Stuck in another world

Chapter 1

Emily agreed to meet Garcia at her new favorite coffee truck this morning and, while it was early and loud, she was glad to have the excuse to get out of the house. She has had a lot on her mind recently. Mendoza has been asking her to visit him and to meet his daughter. While she's always wanted children, she recognizes how big this step is and doesn't know how she feels about taking it. As she's waiting for Penelope to arrive she orders their coffees and watches as a mom pushes a stroller by her. She considers Mendoza's offer again and almost gets lost in thought when her bubbly friend shows up. She's glad to have the distraction and listens as Garcia spoils the new episode of a show for her. While she's listening, her mind wonders slightly to JJ. She's always had lingering feelings for the blonde that usually don't get brought up anymore but aspects of what Garcia is describing sound oddly familiar.

When she hears Penelope say "you're going to this now?! She's loved her for years" Emily is bounced out of her daydream. She jumps back into Unit Chief mode (as well as loving best friend) and smiles as she tells Garcia to lay off the coffee. When Emily walks into her office she is faced head on with yet another reminder that she needs to make up her mind about Andrew.

Before she can even get lost in her spiral of racing thoughts, she is interrupted by a knock on the door. Great she thinks as the other muse of her recent anxiety enters her office. Emily almost misses what JJ says as she is wrapped up in her thoughts. This time she's busy admiring her coworker in the skirt she picked out that morning and the smile she is being pleasantly surprised with.

When she tunes back into the conversation she hears JJ say "that Andrew Mendoza is a keeper". Emily gives a groan as her response, her mind leaving the conversation again as she gets yet another call from the "keeper" himself. As Emily somewhat frantically leaves for the meeting her friend so kindly reminded her of, she can't help but notice JJ lingering to look at the flowers that Mendoza had sent her.
Could she be reconsidering us too? she shakes the thought from her head and attempts to give her budget meeting her full attention. Unfortunately the moment she is out of the meeting she can't ignore Andrew any longer. When she finally calls him back she gets news that his precinct in Denver needs the BAUs help.

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Emily was overwhelmed with the thought of having to go visit her boyfriend on a BAU case when she is still trying to decide whether she is ready to take the next step in their relationship. To make matters worse the lingering feelings for JJ that she had been somewhat successfully pushing down for years were coming up in full force. If that wasn't enough, this case meant the three would likely be in the same room often over the next few days and Penelope, not knowing what was going on, was more than ready to tease her about her trip to see her boyfriend.

While Penelope may have slightly misread the situation, JJ, being a profiler and the only person in the world who could read Emily like a children's book, knew that something was up. After reviewing the profile on the jet, JJ decided to pull her aside. "Okay...what's up with you? A man sends you gorgeous bouquet and your response is 'mhm' then Penelope tries to tease you about the guy and we get the basic run down of everything we already know from working with him? What's going on?"
Emily doesn't know how to respond. She honestly barely even knows what JJ said because as she was talking, Emily was thinking back to a different conversation they had on this jet.

About 12 years before this, they were on a different case in Denver and it was a rough one. The only thing that kept her going was getting justice for Carrie and the fact that she could tell JJ was just as invested as she was. Carrie had lost both of her parents and her younger brother to a murdering duo who had met in a horrible foster home environment. Between watching this 16 year old lose everything and almost having to send the other foster kids back into the home she thought she was going to lose it. That's when she got the idea. Emily decided she could adopt Carrie, take her back to Virginia with her, and figure the rest out later. Unfortunately her fast track to motherhood was quickly derailed, Carrie was already spoken for and had family flying in to take care of her.

Emily will never forget the conversation that she had with JJ though. She was sitting on the jet waiting to take off so she could hopefully just sleep off this horrible case when JJ came and sat across from her. After reassuring her that Carrie would be in good hands, JJ said "I think it's a good idea though" to which Emily didn't know what she was talking about so she said "what?". JJ responded "You...kids...I could see it". This lit Emily up from the inside out. She smiled and said "yeah?".

As she watched JJ nod in response, she realized that maybe just maybe she would want JJ to be the one that helped her raise those kids one day. As Emily looked back on this conversation and the realization that came from it she couldn't help but smile.
"Em?" she heard JJ say, bringing her back to the present.

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Emily was snapped back to reality. A reality where JJ had her own kids with her own husband and she was on a plane to see her boyfriend and potentially his kid. Emily's once happy moment of soaking in feelings of the past came crashing into the anxiety of her current situation. She begins to panic.

JJ recognizing her shift, while still very confused, places a hand on her shoulder and tells her to breathe in an attempt to calm her down. Once she sees Emily has mostly caught her breathe JJ starts again "Seriously Emily, I'm starting to get worried. What's going on with Mendoza?"

At the mention of his name Emily snaps "Look JJ, what's going between me and Andrew is my business and his business only. Garcia got me up really early this morning and I was looking forward to just sleeping for a bit on the way there. So if all you wanted was more gossip fuel about my relationship then I'm done with this conversation." This made JJ even more concerned and confused than she was before but she let her friend go in an effort to not further escalate the situation.

Emily knew as soon as she turned to walk away from JJ that she handled that poorly but she couldn't stand there looking at her any longer. She doesn't know where all of these feelings are coming from but standing there thinking back all of those years and watching JJ's eyes search hers she could help but wish she could go back and do it all over.

She would go back before Will and JJ were serious, before Mendoza was even remotely in the picture, and she would tell JJ it was her she should be with. She would tell her that she wants more than longing looks, stolen touches, cuddly hotel stays, and heat of the moment hook ups. She wanted JJ as much then as she did on the opposite flight 12 years ago and when she realized for the millionth time that she couldn't have her she reacted poorly. She knew she shouldn't have told JJ off or imply that she was trying to get information out of her for ulterior motives. She knew that JJ, being the woman she fell in love with so long ago, was just trying to help because she knew something was off. That all didn't matter though, what mattered is she had to face again the fact that she will never have her.