd prefer.
It's been five months, but sometimes it still feels like yesterday that she was running through that hospital late at night, Morgan hot on her heels, as they tried to find Hotch. His words had been on replay during their interview, during the hours-long drive: she's been shot. Elle, alone in her apartment, because Hotch thought she'd be safe there. Elle, at the mercy of the Fisher King, because Gideon had told JJ to do that press conference. Between the guilt and the fear, JJ had been nearly catatonic on the drive back. It was only when Morgan skidded to a stop outside the hospital did a spark come back into JJ, and she'd led them through those long, sterile halls, desperate to be told that her girlfriend was still alive.
She hardly remembers their conversation with Hotch, but she does remember the relief. He had tried to tell her to come back in the morning, but she hadn't listened—instead, she had gone straight to Elle's room. Gideon was there already, and despite JJ's anger, she hadn't been able to ask him to leave. His presence had been strangely comforting to her, because despite how massively he'd fucked up, she knew he cared for Elle, too. So the two of them sat in the shared, loaded silence for hours until Elle woke up.
Only once JJ saw the honey-brown of her eyes did everything collapse in her chest, and she finally let herself cry.
In the months between then and now, they had both tried. JJ tried to keep Elle together and Elle tried to let her, even though she had never exactly been good at asking for help. But it reached a point where they both knew that it wasn't enough. Elle needed to get out, had to get as far away from the BAU as she could before she snapped. And JJ knew she couldn't go with her.
There wasn't a breakup so much as there was a kiss and a goodnight that they both knew would have no good morning to follow. Even still, every time a door opens, JJ looks up, her heart leaping with hope.
She still isn't used to the disappointment.
At the end of the driveway, she lets Morgan bump into her, scattering the sheets from her case file across the grass. She waves away his apology and offer to help, focusing instead on crouching down and examining the clover beneath her pages. She doesn't really believe in wishes and things, not the way Penelope does, but it doesn't stop her from looking. As she arranges everything into a semblance of order, her knees growing damp on the grass, she actually sees one: a four-leaf clover, right at the sidewalk's edge. She sits back on her heels, preparing to stand, and glances quickly around. Even if there was someone around to see her, she's part of whatever plague has settled on Elle's memory. No one is looking much at her, anyway.
She plucks the clover from the ground and slips it into her file, as if it's a flower from a lover that she wants to preserve. Tucking the file to her chest, JJ turns toward the van, ready to get out of this crime scene and get started on her own work. She sighs at her childishness even as she feels the wish forming in the back of her mind.
I want you to come home. I don't know how to do this without you.
Stupid, she knows. As if anyone will hear it.
iii.
Even though she knows she shouldn't be, JJ is still surprised at how quickly a new agent is added to the team. One day it's just the six of them, and the next there's a seventh again, prepped and ready to go. If Emily Prentiss has any idea of the tense situation she's found herself in, she certainly isn't showing it. But JJ, long used to the idiosyncrasies of her team, sees everything. Hotch doesn't trust her; Gideon underestimates her; Spencer hates her (as much as he can hate someone) on principle, simply because she isn't Elle; Morgan is fronting neutrality; and Penelope, at least, seems to genuinely like her. As for JJ herself? It's a loaded question.
She avoids answering it by keeping all of her interactions with Emily strictly professional. She doesn't have to like the other agent to work well with her, and it's a skill JJ has honed over the years of working with men who don't respect her. But despite the effort, JJ knows she's fighting a losing battle. Emily is simply too easy to like, which of course only makes it all worse.
Worse, because JJ is still in love with a ghost, and every time Emily laughs from her desk—Elle's desk—it hits JJ like a punch to the sternum.
At least she has her office, which is where she's spent most of this particular morning avoiding the rest of her coworkers. When JJ walks into the kitchenette around noon for more coffee, Penelope is holding court in front of Emily, Morgan, and Spencer, all of whom appear to be in various stages of distress. JJ can't help but give a helpless grin when Emily widens her eyes at her, a silent plea for intervention. Getting Penelope to stop is a skill JJ does not have. "Whatcha doing?" she asks casually, skirting around Spencer to refill her mug.
"Garcia's reading our horoscopes," he tells her, seeming the least bothered by the predicament. "We've discovered that Prentiss and I have the same birthday and that she hates being vulnerable."
