Glorified G // Eddie Vedder

Chapter 45

New Years Day 1992

Joanne stood staring down the man in front of her, she had pleaded with him not to do this, but he'd gone past the point of return. As she stood attempting to talk him down she noticed how his hand shook as it held the sharp blade, the next few moments happened in slow motion for Joanne. The blade swiped at his neck and the blood began spewing, Joanne leapt forward her hands reaching to apply pressure to the wound, as she moved towards him he seemed to move further away,

"NO!"

Eddie woke up to Joanne yelling, which happened to wake her up from her nightmare too- despite drinking copious amounts of alcohol before going to bed the images of what she had witnessed hours earlier still seemed to play in her mind on a loop, she had done what Dr Isles had suggested and tried to go to a happy place before but nothing seemed to work, the images she had seen that night were seared into her brain. A few beads of sweat were gathered on Jo's forehead, she swiftly freed herself from Eddie's embrace and rushed to the bathroom where she attempted to gather her thoughts. After what felt like hours Jo heard a timid knock at the door,

"Jo? Babe, are you okay?" Eddie's voice was laced with concern and Jo wanted to smile at the man she loved, but she couldn't muster the strength, she shuffled to the door and led Eddie back to the bedroom, "Do you want to talk about it?" Jo quickly shook her head, "okay, we don't have to talk- is there anything I can do?" Jo shook her head again and let out a sigh, Eddie didn't speak again instead he took her in his arms and began playing with her hair as she drifted off to sleep.

Joanne arrived at work early, she hadn't fallen asleep as Eddie had thought she had, instead she'd pretended to sleep until Eddie had drifted off into a deep slumber, and then she'd snuck out of the bedroom and left for work. She made her way straight to the coffee machine when she arrived, filling the largest mug she could find with the bitter liquid. As she sat at her desk it dawned on her that she would have to write up her report on the events from the previous night, the thought made her queasy resulting in her sprinting to the toilets, much to her coworkers' surprise.

William Webster hadn't slept that night, he hadn't even gone home; he had no reason to go home, there was no one waiting for him. So he'd made a headstart on his paperwork before falling asleep on his desk. For one of the first times since she had started at working at the FBI Joanne was actually early to work, William knew why- she was processing a big trauma, most if not all of his agents had suffered something similar to Jo on the job - he'd lost some of his best agents to trauma, many quitting to go find a more normal job. He prayed to some sort of higher being that Jo would not be one of the agents he lost, there would be no replacing her. William watched as Joanne stood and rushed away from her desk, he briefly considered following her but decided best not to- he'd speak to her when she came back.

As Joanne returned to her desk William called her to see him in his office, with a feeling of dread Jo made her way to him.

"Agent Taylor, Joanne- what you went through last night was a trauma, and I just wanted to let you know that if you need to take some personal time you should do so." What the director had not expected was for the young agent in front of him to scoff,

"Oh is that what you want to call it? A trauma? You know what sir, it was worse than a fucking truama! Finding your grandma dead that's a trauma! Being abandoned by your parents that's a trauma! Watching someone slit his fucking throat is more than a fucking truama, taking some personal time isn't going to make it go away." Joanne paused for a moment before muttering under her breath, "It should've been you." William raised an eyebrow almost challenging her to repeat what she had just said, "It should've been you, I should've never been the one following him! It should've fucking been you!" Tears threatened to fall but Jo blinked them away before storming out of the office, she marched all the way to Dr Isles' office.