i honestly don't think i can defend criminal minds anymore this script sounds like me playing episode with no gems
a waste of talent, they've got PAGET BREWSTER out here saying the cringest shit i've every heard. if even she can't make it sound cool the writers have to lock in.
also (SPOILERS). nothing was foreshadowed, the fan ultimately turned out to a nothing-burger villain who is defeated in like three seconds (ocpd my ASS), elias voit's daughter is now involved even though we haven't seen or heard from her all season, luke was returned to life by his dead dog (his suicidal heroism is not discussed before or after the fact) even though there's no way in HELL he should have survived that explosion.
Summary: You come to spend a quiet weekend away from college with your best friend's family, expecting nothing more than familiar faces and easy conversation. Instead, you meet Emily Prentiss. Your best friend's godmother and BAU Unit Chief, composed, intelligent, and impossible not to notice. What starts as polite distance slowly shifts into something harder to define, especially when silence begins to feel louder than words. And by the time she leaves, you are left wondering whether you will ever see her again or why that question suddenly matters so much.
tags: college!reader, fem!reader, emily prentiss unit chief, soft longing, age gap, late night thoughts, quiet tension, things left unsaid, unspoken connection
word count: 2.9 k
Summary: Leaving the restaurant, you quickly realize that you definitely chose the wrong jacket for the evening. Even after years in the city, the cold still catches you off guard, but Emily is there to take care of you, while Claire begins to voice her thoughts about the dynamic between the two of you.
tags: college!reader, fem!reader, i'm a sucker for jackets, keep me warm Emily, unitchief!emily prentiss, mutual pining, age gap, quiet tension, things left unsaid, unspoken connection, slow burn
Masterlist • Taglist• Series masterlist • AO3
The cool night air meets you the moment you step out of the restaurant. Stars shimmer above you, but clouds are beginning to gather in the distance. You catch yourself searching the sky for them, only to be met with disappointment.
“It’s a shame the stars are so hard to see in the city,” Emily comments, unconsciously closing the small distance between you.
The words pull you back to the night the two of you stood on the porch together, your eyes fixed on the sky as you searched for the stars. Back then, the clouds had stolen them from you before either of you had a chance to find them. Tonight, it is the city lights that wash them away instead.
Claire walks a few steps ahead as the three of you make your way down the street, her phone tucked between her shoulder and ear. Judy is on the other end of the line, just like she has been every evening since the attack at the mall. She is frightened and angry about being so far away. Angry that she cannot hold her daughter or you in her arms, something she has made sure to mention more than once during their calls. The only thing that seems to reassure her is that Emily has agreed to stay in the city a few days longer.
“Unfortunately, yeah,” you reply, pulling your thin jacket a little tighter around yourself. Even after years at college, you still regularly underestimate the weather here. There are no warm tropical summer nights waiting for you, which means you are far too lightly dressed for this hour.
“Are you cold?” Emily asks, and you don’t miss the way her shoulder brushes against yours as you walk. Even though the contact is barely noticeable, you feel the slight warmth radiating from her. More than that, you catch the scent of her perfume again, the one that has somehow followed you all the way into your dreams by now.
“A little,” you admit with a small shrug. “The bus will probably be warm anyway.”
Emily frowns, tilting her head slightly. As her eyes move over your face, you feel the heat rising into your cheeks. Her gaze is so intense that your body seems to have no other response to offer.
“I’ll drive you,” she says, looking back toward Claire. “I’d rather not have you two taking the bus home at night.”
You let out a quiet scoff. “We’ve been doing that for years.”
“That may be true,” her voice softens slightly, “but I’m here now, and I want to take you both home.”
Absentmindedly, you run your fingers over the fabric of your jacket, casting Claire a regretful glance. She is wearing her thick college jacket, the same one she had advised you to bring before you left.
“Here take this,” you hear Emily say, pulling you out of your thoughts. “We’re almost at the car. I dont' need it.”
You look at her and watch as she slips off her jacket, holding it out toward you. “It’s okay, you don’t have to do that,” you murmur, your heart suddenly beating a little faster.
“I insist.” One of Emily’s eyebrows lifts, and you have to suppress the sound that nearly escapes you, one that would have revealed your thoughts far too easily. Why does everything about this woman look so damn good?
“Emily,” you whisper, your voice slightly rougher than before.
