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“He’s getting bolder with his messages, the press attention has got to be fueling it,” Hotch said as he looked at the most recent note from their unsub, which was pinned up to the evidence board. They were working what looked to be an injustice collector in their own backyard in D.C., and after his third victim he had started sending messages to a city newspaper. The press, of course, was loving it, but so was the unsub. He was on his six victim and showed no signs of stopping. “I know you don’t do much press liaising anymore, but you still have the most experience with the media. Think you can track down this reporter and talk her into toning it down?”
He waited for a response from JJ, who was sitting at the conference table behind him, but no answer came. Turning around to look at her, Hotch saw the blonde slumped over, dozing off with her head resting on her arm.
“JJ!” he called, and her head shot up.
“I’m up, I’m up!”
“Are you okay?”
“I’m sorry, Hotch, it’s just been a long day. It won’t happen again,” she tried to cover.
In reality, she hadn’t been sleeping for weeks. Not since the anniversary of her abduction and torture. Nightmares danced in front of her eyes every time she closed her eyes at night, Askari’s face and Hastings’ hands appearing in every corner of her mind. When she had woken Will up for the fifth night in a row a few weeks ago, she had given up on sleeping altogether, started to fight sleep to avoid the nightmares. As far as her husband was concerned it had been a temporary setback and she was doing fine.
But eventually she didn’t have to fight the sleep at anymore, it just stopped coming. She got by with a few minutes on the couch after dinner, a few in Henry’s room putting him to bed, here and there on the jet, a few minutes hidden away in her old office when she needed it during the day. If she didn’t sleep long enough or deeply enough, the nightmares couldn’t get a chance to find her. But she had never fallen asleep during a case. And she never intended for her boss to see it.
“JJ—”
“Hotch, it’s just been a long day,” she tried, her voice bordering on desperate.
“JJ, listen to me,” Hotch said, and at the tone of his voice she briefly looked up, before looking away again, refusing to meet his eye. He took note of the deep bags under her eyes, the shake in her hands as she desperately tried to avoid his gaze by paging through the file in front of her. He sat down in front of his agent, leaving the case behind for a moment.
“JJ,” he said her name again. He reached forward and slid the file out of her grasp, causing her to finally look up and really meet his eyes. “How long has it been since you slept?”
“It’s been a long case, none of us are sleeping much—”
“No, JJ. It’s not just this case. You’ve been off for a while,” he insisted, surprising even himself when he pushed harder than he normally would. But he had lost too many good agents from his team to PTSD. He knew he needed to step in before it got to that point for JJ. “It’s okay if you’re not doing well right now. It’s okay to admit it.”
“Hotch, really I’m—”
“JJ, listen to me,” Hotch interrupted forcefully, making the blonde go silent. “You’re the strong one, you always have been. You bottle things up because it’s easier than facing it, than admitting that you aren’t okay. Believe me, I see it in you because I do the same, you know that. But for weeks you’ve been withdrawn, hypervigilant, recklessly putting yourself in danger on cases and almost getting yourself killed. You just fell asleep mid-conversation and from the bags under your eyes you haven’t been sleeping for a long time.”
By now tears had started to well up in JJ’s eyes, and she angrily brushed them away before they could fall.
“I’m not saying this to call you out, or reprimand you, or upset you, JJ. I’m saying this because I’m worried about my agent. About my friend,” Hotch continued. “Elle, Gideon, Emily. I watched as PTSD destroyed them and I turned a blind eye because I didn’t want to step into their business. I can’t make that mistake with you, JJ. I won’t let this illness take you too.”
She was silent for a few moments, before putting her head in her heads and mumbling, “I think it already has.”
“Then take some time off. See a therapist, actually talk to Will, because I know for a fact if you have been telling him the truth about what’s been going on he would have made sure you got help before it got to this point. You can’t keep going like this, or you’re going to get yourself seriously hurt, and I won’t let that happen,” Hotch said, his voice stern but when she looked up from her hands she could see the genuine care and concern in his eyes. “Your job will be here when you’re ready to come back, and if you decide that you don’t want to come back then that’s okay too.”
“How did you do it?” JJ sniffed, wiping at her eyes again. “After Foyet?”
“Jack,” he answered honestly. “I couldn’t do that to my son. And you can’t do that to Henry either. You know that.”
She nodded, choking back a sob that rose suddenly from her chest at the mention of her son. Hotch was right. She might feel too far gone, but she had to try. If not for herself, then for Henry.
“I can’t watch you tear yourself apart, lose yourself like the others did,” Hotch said, a rare moment of vulnerability. “You have too much to lose.”
“Yeah,” she agreed softly.
“I’m going to call Will to come pick you up, I don’t want you driving with how exhausted you are,” he said, standing up from the table. “I want you to go lay down on the couch in my office. Close the blinds and try to sleep for a bit, I’ll send Will up to get you once he’s here.”
“Okay,” she feebly agreed, trying to hide the way her body swayed as she stood up.
“You still have almost a month of paid leave; I want you to take the full time off,” Hotch said, reaching out and grabbing her arm to steady her. “I’ll talk to Cruz about getting you more if you need it. I’ll send Will the names of a few bureau therapists who specialize in PTSD in the morning. We’ll be here as much as you need, all you have to do is reach out.”
JJ nodded, too exhausted to argue with the forced time off, and turned to leave the conference room and head to Hotch’s office.
“And JJ?” he said, and she stopped to turn back to him. “You might be lost in this illness right now. It might feel like it’s already taken everything. But that doesn’t mean you can’t find your way back.”
She managed a small smile. “Thanks, Hotch.”
Hotch pulled his phone out to call Will as she walked away, running a hand tiredly over his face. PTSD was brutal, and he had lost too many good agents to it. But this time, he had to believe that he had stepped in soon enough, that he hadn’t watched his friend waste away until there was no coming back. Because JJ had so much to lose. Her family had so much to lose. He had lost people to PTSD before, but he would be damned if he let her family lose JJ to it too.