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Chapter: It Takes Acquired Minds to Taste This Wine.
Rating: PG. Tame as a baby kitten.
Summary: JJ possesses Angst.
Spoilers: Revelations 2.15
Word Count: ~1600 Words.
Dedication: For those who love Knight Rider.
Warning: Snarky!JJ.
CHAPTER ONE.
Great fat rain drops left her soaked and shaking, heavy black clouds left her suffocated and trapped, and once again, she would not sleep.
Bursts of blonde ran down her back, stringy and wet and matching the same runny pattern as the mascara smeared along her cheeks.
It had been four nights since she'd arrived home from Georgia. Four nights since she'd feared for Reid's life, as well as her own. Four nights without sleep.
Because every time she closed her eyes, she saw six pairs of vicious canine eyes, and three sets of bloody teeth, and three dead animals by her own hand.
After exhaustion set in, induced by three am infomercials and half a bottle of wine, she would wind up passed out on the uncomfortable sofa. Her dreams filled with a confusing jumble of growling and gore and Emily, left her reeling. She'd jolt awake, sweaty and terrified, and stumble into the shower and into some clothes with just enough time to make it to work.
No one noticed, but not because they didn't care. Simply because they were all too busy keeping secrets of their own. Reid was more distant than he'd ever been, and Hotch spent most of him time keeping a close eye on the young doctor.
Derek, usually so charming and excited about their work, always got more reserved around this time of year, hiding behind dim smiles and downcast eyes.
It was clear Gideon wouldn't notice any of them unless they were photos pressed between the pages of his dear notebook, and Emily, the only one she had to worry about seeing right through her, had been avoiding her like some highly unwelcome disease.
Garcia, of course, already knew. Luckily, she also knew JJ well enough not to push.
And so there she was, alone again, standing on her fire escape in the pouring rain, watching droplets cascade into her half empty wine glass.
She absentmindedly pulled yet another cigarette from the crumpled pack on the ledge, sending the appropriate end up in flame with a flick of her twenty-five cent lighter. The smoke made her light headed, and the wine made her dizzy, and for just a second the thought of tumbling down the fifty foot drop didn't sound so scary.
There was blood on her hands, dirt caking her skin, sweat dripping down her neck, but JJ couldn't feel any of it. The sounds of strangled barks and popping gun shots was still ringing so loudly in her ears that her eyes blurred.
She could still feel their eyes on her, imagine their mouths salivating in anticipation of their next meal. The cold metal of her gun was shocking to her senses as she gripped it tightly, knuckles white against the handle, finger squeezed against the trigger.
"Whoa, JJ!" A trick. Her mind was tricking her into thinking it was okay, and she was okay, but she would never be okay. Even as the ferocious eyes of animals transformed into the worried eyes of Emily Prentiss, JJ still didn't feel safe.
"JJ, it's me." But she couldn't hear her over the raging screams of a girl torn to shreds, over the terrifying snarl of hungry dogs. Her finger tightened against the trigger.
And then warm hands were on her wrist, pushing the gun toward the ground, pulling her into a fierce hug. Her mind shut down and the gun clattered to the tiled floor, and Emily just held her tighter.
Somehow, through strangled cries inside her own head, JJ found herself smiling into a cotton covered shoulder, her hands smoothly pulling brown hair down from it's pony tail to fall across an alabaster neck and her own face.
"JJ." She pulled back to look into confused eyes, to smile at Emily's slight frown, to press her lips against soft cheeks and a warm mouth.
For the first time, the sounds in her head stopped and all she could hear was the beating of her own heart.
The echo of someone knocking on her front door stirred her from her self deprecating reverie, but she did not move. Usually a rather patient person, JJ didn't think she could bare to sit through the Mormon spiel one more time.
Than again, what kind of door-to-door's came 'round at one in the morning?
The knock came again.
And again.
And again.
Until finally whomever it was got the hint that she wasn't feeling particularly chatty. Taking another drag of her cigarette, JJ dumped the now overflowing wine glass over the edge, mildly enjoying the scattering of pigeons it caused below.