This time, she is the one who presses her lips together and stops walking. “Y/N,” she replies in the same tone, and now you stop as well.
Claire’s voice carries back to you through the wind, telling Judy something about her homework, completely unaware that the two of you have fallen behind.
Emily studies your face, then takes a step toward you. Her gaze drops to the jacket in her hand before returning to you.
“Turn around.” Her words carry something final, a command your body cannot ignore and does not want to ignore. Before you can do anything about it, you turn around.
You expect her jacket to be placed over your shoulders, but nothing prepares you for her fingers brushing your hair aside. Emily’s fingertips graze the bare skin of your neck, sending a shiver through your entire body.
Her fingers linger. When you look up, Emily is already watching you. Something shifts in her expression, so subtle you almost miss it. She doesn’t say anything, doesn’t smile or tease you for your reaction. Instead, her fingers brush lightly over your neck once more until your hair rests neatly over your shoulder. A soft breath leaves her as she withdraws her hand, stirring a few loose strands in the process.
You haven’t dared to breathe this entire time. You are frozen, unsure if you can even trust your own voice anymore. So you stay quiet and wait.
The gravel beneath Emily’s shoes shifts as she closes the remaining distance between you, and suddenly the space that existed between you feels much smaller.
She is close enough now that you notice things you should not be noticing. The warmth coming from her, the quiet scent of her perfume, the way the light from the street lamps catches in her hair. It feels strangely familiar.
For a moment, you are taken back to that first night on the porch. You had barely known Emily then. She had been Claire’s godmother, someone you had heard stories about for years without ever meeting her. She was part of Claire’s life, part of her family, but she had not been part of yours. You had not expected that night to become something you would remember.
Claire had brought you home with her, and somewhere between dinner, conversations, and the quiet moments that followed, the house had slowly settled into silence. Everyone else had gone to sleep, but neither you nor Emily had been able to.
So you had found yourselves outside on the porch, sitting beneath the dark sky, searching for stars that were hidden behind clouds. It had been such a simple moment. Nothing dramatic. Nothing that should have stayed with you. And yet, it had.
You remember the way talking to her had felt effortless. How she had listened, not just waited for her turn to speak. How she had looked at you with a kind of attention you were not used to receiving from someone you had only just met.
There had been something between you even then. Something quiet. Something you could not explain because it had happened too quickly and made too little sense. You had known her for less than a day. She was Claire’s godmother. She was someone you were supposed to simply like because she was important to someone you loved.
But standing there on the porch, with the cold night air around you and Claire only a few rooms away, Emily had somehow felt less like a stranger.
Now, few weeks later, standing beside her again, the feeling is no longer just a possibility you are trying to ignore. Back then, you had only noticed the way your attention kept drifting toward her. The way her voice made you want to keep listening. The way silence beside her felt comfortable instead of empty. Now you know what those moments meant.
You know the warmth of her arms around you. You know how easily she can calm the chaos inside your head with nothing more than a touch. You know the difference between simply being near Emily and being noticed by her. This is not the uncertainty of that first night anymore, this is something real. And if you are being honest, that makes standing this close to her feel even more overwhelming.
The memory fades slowly, replaced by the quiet reality around you. The distant sounds of the city, the cold air against your skin, Claire’s voice somewhere ahead. All of it reminds you that this is not the porch, not that first night when you were still trying to understand why Emily felt different. This is now.
Emily is standing in front of you, close enough that you can feel her warmth, close enough that you forget everything else for a moment. The heavy fabric settles over your shoulders, and you sigh softly as warmth wraps around you. Emily holds one side open, but you don’t move.
“Slip your arms in,” she murmurs.
You turn your head slightly in her direction.
“It’ll warm you up faster.”
Her eyebrow lifts again. Damn this woman.
You guide your right arm into the sleeve first, then your left into the other. Emily touches your shoulder, signaling for you to turn around, and starts working on the zipper.
“I can do that myself,” you reply unnecessarily, earning nothing but a disapproving look from her.
“I know,” Emily admits. “But the zipper gets stuck sometimes.” The zipper slides smoothly upward.
“Hmm,” you breathe, your lips slightly parted, overwhelmed by Emily’s closeness.