"Just because I don't want to share my childhood with you people does not mean I hate being vulnerable," says Emily hotly.
This, at least, gets a chuckle out of Morgan, who seems to only be putting up with the scenario because it's Penelope. "Come on, Prentiss, don't be coy. Here, let's see what JJ makes of it. What'd you say again?" He leans over to Penelope, who straightens the newspaper with a flourish.
"A new connection will spark important memories from your past, illuminating new personal meanings. It doesn't say anything about childhood, Emily." Continuing around the table, JJ stops at Penelope's elbow. She looks up at her with a grin. "Thoughts?"
Ignoring Emily's grumble of how Reid has the same message and no one's bothering him, JJ shrugs and says lightly, "Well, she's made a bunch of new connections in joining the team. Maybe one of us will illuminate something for her."
This earns her a round of laughter and a gasp of betrayal from Emily that quickly morphs into a determination that JJ knows can only mean trouble. "You wound me, JJ. What's yours say, huh? Let's dig into your psyche, if you're so game."
JJ has only a moment to begin regretting her choice in coming in here before Penelope says, "Let's see, for my lovely Sagittarius…here we go. There's a possibility that over the past month you've been hesitant about your commitments, as if you were in suspended animation. Now that you're aware of your past errors, you can face your future with renewed perspective."
The silence that greets Penelope's words is so pointed, JJ is sure that even Emily knows something is up. Schooling her face into neutrality, JJ keeps her eyes glued to the newspaper and doesn't comment. There really is no question as to what that means for her—even the timeline is right. But the concept of this cheesy horoscope referring to Elle as an error sends a spike of irritation through JJ that she knows is irrational, but she's unable to stop it. As her friends continue exchanging concerned glances in the wake of her silence, JJ's eyes skim the column of their own volition until they find a chunk of text that tightens her throat with emotion.
Cancer: After a series of turbulent life events, a period of calm is in store. Deep personal changes are coming your way.
God, she hopes it's true—and immediately chastises herself for thinking that. What business does she have reading Elle's horoscope anyway? It's been over a month since she left, and JJ's heard fuck-all from the other woman. She has no idea where Elle is or how she's doing. Part of her thinks she should hate her, but the part that still loves her is louder.
"Well," Penelope finally says, drawing JJ back to the present. "That's certainly something to think about, isn't it, Jayje?"
She only manages a noncommittal hum before her phone rings, and she reaches for it with a surge of gratefulness. The call urges her back to her office, where she can hide once again from the many pairs of eyes that watch her too closely—and the one that isn't there at all.
iv.
As much as JJ complains that the BAU are all too much in each other's business, it is often a relief that this is the family she's chosen for herself. Holidays are complicated for JJ, and she knows she isn't the only one on the team who feels that way. Hotch is really the only one who has a family to spend time with, but as Christmas creeps up on them, they all know he'll make the effort to attend whatever team-wide shindig Penelope will inevitably plan.
Surprisingly it is Gideon, awkward as ever, who offers to host, which Penelope accepts after a still-polite amount of stunned silence. The energy among the team starts to buoy as the day grows closer, stoked by Penelope and merrily carried out by Morgan, Spencer, and Emily, who against all odds have formed quite the trio in the last few months. Even Gideon is reluctantly festive, which is amusing more than endearing, but they cherish it all the same.
JJ tells herself she can push through it, but the doubt plagues her even when she arrives on Gideon's doorstep. In the seventeen years since Roslyn died, JJ has approached the holidays with a very grin-and-bear-it mentality, though it's been a little easier these last few years. She had one beautiful Christmas with Elle before she lost it all, and this year, she isn't sure she can make it through. But she shows up anyway, unable to disappoint her best friend and unwilling to entertain the pitying looks she'll get if she no-shows. She's no stranger to swallowing her grief for the sake of others.
This year, Gideon has pulled out all the stops, cooking a spread of food that could feed a team twice as big as theirs. Between the wine and the laughter, JJ is almost able to mean her good humor. Emily is all smiles beside her, and across the table, Spencer keeps them entertained with a never-ending catalog of holiday-themed facts. Gideon and Hotch hold their own council at the other end of the table, their quiet affection for the younger agents still managing to fill the room. By the time dinner winds down, JJ feels almost normal again.
