THERE SHE GOES . . . ━︎ criminal minds

five . . .

BROKEN MIRROR,

(season one, episode five.)

"Help." Grace's ears perked up at the sound of Spencer's desperate voice, head shooting up as she stopped chewing on the end of her pen. She noticed Spencer and Morgan walking through the glass doors, the former holding multitudes of files in his arms, and the latter shaking the former playfully by the shoulder. And Grace could immediately tell that they were just a few moments away from a files-all-over-the-floor disaster.

Pushing herself up from her desk, Grace hurried over, graciously taking some of the files from the poor man's arms to help him carry them to his desk. Morgan fake gasped, "Grace in work before us? Am I missing something?"

She faked laughed, and whacked him round the back of the head with a file, "Ha ha ha, you're funny." Spencer failed to hold back a laugh as Morgan rubbed the back of his head painfully, wincing a little. Grace turned to Spencer as she placed the files down onto his desk, "Uh, why do you have so many of these, smarty-pants?"

Derek laughed, chirping back into the conversation as if miraculously healed, "Oh, come on, GG, what do you expect from this guy?" The pair rolled their eyes at him simultaneously, and Morgan's face dropped, like he was scared of them, like it was something they did all the time (they did), "Alright, that's creepy, you two better stop doing that."

Not even a minute later, Hotch called the team up to the round table room, telling them the documents he had received on the Trish Davenport kidnapping case had come through. Hotch and Elle walked ahead, Spencer trying to rush after them as Grace and Morgan sauntered behind, "What's it say?"

"That we've got until 8:00 tonight." Everybody made it into the room, momentarily greeting Gideon and Spencer read aloud the copies of the letters that the Davenport family had received this morning. Hotch inhaled deeply as Grace crossed her arms across her chest, "That gives us less than 9 hours to get to Connecticut-"

Grace tensed up. She involuntarily blocked out the rest of Hotch's words, a wave of fear rushing over her as goosebumps rose upon the surface of her skin. Connecticut. She couldn't go back there, she promised herself years ago that she never would.

Before Hotch and Gideon had even finished speaking, Grace had turned on her heels and exited the room. Her hands trembled, palms sweating as she rushed down the steps into the bullpen. She stormed past her desk, grabbing her bag in the process as the woman pushed her way out of the glass doors. Grace felt the nails on her middle fingers roughly scratching her thumb pads -︎ doing anything she could to make this stop.

But it wouldn't stop.

"Grace?" Morgan's voice rang out loudly in the woman's ears, even causing her to flinch. But she wasn't listening. All she could focus on was Connecticut. Before the man could even approach her, Grace had sauntered off towards the elevator, not wanting him to see her like this. Not wanting anyone to see her like this.

"Hey, is she okay?" Spencer strolled over to Morgan as he pulled his satchel over his shoulders. Morgan crossed his arms as he shook his head. His eyes were narrowed with confusion as he watched Grace rush into the elevator, "She didn't even say anything, just walked off."

Grace's breath hitched in her throat as the elevator doors closed behind her. She leaned her back against the wall, exhaling sharply through her nose as she tried to do anything she could to stop this. Stop this panic attack. Her thumbs felt like they were on fire as her nails kept scratching into them, but she didn't even care.