i may just take your breath away - jemily college au

Snow

"And you didn't even talk to me?" Emily said, looking at the ground with her hands tucked into her pockets.

"I didn't want to bother you," JJ admitted. "I guess I just want everyone to think of me as the put together one. The mom friend. The athlete with everything sorted out instead of the disaster that I actually am."

JJ gulped.

"I didn't want to lie to you and say everything was fine when it wasn't," JJ said, "And I made it worse by saying nothing at all."

"Yeah."

"I hurt people, Emily," JJ said as she stopped walking and turned to Emily. "No matter what I do. I wasn't enough to keep my sister alive. I wasn't enough to keep my dad around. I even pushed Will away because I got bored of him. I'm not good enough for you. I thought pushing you away would be better for you in the end, before I got a chance to hurt you."

"Shut up," Emily whispered. JJ's jaw dropped.

"Wha–"

"Shut up!" Emily repeated, louder this time. "Jennifer Jareau, you do not have the right to make that decision for me."

Emily looked up from the ground, and rage flared in her eyes.

" I get to decide whether I'm willing to take the risk on you!" Emily almost yelled. "JJ, you didn't even give me the chance."

Emily's hands were balled in fists on either side of her, her breaths came out in clouds in the cold air. By the end of her sentence, her voice cracked.

" I thought I did something wrong," Emily said, softly this time. "I thought it was me who fucked this up. I spent all this time trying to figure out what I had done to you that made you run from me."

"Emily, you didn't do anything wrong," JJ said.

"And anyways, all of that other stuff isn't your fault," Emily said. "And I think you know that. I'm so sorry about your sister, but it was not your fault. And the same with your dad. It's never the child's fault. You can't control what he does when you're going to college four hundred miles away."

Emily's hand moved to her mouth and she began to gnaw at a thumb nail. JJ was stunned silent. She hadn't thought about it that way.

"You are not required to be the only thing keeping your family together, or even a relationship. If you put all of that responsibility onto yourself, you're going to collapse under the weight."

JJ gulped.

"I learned early on that I couldn't be the only one keeping the peace between my mother and I," Emily said, "It was too hard. I mean, I went the completely opposite way and probably made our relationship worse. But JJ, not everything is your responsibility. You were just a kid when your sister died. Hell, you're still just a kid. Give yourself a break."

By the end of her speech, Emily just looked tired, her eyes softening and looking into JJ's. The blonde didn't know what to say. She stood for a moment, processing Emily's words.

"Why didn't you just tell me?" Emily demanded after a pause.

JJ shook her head.

"I'm good at running from my problems," JJ admitted. She looked down at her shoes and kicked a pebble, not meeting Emily's eyes. "I'm not really used to letting anyone help me with them."

"Stop running from me, JJ."

JJ gulped.

"I don't know how."