Emily steps away from you and takes in the sight of you wearing her jacket. Something about it seems to change something inside her. You see it in her eyes, which appear darker than they did only seconds ago. In the tendon of her neck suddenly becoming visible. In her shoulders, tense and held too tightly. In her fingers, which disappear into the pockets of her pants.
She nods once, then murmurs: “Come on.”
“Thank you,” you whisper into the darkness, not sure if Emily still hears you, because she is already two steps ahead.
You struggle to keep up and wonder why she suddenly seems so eager to get away from you. By now, Emily has caught up with Claire. Claire looks back at Emily briefly, then turns her attention forward again. But you can see the thoughts running through her head. She looks back at Emily once more, frowns, and then looks at you.
You cannot read her expression from where you are, but your best friend definitely has an opinion about Emily’s actions.
Two minutes later, you finally reach the parking lot, where Emily leads you toward a black SUV. While Emily unlocks the car and slides into the driver’s seat, Claire pauses briefly at the passenger door.
“Cold?” she asks, and you don’t miss the strange tone she uses when she looks at you.
“You were right again,” you answer, avoiding her gaze.
“Hmm.” Claire looks you up and down. “How nice of Emily.”
You cannot tell if there is anything behind Claire’s words or if you are simply searching for meaning where there is none. Your thoughts are still too loud, your senses too consumed by Emily’s perfume that now surrounds you constantly.
Claire doesn’t look away right away after saying it. Her eyes rest on Emily’s jacket for a moment, then move toward Emily sitting in the driver’s seat before finding yours again.
There is no accusation in her expression. She looks more like someone trying to understand something she can feel but cannot quite explain yet.
“I said I could handle it, but…”
You don’t get to finish, because Claire has already opened her door and is halfway inside the car. “You should have worn the thick jacket like I told you,” she adds before closing the door.
Your hand trembles as you open the door, one question echoing endlessly through your mind: What is happening right now?
The drive is quiet, a little tense, but you close your eyes and let yourself be consumed by the warmth instead of trying to pick apart your thoughts.
After a while, Emily breaks the silence. “Who have you been texting the whole time?”
You blink and look toward the bright light illuminating Claire’s face.
“Josh,” Claire replies simply, and Emily exhales.
“Are you mad?” she asks directly, and you sit up a little straighter.
“No.”
“Your body language tells me something different.”
Emily’s voice is calm, even though you notice how her hands tighten slightly around the steering wheel.
“Stop analyzing me.” Claire is frustrated, and it becomes more obvious now.
“I’m not analyzing you, Claire. I’ve known you since the day you were born. You’re not exactly difficult to read, you know?”
This time, she looks at you through the rearview mirror. You only nod, afraid of saying the wrong thing.
“You two are weird,” she repeats her comment from a few hours ago, and your stomach drops. “Five minutes ago you were teasing Emily about always deciding what people need… and now you’re wearing her jacket.”
She gestures toward Emily’s missing jacket. “Can you two just get along, please?”
Emily lets a moment pass, her gaze remaining fixed on the road as if she is considering what Claire actually means.
“Get along?” she asks eventually, her voice calm. “Have we ever given you the impression that we don’t understand each other?”
Claire lets out a short, humorless laugh. “Yeah. Kind of.”
Emily throws a brief glance into the rearview mirror. Her eyes linger on you for a moment before she looks back at the road.
“You two tease each other constantly,” Claire continues. “And then suddenly you’re just…” She makes a small, helpless gesture with her hand. “…like this.”
No one answers her, which causes Claire to shift restlessly in her seat, moving from side to side. “I don’t know.” She shakes her head in resignation. “Since the mall, everything just feels… different somehow.”
Her voice loses some of its strength. “I just want everything to feel normal again.”
“Claire.” Emily waits until Claire looks at her. “What happened was extraordinary.”
A brief pause. “It would be unusual if everything suddenly felt normal again afterward.”
Claire turns toward the window, arms crossed, her face reflected faintly in the glass. You watch her for a moment, noticing the watery look in her eyes, the tension around her mouth.
“But you’re both here.” Emily continues, without any pathos, almost matter-of-factly. “You’re safe. You’re together. You’re alive. Everything else takes time.”
Silence settles inside the car, and all you hear is the noise of your surroundings, the rumbling of a garbage truck passing by.
Claire exhales audibly. “I know…” She briefly rubs her forehead. “I just don’t want everyone to start acting weird around each other now too. We already get enough weird looks from everyone else.”
