#drunk texts

It was supposed to be a casual Friday–a few drinks with friends, stories swapped over bar food and music too loud to really talk through. But you hadn’t realized how tired you were. How little you’d eaten today. Or how fast whiskey sours hit when you aren’t paying attention.

You don’t mean to get that drunk.

You had meant to just check in. To send a cute text to your boyfriend of a few months–the man you’d worked with for years, who had somehow gone from boss to friend to something infinitely more terrifying: someone you could see yourself falling for.

Your messages start out… maybe a little embarrassing, but at least coherent..

“miss u. u would hate this place lol so loud”

“why do guys named brad always yell”

“ur tie looked good today. tell it i said hi”

And then someone had ordered a round of shots. And then another. And suddenly, your thumbs stopped obeying your brain–which, to be fair, wasn’t exactly firing on all cylinders either.

“emergency: i need cheese fries n maybe a hug. or both at once”

“hotsh hotc hotdch ur eyes are SO BROWN”

“ty for ur face and ur arms n ur … exist???”

You’ll be mortified by all of it tomorrow morning, but currently, you can’t find yourself caring about much, other than the fact he hasn’t answered.

You frown down at your screen, chin tucked into your hand, your other arm lazily draped around a half-finished drink in a sweating glass.

“What’s wrong with your face?” your friend asks, half-laughing at the childish pout on your lips.

“He left me on read,” you mumble, wiggling the phone at her as though it’s Exhibit A. “Aaron. He read it. Didn’t respond. He read it.”

She squints at your screen, then snorts. “How is he supposed to reply to ‘you’re the best jawline in the whole FBI’?”

You pout harder. “I dunno. Say thanks?”

Your friend just laughs at you, shaking her head. But you don’t think it’s funny.

Because even though you know you’re being ridiculous, even though the room is warm and the night is young, your chest hurts a little. Just a pinch. A flicker of doubt where certainty usually lives. 

You haven’t been together long–just a few months–and it’s all new, still fragile. You’re not used to this part yet. The missing him in public. Needing him without permission. The strange, quiet way his absence can leave you feeling a little off-kilter.

You stare at your phone.

“Fine,” you whisper. “Leave me on read. Rude.”

You sigh and drop your head onto the table, face smooshed against your arm. “I’m going to die here. I’m going to become a ghost in this Chili’s-adjacent bar and haunt the bathroom.”

Your friend pats your head. “You’ll be a beautiful ghost.”

You groan.

And then–

He’s just there.

You blink, lifting your head too fast–definitely too fast, based on the way the room tilts. But it doesn’t matter, because your heart is already thudding, even before your brain catches up with your eyes.

Aaron stands by the door, scanning the room, his tie slightly undone, his expression unreadable in the dim bar light. His eyes find yours, and his whole posture shifts–like something softens behind his stern exterior. Relief, maybe. Familiarity. 

Your mouth drops open. “Hotch?”

He’s already moving toward you, steady and sure.

“You stopped making sense,” he says calmly as he reaches you, slipping a hand under your elbow to help you out of the booth. “Figured I’d come get you after the third text you shortened ‘your’ to ‘ur’.”

“You read my texts,” you accuse softly, tilting your head back to look at him.

“I did,” he says as though it’s obvious, guiding you through the crowd like he’s done it a hundred times. 

“You didn’t answer.”

“I figured showing up would say more.”

You blink.

Oh.

You’re not sure if it’s the alcohol or just him, but your chest folds in on itself. You let him guide you out into the night, warm and solid at your side, and suddenly the rest of the world feels quieter.

A little less lonely.

The car smells like him. Clean, calm, a little like cologne and a lot like comfort. You curl into the passenger seat, his jacket draped over your legs, your shoes on the floor, bare feet propped on the dash despite his protests.

The window is cracked. The scent of pine and rain float in on the wind. The road curves gently away from the city, trees rising up like shadows on either side.

“I wasn’t that drunk,” you mumble.

Aaron hums. “You sent me a voice memo where you just repeated the word ‘eyebrows’ for thirty seconds.”

You groan, covering your face. “That’s not a crime.”

“I didn’t say it was. But it was… concerning.”

You peek at him—his profile bathed in the dim light of the dashboard, jawline sharp, mouth soft. That little tug of a smile plays at the corner, the one that always makes your heart do strange things.

You’ve known him for years. Shared cases. Late nights. Quiet grief. It took months to earn that smile, and when you finally did, you made it a mission to chase it every chance you got. And then—somewhere between burnt coffee and unexpected laughter—everything changed.

