Classified light- a criminal minds fan fiction

Blank, nothing, cold, distant

'Forever,' it seemed was a lot shorter than Hotch had thought since he saw Cameron everywhere after she left that apartment.

But it wasn't her, not really.

Just things that reminded him of her, which he quickly learnt was anything and everything;

an empty coffee mug on a desk she would have filled right back up for him before it got too low without him realising.

An extra hair tie on the sidewalk that she would always keep one of on her wrist in case anyone needed it.

An empty spot next to him in his bed where he could almost imagine waking up with her again, her head on his chest, her sweet scent that had a hint of her lemon and lavender shampoo he loved so much, her right next to him again.

He would sometimes let himself get lost in this fantasy. 

He would stroke her hair and place little mumbles of kisses on her arm that he knew she loved so much as she read to him. He would let himself laugh when he would flick the page to the next one mid-sentence and she would playfully tell him off for 'spoiling the next page for himself' before they forgot about the book completely and fell into each other.

And then his alarm would go off to wake him from that dream, and every time he would look at her urgently and she would say "it's okay, just enjoy this moment before reality comes back- I'll always be here in this moment, in this memory, I'll always be here."

And then he would wake up, his bed empty, her gone, the light in the room dimmed without her there to support it.

He had given up on burning the files she had written by the third week of her being gone, there were too many.

Instead, he took them all home.

The boxes and stacks lined his usually tidy bedroom that was now overwhelmed with papers and reports signed by her name that he spent hours re-reading and scanning his finger over the ink she had written to try and have her back in the tiniest way.

By the third month, Cameron Johnson was completely and utter gone from all traces of the FBI- from all traces of the world.

Garcia wasn't only to blame for the first part of that, they had no idea who managed to wipe all traces of her from everywhere else overnight, but they did.

And she was really gone then, it was finally hitting Hotch; she was really gone.

Two more months passed and that feeling of pain didn't leave like he hoped it would, time did not fix anything it seemed.

The cases went on, JJ had her baby now and was back at work but taking a lot of time off to understandably spend with her family- Reid too was taking a lot more time off work which was unusual for him but Hotch didn't have the energy to check on everyone.

He knew he wasn't the only one mourning the loss of Cameron, she affected everyone she ever met in such a beautiful way that it was impossible for even a stranger who had only met her once to feel her absence as if it was their own family member's death;

Dimi the security guard retired despite his vow to never do that.

Lola, the girl from the hospital that Cameron had still continued to visit almost every day after she herself got out of hospital, had managed to get the doctors to let her go to school again just so she could distract herself from the lack of Cameron's presence at the hospital during visiting hours.

Amanda didn't visit the BAU anymore after kicking up a fuss at how unfair it was that no one was telling her where or why Cameron had gone and why they were all telling her to pretend she never existed.