Emily awoke to the rustling of someone getting out of bed. She turned over and groggily watched as Aaron made his way to the bathroom, closing the door behind him. She let out a sigh as she herself got out of bed and quickly got dressed for work.
The two BAU agents had been an a reasonably steady relationship for over four years and have lived together for two of those four. In the last year and a bit, Aaron had proposed, and she couldn't have been more ecstatic. At least until a few months after they got engaged.
Aaron Hotchner was often known to have a cold and standoffish demeanor but not when he was with Emily and Jack. He was usually warm and kind, but something had changed in him. Being both a profiler and his significant other, this didn't go unnoticed by Emily. She noticed how he'd leave earlier for work and stay later at the office. And like most relationships, they weren't without problems, but Aaron's not so recent distance had internally frustrated Emily to the point where they hadn't spoken for four days a month ago.
But the two of them had kept up a façade for Jack; he was only six after all. The last thing he needed was more confusion, especially after Haley and Aaron divorced. Emily loved Jack with all her heart, and she couldn't risk another heart break, mainly Jack's.
Once she was done getting ready for work, she walked into Jack's room and gently knocked on the door before entering. She walked up to the sleeping boy and ruffled his hair, making him slowly stir awake. Jack rubbed the sleep from his eyes and gave Emily a tired, flat smile. "Hi, Emily." He said quietly.
Emily smiled down at him. "It's time to get ready for school, Jack. I'll make you some waffles." The brunette replied happily.
Jack immediately jumped out of bed. Emily chuckled to herself before closing his door. She made her way to the kitchen and popped some Eggo waffles into the toaster. She began gathering everything else together for Jack when she saw Aaron come out of their room in somewhat of a hurry. Emily gazed down at her watch. 7:31. They technically didn't have to be at the office until 9:30 today. She furrowed her brows, stopping Aaron in a kitchen as he went to grab his coffee. "Hey, where are you going so early? It's only 7:32." Emily asked concerned and suspicious.
"I have a meeting with Strauss at 8:00." Aaron said gently grabbing Emily's arm.
"Ok." The raven haired woman replied, hiding her sadness. "When will you be home tonight?"
Aaron let a somewhat annoyed sigh. Emily wondered why due to the nature that it was a perfectly reasonable question to ask. "I don't know, Em. Whenever I can."
Emily's sadness grew into irritation. She let out a sigh similar to her fiancé's. "Aaron, you've said that for the past week. I know your job keeps you late, but you haven't been home earlier than one in the morning."
They tried to keep their voices quiet, afraid that Jack would be right around the corner. Aaron took a step closer to Emily. "You of all people should understand how busy my job can get."
Emily let out an amused scoff and crossed her arms. "Of course I do. But we have similar jobs, and I still make it back to feed Jack and put him to bed. He misses you. He barely gets to see you in the morning."
Aaron let out a long sigh and hung his head in shame. As if on cue, Jack came running out of his room at the sound of his dad's voice. "Daddy!" He shouted running into his dad's arm.
Aaron put on a smile as he scooped her up in his arms, hugging him tightly. "Hey buddy." He said kissing his son.
"Are you taking me to school today?" The boy asked hopefully.
Aaron's response saddened everyone. "No, I have an early meeting. I'm sorry, buddy. Next time." Aaron put down Jack. The dirty blonde boy walked over to Emily and hugged her. The BAU agent walked up to his fiancé and gave her a kiss on the cheek before leaving.
"You said that last time." Jack mumbled to himself as he sat down to eat his breakfast. He thought he was the only one who heard his response, but a Emily heard every word.
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The car ride to school was talkative as usual. Jack rambled on to Emily about his friends and his animal project she had been helping him with. Recently, the only thing that made Emily truly smile was when Jack talked to her. It helped her forget her problems with Aaron.
As Emily stopped along the school's curb, Jack hopped out of the car and waved Emily goodbye, running off to find his friends. Just as she was about to pull away from the curb, one of Jack's friend's moms came up to the open window. "Hi Emily." The woman said with almost a sickly sweet smile.
