#Emily: you listened to him talk about space last month for two hours

[only-one-brain-cell]

Headcanon that Spencers son develops a hyperfixation on dinosaurs after reading about them at the library so anytime he gets a change all he talks about is dinosaurs and of course the BAU is hanging onto his every word. (of course so are his parents Spencer is the one that brought him to the library.)

[oneirataxiahiraeth]

First Time Jitters

Pairings : SpencerReid x Fem!Reader

Warnings : unprotected sex, oral (fem receiving), fingering, language

Summary : At a dinner party hosted by Rossi, the girls tells stories on the first times they’ve had to fake an orgasm. They all get intrigued by the readers silence and begin digging into her new relationship with Collague Spencer Reid and find out they haven’t even had sex together... yet.

Word Count : a little over 4K

“Are you kidding me? I’ve never felt anger like that in my life.” Emily laughed out, the rest of us entranced in her tales about the horrors of her sex life. “That’s was probably the first, but definitely not the last time I ever had to fake it.” She shrugged, and I felt my cheeks turn pink. We all sat around the fire pit at Rossi’s house after dinner, soaking in the warmth from the fire. Rossi and Hotch were inside, probably have a heart to heart about man troubles or something, and Reid was entertaining Henry and Jack showing them Magic’s tricks and ignoring any signs of the rest of the adults here.

“Well, sorry to you ladies but I can gladly say that none of my boo thangs ever had to worry about not finishing.” Morgan spoke proudly with a smile on his face. I could see on Garcia’s face how bad she wanted to make some inappropriate joke but she let it pass.

“Okay, I mean... Will is amazing. A totally sweetheart, but sometimes...” JJ groaned, leaving the rest up to our imaginations. If I remembered correctly she was actually the one who brought up the conversation. She mentioned something about her ‘mommy and daddy’ time last being a complete disaster that Will didn’t even know about.

I sat quietly listening to everyone tell their worst stories, laughing when they did and making some commentary from time to time. It was growing late and the only thing in the sky was a crescent moon that seemed to shine really bright. I was seconds away from passing out on Morgan’s shoulder as my attention suddenly was drawn to the fire. I should’ve know that eating so much pasta tonight would’ve led to a food induced coma.

“Awfully quiet tonight.” Morgan spoke, his shoulder moving my head up to get my attention. My eyes looked back up to the group whose eyes were all focused on me. I was fairly quiet tonight, but with the topic on hand I hadn’t needed to speak too much. I’ve had my fair shares of faking my orgasms with ex boyfriends, but it’s been a while since I last did anything sexual with anyone. Reid and I only began dating about 5 months ago, and while I was okay waiting for him, he just never seemed to be interested in doing anything like that. Besides the flirty comments, we never seemed to take it past the heated make out sessions whenever we could sneak them in.

“You’ve been staring off into space for like half the conversation.” Emily spoke, a bit of worry in her tone. “What’s up? No fun stories of boyfriends who couldn’t get you there?” She raised a brow and I gave a slow shrug. Of course I have stories, but none of them really worth mentioning.

“Oh no, I have tons.” I spoke, picking my head up off of Morgan’s shoulder. “No fun ones, though. None of my ex boyfriends have ever been able to get me close.” I spoke honestly. None of any of the guys I slept with in the past has ever been able to make me cum.

“Any stories of boy wonder over there?” Morgan teased and I shook my head.

“Not one.” I answered, hoping my answer would satisfy their need for gossip.

“Really?” Morgan looked surprised, looking back to the brown haired Doctor who was explained to the child how he did his last magic trick. “You’ve never had to fake it with him?” He scoffed. “He’s only had like one girlfriend before!” He wasn’t wrong. Spencer had expressed to me a few times about his lack of experience. Maybe that simple fact that he’s only ever had sex like maybe twice played a part in his abstinence. Maybe he just didn’t see me as someone he wanted to have sex with.

“Honestly,” I took in a deep breath as I realized that they were all staring back at me like I was the object of their affection. “We haven’t had-”

“Oh. My. God.” Garcia gasped, already knowing the end of my sentence. I rolled my eyes, as Morgan’s whole body shifted just to give me a look the read ‘are you really serious right now?’

“It’s not that big of a deal.” I shrug it off, minimizing the impact of the news. “Like you said, he’s had one girlfriend before. Maybe he’s just not ready yet.” I mention, relaxing my already tense body.

“It’s been 5 months.” Garcia adds.

"It's not that long of a time to be dating."

“You guys are around each other for almost like 24 hours a days every day of the week!” Emily scoffed. “You’re telling that you’ve never had sex with him before?” She asked and I shook my head .

“We don’t even talk about it really...”

Each of my team members remained silent, coming up with possible solutions to my ‘problem’. I could see it in there faces that they were just in shock. They all looked to each other, equally as confused and a bit uncomfortable as the next. Doubt flashed across their eyes as they all looked because me and the brown haired Doctor across the lawn.

“So...” Emily began “if you and Spencer haven’t had sex yet, when was the last time you did?” She asked, interrupting he silence.

“I don’t know like...” I honestly couldn’t remember the last time I had sex with anyone. “A few years maybe?”

“A FEW YEARS?!” Garcia gasped loudly, gaining the attention of the doctor from across the field who only paid attention for a second before returning to the two boys.

“Oh my god, could you be any louder?” I laughed at her obvious dismay over my absent sex life.

“If you said anything over ‘a few years’ then yeah, I probably could be.” She nodded, still very troubled over the news.

“Look, We’re both pretty busy people outside of work and obviously weee not going to do it on the job-”

“Literally that’s a terrible excuse.” Garcia shook her head, as disappointment began to form on her face. Maybe they were right. We’ve been dating for 5 months but we’ve known each other way longer. It’s not like we were complete stranger still digging to get to know the other person.

“What’s a terrible excuse?” Spencer’s voice spoke from over my shoulder, causing me to jolt slightly. Everyone’s eyes immediately focused on him as he stood there confused and left out. I didn’t even have to give them a dirty look to tell them to keep our conversation under wraps, considering it was him we were talking about.

“Y/n was just telling us how she never read any of the Harry Potter books before.” Garcia spoke quickly, everyone nodding to agree with what she said. I cursed him out in my head as he moved around the couch and sat down next to me. I then shifted my weight from Morgan to Spencer, leaning my head on his shoulder. I tried to ignore the eyes but I couldn’t, each other them staring completely unbothered on how awkward it totally was.

“Y/n doesn’t read anything that doesn’t have hot vampires who sparkle in the sun.” Spencer commented, making my mouth drop. That’s was so untrue, I read other things too... I can’t name them off the top of my head but I know I do!

“Thats so-”

"very accurate?" he finished my sentence causinf my eyes to narrow even though i wasnt looking at him.

“Actually Spence, y/n was just telling us about a headache she had!” JJ spoke up, putting on a concern face that confused the hell out of me. When did I mention I had a headache? “She’s said her head was pulsing and it felt like her brain was throbbing?” My eyes widened and I realized what she was doing.

“Yeah,” Emily spoke, nodding her head as she picked up on the silent plan they just agreed upon. “I think she needs to get home, she might have hit her head or something earlier.” Emily frowned, as if she was really concerned for my health. They each had a look of evil on their faces which, to the blind eye, could easily be mistaken for care.

“Really? That’s does sound kind of bad, maybe we should get you to the ER? It might be a concussion...” Reid spoke, and my eyes widened even more.

“Oh no, she was check by the medics earlier! She might just have a migraine.” Morgan came quickly to my rescue. God knows what I’d have to do to talk Spencer out of taking me to the ER if he thought I was hurt or injured.

“You guys a such-” I stopped myself, watching the amusement grow on their faces as the waited for me to finish my sentence. “... such angels...” I grumbled, “always looking out for me.” I hummed, narrowing my eyes at the women on the couch across from me.

“Come on, let’s get you home.” Spencer spoke, helping me stand from the couch even though I was perfectly fine.

Our fingers were intertwined as we bid farewell to our evil scheming friends. I let him lead the way back to the hous, solely so I could flick them off behind his back. Once we got close to the house, we were attacked with hugs and pleads not to leave by the touch gorgeous little boys who would just missed their uncle Spencer. After we said our goodbyes to Rossi and Hotch we headed back to his apartment. Only because I loved the smell of strong coffee and old books, and he was closer.

“You should go lay down, y/n/n. I can wake you up when it’s time to go?” He spoke sweetly, his hands on my hips as we entered his bed room. I smiled at his kindness, remembering how I promised I’d go to some late night movie with him this morning. It was showing in Russian and he was just itching to sit through 3 hours of it to translate it to me.

“I love you.” I hummed, pressing a gentle kiss to his lips, as my arm snaked around his neck in order to pull him into a hug. His movements stuttered just a bit before he returned the hug back to me.

“I love you.” He counter, squeezing me into him. “Now tell me, how many glasses have you had?” He teased.

“One.” I answered, laughing at the face he gave me when he pulled away. “Only one, I swear!” I defend myself with a smile. It wasn’t thag hard to get him to realize I was telling the truth, I wasn’t big on drinking and I’d be damned if I let myself get wine drunk.