She's only paying partial attention to a story Morgan is telling when Emily gasps quietly beside her. "No way." Leaning forward slightly, Emily uses her knife to nudge at the half-carved turkey in front of them before pulling out a thin, curved bone. Her smile is bright and childish, nearly infectious. Holding out the wishbone to JJ, she asks, "Wanna play?"
Unable to say no to Emily's joy, JJ carefully grips the other end of the bone. Emily counts down from three before they both pull, and JJ just barely remembers that this is a game she could win before the wishbone snaps. In her fingers lies the larger half.
"Well, what do you know?" Emily says, not sounding the least bit disappointed. "Make a wish."
"I wish Elle was here."
The words are gone before she can stop them, before she can think. Her only saving grace is the softness of her voice and the timely laughter of Morgan and Penelope that keeps the rest of the group from hearing her stupid, stupid wish. But Emily and Spencer both go still, and JJ has to choke down the wave of tears that threatens to burst from her at the slip. She hasn't spoken Elle's name since she left, and her throat burns with its memory. She pushes out her chair and stumbles from the room before she begins to sob.
Over the table, Emily's confused gaze meets Spencer's concerned one, and he exhales softly as he watches JJ go. His voice is only loud enough for her to hear when he says, "She never talks about Elle, but every time we go out, she tells people she's taken. Some part of her still believes that she's going to come back."
Emily closes her fist around her half of the wishbone, feeling irrevocably foolish. "Can't say I blame her for not wanting to move on."
A twitch of Spencer's eyebrows is the only answer she gets for a long moment. If she listens hard, Emily wonders if she can actually hear JJ crying from somewhere else in the house, or if it's simply the wind outside. When Spencer finally speaks again, his words break Emily's heart.
"I don't think she can."
v.
The team is gathered in the conference room of the local precinct, surrounded by several boards' worth of evidence, victimology, and timelines. A few hours outside of Chicago, the weather here is still bitterly cold even as winter trends toward spring, and it has seeped in with them. Several of the victims had been found blue with cold, and one was practically frozen through. It's been a brutal two days, but the energy in the room speaks to the team's approach to a breakthrough.
"There's an eerie consistency to the unsub's timeline," Spencer is saying, adding a few notes to the board. "The time between capture, kill, and the tape he releases afterward are almost identical for each victim."
"It's more than that," Penelope adds. She sits on video call in the center of the table. "I've been going back over the tapes he's sent to the precinct, and these things are down to the minute. Each one begins at six-twenty, lasts between forty and forty-five seconds, and is emailed to the police at exactly six twenty-four. They're all like this."
The conversation continues, but JJ's attention snags on the time. Six twenty-four is oddly specific, but it pangs in her chest for a different reason—a different importance. It's Elle's birthday. JJ would recognize it anywhere.
"It could be a manifestation of obsessive-compulsive disorder," Emily suggests as she walks around the table. Her passing jolts JJ out of her memories, and she returns her attention to the board.
Hotch tells Penelope to add an OCD diagnosis or treatment into her search. They've already localized the victim pool to the nearby university, but the profile so far has been too wide to really be effective in narrowing down their suspects. She acknowledges this with a roger that and the room falls momentarily quiet. Amid the distant clacking of Penelope's keyboard, JJ's mind begins to churn. She isn't a profiler, but she's absorbed plenty over the last couple of years. That specific number is important to her, so what if…
JJ surprises herself by speaking the thought aloud. "Could it be that these times mean something to the unsub specifically, outside of a compulsion? We're already operating on the theory that he's recreating something from his past, or at the very least trying to rectify something. What if these times are personal to him? They could be the original timeline for whatever happened to him."
Five pairs of eyes land on her immediately, and even though Penelope can't see JJ, she stops typing too. There's a weighted pause before Gideon says, "That's good, JJ. Garcia, map out this timeline and cross-reference it with those we found who had violent experiences in their childhood. See if any of it matches."
"On it," she says, and JJ exhales sharply. Morgan starts shuffling through his notes, but he doesn't have time to share whatever he's thinking, because Penelope is faster. "Got one. Robert Marshall, twenty-seven. He's a grad student and a teacher's assistant at the university. When he was twelve, there was a violent home invasion that lasted several hours. He and his older sister, Nicole, were both home. She died before they could be rescued."