"That was expensive wine, you know." A voice came from behind her. A sound of sarcastic disbelief slipped from her throat. She should have known this would happen eventually.
"Wasn't my taste." She shrugged; smoke streaming from the corner of her mouth.
"Mine either. That's why I gave it to you." A heavy silence hung in the freezing air, and finally JJ turned to see a rather damp Emily Prentiss straddling her window ledge, dark hair hanging around her face in dripping strands, t-shirt plastered to her skin like a thin layer of paint.
"You didn't answer the door."
"Which somehow you seem to have mistaken for an invitation." Doe eyes just stared at her and with a sigh JJ held out an extra cigarette, which Emily took along with the lighter and lit in one fluid movement.
"Is this where we're supposed to have a heart to heart and talk about our feelings?" JJ wondered dryly, stamping out the filter with the bottom of her wine glass. "Because there's a Knight Rider marathon in about twenty minutes that I've been looking pretty foreword to."
"It won't take long." Emily smirked, but where JJ had expected her to launch into some wiser-than-thou monologue about how she needed to talk to someone, and living like this wouldn't help it go away, she simply stared back at her, cigarette dangling from her lips.
JJ waited, lighting another cigarette and leaning against the rain soaked guard rail, but still, no monologue came.
"Well, this has been fun." She said after a few minutes, raising her eyebrows at the other woman. "But I really should get prepped for that marathon."
She moved to slip back in through the window, but Emily stood to block her way. Feeling a little buzzed from the wine, and a little nicotine high from the smoking and, wow did Emily always smell this good?
"You're not the only one who was scared, JJ." Prentiss said quietly, eyes never leaving JJ's face. The blonde looked back at her stubbornly.
"Oh, really? I guess I missed the part where you were almost torn apart by rabid animals and thought you were responsible for the death of your best friend."
"Did you also miss the part where the woman I," She could tell Emily had let herself get a bit worked up as she took a deep breath to center herself. "You pointed a gun in my face, JJ."
"Oh, please!" JJ turned from Emily to rest her arms on the rail, looking out into the city. "I was on edge and you came sneaking up like the freaking Pink Panther. It was only for a second."
"That's a second longer than I ever wanted it to be." JJ had no sarcastic response to that one, so she ignored it. Neither of them said a word, but Emily moved quietly to stand next to JJ, dropping her cigarette through the metal slats in a shower of sparks.
"You kissed me." It was not an accusation, or a plea for eternal love, but a simple statement of fact. Straightforward, and sincere and just so Emily that it made a crack in JJ's snarky exterior.
"I know," JJ sighed, putting her hand to her temple. "I know! And it was rash, and ridiculous and completely out of line. But I was so scared about Reid and about what it might mean that I was the reason he was gone, and then you were there with your eyes and your best “talking to a victim” face, and I just…”
But it didn’t matter what she ‘just’, because this time it was Emily that wrapped a hand around the back of her neck, and pulled her into a searing kiss. It was nothing like the kiss in the Hankle house had been. Where the first kiss has been rushed and desperate, just the fulfillment of a primal urge, this was careful and languid. Slowly JJ’s arms snaked around Emily’s waist, pulling her close until they were flush against one another, rain cascading around them. They kissed for what could have been hours, or days, or forever and JJ could have died then and been perfectly happy, until Emily careful pulled away.
JJ’s eyes looked worried, and Emily pressed a kiss to her temple.
“Were you serious about that Knight Rider marathon?” The cheesy grin that followed this statement broke JJ's rugged shell completely, and she leaned into kiss Emily softly once more.
"I never joke when it comes to crime fighting cars." JJ grinned. Inside she reveled about the fact that Emily Prentiss could quell her fear and surliness with one sweet kiss.
Hours later would find them both sound asleep on JJ's floor, Emily leaning against the sofa with a drooling JJ draped over most of her body. They'd finished off the rest of the wine, the empty bottle having rolled across the floor to clink against the tv set. Their shoes were kicked off, and their legs were entangled, as though they'd slept together every night for the past twenty years. Most of the Knight Rider Marathon had been replaced by conversation and longing glances, but neither seemed to mind.
JJ had TiVo.
FIN.
TBC.
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