“Y/N Y/L/N, showing affection to little old me?” He raised his eyebrows. “What did I ever do to deserve it?” He joked.

"Why wouldn’t I be affection towards my loving, sexy, intelligent, boyfriend?” I teased with a playfully frown.

"Have you met you?" He smiled from my response, his arms wrapping around me a bit tighter.

“You know... I like kissing you.” I spoke slowly, my eyes falling to his lips no matter how hard I tried to get them to stare into his sparkly green eyes which always seemed to stare right into my soul.

“I like kissing you too...” his cheeks turned pink from the compliment.

“Hugging you is pretty nice too...” I further my compliments, my voice turned sultry and smooth as I tried my best to be seductive. I never really pushed the idea of sex on him, I was too scared that he’d reject me and I’d ruin everything. Now I’m starting to think that maybe everyone was right? It’s been a long time since I had sex, and it’s probably been longer for him. And we’ve been dating for a while now... maybe now is the time? “Hugging you and kissing you is really nice.” I murmured as his lips pressed into mine once more.

“I enjoy hugging and kissing you too.” He smiled back, a bit confused but he didn’t seem to mind. His large hands moving up and down my back. Right now, in his mind I was probably just basking in him right now. In mine, I really wanted him to catch the hint that I needed him to fuck me.

Our lips pressed together again, this time sending tingles down my spine. We slowly moved back until I had Spencer on the bed, with me straddling him as our lips moved in sync. He smiled against my lips as his hands moved down to my thighs, gripping them a bit harder than usual. This was it. This was them position we ended up in every single time we made out, only this time I was hoping for somethingother than just a heated make out session. His tongue swiped at my bottom lips gaining instant access before his was in complete control.

Spencer William Red had me wrapped around his finger and didn’t even know it. It’s been 5 months, yet even before I had the privilege of being his girlfriend I would’ve done whatever he asked of me. I was and still am completely ready to be used at his disposal.

“Are you sure you’re not tired?” He mumbled against my lips, slowing the pace before things could get too heavy.

“Not at all.” I hummed, leaving one last peck on his lips. I debated on what to do for a few seconds as my eyes wondered over his beautiful face. “I- I uhm, I have a question.” My voice came out soft, and gentle which wasn’t usual. Whenever I spoke, usually it was with confidence, and had no problem talking about uncomfortable topics but this... this was a whole new world.

“What’s wrong?” I watched the content look on his face dropped into more of a frown.

“I-” my eyes got caught in his, sparkling from the dim light in his dark green painted room. “I don’t know...” I used my fingers to brush a piece of his hair before his ear. He was truly magnificent to look at, from his cheekbones to his perfect nose, everything about him was just... pretty.

“Talk to me.” He frowned further, his hands careful not to move further than where they already were.

“Do you not want to... like...” my eyes narrowed a bit watching his confusion take place. He was one of the brightest people I knew yet he was still so clueless. “...touch me?” I sounded like an insecure teenage right now, and I honestly didn’t care. This conversation could go a number of ways and I’d rather take everything right now that go another day or week or month thinking that sleeping with me was a repulsive idea to my own boyfriend.

“You- I- what?” His eyes widened, and I dropped my arms from around his neck. I would’ve gotten off of his lap, but his hands were gripping tightly on to my hips in a way that made me want to throw myself at him. “You mean like...?” Goddammit Spencer, how fucking clueless are you?

“Do you not want to have sex with me?” My face was just as soft as my tone. I could see the shock taking effect as his brain worked as quickly as it could to fully understand what was happening at the moment.

“I- uhm, I-“ he stumbled, and for a second I swore my heart broke into a thousand many pieces.

“You know... just forget it, it was a stupid question anyways-”

“No!” His voice came out strong and willful. “No I just- I wasn’t expecting that, I guess.” He explained and I nodded. “I-I- do want to... uhm... have a- sex with you, y/n.” His face was showing a variety of emotions and I’m sure mine was too. “ I just...”

“Don’t want to catch a disease?” I joked, which he apparently didn’t find very funny. I couldn’t help it though, it’s too awkward in here for my liking.

“I don’t want you-“ he stopped to think for a moment, “I don’t want you to be underwhelmed.” He explained, my mouth dropping at his confession. He was scared he wouldn’t be able to pleasure me? That’s was... horribly sweet of him. Not that I expected anything less from Spencer himself... that was just very unpredicted.

I wanted to tell him about all the past guys who never even got close to getting me off, but I don’t think that would make the situation any better. Honestly, right now, just the thought of him touching me could’ve got me off. Even if he couldn’t get me there, I’d fake it. I’d fake it really fucking good just for him because so am completely wrapped around his finger. Well, I wanted to be at least...

“I just want to be with you, Spence.” I spoke, watching the light smile form back to his lips. He was conflicted for a second before nodding his head. His light green sparkly eyes then turned dark, his pupils dilating as our faces grew closer until I could feel our breaths mixing together.

“I love you so fucking much.” He hummed, just before connecting our lips again. I felt the butterflies in my stomach going crazy as his hands moved to my face, pulling our lips together again.

He tasted like the white wine he enjoyed at dinner earlier. It was an odd choice but one I could definitely get behind, only if it was on his tongue. His signature scent of vanilla coffe and some expensive cologne swirled around in my nostrils driving me absolutely mad. My hips moved against the fabric of his pants, grinding against him releasing only a bit of tension from my own body. His hands working quickly to unbutton my jeans and blouse, exposing my black laced bra hiding underneath. I let out a tiny giggle as his back collided with the soft duvet, leaving me right on top of him, making it much easier to grind down on him.

His hands moved to my hips, guiding me right where he needed me. My hands traveled from his jaw all the way down his chest, unbuttoning what I could until I got to his belt. I gasped as my back suddenly hit the duvet, giggling again as I felt Spencer smile against my lips. Spencer struggles to carry a gun properly so, flipping us over was a very impressive move coming from him.

“Literally, just beautiful.” He mumbled on my lips before pulling away to look at me.

My cheeks burned a bright red, as I watched him study my own body. His body rested in between my legs, and his hands slowly traced over my skin. He sent me a sweet smile, and I thought of 100 jokes I could make right now but I figured it wasn’t the moment. I lift my hips as he tugged off my jeans and shirt tossing it somewhere across the room, ditching his own shirt. Now I was laying naked, waiting for him to touch me, well, everywhere. My eyes caught onto the faint six pack that’s always hidden under his own shirts, and I swear if I could I’d stare at it forever.

“Like what you see?” I teased, watching a smile spread to his lips as he rolled his eyes.

“Kinda, yeah.” He nodded, bringing his forehead down to rest on mine. His hands moved to my side, taking his heavy grip on them. My leg propped up on his side, giving him a bit more room to work.

“Kinda?” I raised an eyebrow at the reply and he shrugged. My breathing halted at the feeling of his hand playing at the band of me black panties.

“I’m sure I’d like it much better, if you had nothing on at all.” I felt my stomach go into full on cartwheel as his hand slipped under the band of my panties. His lips pressed a light kiss to my forehead, before he went down to my neck. The heat from his hand hovering above me sent the most explicit images to my head. Every time my hips bucked into his hands, his lips found a spot to suck and nip at earning light moans.

“Please Spence.” I whimper, feeling his lips curl into a smile against my neck. He pressed some more antagonizingly slow soft kisses as he made his way back to my lips. He hovered for a second before our lips were moving again, his lips muting the sounds of my moans from his finger circling around my clit.

“Shit.” He muttered against my lips, as he ran his finger up my soaked slit, teasing my entrance just enough to collect just juices on his fingers. My hips grind up into his hand, begging for more of him.

His fingers sped up as he massaged my clit, sending a deep tingle throughout my body. He pulled apart from our kiss, and I released a loud moan. His fingers already finding their way into me, curling to touched that right spot inside of me. My hands grip at the sheets and pillows as he begins to pump in and out of me. I felt the tension in my stomach tightening as he brought my closer to where I was so desperately needing to be. He left a trail of sweet kisses down my body until he reached the band of my panties.

“Oh fuck-” I moaned out, catching a glimpse of what he was doing to me in the body mirror across the room. I could see my panties pushed to the side as his fingers fucked into me faster by the minute. I could’ve came at the sight right there, but picked up on where I was looking. His head turned to the mirror watching as I squirm under he touched when he pushed into me a bit harder than before. He sent me a devious smirk before turning back to his current project. “Oh my fuck- right there Spence- god!” I moaned loudly as I felt his tongue lapping up my slick, playing with my clit as he sped the pace of his fingers. My back arched off the bed as the euphoric high of the orgasm I was about to reach shot through me.

“Cum for me, Angel.” He murmured against me, sending a vibration right to my clit. Without warning I spilled everything on his fingers. I let out another string of curses as he removed his fingers only to replace his digits with his tongue, sucking everything out of me.

“You taste even better than you look right now.” He hummed, as he sucked my juice from his fingers. I put on a lazy smile, as my arms wrapped right back around his neck. He brought his lips down to me, giving me a good taste of myself.

“So pretty damn good?” I joke, earning a tickle at my sides. “My turn?” I prepared myself to be flip over again but instead I was hold down in place by the brown haired man.

