"A tiny daughter gives parents a life in a climate of perpetual wonder." -Pierre Doucet

'~-Amelia-~'

September 15th, 2012

"She's so beautiful," I whispered, kissing my daughter's forehead.

"She is." Spencer agreed, stroking her small face. Her first name was Jessica, but we hadn't decided on a middle name. In fact, we hadn't thought of middle names for any of our children.

"I have an idea." I looked up at Spencer.

"For what?"

"For her middle name. Actually, for all of their middle names." He nodded. "I know that your colleagues are important to you, so why don't we commemorate them? I was thinking of Jennifer for her middle name so that we can call her JJ."

Spencer grinned at me. "It's perfect. What about the others? We'd have to have their birth certificates changed."

I nodded. "Hm, gimme a second." The room was silent for a few moments.

This time, Spencer spoke up. "What about 'Morgan' for Jason's middle name, since we already have Derek?" I smiled. "Crystal's middle name should be 'Emily'. Kinda has a ring to it."

"What about Derek's middle name being 'Hotchner'? That works a lot better than 'Aaron'." He nodded, looking down at our daughter with a smile on his face.

"One day, the entire universe is gonna know your name. Just imagine your beautiful face plastered over every scroll thousands of years from now. Does that sound cool, JJ?"

Her eyes opened at the sound of his voice. They were a beautiful amber color, shining back at us with their brilliance.

"They look like my mother's," I whispered, furrowing my brows in sorrow. Spencer rested his hand on my shoulder.

"I didn't know her, but from what I've heard, she would definitely be proud of you." He pecked my lips.

"Thank you. That means a lot to me."

'~-Spencer-~'

October 23rd, 2012

The chill October breeze pushed against my sweater as I waited outside of Solien's Café. Leaves had begun to fall from their branches, turning all sorts of colors as they covered the ground. I spotted a group of crows perched on the top of the building, their black feathers reflecting in the sunlight. My hands buried themselves into my pockets as another chill passed by me.

"Spencer!" A cheerful voice called out my name. I turned towards its source, seeing a young woman about the same age as me- Maeve.

"Hey, it's good to see you again." I pulled her into a hug.

"You said that you needed to talk to me about something?" I nodded, taking her hand and leading her into the back of an alleyway.

"Okay, this is going to be hard to explain, but hear me out." She had a curious look on her face. "Do you remember around eleven years ago when we came to this café to discuss something? Well, we were interrupted by someone- and for a good reason. They were trying to protect an entire world of unique creatures. Essentially, these creatures can manipulate atoms to create whatever they want- at the cost of energy. The public doesn't know about these creatures because they can shapeshift, and often they have human forms that they use all the time."

"Wow, that's so cool! Why are you telling me this?"

I hesitated, scratching the back of my neck with my nails. "I'm one of them."

I was met with an ear-splitting silence as Maeve's jaw hung open in shock.

"You're... that's insane, Spencer! Wait- I remember that incident! That girl made me forget what happened, didn't she?" I nodded, breathing out a sigh of relief.

"I asked you to meet me here because I need your help."

"Sure, anything you need, Spencer. You're my best friend."

"Um, okay. Don't be mad at me, but I just had a daughter-"

"You what?!" She took my shoulders and shook them violently. "Okay, I'm not mad at you, but congratulations! What's her name?"

I smiled. "Jessica, or JJ for short. Having a biological child of my own is a huge change for me, and I'm worried that my team will notice that something's off."

"Why don't you just tell them? Won't they understand?"

"It's not that they won't understand. It's that telling that many people could put my entire family in danger."

"How's that?"

I paused for a second.

"Well, you know the woman that I married? She's the queen of this species."

Maeve looked at me like I was crazy.

"You're telling me- that you got with- the ruler of an alien species."

"Pretty much." She looked flabbergasted.

"Wait, doesn't that make you the king?" I nodded, and her jaw dropped once again. "I see why you need help. What do you want me to do?"

"It sounds crazy, but hear me out. What if you pretended to be my girlfriend? Think about it- if I'm smiling because I'm thinking about my daughter, then I'll just say that I'm thinking about you. We could 'date' for maybe two years and then 'break up'- it would definitely convince them. We could say that we met when I was looking for a solution to my headaches since you're a geneticist."

Maeve grinned at me. "That sounds like a good plan to me. I don't think we can meet up very often, though, because I've been getting a couple of creepy messages from an unknown number recently. Maybe that could be our reason for barely meeting up- that I'm scared to leave my apartment because I think there's a stalker after me. That way, we would never have to kiss in front of them." I scrunched up my nose in response while she stuck her tongue out in mock disgust.