“Earlier at the restaurant…” She trails off, her gaze moving briefly between you and Emily. “…there was something.”
You don’t know what Claire saw. You don’t even know what you would call it yourself. But the fact that she noticed something makes your stomach tighten.
You lift your gaze, and your eyes meet Emily’s again in the rearview mirror. Your gazes hold, and you realize that both of you know Claire isn’t completely wrong. There was something. And if you had to guess, you would say Emily had been jealous.
Claire pulls the sleeves of her jacket a little further over her hands and turns her attention outside. The lights from the street glide across the window, briefly reflecting on her face before disappearing again, while she stays quiet for a long moment.
“I don’t know,” she murmurs eventually. “Maybe I’m just imagining all of this.”
“Maybe you’re just exhausted.” Her voice remains calm, almost clinical, without any attempt to convince Claire of anything. It isn’t an argument, just a possibility she offers her.
Claire nods. “Maybe.”
After that, the conversation fades on its own. No one seems to know how to continue without ending up right back at the point everyone just managed to leave behind.
You watch the streets passing by, the shop windows and traffic lights moving across the windshield in a steady rhythm. The warmth inside the car slowly begins to chase the cold from your fingers, but Emily’s jacket still rests heavily and comfortably on your shoulders.
Eventually, you clear your throat quietly. “So…”
Claire lifts her head and looks at you.
“…are you actually meeting Josh now?”
For a moment, she looks like she has to figure out what you are referring to before her gaze drops to the phone in her lap. “Oh.” A small smile appears on her face. “Yes… if that's okay for you.”
“Sure. Absoluletly. So it is a date after all?”
She throws you a deliberately offended look. “It’s not a date.”
You cannot stop yourself from grinning. “Of course not.”
“You’re impossible.” It is the first time tonight that her voice sounds like it usually does again, light and carefree, and that alone makes some of the tension that has lingered between you since the restaurant finally begin to disappear.
Emily doesn’t comment on it. In the rearview mirror, her gaze meets yours for the briefest moment. It is barely more than a passing second, but you see the smallest hint of a smile fade from her expression before she turns her attention back to the road.
With a calm movement, she guides the car through the nearly empty streets, leaving the city center behind and heading back toward campus. The steady hum of the engine fills the car while Claire is already looking at her phone again, typing out a message.
You rest your head against the cool window and close your eyes for a moment.
Almost unconsciously, you pull Emily’s jacket a little tighter around yourself. It is still warm, her perfume lingering in the fabric, familiar enough that your heart beats a little faster every time, even though you stopped searching for a reasonable explanation for it a long time ago.
Outside, the last lights of the city slowly disappear behind you as Emily silently drives the car across campus.
word count: 2.9 k
Summary: Leaving the restaurant, you quickly realize that you definitely chose the wrong jacket for the evening. Even after years in the city, the cold still catches you off guard, but Emily is there to take care of you, while Claire begins to voice her thoughts about the dynamic between the two of you.
tags: college!reader, fem!reader, i'm a sucker for jackets, keep me warm Emily, unitchief!emily prentiss, mutual pining, age gap, quiet tension, things left unsaid, unspoken connection, slow burn
Masterlist • Taglist• Series masterlist • AO3
The cool night air meets you the moment you step out of the restaurant. Stars shimmer above you, but clouds are beginning to gather in the distance. You catch yourself searching the sky for them, only to be met with disappointment.
“It’s a shame the stars are so hard to see in the city,” Emily comments, unconsciously closing the small distance between you.
The words pull you back to the night the two of you stood on the porch together, your eyes fixed on the sky as you searched for the stars. Back then, the clouds had stolen them from you before either of you had a chance to find them. Tonight, it is the city lights that wash them away instead.
Claire walks a few steps ahead as the three of you make your way down the street, her phone tucked between her shoulder and ear. Judy is on the other end of the line, just like she has been every evening since the attack at the mall. She is frightened and angry about being so far away. Angry that she cannot hold her daughter or you in her arms, something she has made sure to mention more than once during their calls. The only thing that seems to reassure her is that Emily has agreed to stay in the city a few days longer.
“Unfortunately, yeah,” you reply, pulling your thin jacket a little tighter around yourself. Even after years at college, you still regularly underestimate the weather here. There are no warm tropical summer nights waiting for you, which means you are far too lightly dressed for this hour.