“Normally I wouldn’t object but I really want to be inside of you right now.” He commented, my eyes widened a big at his bluntness before nodding my head. He slipped off his boxers, pumping himself above me a few times. His tip grazed my clit twice earning a moan from the sensitive sensations. I could tell he was enjoying having me completely at his mercy. I was enjoying it too. “Are you Ready?” He asked and I nodded, eager to feel him inside of me.

Without another word he slid into me slowly until he bottomed out. I gasped at the stretch and sting I felt as he entered. I felt myself convulse around him, causing him to tense over me. He stayed buried in me, allowing me to adjust to his size. I had half the mind to make a joke about him being such a gentleman but I kept it to myself.

“You can move.” I he gave a nod, as he pulled out earning a light moan from my throat. For a split second a saw a flash of evil cross his eyes. There was no pretty Sparkles in his eyes, they were now fake and filled with lust as his eyes raked over me.

He slammed into me, hitting the exact spot where I needed him. He kept a fast pace, hiking my leg up to his side again hitting into me at a deeper angle. His lips attached to mine in a hungry manner, as if I was just there for his own comfort. My back was arched off the bed as I get the knot forming in my stomach threatening to come undone once more as I cried out multiple profanities in his kiss.

“Oh fuck, y/n.” He moaned out bringing me right to the edge, my walls clenching around him as he picked up the pace. I let out the loudest pornographic moan of his name as I came undone. He fucked me through the euphoria as his own thrust began to stutter.

Our breathing was heavy as he pulled out and released his load on my lower stomach. I gave him another lazy smile, seeing as I didn’t have the energy for much else. Once he as finish he collapsed on the bed next to me, pulling my body into his. I could hear his heart beat racing through his chest... or was that mine? I was sure to be 8 different types of soar in the morning, and right now I was on the verge of actually passing out.

“You’re incredible.” I breathed looking to my equally as fucked out boyfriend. His long strands of hair sticking to his sweaty forehead, driving me slightly crazy.

“I don’t think we’re going to make that movie.” He laughed, making my smile grow.

I looked to the alarm set by the bed. “It’s only 11:30, we totally make it in time.” I spoke, remembering his excitement about this film earlier in the day.

“Yeah, but I have much better things to do actually.” He mentioned with a light shrug, brushing a few strand of hair from my own sweaty forehead.

“Like?”

“You.”

I smiled at the group of agents all hovering in the bullpen, probably talking about their weekends off. It was rare we ever got a whole weekend to ourselves, so whenever we did we made sure to take full advantage of it. I mean... I certainly did.

“Morning guys.” I smiled as is at down at my desk which Morgan for some reason thought was a chair.

“Morning sunshine!” The muscular clad man greeted me with a smile. “How waa your weekend?”

“It was really good actually.” I shrugged, noticing the expecting looks I recieved from the group. I noticed Penelope coming out from her office in the corner of my eye. She caught a quick glimpse of all of us, and her senses caught on quickly before she changes her route and made her way down with a giddy smile.

“You seem happy.” She walked up with a grin on her red painted lips. “You’re not a morning person... you never smile this early.” She stated. “Did you have sex?!” She spoke right to the point, taking me by surprise.

“I- uhm... what?”

“Yes? No? Did you at least talk to him about it?” She pushed, my cheeks turning red at the questions.

“Yeah, we did talk about the whole sex thing.” I gave in, knowing eventually they were going to find out everything on their own, either from me or Reid.

“How’d it go?” JJ asked, her and Emily catching onto the conver as the two of them moved to the front of my desk.

“Am I invited to the party this time?” Rossi spoke, as he walked down from his office, joining our group cluster.

“They talked about it!” Garcia cheered to him, and his face lit up as if her was actually proud of me.

“You did not tell Rossi!” I gasped

“Yeah we did, Hotch knows too.” Emily spoke, “now, what happened after you talked about it?!” She dismissed it, in hopes to get more information.

I sat in disbelief for a good few seconds before shaking my head. I knew they lived for the office gossip, I was the same way. Things like office gossip made us feel regular, considering the crazy and gore that came with the job. In all honestly, I hadn’t minded it all that much.

“It went well...” I shrugged

“And...?” Rossi spoke, waiting for more of the story.

“How well?” JJ asked, a smirk taking over her lips. They all stared intently as they waited for me to reply.

“I mean... we had sex.” I mumbled, just loud enough for them to hear. “...a lot”

“Seriously?!?” Garcia squealed.

“I- was it- was it good? How’d did it happen?” Emily asked, and I felt the heat rushing to my cheeks.

“Uhm...” I tried to think of less descriptive words than the ones popping into my head. “It was really good... like amazing actually.” I scoffed, laughing at the noises each of them made.

“So did you actually-”

“Yup.”

“And he’s the first person to ever make you-” I raise a brow at Morgan, putting slip finger to stop him mid sentence. He honestly looked in disbelief that Reid, of all people, could satisfy me after all these years.

“I said non of my ex boyfriends.” I clarified. I watched as Emily’s smile grew impressed, and Morgan and JJs jaws dropped at the confession. Garcia simply just squealed again, and I can’t even describe the look on Rossi’s face.

“Morning guys!” Reid walked in, a bright smile on his face chasing the rest of us to giggle at his brightness. He was usually in a good mood on mondays, but this was just a whole different type of mood. I had my ideas on why, but I didn’t have to say them out loud.

“Morning loverboy.” Morgan smiled at the new nickname. I haven’t seen him since early early this morning. We decided to part ways, mainly because anytime we looked at each other ended up in us having sex on whatever piece of furniture or appliance was nearest. Surprisingly he didn’t even mentioned a single thing about the about of germs and bacteria we could’ve spread either. Reid gave us all a wide smile before he walked up to my desk. He leaned down to height, placing a stern yet soft kiss to my lips. He usually went for the forehead or the nose, which all of us were aware of.

“How was your weekends?” He asked, looking to his friends happily.

“How was yours?” Garcia smirked, as she rest her elbow on dereks should. I felt my cheek glow hot again.

“It was... really good.”

“Oh we know.” Rossi mumbled, earning a dirty glare from me as my jaw dropped a little bit. The old man sent me a innocent smile a shrug, before Reid caught on.

“You know...” he spoke, giving me the same right lip smile he does when he really doesn’t know what to say.

“They know we had sex.” I spoke quickly, and his eyes widen a bit as he finally realized.

“Oh.” He spoke, fixing the satchel on his shoulder. Spencer was never very public with past romances, so I don’t know how he’d react to this. “I mean... I had sex with my girlfriend, what’s the big deal.” He shrugged, not seeming to mind too much. My eyes widened a bit, as I felt his arm snake around my waist pulling me into his side.

“You know what?” Rossi spoke, standing from his seat. “He’s right. He’s an adult, as are we. So stop acting like a bunch of children!” He scolded the group of adults hanging around us like a bunch of lost puppies. I smiled and nodded agreeing with the man. Reid gave him a thankful smile, before pressing another kiss to my cheek and going to his own desk.

Rossi stood in front of me as he watched the other back off, with eye rolls and huffs.

“Did you at least use protection?” Rossi teased, but for some reason thag caught my attention. Our attention. Sudden flashes from all the events that took place over these last few days flooded our minds at the exact same time. My body stiffened for a second before I grabbed the files stacked up on my desk to work from home. We hadn’t used a single condom all weekend. Everyone’s eyes were wide and I moved quickly, scrapping everything into my arms before I looked to Reid with an equally as fesrful look on his face.

“Text if you need anything.” I mumbled before practically running out of the office with Spencer close on my heels.

We were totally screwed

[wtfevenismypage]

Safe and Sound

Pairing: Spencer reid x reader

Summary: Reader goes into a coma after being tortured on a case and Reid spends all of his time with her.

Warnings: Abuse/torture, coma, probably a swear word or two

Category: Angst/fluff

A/n:I wrote this really late last night while half asleep, so it isn’t the best quality but oh well, I hope you enjoy!

Pain was the only feeling you had. It wasn't just a feeling, it was also your current emotion. You were ashamed in yourself for being so stupid.

You were moving in on the unsub, thinking it was only one person, you should have been able to take him out, but it was two grown men. Two grown men that took you out instantly.

And now you’re tied up to a chair, a blindfold tight over your eyes.

“Your friends are watching. If you try to send messages you’re dead.”

You smile sadly and look up, revealing your battered face to the men who beat you.

“I’m alright guys. Just look for the victims. I’ll be fine-”

A fist to your face cuts you off, and you let out a yelp as they yank your hair backwards.

“You all have four hours to find her. Every ten minutes we’ll carve two letters into her. If you can’t find her in time, she’s dead.”

A blade is pressed against your neck and you whimper.

The blindfold is torn off of your face and you look around with bleary eyes, observing all you can about the area around you.

An abandoned production warehouse. There’s colorful powder streaked across the walls and floor, so beautiful, yet you knew it would only fuel your nightmares for the next few months.

“You better hurry.”

The tall man behind me presses the blade into my neck, marking a shallow sting of blood on your throat.

“P-please... Please stop.”

-

-

-

-

The team could only watch in horror as you get beaten, Penelope trying desperately to track the live footage.