"Thank you for this, Maeve. I have to go home now, but it was nice to talk to you again. Maybe we could start writing 'love letters' or something to make this seem more legitimate?"

"That sounds good. You know I care about you, Spencer. I would walk to the ends of the earth for you."

I smiled as we made our way out of the alley. "That's comforting to know. I'll see you soon."

She waved goodbye as I crossed the street, noticing the crows on top of the café had doubled in number. I had never been superstitious, but I could only hope that this wasn't a bad omen.

January 16th, 2013

"WAIT!"

I stood there helplessly as Diane placed the gun to her head and pulled the trigger, taking the life of my best friend with her.

Soon after our letters had started, the phone calls that Maeve was getting started to become more frequent. Of course, I began to worry, so I scheduled a meetup. However, I had thought that the stalker was there- only it was a false alarm.

Some time had passed before the phone call came, which convinced me that someone had taken her. It took all of my willpower to not use my magic to find her. When I did find her, I had been thinking about it, but I knew that when my team came in, it was too late.

I had tried reasoning with Diane. I tried to convince her that I loved her, but she didn't believe me.

So now, as I fell to my knees, I cried. I cried as the paramedics came in to retrieve their bodies, and I felt numb when they examined the wound on my arm made by Diane's gun. Tears were still streaming down my face in waves, flowing gracefully onto the concrete ground as my friend Jennifer wrapped her arms around me. I prayed that the comfort of her hands running through my hair would be soothing enough for my aching heart, but it wasn't.

Maeve Donovan was dead, and all that I could tell anyone was that she was the geneticist that I had fallen in love with. Everything I knew felt like it was built on this foundation of lies, but I knew that soon, it would crumble to the ground, and out of its ashes, hate would arise like a phoenix, waiting to swallow me whole.

I spent the remainder of the night and the next day in my apartment, which I had not lived out of in a while. There, I grieved while lying motionless on the sofa, not able to get a wink of sleep.

I remembered when my father left me- I was young, but I still grieved for him, even though he had not died. I also thought of Jason Gideon, who had become a father figure to me. Yet, he left me too, with nothing but a note and his watch. I grieved for him, too.

Nothing, however, could compare to the agony of losing my best friend. The one person who had been with me the longest was dead. All because I had involved her in a selfish plan to uphold the web of lies that I was tangled in.

On the second day, I was laying in my bed, letting the numbness comfort me in ways that no other person could. I laid there, my body exhausted from staying up for almost 48 hours. The silence was deafening, each noise or creak echoing through the house and reverberating through my skull.

I felt sick, unable to move from my spot on the bed. My stomach growled at me from the lack of food, but I ignored it. I glanced at the clock, which read that it was 1:00 in the afternoon.

Suddenly, the weight of the bed shifted beneath me, signaling that someone had joined me. I weakly lifted my arms, placing one on her lower back and the other through her hair. I knew who this was.

"Hey, how are you?" Amelia placed her hand on my cheek.

I wasn't able to respond, my throat dry and voice lost to grief.

Slowly, she lowered herself so that our bodies touched. Amelia embraced me, and for the first time in days, my guilt and sorrow were swept away. I sighed, holding her tighter in my arms.

"You need to eat something. Just because Magi can go months without eating does not give you an excuse not to. Also, it looks like you haven't used magic in a while- and that will kill you." I grinned softly at her.

Amelia disappeared, and a few seconds later she re-appeared with a bowl of soup and a cup of water. She handed me the soup first, noticing that my grasp was weak as I tried to take the bowl from her. She shook her head, taking the bowl and feeding me slowly. I was a little embarrassed, but my body thanked me for putting fuel into it. Then, Amelia pressed the cup to my lips as I drank hastily.

I was grateful for her help, knowing that I might've withered away there if I hadn't moved for another few days. Amelia helped me out of the bed, my legs shaking from lack of use. We began to walk around the small apartment, slowly but surely circling the entire place.

Finally, we sat down on the couch, laying in each other's arms.

"Spencer, I want you to pick a random book from your shelf and levitate it into your hand."

I nodded, lifting my hand and concentrating on the particles around one of my books. Sparks of white magic floated around the object as it began to levitate until it found my hand. I smiled triumphantly, opening the book to the first page and speaking with a raspy voice.

"The Odyssey, by Homer."

"Only people who are capable of loving strongly can also suffer great sorrow, but this same necessity of loving serves to counteract their grief and heals them." -Leo Tolstoy