Mothers and Daughters

Elizabeth Prentiss is in the BAU bullpen. Emily can't believe her eyes. Surely this is just a bad dream; any moment now, her teeth will start falling out, and she'll have to take an exam she hasn't studied for. She blinks her eyes and shakes her head, hoping it will clear the image from her field of vision, but it doesn't. This is real. Her mother is standing in her office, demanding to speak to "Agent Prentiss and one of her superiors." Emily ignores every word Gideon is saying as she stands up from the table and pokes her head out of the conference room.

"Mother?" she says incredulously. At the sound of her daughter's voice, Elizabeth looks up at the catwalk. Emily hasn't seen her mother in months, despite being back in D.C. for good. Now, her mother's face is tilted upwards towards her, and she's looking down at her from above, and it reminds Emily of the photograph that always sat in the exact same spot on Elizabeth's desk, no matter how many times they moved from country to country.

The picture was taken in August of 1971, when Emily was ten months old. Her mother and father had taken her to a beach an hour outside of Athens for a family outing, and her father had snapped the photo of his two girls bathed in summer sunlight, Elizabeth holding Emily up in the air above her head and looking up at her. Emily was a cute kid, with her rosy cheeks and her dimples, her soft, jet-black hair and big, expressive brown eyes. Elizabeth was young and pretty and full of life, full of hopes and plans for her career and her family. Emily and Elizabeth were both smiling brighter than the Mediterranean sun. It's one of the few times Elizabeth has ever looked truly happy to be spending time with Emily, and Emily was too young to even remember it.

Elizabeth has brought the team a kidnapping case: The brother of one of her former colleagues, a Russian immigrant, had been abducted from outside his home in Baltimore, and his wife and daughter had received a ransom note demanding a wire transfer to a Moscow bank account—along with his severed ring finger. Emily watches as her mother explains the situation to Hotch, and as Hotch explains that while he'd like to help, this isn't really how the team does things. There are proper channels that cases need to go through. Elizabeth doesn't take no for an answer. She pushes Hotch to investigate, and he relents. Elizabeth is very good at getting her way.

Emily knows better than anyone just how hard it can be to stand up to her mother. When she was six, Elizabeth signed her up for ballet class. Emily hated it. She was never particularly graceful. The classes were boring, and the other little girls were mean. But Elizabeth had done ballet as a child, and it was supposed to be a lovely thing that she could share with her daughter, and the look of judgment and disappointment on Elizabeth's face whenever Emily expressed a desire to quit was enough to make her keep taking ballet classes for five more years. When Emily was ten, Elizabeth told her she was old enough to pick out her own dress for the embassy Christmas party. Her father took her shopping, and she came home with a bright floral dress with a flowy skirt that billowed when she twirled. She was excited to show it to Elizabeth, and even more excited to wear it to the party, but the look of disdain on her mother's face when she twirled around the living room in her new dress was enough that she didn't protest when Elizabeth took her back to the store to exchange the dress for a plain pink one with a starched lace collar that made her neck itch. As Emily got older, she got better at not letting her mother's disapproval dictate her every choice, but Hotch hasn't had 36 years of practice. He gives in to Elizabeth and takes the case.

While the rest of the team heads to Baltimore to investigate Mr. Chernus' disappearance, Emily stays behind and works with her mother on getting information about the Moscow bank account through Elizabeth's diplomatic contacts. While they wait for a phone call from one of Elizabeth's friends, Emily peruses her mother's office. It's stately, but functional. Everything in the office serves a purpose. Everything in the office is strategically chosen to project the image of a diplomat. The only personal touches are the photographs of Emily on Elizabeth's desk—not of treasured memories from Emily's childhood, but professional portraits Elizabeth paid for. Elizabeth is seated at her desk, eyes glued to her computer screen.