A firm hand is resting on Spencer’s shoulder, trying to calm him down as he glares at the screen, tears dripping down his neck.

Thirty minutes pass with no succession of finding Y/n. six letters are carved into you.

D-E-A-T-H-I.

One of the men, the taller one, walks in front of you and pinches your cheeks together.

“We’re going out, but we’re watching you. If you try and send any messages to them, We have deadly gas in the vents waiting to be released. Behave.”

They walk out, but not before punching you in the stomach, the rough leather of their gloves rubbing against your carved skin.

“Please... Guys they’re going to kill again... I... I don’t think I’m gonna make it. If... If anyone is watching this, please, Tell the rest of the team I love you all. Penelope, please keep being yourself, never lose the light that you have, it’s a beacon for others.”

Penelope’s eyes overflowed with tears as the team watches you bleed out more and more with every breath.

“Rossi, you gotta get out more man, get yourself a woman to love. There’s someone out there for you, you’ll find her soon.”

Rossi turns his head, not wanting to cry at your words.

“Emily, You are the strongest woman I know, please don’t lose your persistence. JJ, Tell Henrey I said Hi okay? You’re so brave, don’t let anyone push you around. Morgan, You keep fighting for what’s right and don’t you dare give up, the world needs you bud.”

“Hotch, it’s alright to take breaks, this team is strong, they’ll survive if you take a cheat day. You have to give yourself a chance to breath okay?”

Even Hotch himself had a tear dripping down his cheeks as you let out broken sobs, almost screaming as the pain in your stomach starts to make you dizzy.

“Spencer... Oh god Spencer... I’m so sorry... I should have waited for you to come up... I’m so sorry...”

““But if I’m... If I’m gonna die then I have to tell you... I have to tell you that I love you. I’m in love with you...”

You look around, looking at the corner where a pile of spilt boxes on the floor, Makeup palettes shattered across with broken eyeshadow on the floor.

“It was a few months ago in December, it was a cold night.” You desperately send them hints. “You had given me an eyeshadow palette. I was upset that day, and slowly, I forgot about it. But I came across it recently. I’m so sorry that I never told you. I love you Spencer... I love you so much.”

-

-

-

-

-

The team watches Spencer, waiting nervously as his eyebrows are furrowed together.

“I never bought her an eyeshadow palette...”

Everyone’s eyes widen.

“Garcia look for abandoned eyeshadow palette factories within a fifty mile radius.”

Hotch demands as Morgan sits Spencer down.

“Take a breath, we’ll save her.”

“Morgan, I love her too, if she dies, it’s my fault, I didn’t make it to her in time...”

“Hey kid, don’t do that to yourself, she’ll make it.”

Spencer continues to think about all the times you two had together. You were the only person who listened to his rambling, you actually listened and you liked it. You and him told each other everything, your deepest darkest secrets.

He couldn’t survive without you, there was no way. You helped him when he had nightmares, you made him coffee, you truly held his heart in your hands.

“There’s a match! 68738 Raney Street! Go get my baby!”

Reid is off in a bolt with Emily and Hotch following right behind him.

-

-

-

-

-

The men return to the ware house, flipping knives in their hands.

“Looks like it’s time for some letters.”

“Can’t we just finish the message? Please baby?”

The tall man sighs before crouching in front of you, pulling your shirt up and place the knife right under your boob before pressing it in, making you scream out.

“Please! Please stop!”

Your breathing is labored, the blood draining from your body quickly as he continues to slice into you like a stick of butter.

The last thing you hear before passing out  is the sound of bells ringing in your ears.

“Please...”

-

-

-

-

-

You wake up with a pounding headache, you can’t open your eyes or move any limbs, but you can hear voices talking.

“The nurse said she had a few complications before they could get her to surgery, her heart stopped twice, but they managed to stabilize her.”

It was Penelope, you could tell by the sigh that followed she was talking with Morgan.

“What did they... What did they cut into her?”

His voice was shaky, it made your eyes tear up even when closed, and you could feel the itch slip out of your eye as Penelope speaks.

“They said death is the beginning.”

“And he’s been there since she got out of surgery?”

“He refuses to leave. The nurses told him he had to leave but he wouldn’t budge. It’s been three days. I don’t think he’s eaten...”

Another sigh from Morgan.

Your body is numb, gentle pins and needles spread all throughout your senses. More tears slip through the tiny slits of your closed eyes, dripping down to your ears.

“She’s crying... Probably a nightmare...”

Silence. You can feel yourself drifting back to sleep slowly, the gentle beep of your heart rate putting you to ease as your breathing slows down.

“I can’t believe she went through that torture for four days...”

Had it really been four days? It felt like a life time had passed from being taken from your team.

As you drift into a deep sleep, you can only relive the horrors as you remain unable to wake up.

The next time you awaken, you still can’t move or even blink, your throat dryer than before, pools of sweat at your thighs. You’re able to feel a hand clutching yours though, it’s slender and bony, long fingers squeezing yours tightly.

“You might be able to hear me, and if you can, we uh... We saved you Y/n. You’re safe now.”

Spencer.

You wanted to smile and throw your arms around his neck, but your limbs feel like lead, the heaviest lead in the world and you just can’t lift them up.

“I love you too Y/n. I love you so much. But it’s been eight days since you got to the hospital... Please wake up so I can tell you how much I love you.”

A pair of lips presses against your forehead. It tickles, warm breath from his nose gliding over your skin as he finally pulls away.

“Wake up soon Y/n...”

You slip in and out of consciousness like that for the next few weeks, listening to Spencer’s stories of the team’s current case, and relaxing to classical music as he reads books aloud to you.

They were books you loved too, fictional books about space pirates and cheesy rom-coms. You were so grateful  too him, hoping you could move sometime soon so you can kiss him.

One day the nurse came in to talk with Spencer.

“Her state isn’t improving, she hit her head pretty hard when you found her,  we don’t know how long it’ll be until she wakes up.”

You wanted to fight for him. You wanted to open your eyes and look at his beautiful face, you wanted to be able to hold him in your arms. So when his hand returns to your’s, you try your hardest to squeeze his hand, to let him know you’ll survive.

It takes all of your energy, but briefly, very briefly, your hand clenches softly, and you can feel his hand tense up.

“She squeezed my hand!”

With those words you swiftly passed out.

-

-

-

-

-

Spencer squeezed your hands days after that, it had been almost three months now, and a few days since you held his hand.

Your disheveled state was slowly improving, your sunken cheeks and deep eyebags now gone, but you still weren't waking up. 

“So I brought a children’s book today, I thought you would like it.”

He begin’s reading to you, squeezing your hand every few seconds to hopefully gain some sort of reaction from you.

But once again, nothing.

“Please wake up soon princess...”

-

-

-

-

-

You strain your muscles harder than you ever had to before, trying so hard to tap your fingers on his hand in the tune of the distant piano playing in the background.

One finger twitches on his skin, bouncing up and down to the beat of the piano, the rest of your fingers following suit.

A gasp escapes his lips.

“Princess? Are you awake?”

How the hell do you think I’m gonna answer that Spencer you dumb-

“Oh wow princess, You’re awake! Um, Uh, Okay, I need to go get a doctor, keep your fingers tapping okay? Doctor!”

You keep tapping your sore fingers, listening to Spencer and the doctor panicking about what to do.

But then, You’re eyes slowly flutter open, the blinding light impaling your irises as the sound of Spencer’s crying fills your ears.

 “Good morning Agent Y/l/n, you’ve been sleeping for a while now, I’m gonna help you sit up okay?”

You do your best to nod as the female doctor moves the hospital bed upwards, allowing you to lock eyes with Spencer.

“Sp... Spence...”

Your voice comes out broken and shattered, only a semblance of a croak, but he leans in and wraps his arms around you, making you feel safe and secure.

“Hey princess, I missed you so much.”

He presses a kiss to your head again, letting his tears fall onto your hands, which he’s held against his cheeks.

“I... I love...”

“Shhhh, I know princess, I know, just relax now alright? You’re safe and sound.”

“I love you...”

“I love you too.”

[your-eternal-muse]

Kinda Wish She Were Dead

Heather Series Part 8

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 Part 7

Bonus! Readers Card Confession Series Playlist 

Summery: During a night out on the town with the girls, Reader see’s something she wasn’t supposed to.

Words: 3.7k (my longest yet!)

Warnings: Swearing, a few sexual innuendos, Cheating, Mentions of Alcohol, and a fabulous right hook.