A kiss, in the kitchen after an especially tough case. A breathless “what are we doing?” followed by that smile and the softest, realest “I don’t know. But I want to keep doing it.”

It’s still new. Still precious.

But you can’t deny it already feels like home. 

Outside, stars scatter across the sky. You tilt your head, watching them. A few drift–too slow to be shooting stars, too steady to be anything magical. Satellites, maybe. You squint, tipsy and thoughtful.

“Do they ever crash?” you ask, voice quiet. “The stars and satellites. Do they ever just–” you mimic an explosion with your fingers. “Boom?”

Aaron glances at you, like he’s deciding whether you’re serious. Eventually, he says, “No. They keep their distance.”

“That’s kind of lonely,” you say. “All that space between things. Nothing touching.”

He’s quiet again for a second, eyes back on the road. Then: “Or maybe it’s safe.”

You let that settle. Then smile, a little sad. “I think it’s sad.”

He glances over at you again. “You think everything is sad when you’re drunk.”

You pout. “Not true.”

He reaches over, hand brushing yours where it rests on your knee. “Alright. What’s not sad?”

You turn your head, taking him in. The clean line of his jaw, the focus in his eyes even as he drives, the quiet steadiness of his presence. Your heart softens, like it always does with him. 

“You,” you say, a little too easily. “You’re the opposite of sad.”

He doesn’t respond right away—just gives your hand a quiet squeeze.

“When you’re like this,” he murmurs, “you forget to hold back.”

You smile, sleepy and honest. “I know. But you love me.”

A beat.

“I do.”

You blink.

The words hang in the air like mist, weightless and heavy at the same time. The quiet hum of the tires on asphalt, the wind brushing through the cracked window, the rustle of leaves as the road curves–all of it fades beneath two words spoken so simply that they almost don’t register. 

You sit with it for a second. Like you’re not sure you even heard him right. 

Almost.

But then they do.

“...You do?”

Your voice is barely a whisper, a fragile thing in the dark of the car. You’re staring at him now–more sober in this moment than you’ve been all night. Not just because the alcohol is wearing off, but because nothing snaps you into clarity like him.

Aaron’s hand is still on yours, thumb moving once, slow across your skin.

He doesn’t look over at first. Just exhales, the smallest lift of his brow, like he’s thinking back through the last thirty seconds and only now realizing what slipped out.

He gives a quiet, dry sort of laugh. “Suppose that’s not how I meant to say it.”

You just stare at him. “So… you did say it?”

His mouth twists–not regretful, just wry. That little pinch between his brows appears, the one you’ve come to learn means he’s sifting through something careful and important. “I did. Wasn’t planning to. Not like this. Not while driving you home after you sent me a bunch of texts about how brown my eyes are.”

You let out a tiny wheeze. “They’re very brown. Deeply brown.”

He huffs a laugh, but it’s quiet. Focused elsewhere.

“I mean it, though.”

You don’t breath.

He clears his throat, almost awkward. “I do love you. I was going to say it eventually. Preferably when you were sober. Maybe cook something. Say it over dinner. Something better than… a carfessional.”

You gasp. “Oh my god.”

“Don’t say it again.”

“A carfessional.” You bite your lip, barely holding in your smile. 

He groans, but you can see it—his smile, finally unguarded. Like he’s letting himself have this.

And something about that makes your eyes sting. It's a shaky little moment, full of that strange, sacred feeling that only comes around a few times in life.

You turn back toward the window, toward the trees passing by like silhouettes, the stars still scattered like someone spilled silver across the sky. You’re quiet for a while. Letting your heart settle. Letting the words breathe.

Then, softly: “I love you too.”

Aaron doesn’t flinch but you see it–the way his hand pauses slightly against yours. The way his shoulders shift, like something’s unfulring inside him. He doesnt say anything, but you don’t need him too.

He brings your hand to his lips, presses a soft kiss to your knuckles.

You smile down at your lap, at the warmth tucked beneath his jacket, at the world outside that suddenly feels a little softer. 

After a few moments, you sigh.

“... Still want cheese fries, though.”

He chuckles, shaking his head.

“I’ll find you some,” he says. “But only because I love you.”

Your smile curls wide. Warm. Dizzy with the weight of it.

“Gross,” you whisper. “Say it again.”

He glances over, flashes another smile back at you.

“I love you,” he says again, like it’s easy now.

Like it was always meant to be.