“Are you cold?” Emily asks, and you don’t miss the way her shoulder brushes against yours as you walk. Even though the contact is barely noticeable, you feel the slight warmth radiating from her. More than that, you catch the scent of her perfume again, the one that has somehow followed you all the way into your dreams by now.
“A little,” you admit with a small shrug. “The bus will probably be warm anyway.”
Emily frowns, tilting her head slightly. As her eyes move over your face, you feel the heat rising into your cheeks. Her gaze is so intense that your body seems to have no other response to offer.
“I’ll drive you,” she says, looking back toward Claire. “I’d rather not have you two taking the bus home at night.”
You let out a quiet scoff. “We’ve been doing that for years.”
“That may be true,” her voice softens slightly, “but I’m here now, and I want to take you both home.”
Absentmindedly, you run your fingers over the fabric of your jacket, casting Claire a regretful glance. She is wearing her thick college jacket, the same one she had advised you to bring before you left.
“Here take this,” you hear Emily say, pulling you out of your thoughts. “We’re almost at the car. I dont' need it.”
You look at her and watch as she slips off her jacket, holding it out toward you. “It’s okay, you don’t have to do that,” you murmur, your heart suddenly beating a little faster.
“I insist.” One of Emily’s eyebrows lifts, and you have to suppress the sound that nearly escapes you, one that would have revealed your thoughts far too easily. Why does everything about this woman look so damn good?
“Emily,” you whisper, your voice slightly rougher than before.
This time, she is the one who presses her lips together and stops walking. “Y/N,” she replies in the same tone, and now you stop as well.
Claire’s voice carries back to you through the wind, telling Judy something about her homework, completely unaware that the two of you have fallen behind.
Emily studies your face, then takes a step toward you. Her gaze drops to the jacket in her hand before returning to you.
“Turn around.” Her words carry something final, a command your body cannot ignore and does not want to ignore. Before you can do anything about it, you turn around.
You expect her jacket to be placed over your shoulders, but nothing prepares you for her fingers brushing your hair aside. Emily’s fingertips graze the bare skin of your neck, sending a shiver through your entire body.
Her fingers linger. When you look up, Emily is already watching you. Something shifts in her expression, so subtle you almost miss it. She doesn’t say anything, doesn’t smile or tease you for your reaction. Instead, her fingers brush lightly over your neck once more until your hair rests neatly over your shoulder. A soft breath leaves her as she withdraws her hand, stirring a few loose strands in the process.
You haven’t dared to breathe this entire time. You are frozen, unsure if you can even trust your own voice anymore. So you stay quiet and wait.
The gravel beneath Emily’s shoes shifts as she closes the remaining distance between you, and suddenly the space that existed between you feels much smaller.
She is close enough now that you notice things you should not be noticing. The warmth coming from her, the quiet scent of her perfume, the way the light from the street lamps catches in her hair. It feels strangely familiar.
For a moment, you are taken back to that first night on the porch. You had barely known Emily then. She had been Claire’s godmother, someone you had heard stories about for years without ever meeting her. She was part of Claire’s life, part of her family, but she had not been part of yours. You had not expected that night to become something you would remember.
Claire had brought you home with her, and somewhere between dinner, conversations, and the quiet moments that followed, the house had slowly settled into silence. Everyone else had gone to sleep, but neither you nor Emily had been able to.
So you had found yourselves outside on the porch, sitting beneath the dark sky, searching for stars that were hidden behind clouds. It had been such a simple moment. Nothing dramatic. Nothing that should have stayed with you. And yet, it had.
You remember the way talking to her had felt effortless. How she had listened, not just waited for her turn to speak. How she had looked at you with a kind of attention you were not used to receiving from someone you had only just met.
There had been something between you even then. Something quiet. Something you could not explain because it had happened too quickly and made too little sense. You had known her for less than a day. She was Claire’s godmother. She was someone you were supposed to simply like because she was important to someone you loved.
But standing there on the porch, with the cold night air around you and Claire only a few rooms away, Emily had somehow felt less like a stranger.
Now, few weeks later, standing beside her again, the feeling is no longer just a possibility you are trying to ignore. Back then, you had only noticed the way your attention kept drifting toward her. The way her voice made you want to keep listening. The way silence beside her felt comfortable instead of empty. Now you know what those moments meant.