Pairing: Spencer Reid x Heather Carmichael, Spencer Reid x eventual Female!Reader 

A/N: I’ve been waiting for this one....turn it up! Also, the song that inspired this chapter. For the meaning of the song, not that fucking boat scene.

~~~~

It’s hot.

Like “laying naked in the middle of your apartment with the air cranked and every fan blowing on you” hot.

I’m one of the lucky ones.

My old apartment was renovated to include central air a few years before I moved in.

Still, the humidity was smothering.

So why was I putting a full face of makeup on, knowing damn well I’m gonna sweat it off before the end of the night?

Because why the hell not?

It’s the first time I’ve made plans with the girls in months, and I deserve to feel pretty, even if only for an hour or two.

My therapist tells me I’m making progress.

And it finally feels like I am.

I don’t hate the day before it even starts when I wake up.

I hardly close my curtains anymore.

I’d like to say that with her help, everything went back to normal.

I go to work and come home. I hang out with my friends, water my potted plants. Talk to Spencer like I never confessed my love for him.

But it didn’t.

I haven’t really spoken to Spencer since the day I left.

I’ve wanted to.

I’ve wanted to tell him that I’m here. I’m still here. That I’m always going to be here.

That I care about him more than probably life itself.

Ever since I came back, we’ve had to work together, and we’ve had a few small conversations, but nothing like what we used to have.

I crave those conversations.

How we would bounce back and forth from idea to idea, topic to topic without so much as breaking a sweat.

The late night conversations about the probability of aliens, and life on the opposite side of the universe.

I crave him, and the intimacy he brought.

Lately though, he’s been coming to work with a sullen look on his face.

He shows up earlier, and stays later, drowning himself in his paperwork.

When her calls interrupt a caseload, he no longer eagerly picks up to hear what she has to say.

All I want to do is walk over and ask him how he’s doing. How the married life is treating him. If there’s anything I can do to help lift his spirits.

But I can’t.

I’d be overstepping a boundary I didn’t even know I created that night out on the balcony.

Knocking on my door snaps me out of my daze, and I quickly cap my lipstick, making my way towards my front door where my night stands, waiting.

JJ, Emily, and Penelope are waiting, big smiles and laughter bubbling from their lips.

I let the smile spread across my face.

“I just need to grab my shoes and then I’ll be ready.” I usher them into my hallway, running back to my bedroom to grab the pair of heels resting by my closet.

I sit on my bed, slipping them on with ease and grabbing my bag on my way out.

They all ooh and ahh when I step into the light of my kitchen, and JJ grabs my hand, twirling me in place so they can get a better look at my outfit.

“I almost forgot you had party attire, y/n.” 

“God, I wish I had an ass like that. I’m older than you. That’s not fair.” Emily says, landing a playful slap against the fabric of my skirt. 

“Oh stop it, you flatter me.” Once upon a time, the attention would have made me antsy. The voice in my head would whisper that they were lying to me, that they really thought I was the ugliest thing in existence. 

That was then, and this is now. Now the confidence shines off of me like a spotlight.

“You deserve to be flattered, you beautiful goddess you.” Penelope says, her hands waving in the air.

I take a look in the new mirror that hangs in my hallway, and I can’t help but agree. The tight black skirt accentuates my curves, the low cut golden crop top that sticks to me like another skin puts the girls on display, and my heels give me legs for days.

I look damn good.

“Okay okay okay, pre-game selfie!” Penelope grabs her phone and holds up in front of her while we gather around. 

She snaps the picture and within a few quick taps, a buzzing emits from my bag. 

I dig my phone out, seeing the picture pop up in my notifications. 

JJ has her arms wrapped around me, and I’m pressed to Penelope's side. Emily stands over us, one hand on JJ’s shoulder, the other on Penelopes. 

I don’t think I could fake a smile like the one on my face even if I wanted to. 

I save it to my phone.

~~~

If I thought being in my house, alone, with air conditioning was bad, then I shouldn't have even bothered coming out.

The bar, albeit small, was packed. 

Even if there was a breeze, or any airflow at all, the combined body heat of the crowd would have swallowed it up.

I couldn’t really bring it in me to care all that much, though.

The dim lights and heat left my skin with a sexy shine, bringing attention to all the right places. 

I could feel the eyes on me. 

The ones belonging to men wanting to drown their sorrows in a woman like me, one who appears vulnerable, willing to go along for the ride.

It’s been a while, since I’ve had the attention of the opposite gender, especially this very specific kind of attention.

It feels good, in a way. To be wanted so openly. But it doesn’t mean jack to me, not if it’s not the pair of eyes I’ve been desperate to catch.

I should stop thinking about him.

It’s a girls night out. I don’t have to think, or worry about anything. 

Besides, he’s probably busy doing other things. Thinking about me is the last thing on his mind.

I laugh and take a sip from the Shirley temple sitting in front of me, laughing as JJ recounts a story about will and a botched attempt at breakfast in bed.

I pick a cherry up from the fizzy drink, and bite the end off, relishing in the sweet flavor. I pop the stem in my mouth, twirling it around my tongue as I listen to the conversation, pulling it between my teeth and setting it down on the table in a knot.

“Oh my god. Did you just tie a cherry stem with your tongue?” Penelope is cheesing from the other side of the table, the bright pink straw of her margarita almost to her lips.

I laugh, holding it up for them to inspect. 

“You know what that means.” Emily says, taking a sip from her own drink, before continuing her thought. “You, my friend, can give great head.”

A blush covers my cheek, but I cock an eyebrow. “Who told you?”

The three women burst into high pitched laughter, and I see Pen pull out her phone. She holds it up to me. 

“Do it again. The internet needs to be blessed with this knowledge.”

I chuckle again, the spirit of the night enough to get me drunk off the energy. I grab another cherry from my drink, sucking the end into my mouth before popping it off, and swallowing it. 

“Alright, we have one, untied cherry stem before us.” I hold out the stem for the camera to see. “Now watch as I tie it with no hands.”  I stick out my tongue, placing it in the middle before closing my mouth. 

I rest my elbows on the table, working my tongue around the stem, forcing it into submission to do exactly what I want. 

Within 15 seconds, I pull it through my teeth, and hold up a tied cherry stem. 

“Ta-da! Magic.” I place it on the table as they clap, smiles wide and goofy from their own alcoholic concoctions. 

“She’s single people. And there’s a line forming so shoot your shot.” JJ is the one to speak to the camera, and I giggle, taking another sip. 

Penelope brings her phone down, and within a minute my phone buzzes again, this time with the notification of the video being posted. 

There are worse things to be posted on the internet about me.

“I never knew you could do that, y/n/n.” Pen says, taking a sip from her drink. 

I run a hand through my hair, shrugging. “Didn’t think I needed to put it on my resume. It’s mostly a party trick I use when I like someone. I haven’t used it in years though.”

The unspoken question lingers on the air. 

“No, I never showed Spencer. But I’m sure it’d blow his mind. The way that man applies math and logic to everything he does just solidifies the fact that I know he wouldn’t be able to do it.”

It’s been a while since I’ve joked about him openly, but it wasn’t forced. It didn’t hurt. 

It was just a natural statement.

“Have you guys noticed that something’s up with him? He seems distant lately.” JJ says, leaning in closer so she doesn’t have to talk over the crowd. 

“Okay, so it’s not just me.” I reply, playing with the straw in my drink.

“It’s gotta be something at home. I mean, he doesn’t even remotely act the way that he did when him and Heather first got together.” Emily's eyes look me up and down, reading my body language, but I’m done hiding. 

I let the building anger ripple through me.

“He seems...sad. And not like, normal Reid sad where it has to do with his mom or something, no this is like..” she stops herself from continuing the sentence.

I finish it for her. “It’s like, me, sad.”

JJ sighs. “I hate to say it, but do you think it has anything to do with Heather?”

A glass shatters across the room, and like the red sea, the crowd parts.

Everything happens in no more than a couple seconds, but it feels like a lifetime. 

Through the empty space, I see two people standing at the bar. The woman has her hands wound into the man's shirt, her body turned as she laughs at someone behind her, I’m assuming the one who dropped the glass. 

The man has his hands gripped on her hips, smiling into her hair, before she turns back around, connecting their lips in the most disgusting kiss I have had the displeasure of witnessing.

The rage builds swiftly in my stomach and it pulses from my soul outward. The world’s tint changes and I see red.

“Even if it doesn’t right now, it will.” 

When the hell did I stand up?

They stand with me, and I’m about to argue my point when Emily speaks. “You want something to record, Garcia?” She moves by me, fixing my hair, handing me her glass which holds a swig of her drink left. “Record this.” 

I take it, downing it for a little liquid luck, and start for the bar, the three of them on my heels.

I profile him as best I can in the 20 seconds it takes to get through the now reforming crowd. 

There’s a gold ring on his hand. His pants and shirt are dirty, and his boots are thick. He works in something having to do with construction, which means he’s probably done around 5 every night, and I know for a fact that it is way past that.

I walk up to them, grabbing her shoulder and pulling them apart, stepping in between them, getting face to face to him.

“Before you even think about laying a hand on me, my name is SSA Y/L/N of the Behavioral Analysis Unit of the F.B.I. From the look of your clothes and the ring on your finger, I’m gonna go ahead and assume that your wife is waiting for you at home.” 

His hand instinctively falls to his back pocket.

“And since you just reached for what I’m assuming is your phone, she’s called you multiple times tonight. She knows. Now, fuck off and maybe you can salvage things with her, but believe me when I say this,” His breath smells sour. “You aren’t even half the man that she’s married to.” 

He opens his mouth to say something, looking from me, to Heather, to the three women surrounding her, keeping her from leaving, and the camera pointed directly at his face.

He looks back down to me, and huffs, stepping back and walking in the other direction.

For a moment, I stare at where he stood. 

And then a fire ignites in my stomach and it takes everything in me to not beat the girl standing behind me.

I turn, and lightning strikes behind her eyes. 

