Soaring Free
Quantico, Virginia. January 2015.
JJ shut her former office door firmly behind her, determined to keep the ghost of Tivon Askari as far away from her as possible. She almost laughed; she had been working with the Behavioural Analysis Unit for ten years now, and the depravity that people were capable of still came as a shock to her, even after all this time.
Almost unconsciously, JJ found herself walking into the briefing room, letting her hand trace the circumference of the round table as she strolled by it, until she stopped in front of the screen at the head of the room. She had lost count of the number of cases she had presented to the team here during her time as Media Liaison, and she couldn’t even fathom trying to put a number to the amount of cases she had heard from Garcia since officially becoming a profiler.
Ten years spent staring at dead and mutilated bodies, and it never gets any easier.
In fact, JJ mused angrily, it had only gotten worse.
“I’m sorry.”
JJ spun around, nearly dropping her go-bag that was slung over her shoulder and instinctively reaching for the gun attached at her hip. She closed her eyes in relief and lowered her weapon when she realized that it was only Spence, who was leaning slightly on the doorframe, arms raised in a show of non-aggression.
“You scared me.”
“I’m sorry.”
“You said that already, what are you sorry for?”
He moved to sit down in his regular chair at the table, and JJ, suddenly finding herself incredibly exhausted from the day, sat across from him.
“If the file on Tivon Askari did more harm than good. I was grabbing a coffee before I left and noticed your old office light was still on. Just wanted to make sure you were okay.”
JJ couldn’t help but smile. Only he could get a coffee at ten past midnight before leaving work that should have ended four or so hours ago. It was comforting, in a way; the knowledge that although they have all been irrevocably changed over the past ten years, some things stayed exactly the same.
“I’m not sure whether it helped yet, but I don’t think it did any damage.”
He nodded in response but said no more. JJ wondered if that was where their conversation was going to be left, a middle ground with no solution. She knew, logically, that this feeling inside of her had no easy solution, and that the existence of a black and white world was a child’s fantasy. It didn’t make it hurt any less, though.
“You need something to hold on to.”
“What?”
Spencer’s words shocked her out of her thoughts, and she looked at him with furrowed brows.
“Its hard to explain – it doesn’t have to be exactly physical. But I’ve found it useful to have something to tether you to reality when everything starts to get a bit… much”
“Oh, like dilaudid?”
And JJ hated herself just then. Hated the sharpness that accompanied her words, and the pain that flashed in her best friend’s eyes at the reminder of his struggles. Most of all she hated, with a vicious passion, what this trauma was turning her into. She recalled the words of Tivon Askari, or at least, her hallucination of him. He promised that he would change her so completely that she would be unrecognisable, even to herself. She couldn’t, wouldn’t let that happen.
“I’m so sorry- “
“It’s alright. You weren’t completely wrong.”
JJ’s heart skipped a beat, and she felt every inch of her body turn cold with fear. Spencer must have noticed, and quickly tripped over his words in explanation.
“No! No, not like that. Never that. Its- It is related though. I mean- Its- “
He stopped trying then, and instead reached deep into his trouser pocket, pulling out a seemingly innocuous coin. A nod of his head prompted JJ to reach across and grab it with slightly shaking hands. It was golden and worn and engraved, and along the top it said, ‘One Year’.
“I’ve had this for seven years now, and I never go anywhere without it.”
He stooped over suddenly, reaching into his bag that was on the floor. After a few seconds of rumbling through his belongings, he slid a book onto the table as well. JJ didn’t recognise the title, but it was obvious that Spencer treasured it. The front cover was slightly worn, but the pages inside looked to be in pristine condition.
“A couple weeks before Maeve was killed we had arranged to meet at a restaurant. It turned out to be too dangerous, but she left me this present. I had gotten her the exact same book.”
His soft explanation halted slightly, and JJ looked up from the book to see him staring at it also, with a look of untainted love in his eyes.
“I always carry these. As a sort of reminder, I guess. If I can last seven years, I can last another day. If the love between me and Maeve wasn’t real, how could we know each other so intimately, so perfectly?”
And suddenly JJ was angry, not at him, but at his stubborn brain.
“Of course your love was real! How could you think it wasn’t? Because you never… what, kissed her? Being in love is so much more than that.”