The brunette put on a similar smile. "Hi Janet." Emily replied.
"Jack just asked me if he could spend the night tonight. Is that ok with you?"
"Yeah, of course."
"Thank you so much! Have a good day!"
As Emily drove away from Jack's school, she felt a wave of relief flow through her body. With Jack out of the house for the night, Emily could finally take advantage of it. She planned on talking to Aaron as soon as he got home, regardless of the time.
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Later that night, Emily stayed up waiting for Aaron to come home. She sat in their bed, reading a book with her glasses in attempts to distract herself from the confrontation that was to come. She hadn't gone into work that day. It was her day off, which gave her the opportunity to run errands and think about the growing space between her and Aaron.
Emily heard the door open. She inhaled sharply as her fiancé's footsteps grew closer. Aaron entered their bedroom, surprised to see Emily still awake. "You're still awake?" He asked taking off his suit jacket and hanging it up.
The brunette woman closed her book and took off her glasses. "It's not that late." Emily replied shrugging.
Aaron looked down at his watch. "It's 12:43."
"How was your day?"
Aaron undid his tie letting out a sigh. "Fine. Lots of paperwork."
"That's good. Was the team there?"
"Reid and JJ went to go visit their parents."
A silence fell in the room but not a comfortable silence. She simply sat on their bed, fiddling with her fingers doing her best not bite her nails again. She watched Aaron walk into their bathroom from her peripheral vision. Emily let out a deep breath she didn't know she was holding in.
As the she heard shower water run, she heard Aaron's phone sound off. She knew it was his phone because they had different ringtones. It took practically everything she had in her body to not look at his phone. She knew it was wrong to think their would be something incriminating on his phone. She knew she should've trusted him. She really had no credible reason to distrust him; it was just her intuition telling her that something was off.
Without another moment of thought, Emily reached for Aaron's phone. She looked at the screen, and her heart dropped. The first thing she saw was the bolder name; it read "Haley". There was only one Haley that Emily and Aaron both knew but she hadn't been a significant part of his life until now.
Emily felt a large lump form in her throat as she read the text on his Lock Screen. It read: "When will I get to see you again? I miss feeling your body on mine." Her breath hitched as she processed the words from the text. A million thoughts began racing through her mind. She wished she'd never read the text in the first place, but it was too late. All her emotions were raging through her body. But the ones that stood out the most were anger and sadness.
The raven haired woman sat on the side of their bed as she heard the water of the shower turn off. She had to stay strong for both herself and Jack. Aaron came out of the bathroom in a maroon T-shirt and grey plaid pajama pants. His hair was slightly damp as he dried it with a towel. He looked up at his fiancé who was holding his phone in her delicate hands.
Aaron's breath hitched as he dropped his towel on a chair. She looked up at him with the most heartbreaking look of disappointment on her face. He saw the sadness in her eyes. Emily inhaled deeply before looking into her fiancé's eyes. "How long?" She asked quietly, biting the inside of her cheek.
Aaron was so surprised, he couldn't find the words the respond. A moment silence passed over before Emily asked again, "How long, Aaron?" She asked again, this time more annoyed and with authority.
Aaron hung his head in shame, not being able to look at the woman in front of him. "Almost a year." He replied weakly.
It all made sense now. The distance. The late nights. Everything. Emily's questions were all answered as to why Aaron had put so much distance between them. Emily did her best to keep her composure and not cry. All she wanted to do was sob. She stood up from the bed and put distance between them, like he had done to them emotionally. "How could you do this? To Jack. To me." Emily said in almost disgust.
Aaron shook his head, still unable to look at Emily. "I didn't think of the consequences." He said simply.
This irritated Emily beyond belief. She knew that Aaron wasn't a man of many words, but this was not the time to keep his sentences to less than ten words. Emily crossed her arms. "What exactly were you thinking because you clearly weren't think about me or Jack?"
At the sound of Jack's name, Aaron furrowed his brow. He looked up at Emily with sad, yet slightly irritated eyes. "Don't bring Jack into this."