“You’re not gonna tell him.”

“Like hell I’m not!” I take a step forward, and she takes one back, bumping into Emily who has her arms crossed, and her shoulders raised. “You know, I tried so hard to give you the benefit of the doubt, Heather. You made him happy and I honestly thought you loved him, but I realize now that he deserves someone so much better than you.” 

“Oh what, someone like you?” She’s snide, her demeanor defensive and cocky at the same time. She thinks she’s gonna come out on top of this.

“You know what? Yes. Someone like me. Someone who wouldn’t even think about doing this to him, because the amount of pain that he is about to go through doesn’t even come close to the stupid fucking reward. Oh, so you slept with some douchebag because what? You’re not getting enough attention?” The words are cathartic, leaving my belly with the venom that has been brewing there for the past 2 and half years.

“I found your letter. I was right about you.”

That would have stopped me in my tracks 6 months ago. Now I don’t even flinch.

“Oh honey, it’s not a fucking secret anymore. You want to hear me say it? I love him. I am in love with Spencer fucking Reid, and the only reason that he is with you, is because I was a decent human being and could see that you made him happy, so I kept my mouth shut. But I don’t care anymore. I don’t give a flying fuck what happens now, because whatever it is, it has to be better than being with a lying, cheating bitch like you.”

“You think he’s gonna run to you? Is that what you’re hoping for? He’s not gonna believe you. And even if he did, I’d turn on the water works and make him believe it was just this one time.”

She doesn’t know she’s being filmed. 

I turn to the bartender. “Excuse me, is she a regular here?”

The bartender smirks, wiping down the wood. “Yep. She comes in at least a couple times a week with that dude you kicked to the curb. They almost always leave together.”

Heather scoffs, crossing her arms. “Again, he’ll never believe you.” 

“You sure about that hot stuff?” Penelope steps forward, shoving the camera in her face. “Smile for the camera.”

Heather's eyes go wide, before turning to me. “You wouldn’t dare.” 

“I would do it for a fucking corn chip.” 

I place my hands on my hips, getting so close to her our noses almost touch. My voice is dangerously low when I speak. “Either you tell him everything or I will. And trust me. I have my ways of finding out if you did.”

I step back, wishing the daggers in my eyes could inflict actual pain, as I turn to walk away. 

I hear her shout in frustration before I feel her hands on my back, pushing me forward into the mass of people. 

A couple people unaware of the confrontation help me back up with a smile, thinking I’ve just drunkenly tripped over myself.

Emily and JJ each hold one of my arms, making sure I’m stable, while Penelope keeps filming a look of shock on her face.

A wicked smile forms on my face.

I was hoping she’d do something like that.

I turn and my fist connects with her face, a nice cracking noise satisfying the lust building in my chest, as a thin coat of blood covers my knuckles. 

Though, it’s not my blood. 

She’s holding her nose in pain as she falls to the floor, taking down a bar stool with her, and I swear I see the bartender laugh.

I grab a napkin off the bar, wiping my knuckles before throwing it on the floor by her feet. 

“C’mon girls. The night is still young.” 

I see them cover their own smiles with their hands, and Penelope starts to giggle the shock away. 

I know I should feel bad. It was unprofessional of me. 

But she shoved me first. 

It is, legally, self-defense. 

Is it sick that I wish she would have punched me?

It doesn’t matter anyway. I know she won’t press charges. She’s smart enough to know she just dug her grave.