You know the warmth of her arms around you. You know how easily she can calm the chaos inside your head with nothing more than a touch. You know the difference between simply being near Emily and being noticed by her. This is not the uncertainty of that first night anymore, this is something real. And if you are being honest, that makes standing this close to her feel even more overwhelming.
The memory fades slowly, replaced by the quiet reality around you. The distant sounds of the city, the cold air against your skin, Claire’s voice somewhere ahead. All of it reminds you that this is not the porch, not that first night when you were still trying to understand why Emily felt different. This is now.
Emily is standing in front of you, close enough that you can feel her warmth, close enough that you forget everything else for a moment. The heavy fabric settles over your shoulders, and you sigh softly as warmth wraps around you. Emily holds one side open, but you don’t move.
“Slip your arms in,” she murmurs.
You turn your head slightly in her direction.
“It’ll warm you up faster.”
Her eyebrow lifts again. Damn this woman.
You guide your right arm into the sleeve first, then your left into the other. Emily touches your shoulder, signaling for you to turn around, and starts working on the zipper.
“I can do that myself,” you reply unnecessarily, earning nothing but a disapproving look from her.
“I know,” Emily admits. “But the zipper gets stuck sometimes.” The zipper slides smoothly upward.
“Hmm,” you breathe, your lips slightly parted, overwhelmed by Emily’s closeness.
Emily steps away from you and takes in the sight of you wearing her jacket. Something about it seems to change something inside her. You see it in her eyes, which appear darker than they did only seconds ago. In the tendon of her neck suddenly becoming visible. In her shoulders, tense and held too tightly. In her fingers, which disappear into the pockets of her pants.
She nods once, then murmurs: “Come on.”
“Thank you,” you whisper into the darkness, not sure if Emily still hears you, because she is already two steps ahead.
You struggle to keep up and wonder why she suddenly seems so eager to get away from you. By now, Emily has caught up with Claire. Claire looks back at Emily briefly, then turns her attention forward again. But you can see the thoughts running through her head. She looks back at Emily once more, frowns, and then looks at you.
You cannot read her expression from where you are, but your best friend definitely has an opinion about Emily’s actions.
Two minutes later, you finally reach the parking lot, where Emily leads you toward a black SUV. While Emily unlocks the car and slides into the driver’s seat, Claire pauses briefly at the passenger door.
“Cold?” she asks, and you don’t miss the strange tone she uses when she looks at you.
“You were right again,” you answer, avoiding her gaze.
“Hmm.” Claire looks you up and down. “How nice of Emily.”
You cannot tell if there is anything behind Claire’s words or if you are simply searching for meaning where there is none. Your thoughts are still too loud, your senses too consumed by Emily’s perfume that now surrounds you constantly.
Claire doesn’t look away right away after saying it. Her eyes rest on Emily’s jacket for a moment, then move toward Emily sitting in the driver’s seat before finding yours again.
There is no accusation in her expression. She looks more like someone trying to understand something she can feel but cannot quite explain yet.
“I said I could handle it, but…”
You don’t get to finish, because Claire has already opened her door and is halfway inside the car. “You should have worn the thick jacket like I told you,” she adds before closing the door.
Your hand trembles as you open the door, one question echoing endlessly through your mind: What is happening right now?
The drive is quiet, a little tense, but you close your eyes and let yourself be consumed by the warmth instead of trying to pick apart your thoughts.
After a while, Emily breaks the silence. “Who have you been texting the whole time?”
You blink and look toward the bright light illuminating Claire’s face.
“Josh,” Claire replies simply, and Emily exhales.
“Are you mad?” she asks directly, and you sit up a little straighter.
“No.”
“Your body language tells me something different.”
Emily’s voice is calm, even though you notice how her hands tighten slightly around the steering wheel.
“Stop analyzing me.” Claire is frustrated, and it becomes more obvious now.
“I’m not analyzing you, Claire. I’ve known you since the day you were born. You’re not exactly difficult to read, you know?”
This time, she looks at you through the rearview mirror. You only nod, afraid of saying the wrong thing.
“You two are weird,” she repeats her comment from a few hours ago, and your stomach drops. “Five minutes ago you were teasing Emily about always deciding what people need… and now you’re wearing her jacket.”
