heart like yours (jennifer jareau)

2. twenty three

AN: so long story short i fucked up with lining the heart like yours and take me to church season two chapters up

so in order for the next take me to church chapter to be published on monday, i have to publish four chapters of this before monday

so have an update! have two! i'm spontaneously uploading the other chapters before monday so there'll be four in total before then! i think! i hope!

i went to see taylor's movie last night so i'm in a good mood in case you can't tell, but these chapters are ... yeesh

they are the tobias hankel episodes fyi for anyone who needs a TW

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"people are oceans. you cannot know them by their surface." - beau taplin

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It's kind of crazy if you think about how fast time actually moves around you when you're too stuck in your own head to notice. It's kind of crazy how Delilah had lost so much of her life; that year locked up in a cabin the woods she still couldn't remember the location of, those four years in Thailand with Jorge and Sunny and Albie.

The last two months since that phone call to JJ, the last two months that had moved by without them talking about it.

Delilah was in two minds about the situation. She knew she still had feelings for JJ, judging by the ache in her chest whenever they were together at work and JJ would look at her when she didn't think Delilah noticed, a small frown on her face like she was trying to peel back the layers of Delilah's heart to understand what was going on inside her hurricane.

She also knew that things were a lot easier now JJ was away from her. It sounded terrible, Delilah knew that, and she knew she was a terrible best friend and a shitty person and a liar and a player and whatever other abuse had been ingrained into her brain throughout her life. But it was the truth.

Everybody had told her you can't run away from the truth forever. Delilah had just thought she'd get a bit more time before her kingdom came crashing down in front of her, her crown of deceit slipping from her hair and landing at the feet of her throne of lies, the blood of innocents staining the guilty hands she called her own.

Delilah was a hurricane, always had been, and hurricanes caused destruction. Delilah tried to minimise the damage, but she'd gotten careless with JJ and now she was hurt, and people were noticing that JJ and Lilah weren't JJ and Lilah anymore.

Delilah had been a spy a small lifetime ago. Lying was her first nature. She'd built this image of herself out of a lie, destroying any reminder of Isobel's weakness and Alia's family. She could become exactly what people wanted from her and she played her role to perfection.

Still, that didn't mean JJ got the memo. She was weird around Delilah at work and their friends/colleagues were concerned. Hotch had asked Delilah about it after a case, having watched JJ leave before Delilah in her own car, the two not even looking at each other as JJ left the floor.

And Delilah had told him everything. He'd made a conscious effort to pair the two together as little as possible, selfishly hoping that the distance would either persuade Delilah she didn't have to run away completely, or that it would make JJ realise what everybody except JJ seemed to understand; she loved Delilah.

The others didn't seem to understand what was going on between them. Derek tried asking, but Delilah had given him a look that was both a warning and a plead; don't ask me about JJ because I can't talk about it right now.