And now she has to lie in it.

~~~~

The atmosphere is different when I walk into the office the next morning. 

It’s tense. 

And one look from JJ and an inhale of air tells me why. 

Spencer’s here. 

I barely have time to set my bag down on my desk, before he grabs me suddenly by the arm, dragging me into a nearby conference room.

The anger is rolling off of him in waves, and I can see by the way he clenches and unclenches his fists, he is pissed.

He almost throws me into the room, slamming the door behind him. 

“You want to tell me why the fuck you punched Heather in the face for no damn reason?”

Stupid, stupid girl. 

Did she not think, that the way I would find out, would be from Spencer himself?

I can’t help but shake my head and laugh. “She didn’t tell you.”

“She told me that she was having a drink with a girlfriend of hers when you came up drunk, yelling at her, until you just punched her. Can you explain that to me?”

He’s finally yelling at me. After months of begging for him to yell at me, he finally is. 

It doesn’t feel as good as I had hoped it would.

I don’t say anything, just pull out my phone to find the video that Garcia sent me.

“Are you serious right now, Y/N? Put your fucking phone down and explain to me why you broke my wife's nose!”

I sit in a chair, setting the phone on the table and sliding it towards him. I lean back and cross my hands over my stomach.

“Watch the video, Spencer.”

“Why? Why should I listen to anything you tell me?”

I lean forward, onto my elbow, annunciating every syllable. “Watch the damn video.”

He stands, and I watch as he fights with himself, before huffing in defeat, sitting in a chair and pulling my phone towards him.

He presses play.

I watch as his anger flows away with each passing second, despair taking its place. 

This is what I wasn’t looking forward to. Seeing him see it for the first time.

Watching him break. 

It wasn’t pretty.

I watch as tears form in his eyes and silently drop down his cheeks. 

He clenches his jaw as he watches her shove me, and the punch that followed. 

The room is dead quite when the video ends.

I’m the one who speaks first, my voice soft. 

“I punched her, because she had the audacity to do this. She had the audacity to hurt you, and flaunt that fact publicly.” 

I swallow, taking a breath before speaking. 

“I meant everything I said in that video, Spence.” 

He looks up at the nickname, his anger no longer directed at me.

“She hurt you, and I saw red. I didn’t think about what I was doing, and frankly, I’m glad I didn’t. I don’t regret standing up for you. I never have, and I never will.”  I clasp my hands together, forcing myself to continue. 

“I love you Spencer. I don’t think that’s ever going to change. I’m going to have to live with you finding other people and falling in love, and I promise you, I will support you in that. But not with her. Not after that. You deserve so much better than a girl who thinks she can get away with this just because she’s pretty and jealous.”

He taps a couple things on my phone, before turning the screen off and sliding it back over to me. 

He stands. 

I don’t. I continue talking as he walks over to me.

“You mean everything to me, Spence. If I know you’re happy, truly happy, then I’m satisfied. I will defend you until the end of the universe comes. You are my best friend, and I love you. And I’m sorry I was never upfront about it before, but I am now.”

I look up at him as he stands in front of me. “I’m done hiding from you.”

He’s still for a moment. 

He reaches down and grabs my hands, pulling me up before he wraps his arms around my waist and buries himself into my neck. 

I pause, but only for a moment, before wrapping my arms around him and holding him tight against me. 

I can feel the wet spots on my neck as he cries, and his hands wind themselves into the fabric of my shirt.

When was the last time he was held like this?

I don’t count the time until he loosens his grip, stepping back from me and wiping his face. 

I would hold him until the end of time if he let me.

“Thank you.” He whispers, before moving towards the door. 

He opens it and walks out, and I grab my phone, running after him.

I stop in the doorway. 

“Hey!” 

He stops and turns, and the rest of the team is watching over their files. 

My heart is pounding, and I feel out of breath.

“I don’t have a choice,” I let him remember. “But I still choose you.”

A small smile flutters across his face, before he turns and walks away.

I look down at my phone.

Spence xp

[Video]

    Sent, 9:06 a.m.

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[darthkruge]

Hello! I'm kinda new to the whole tumblr thing so sorry if this request is bad but I was wondering if maybe you could do an imagine for spencer reid where the reader is Garcia's younger sister and Garcia brings her in to meet the team because it's her first day there. Maybe Reid recognizes her from somewhere and he will not leet it go until he finds out how he knows her? Btw it's totally fine if you don't get to this! :)

Spencer Reid x Reader ~ Piano

Summary: When a new agent joins the BAU, Spencer knows he’s seen them before but literally cannot figure out where. His memory having never failed him before, he doesn’t rest until he figures it out.

Pairing: Spencer Reid x Gender Neutral! Reader; Penelope Garcia x Sibling! Reader

Words: 1973

Warnings: A little bit of language, I think that’s all?

A/N: Hey anon!! First off, don’t worry, love! I’m honestly new to this whole tumblr thing too, but I loved this request! I’m sorry I didn’t get to it sooner, life’s been a bit hectic. I made it so the reader is Garcia’s younger sibling instead of sister, I hope you don’t mind. I’m going to try to make writing as gender neutral as possible moving forward. Nothing against you, of course, I know I haven’t specified in past requests and I couldn’t have expected you to know, so don’t worry! That being said, sorry for rambling and I hope you like it :)

(gif isn’t mine)

“Hello, everyone! I want you to meet the youngest of the wonderful Garcia children!” Penelope led you into the BAU where you waved a bit stiffly. You weren’t a huge fan of being the center of attention, but you knew your sister loved these introductions.

Looking around, you pieced together the people you knew from Penelope’s stories. You recognized Derek immediately. You assumed from his professional stance that the taller and older dark haired man was Hotch. Logically, that meant Rossi was next to him. And Emily and JJ were the two women, smiling and waving at you encouragingly. You smiled a bit broader, immediately sensing you would be fast friends with them. Finally, your eyes landed on what had to be Spencer. You thought he was quite attractive and, from Penelope’s descriptions, he was also amazing, talented, kind, smart, basically everything you liked. You waved at him but noticed he was almost studying you? You weren’t sure, but felt a bit awkward, confused as to why he seemed friendly to everyone else but wouldn’t even smile at you.

“Umm, hi!” You said, laughing nervously and kind of hoping to disappear. Hotch sensed your discomfort and offered you a kind smile before putting you out of your misery.

“Welcome to the team, L/N. Garcia’s told us wonderful things about you. That being said, we’re just closing up tonight, so you could finish up your paperwork finalizing your transfer into the BAU if you haven’t already and then come in for your first day tomorrow?”

“Okay, thank you, Sir.”

“Goodnight, team”

Everyone echoed the “Goodnight” before filing out of the room. You got into the car with your sister and pulled out of the BAU, reflecting on your past and thinking about the next chapter of your life.

After almost everyone else had left, Spencer was still at his desk, thinking. The certified genius, was, for once, completely at a loss. He couldn’t figure it out. Where had he seen you before? He was currently in the process of mapping out every place he’d gone to over the last few months. Every restaurant, every film festival, every face he saw in passing at crosswalks, through car windows, at coffee stands, and, still, nothing.

“Woah, Pretty Boy, slow down! What’s got you so riled up?” Derek says, walking over to where Spencer was hunched over his notebook, furiously writing.

“I can’t figure it out, I know we’ve met before or I’ve seen them before or something. I just,” Spencer put his head in his hands, eyes starting to burn a bit from the strain of writing and concentrating for so long, “I just know it”

“Seen who before?”

“Y/N, the new agent. They’re so familiar, but for some reason I just can’t figure it out”

“Ohh! Garcia’s their sister, right?”

Spencer nodded and Derek came behind him, seeing the messy timeline and pages of notes scattered around the agent.

“Are you sure you’ve seen them? I mean, we see lots of people on the job. You could have just seen someone who looked like them, you know? And come on, Reid, your memory is, like, insane . If you’d met, you’d have remembered”

“I know, that’s what’s got me so messed up.” Spencer sighed.

“Take a rest, kid. It’s late, get back to it tomorrow. Maybe they’ll visit you in your dreams…” Derek said, wiggling his eyebrows and laughing as he walked away.

Spencer laughed, hoping Derek was right. He’d do anything to get more time with you, even if it was in his subconscious. Honestly, he felt a bit bad. He’d been so caught up in figuring how he knew you that he’d kind of forgotten to actually talk to you. Normally, he’d have caught a new recruit before they left, but he didn’t get the chance with you. After packing up, Spencer went home and continued his search with you on the forefront of his mind.

Meanwhile, you had just gotten back to your sister’s apartment. You had your own place but you were new to the team and felt a bit lonely. Mentally, you didn’t want to be alone at home, too.

“Hey, Pen, what’s up with Reid?” You asked. You were confused, you knew he was quiet but he seemed to be actively ignoring you. Even stranger, you caught him intensely staring at you, as if he was trying to figure something out.

“He’s just shy, Y/N. But he’ll warm up to you, don’t worry! Honestly, I think the both of you would be a pretty good match. If you want, I can do some of my famous matchmaking!”

“Please, noooooo,” You groaned, dragging out the word.

“Come on! I’m great at it!”

“No! Remember last time? I ended up on a blind date with a guy who, within the first three minutes, told me he liked me because he saw similarities between me and his parents!! Then, he proceeded to detail their divorce for the next 45 minutes!”

Penelope was laughing hysterically, “I mean, you did say you liked emotionally available people!”

You grabbed a pillow and threw it at her head, dying in your own fit of laughter.

“Alright, that’s it, I’m going to bed. I can’t be conscious in the same house as you anymore” You say, smiling and jokingly flipping your sister off as you walk away and into the guest room.

Naturally, she returned the gesture.

When Spencer arrived at work the next morning, his eyes were bloodshot, hair was sticking up in a million different directions, and clothes were exceptionally disheveled. Anyone else and you would have thought they had a really bad (or great) one-night stand. Although you weren’t close with him, you just didn’t see him being that type of guy. You laughed a bit as he grimaced, taking a sip of what looked like extremely bitter coffee.

Deciding to try and break the ice, you went over to him. “Long night?”

Spencer’s head shot up. “Uh, yeah, I guess you could say that” He said, laughing a bit.

You smiled. Even though he was awkward, you felt at ease in his company. “I get that, I’ve had a few long nights myself. I love the job, don’t get me wrong, but the way the BAU runs is different from anything else I’ve ever dealt with.”

“Yeah. It can be a bit of an adjustment, but you’ll be fine. You’re doing great. I mean, you arrived early, so I can already assume you’re organized. And your desk is a little messy, leading me to believe you’re a creative person. Your handwriting is quite slanted, too. I recognized it from your entry forms. Did you know that’s a sign of high intelligence? Because your thoughts are moving so quickly, your hand can’t keep up in the “perfect” way, so the letters normally slant and become more sloppy.”

You were mesmerized by him. You could watch him talk for hours, truly. Sure, he wasn’t always graceful, but he was so passionate about everything he talked about. You loved listening to people talk about what they love. The way their eyes light up, it makes the energy surrounding them contagious.

Realizing he had just psychoanalyzed you without permission, Spencer looked at your sheepishly, rubbing the back of his neck. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to profile you. It’s sometimes hard to shut off, especially around new people.”

“I get that. It’s okay, I don’t mind.” You said, nodding knowingly.

As you said that, Spencer figured it out. He remembered one time visiting his mother in Vegas and hearing you say those exact words. You were playing the piano, talking to a patient who had just accidentally spilled some water on your sheet music as they took their medicine. “It’s okay, I don’t mind. I was in need of new music, anyway” You had responded, laughing. He was surprised he didn’t immediately recognize you, the beautiful and talented person he’d seen that day. But, it did make sense, in a way. Spencer’s memory is always at its highest and weakest when he’s with his mother. He can remember each of their conversations, verbatim, but everything else fades.

“Spencer? You alright?” He had been kind of spacing out for a few moments and you were afraid you did something wrong.

His attention came back to you and he smiled again, brighter this time. “You play piano.” He stated.

Your breath caught and you let out a small laugh, extremely confused. “Uhh, yeah, I do. I’m sure you’re great, but that seems extreme even for you, Mr. Profiler”