She gestures toward Emily’s missing jacket. “Can you two just get along, please?”
Emily lets a moment pass, her gaze remaining fixed on the road as if she is considering what Claire actually means.
“Get along?” she asks eventually, her voice calm. “Have we ever given you the impression that we don’t understand each other?”
Claire lets out a short, humorless laugh. “Yeah. Kind of.”
Emily throws a brief glance into the rearview mirror. Her eyes linger on you for a moment before she looks back at the road.
“You two tease each other constantly,” Claire continues. “And then suddenly you’re just…” She makes a small, helpless gesture with her hand. “…like this.”
No one answers her, which causes Claire to shift restlessly in her seat, moving from side to side. “I don’t know.” She shakes her head in resignation. “Since the mall, everything just feels… different somehow.”
Her voice loses some of its strength. “I just want everything to feel normal again.”
“Claire.” Emily waits until Claire looks at her. “What happened was extraordinary.”
A brief pause. “It would be unusual if everything suddenly felt normal again afterward.”
Claire turns toward the window, arms crossed, her face reflected faintly in the glass. You watch her for a moment, noticing the watery look in her eyes, the tension around her mouth.
“But you’re both here.” Emily continues, without any pathos, almost matter-of-factly. “You’re safe. You’re together. You’re alive. Everything else takes time.”
Silence settles inside the car, and all you hear is the noise of your surroundings, the rumbling of a garbage truck passing by.
Claire exhales audibly. “I know…” She briefly rubs her forehead. “I just don’t want everyone to start acting weird around each other now too. We already get enough weird looks from everyone else.”
“Earlier at the restaurant…” She trails off, her gaze moving briefly between you and Emily. “…there was something.”
You don’t know what Claire saw. You don’t even know what you would call it yourself. But the fact that she noticed something makes your stomach tighten.
You lift your gaze, and your eyes meet Emily’s again in the rearview mirror. Your gazes hold, and you realize that both of you know Claire isn’t completely wrong. There was something. And if you had to guess, you would say Emily had been jealous.
Claire pulls the sleeves of her jacket a little further over her hands and turns her attention outside. The lights from the street glide across the window, briefly reflecting on her face before disappearing again, while she stays quiet for a long moment.
“I don’t know,” she murmurs eventually. “Maybe I’m just imagining all of this.”
“Maybe you’re just exhausted.” Her voice remains calm, almost clinical, without any attempt to convince Claire of anything. It isn’t an argument, just a possibility she offers her.
Claire nods. “Maybe.”
After that, the conversation fades on its own. No one seems to know how to continue without ending up right back at the point everyone just managed to leave behind.
You watch the streets passing by, the shop windows and traffic lights moving across the windshield in a steady rhythm. The warmth inside the car slowly begins to chase the cold from your fingers, but Emily’s jacket still rests heavily and comfortably on your shoulders.
Eventually, you clear your throat quietly. “So…”
Claire lifts her head and looks at you.
“…are you actually meeting Josh now?”
For a moment, she looks like she has to figure out what you are referring to before her gaze drops to the phone in her lap. “Oh.” A small smile appears on her face. “Yes… if that's okay for you.”
“Sure. Absoluletly. So it is a date after all?”
She throws you a deliberately offended look. “It’s not a date.”
You cannot stop yourself from grinning. “Of course not.”
“You’re impossible.” It is the first time tonight that her voice sounds like it usually does again, light and carefree, and that alone makes some of the tension that has lingered between you since the restaurant finally begin to disappear.
Emily doesn’t comment on it. In the rearview mirror, her gaze meets yours for the briefest moment. It is barely more than a passing second, but you see the smallest hint of a smile fade from her expression before she turns her attention back to the road.
With a calm movement, she guides the car through the nearly empty streets, leaving the city center behind and heading back toward campus. The steady hum of the engine fills the car while Claire is already looking at her phone again, typing out a message.
You rest your head against the cool window and close your eyes for a moment.
Almost unconsciously, you pull Emily’s jacket a little tighter around yourself. It is still warm, her perfume lingering in the fabric, familiar enough that your heart beats a little faster every time, even though you stopped searching for a reasonable explanation for it a long time ago.
Outside, the last lights of the city slowly disappear behind you as Emily silently drives the car across campus.
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