"And the timeline fits?" verifies Hotch, though he and the team are already moving.
"To a tee," says Penelope. "Kids got out of school early, and the perpetrators showed up at twelve forty-five. Nicole's time of death is an estimate on the coroner's report, but there's a note in the police report that Robert claimed it happened at exactly four seventeen. Police breached the home at six twenty and the arrests were made at six twenty-four."
Gideon demands, "Where can we find this kid, Garcia?" She rattles off his on-campus address and sends his schedule to their phones before the team is out the door, leaving JJ behind to run point with Penelope from the station. The silence that settles in the room after such a flurry of activity feels like a ringing in her ears, but at least she can breathe.
She nearly forgets that Penelope is still on the line, and when she speaks JJ jumps. "Good work, Jayje. What made you think of that?"
There's genuine interest in Penelope's tone, but JJ can hear the worry beneath. She delays by fidgeting with the laptop, angling it so she can see Penelope clearly. "The, uh…the time. Six twenty-four." She pauses, wondering if she's being stupid, but Penelope's gaze is gentle. Understanding. "It's Elle's birthday. June twenty-fourth. It's the first thing I thought of when I heard it, so I figured if something like that could be important to me, it could mean something for the unsub, too."
"Oh, JJ. You'll make a hell of a profiler someday." A small laugh escapes JJ even as she shakes her head. Penelope tilts hers to one side, and her voice is soft when she adds, "You miss her, don't you?"
She wishes she didn't, but there's no point in denying it. The yes still gets stuck in her throat.
i.
The windows of Penelope's apartment are all flung open, airing out the space with the desperately craved warm breezes of spring. After a late night that had started as post-case drinks and turned into an impromptu girls' night, JJ is just starting to feel human again in the late morning sunshine. From her spot in the kitchen, she can hear Emily fiddling with Penelope's stereo, and eventually soft strains of music fill the apartment.
Penelope hands JJ a bowl of ingredients and a whisk. "Here, mix that for me."
"And I thought I was just here to look pretty," JJ teases, though she begins stirring anyway.
Throwing her a look, Penelope says, "You can look pretty and help make pancakes, Jayje."
JJ laughs and turns back to the bowl. Despite the dull headache of a hangover that lingers behind her eyes, she is admittedly…happy. It's been just over six months since Elle left—not that JJ's counting the days—and it's been at least that long since JJ really let herself hang out with her friends and simply exist. As reluctant as she'd initially been to embrace Emily's presence, JJ has to admit that the dark-haired woman is a good friend, someone JJ wants to keep around. And Penelope—well, Penelope has always been precious to JJ, and she's been patient with her as she's wallowed through the pit of Elle's absence. While she still refuses to accept the possibility that she may never hear from Elle again, JJ has come to realize that she doesn't have to face everything alone. She can miss Elle and be happy at the same time.
It had still hurt to admit, because the happiness did feel like some sort of twisted betrayal. But, as she glances around the kitchen, JJ knows she's more than lucky that it was Penelope and Emily who were there to carry her through.
The pancake batter has reached the right consistency when Penelope exclaims, "Oh, it's eleven eleven! Make a wish!"
"What are we, twelve?" Emily asks from the living room, and JJ laughs despite herself. But before Emily can continue griping at Penelope's whimsy, a knock echoes from the front door. "I'll get it."
"That woman has no sense of wonder," Penelope says, taking the batter from JJ and moving to the stove.
Of the three of them, it's definitely only Penelope who believes in that sort of magic: wishes and signs and horoscopes, the whole shebang. JJ can't say she's ever felt that same pull, but it's certainly never stopped her from trying—or from feeling silly for doing so. Still, as she stares at the clock hands tick away the minute, she can't quiet the part of her that wants to make another hopeless wish for things to be different.
She's jolted from her thoughts by Emily calling her name. "Hey, Jayje? Can you come here?" There's an undercurrent of uncertainty in Emily's voice, and it's so out of place that JJ doesn't hesitate to step into the living room.
"Is everything o—" The words die on her tongue. She'd assumed the knock at the door to be a delivery driver or one of Penelope's neighbors, but she was wrong. So wrong, in fact, that JJ can't even process the surprise on Emily's face, because she's too busy remembering how to breathe.
