This is the end of the ending, but you should not be surprised.

Everyone has something that keeps him sane. For Reid, it was his books, for Garcia, it was her online games, for Morgan, it was his women.

But for Hotch, the saying behind every great man there is a great woman rang true. The only thing keeping him sane was Haley. Haley who lied in a cold grave deep in the ground.

Haley was dead. Haley was dead. Haley was cold gone and dead. With ever step he took and every breath that shook his frame.

He had driven home, and entered the door. Sat down in some kind of daze, and slumped. Looking at nothing in particular, that was when he heard it.

Like a lighting bolt out of a clear sky. Like a voice that awakens one from a dream.

“Daddy, when is mommy coming home?” he heard it as clear as daylight, as clear as anything you wish to name. And the voice repeated.

“Daddy, when is mommy coming home?” If it was in his head, Jack looked an awful lot like he was expecting an answer.

It was the time that stopped, the moments seemed like hours. He did not answer, but rushed out of the room, into the bedroom, a place he had not dared to touch.

He had slept on the couch, to preserve the perfect smell of Haley’s perfume. He buried his head in the pillow and tried for the life of him to remember the last thing they had said to each other.

It was all gone, nothing at all was left.

He tried to remember what her hair felt like when it rested against his chest. He tried to remember the sound of her voice, or the touch of her skin. Skin that was so sweet to the taste. Good god.

All those little facts that were so easy to forget rushed back to him in a storm, the little tune she hummed in the morning.

He wanted so badly not to forget her. He wanted so badly not to forget all those little things, but he found that even her face had faded in his mind. He couldn’t even rember the color of her eyes.

Her favorite ice cream and how it tasted to kiss it off her lips. He remembered how she would talk to him on the phone when he was gone, and in the morning he would get a letter express delivery.

He remembered how he had missed his sons’ first steps, and she had been so angry. He remembered how beautiful she was when she was angry. He inhaled, and the smell of vanilla and hot coco assaulted his nose, and he wished he could remember enough to bring her back to him.

That was when he realized that he had been dreaming, and in a sleep, the feeling of having her wet, cold, blood on his hands fell on him full force and he was cruelly awakened.

She was gone, and in another breath, Hotch reached down and took his gun out of his holster. He looked at it, turned it in his hands, and placed his calloused finger on the trigger.

He remembered how cold her skin was, how hard the cement floor was, how wet the crimson blood had felt to him. One tear slipped down his cheek, and he took the gun and rested it against his temple.

One gunshot.

One was all it took, and the gun fell to the floor from dead hands.

The body fell backwards onto the pillow, and the last thing Aaron Hotchner was aware of was the smell of vanilla and hot coco being replaced with warm, red blood.

They had not known him at all.