"Are you serious? Jack is the person this will effect the most. Not me or you, him! Do you have any idea what this is going to do to him?"
Emily was overcome with rage and sadness at this point. Aaron inhaled to speak, but Emily cut him off, pacing around the room slightly. "Clearly not because you wouldn't have cheated on me in the first place. If you had just stopped to think about how this would effect anyone but yourself, maybe things would be different."
There was a pause in the room filled with so much tension, it could be cut with a knife. Aaron took a step closer towards in attempts to comfort Emily, but she immediately stepped back. "Emily, I'm sorry. It was a mistake." He said genuinely.
"It's too late for 'sorry'. You should've realized that a year ago. This is on you, Aaron."
"Please! Let me explain." Aaron pleaded.
Rage continued to surge through her body. "What is there to explain!" She almost shouted. She quickly composed herself. "You've been cheating on me with your ex wife for almost a year. I trusted you, and you betrayed that trust. There's a lot of things I can forgive, but this isn't one of them."
In the heat of the moment, Emily slipped off her engagement ring and placed it on Aaron's nightstand. "Here. Give it to Haley. I'm sure she'll love it." Emily said coldly. It took everything she had to prevent herself from crying. She kept her arms crossed as if to protect herself from jumping into Aaron's arms and crying against his chest like she usually did when she was sad.
Aaron stared at the ring in complete shock. When she did this, Aaron knew that it was over. However stubborn Emily was, she was the most strong-willed person he knew. Which meant that there would be few opportunities to change her mind. Aaron looked back up at Emily who was looking down at the floor, most likely to hide her tears from him. "Emily..." he said quietly, taking a step closer.
She immediately stepped back. "Get out." The brunette woman said without looking at him.
Aaron hesitates for what felt like forever to Emily. They stood in silence, both hanging their heads in shame. Aaron wanted to stay, but he knew there was no changing her mind. With every bit of hesitation in the world, Aaron took the ring and his jacket and walked out the door.
As soon as Emily heard the door close, she ran into the bathroom, locking the door behind her. She pressed her back against the door, sliding down the white painted wood as she burst into tears. She threw her head into her hands as her salty tears filled her hands. She cried to the point where her eyes stung as if they were on fire.
Emily felt completely betrayed, but she was angry more than anything else. How could someone she let love her so dearly break her so easily? Deep down she knew the distance between them had grown in the past year, she just refused to believe it was really there. She thought it was all in her head.
Could this have been her fault all along? Was it something she had done to make him cheat? Had she somehow distanced herself, making Aaron feel unloved? She snapped back to the truth which was that Aaron chose to cheat on her. He could've talked to her if something in their relationship was bothering him; but instead he chose to sleep with another woman and his ex wife of all people. She wondered if Aaron had chosen to talk to her, things may have been different. The whole situation perplexed Emily to the point where she became frustrated with her own confusion and cried even more.
After several minutes of uncontrolled sobs, Emily finally managed to gather what little strength she had and grabbed her phone from her back pocket. Although her vision was blurred from her tears, she managed to dial the number she needed. Sniffling, she held her phone up to her ear, listening to it ring.
JJ shot up from her bed when she heard her phone ringing. She quickly turned on her side, glancing at the time in the process. She felt Will stir beside her as she picked up her phone to check the caller ID: it was Emily. "Emily? What's wrong? It's two in the morning." JJ asked rubbing her eyes.
"What's wrong JJ?" Will asked in a groggy voice.
Gathering what little composure she had left, Emily said, "I need you." She rubbed the tears from her cheeks, he eyes burning wildly.
JJ knew her friend well enough to know that when Emily cried, it was bad. She almost never cried, at least not that JJ saw. When the blonde heard the sadness in her friend's voice, she immediately awoke completely. "I'll be right over." JJ said jumping out of bed.
Emily hung up the phone after hearing her friend say those words. She set her phone down and pulled her legs to her chest, hugging them as tight as she could. Her head fell into her knees as she continued to cry, feeling lost, betrayed, and unloved.
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