And then Spence was nodding along, agreeing with her, and rambling about how he himself came to that conclusion a few months after her death. But to her chagrin, JJ found she wasn’t listening. Her own words seemed to hover in the air, staring her in the face. Daring her to make the connection. Being in love is so much more than a kiss on the lips. It is so much more than that. That love is trashy motel rooms in 2007 and complaining about reporters. That love is the jet on the long flight to Paris, with uncertainty sinking into their bones. It’s the car ride to the airport. Black hair, sometimes with a fringe. Being in love is-
“…Emily agrees with me, by the way, and-“
“Emily?”
Spence looked her in the eyes, soft amusement gracing his features.
“Emily agrees with me, that you need someone to talk to, and something to hold on to.”
JJ, desperate to think about something else, anything else, racked her brain for a question to ask, to set Spencer on another ramble that she could lose herself in.
“Who was your person? To talk to?”
But that was the wrong question to ask. Although Spence was explaining at several thousand miles an hour that for dilaudid it was his sponsor, someone high up in the FBI that was of course going to remain anonymous, and that for Maeve it was Rossi, who had so recently, so tragically, lost his first wife, JJ was sucked back into her own thoughts.
Unbidden, a memory stirred. Emily, sitting to her right, the space between them illuminated by the glowing ‘Departures’ sign. Her voice, so unique, so soft, telling her that she would need someone to talk to. Emily, who was sarcastic and witty and kind and good. Emily, who had gotten a blackbird tattoo after the worst experience of her life, just to remind herself of JJ. To give her something to hold on to-
Oh.
And suddenly JJ was tearing up, and she heard the comforting sounds of Spencer rambling being replaced with concern. She brushed him off and stood up, smiling although her eyes were red.
“If I ever have a bad day, can I talk to you?”
Emily had said that talking to someone who recognised what you were going through helped. Hotch, who had so recently had his life destroyed by Foyet, had stepped up after Emily had hers destroyed by Doyle. If there was anyone on the team who knew that it was like to be held, tied, and beaten, it was Spence. And that knowledge hurt her, but it also made her feel safe.
Spencer answered with a nod, and JJ smiled again.
She had her team, she had her family, she had her best friend.
There was only one more thing she needed.
--
The tattoo parlour that JJ strolled into a few weeks later was positively miniscule. It was situated at the end of a cramped street in some random town in Missouri. There were no flashy signs announcing it. In fact, only the low lamp light on the street illuminated JJ’s way. She was lucky to get this chance. The team had a case there that, miraculously, ended rather quickly and bloodlessly. It gave her an evening off before the flight home to do an important job.
The tattoo artist raised pierced eyebrows in shock when she rolled up her shirt, revealing the electrical burn on her abdomen. He quickly recovered, however, and started in on the design. JJ had always imagined herself spending hours agonising over a decision like this. If she were going to ink something permanently on her body, she would want it to be perfect. If there was anything she had learned, however, in the past year, the past decade, it was that perfection was an impossibility.
Oh, many things in life came close. Her memory flashed with snippets of laughter and early morning breakfasts, tight hugs and clouds high in the sky. She thought of the black hair that accompanied each moment, and how despite how long it had been since she had seen it in person, she could still smell the luxury shampoo that Emily swore by.
JJ was married. Happily. Love came in many forms, and what she felt for Will was certainly love. He made her feel good, and safe, and present. Henry was the light of her life, and took precedence above all else, no questions asked. Her adorable little baby star, whose smile missed his front teeth and whose hair was as bright as hers. Tivon Askari had taken away Henry’s little brother or sister, and JJ still physically ached whenever she thought about it. Despite all she had, so much was taken from her, and it was impossible not to feel angry.
There were days, impossibly long days, the ones Emily had warned her about, where she felt broken. Days where her brain screeched at her, loud as a faulty motel heater, that nothing in life, not even her precious family, would allow her to feel whole again. These were the days that perfection mocked her. She knew from the outside that all looked well, a young husband and wife, with their gorgeous little boy. Perfection was an illusion, and a cruel one.
Emily was too cold sometimes, compartmentalizing so much of herself that JJ struggled to see below the surface. She was impossibly stubborn and self-sacrificing, and it terrified JJ to no end.
JJ missed her.
She missed her fringe, her turtleneck jumpers, her sharp nose, and her rosy cheeks. She missed the curve of her lips. She missed Emily, and life would never be prefect.
But that didn’t mean life had to be over.
The buzzing of the needle stopped, and JJ stared down at her abdomen.
It was simple and minimalist, a small blackbird in flight. But while Emily’s was on the right side of her body, and flying west, JJ’s was on the left, and flying east.
And at night, when she dreamed, she imagined them flying to each other, and meeting halfway across the Atlantic.
Two broken blackbirds, but they could still soar.
Maybe that’s what being in love was.