Because standing in the open doorway is Elle Greenaway.
She looks much the same as the last time JJ saw her. Her bangs are a little longer, her highlights a little lighter. The semi-permanent bags under her eyes have faded. But her clothes, her eyes, the way she holds herself—it's all exactly as JJ knows. And the way her entire demeanor brightens when she lays eyes on JJ makes her ribcage feel suddenly too small.
"Jay," Elle breathes. The nickname, even quiet, even at a distance, worms its way into JJ's heart. Elle was the only one who ever called her that—never Jayje, never Jen, just Jay. It was all hers, and so was JJ. "Sorry to just show up here. I, uh, I went to your place first, but I ran into your neighbor and she recognized me and said you weren't home, and since it's Saturday I figured you might be here—"
Something long buried unlocks in JJ's chest as Elle speaks, flooding her with with all the longing and ache and love that she has been ignoring for months. She's moving before she can think it through, and Elle's nervous, adorable rambling is cut off by JJ throwing herself into her arms. Elle lets out a startled laugh as she catches her, and as JJ buries her face in the familiar warmth of Elle's shoulder, she's reminded full-force of the night they kissed for the first time. In her excitement, her hunger, she'd chased the air from Elle's lungs by accidentally pushing her into a wall. This doesn't feel all that different, and she laughs too: strangled and wet, but real.
Elle's arms are tight across her back, and when she pulls away slightly to meet her eyes, JJ is relieved that she doesn't loosen her embrace. "I was so scared that I'd never—" She swallows the rest of her words down as Elle's eyes flash with tears. All of that doesn't matter right now, because Elle is here. She came back. JJ shakes her head and restarts. "How are you?"
"I'm okay," Elle whispers, and for the first time in a long time, JJ believes her. "I spent a lot of time just driving, in the beginning. But I decided to give therapy another shot. It's helping. Things are…getting better." Her gaze softens, and JJ shifts her hands to cradle Elle's face between them. "But I realized that I—I wanted you to see me get better, too. I can't return to the BAU, but I can't stop loving you either. I know that I hurt you, when I left, so I understand if you don't…" She blinks hard, swallows. "But I don't want to do this without you."
For a moment, there are no words for JJ to describe the whirlwind in her heart. There is the hurt, yes, but more than that, there is hope. It is there in her chest, bright and burning. It is in Elle's gaze, too, as she watches JJ with what she can only describe as wonder. "I don't want to do this without you either," she whispers, and Elle shudders with relief. "God, I missed you. I missed you so much."
"It's true," Emily agrees solemnly, reminding them of her presence, and JJ knows she can't stop the teasing that's coming. She shakes her head, gaze locked on Elle's, as the brunette tries to hold in a laugh. "That's a keeper, Greenaway. You know, on Christmas she—"
"Enough, Emily," interrupts JJ, the blush already creeping up her cheeks. She turns just quickly enough to glare at the grinning woman before returning to Elle. "She's like the lesbian version of Morgan. Please free me."
Elle's laugh is loud and true as Emily scoffs. "Words wound, JJ!" But soon enough the three of them are all in stitches, and happy isn't a big enough word for JJ anymore.
"What are you guys doing?" Penelope calls, her voice preceding her as she finally steps out of the kitchen. "You've been out here for—oh my god."
From her position glued to Elle's side, JJ grins at her friend's shock. "My wish came true."
Penelope snaps back to herself and huffs affectionately. "We all know you only pretend for my sake, JJ. Come on, Dream Come True, get in here." Elle looks momentarily unsure before JJ grabs her hand and pulls her fully into the apartment. The four of them glance between each other before Penelope smiles, dissolving the remaining nerves. "We're having pancakes. I'm almost done, so go sit!"
The way back is far from over, JJ knows. But as Penelope bustles back toward the kitchen, her easy acceptance a much-needed balm, JJ takes comfort in the fact that it's possible. Elle squeezes her hand, and when their eyes meet, a peacefulness settles over JJ's thoughts. The love in Elle's gaze is warm and heavy like a blanket, and JJ melts even further into her. Maybe shooting stars and wishbones and clovers were silly things to wish on—but right now, she has Elle back, and JJ thinks she'll never need to wish for anything else.
"Come on," she says softly, tugging Elle to follow her. "I've been waiting for you."