Spencer laughed. “No! I didn’t profile you, I just, I remember you. Las Vegas, March 12th, Psychiatric Hospital, you were playing piano. A patient spilled water on you. I remember you.”

“Oh, right! Ms. Owens! She’s lovely. You were there that day? Well, either that or you just gave yourself up as a damn good stalker”

“No, no, not that,” He said, a shy smile playing on his lips, “My mother’s a patient there, Diana Reid? I’m not sure if you know her.”

“Yeah! She’s quite a character. I always enjoyed playing on days Diana was there.” You reminisced for a second, lost in the memory.

“Were you visiting someone there, too?” He said, pulling you from your thoughts.

“Not exactly. My grandfather was a patient before he passed. He taught me how to play and I kind of just asked the staff if I could volunteer and continue to after he left. They were kind enough to let me. I mean, he always encouraged me to perform and I thought it was a nice way to honor his memory. A few months later I heard from Penelope that there was an opening at the BAU. I moved out, and, well, here I am.” You gestured to yourself, slightly embarrassed after you realized you might have overshared.

Spencer caught onto this, however, and quickly reassured you. “That’s amazing, Y/N. You were amazing when I heard you. I wish I could have heard you play again.”

“Thank you, that’s really sweet, Spencer.” You said, resting your hand atop his, a blush forming in his cheeks at the touch.

“Um, if you don’t have plans. I mean, not to assume you don’t have plans, just if you, you know, happen to not be busy, would you want to maybe get dinner sometime? You don’t have to, of course! I wouldn’t be offended! I just kind of want to get to know you more. If that’s alright with you.” He trailed off, not making eye contact and playing with the buttons on his shirt a bit as he awaited your answer.

Deciding to be bold, you gently turned his face to meet yours and smiled. “I would love to. Tomorrow, pick me up at 8:00?”

“Yeah! Here’s my number, text me your address?”

You smiled and nodded, taking his phone. He took the moment to just look at you. You were truly one of the most breathtaking people he’d ever met. He couldn’t believe he’d just gotten you to agree to go out with him. Even so, he wouldn’t question it. If something in the universe gave this to him, he wouldn’t risk it for a second.

You placed a gentle kiss on his cheek as you slipped the phone back into his hand. As you pulled away, Spencer cupped your cheek and pulled you back in for a kiss. His lips tasted sweet and soft and a sense of serenity washed over you as you stood in the middle of the BAU, kissing him. Everything faded away and quickly came into focus again as he pulled away, far too soon for your liking.

“More of that tomorrow” He whispered, his forehead resting against yours.

You smiled, “That’s fine by me.”

~requests are open~

[psychedellic-phase]

Cold Coffee

a/n: ((gif by me)) sorry for being so inactive y’all, but i hope you enjoy this small blurb of angst inspired by cold coffee by ed sheeran :) it’s like kind of a song fic maybe? idk

tw: Arguing, cursing, angst, insinuation of cheating, breakups ( and a cat! )

Word Count: 1.5k

The pot was cold. It’d been sitting out for a few hours, half empty, or maybe half full, depending on how you look at it. Right now, it was definitely half empty.

You didn’t know why you still made so much every morning. You only drink a cup, or maybe two, not an entire pot with a gallon of cream and sugar like he did. For some reason, you still make sure that at 6 am it’s ready, waiting for him, even though he isn’t there and you don’t wake up until eight. At this point, it was a habit. A bad habit you couldn’t quite break.

You made excuses, of course, justifying ice cold coffee every morning by saying that you had grown accustomed to waking up to the smell. That you actually preferred it cold. But they were lies. The truth was that you missed him. It wasn’t the smell of coffee you’d grown accustomed to, it was the fact that you made it for him.

He was the bad habit you couldn’t quite break, the feeling you couldn’t quite shake, the shadow looming over you every waking moment.

His mug was in the same place it always was. Third overhead cabinet from the left, second shelf, front and center. It was white and said “CalTech” in orange block letters on the front. There was a brown ring inside, at the top where he always let the coffee sit to cool. It was permanently stained, no matter how hard you scrubbed and scrubbed, the mark never left. You felt similar. No matter how hard you tried, you couldn’t remove the stain of him from your mind.

It had been far too long for your feelings to still be this way. In some ways, your feelings never should have been that way in the first place. You shouldn’t have loved him. He told you as much the first moment you met.

“We can’t,” He said, his hands tangled in yours, squeezing lightly at your fingertips.

You turned to him, nose almost brushing nose, “Don’t try and stop it.”

But that was a long time ago, nearly four years, and everyday you wish you had listened to him. You wish you had let him stop you, taken the rejection gracefully and moved on.

In not stopping, you stumbled into the greatest love of your life. The kind of love that made you believe in soulmates and stardust and magic. The kind of love that finally made you feel like you were enough. The kind of love that could only come with a certain kind of man. A man that wasn’t there anymore.

You saw the half empty coffee pot on your way past the kitchen. You stared at it, and it reminded you that it would not be miraculously drunk. It’d still be half empty. It’d always be half empty.

You sighed, taking it and pouring yourself a third cup, cringing as the smell of stale coffee filled the air around you. Honestly, you preferred tea.

You walked over to the couch where your cat was lying lazily. You rubbed his soft gray belly, smiling at the sound of him purring. The cat, Poe, was Spencer’s idea. He met Emily’s cat, Sergio, and immediately fell in love with the idea of having his own companion. He came home grinning and laughing, the number for the closest animal shelter already in his phone. You got Poe a few days later, he was a sick little American shorthair that had been abandoned in a street alley. Spencer saw him, and immediately decided he was the one you needed to have. You obliged, of course, loving the way his eyes lit up the moment Poe was in his arms.

Poe was very much so Spencer’s cat. Poe preferred to lounge on his lap, rather than yours. He only liked to be held by Spencer. He only liked you when you were giving him treats, taking a break from his usual preference of scratching you when you came near.

It was a shock when Spencer didn’t take Poe with him, and you could tell that somehow the cat knew. He felt the rejection. Somehow Poe was heartbroken, just like you. He missed him too.

“Tell me what’s wrong!” You begged, voice cracking and wavering with every word, Spencer staring at you blankly as you fell apart in front of him.

You were standing over him, arms flailing as you had one sided argument and hejust looked at you. It was exhausting, really, to love someone who only half loved you back.

It hadn’t always been like that, but somewhere between then and now he stopped loving you, and you only loved him more.

“Nothing is wrong,” he answered, avoiding your gaze, Poe in his lap.

You wanted to pull your hair out, to scream, whatever it would take for him to see how hurt you were by his passivity.

“That’s a lie.”

“No, Y/N, it isn’t. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to go.” He stood up, pushing Poe onto the couch.

“Go? Go where? You just got home!”

He finally looked at you in the eyes, his steely and cold, yours wide and begging, “Anywhere but here.”

He turned to walk away, to brush past you and leave you with nothing but a shoulder bump. You reached out and grabbed his arm, “Is that where you go?”

He stiffened under your touch, your cold fingers chilling him to the core, instead of making him feel warm like they used to. He didn’t know when he stopped loving you, it was just that one day he woke up could no longer feel it. That in and of itself was worse than the heartbreak he couldn’t force himself to feel.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Spencer replied, trying to remain as calm as possible.

You scoffed, “That’s really where you end up? Where you want to end up? In the arms of someone who isn’t me?”

“How am I supposed to be content in your arms when this is what our lives are like? We fight and we fight and at some point we have to ask ourselves is this,” He gestured between you, “even worth fighting for?”

You winced, as if you’d been slapped in the face, “I-I think it is!”

“Well I don’t,” He said coolly, with a shrug, as tears stung your eyes.

“I love you, Spence, I–”

He shook his head, “That isn’t fair.”

“Just say it back, you haven’t said it in months, just–”

“You know I can’t say it back! You know that! You know I don’t love you anymore!”

“Do you not remember what we used to be like? The way we used to pack picnic baskets and go to the park on Sundays? The way we laid on gingham blankets and ate apple slices and laughed in the sunshine? Do you? Or do you only remember the moments like this? When I’m fighting and you’re just watching?”

“I-I remember,” He said, shaking his arm from your grasp and moving away to create space, “But, that isn’t us anymore!”

He made his way to the door, grabbing his go bag from where it always sat next to the front door.

“Y-you’re taking your bag?” You whispered, rubbing your face to remove the tears.

He nodded, “Yeah, yeah I’m taking my bag.”

“W-when are you coming back?”

He looked into your eyes, hoping you’d understand what he meant without him having to say the words. He was never coming back.

“Stay? Would you please just stay, not for forever, but at least for now?” You knew his answer, but that didn’t make it hurt any less. In fact, knowing how much he no longer wanted you hurt more than anything else in the world.

He looked into your eyes and pursed his lips before speaking, “No.”

And the door opened and closed before you could protest.

You stared at the door for a while, tears streaming down your cheeks, waiting for him to open back up.

He never did.

When you finally gave up and found yourself wrapped in a blanket on the kitchen floor with a bag of chips, Poe walked over.

He meowed at you, and you swore he meowed sadly. He stepped into your lap for the first time, curling into a ball there.

“Hey buddy,” You sniffled, petting his head, “Daddy isn’t coming home anymore.”

He meowed again, and you fell asleep there on the floor with him.

That was four months ago. You hadn’t seen Spencer since. He came one day while you were at work to collect his things, pet Poe one last time, and leave for good.

That was four months ago, but you still made a full pot of coffee every morning. You still wished for him to come back. A part of you always would, but instead every night you slept alone, with Poe by your side.

Tell me if you need a loving hand to help you fall asleep tonight

—-

taglist:)

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[jetaime-jespere]

Prompt #74/188

#74: Well. Yell, scream, say something, anything / #188: Say it.

Rated M.

Atlantic City is a calamitous disaster. At least that’s how it starts.

Not because of their case - of course it’s awful, as most of them are. There’s nothing not awful about a duo of killers targeting vacationers during the height of the summer tourist season. Everyone is on edge, it’s hot and cramped, and there isn’t much time before they’ll almost certainly find two more dead bodies in the early morning hours outside one of the many casinos dotting the shoreline. But they’re used to that; it’s practically their daily vernacular at this point, a bit of normalcy in the current chaos between them. The case is the least of Aaron’s concerns, or Emily’s for that matter.

It’s everything but the case this time.

Things go downhill before they even cross the New Jersey state lane. A last minute hydraulic fuel leak on the jet renders air travel a non option. Instead, they get stuck in the same SUV with Reid for company in the backseat for the four hour drive. Aaron almost feels sorry for him, but he’s completely oblivious to the brewing storm inside the confines of the car for the entire first leg of the trip. Reid chatters endlessly, yet neither of them seem to hear a word he’s saying. By the time they hit the Atlantic City Expressway, Emily is all but ready to leap out the window. Hardly any words are exchanged between the two of them at all; they aren’t needed. It’s in her body language and his reticence, the firm clench of his hand on the steering wheel and her weary head resting on a fist, angled as far away from him as possible.

“This is a mess,” Aaron mutters with more than an hour left to go, and he isn’t talking about the thickening traffic. He’s talking about them, and the ending to what never really had as much as a beginning in the first place.

Things spun out of control towards the end. There was a breakup, if it could be considered as much. What they had was never labeled or defined, it just was. It was built on a mistake, nurtured through secrecy and quiet whispers in the dark. It then spiraled into something else entirely, creating an impasse between them during the day that bled into endless nights spent wrapped around one another in beds across the country for almost four full months.

“We can’t do this,” Emily finally said in a darkened hotel room in Seattle exactly 12 days prior to this one. He’d been expecting it, recognized the signs of her pulling away a little more with every kiss he left on her smooth skin, every shudder of her body beneath his and every breathy pant in his ear. There’s nothing tangible left of them, just broken fragments and heavy silence, and every reason why they shouldn’t have ever started this in the first place plays out right before their eyes. “There’s only one way for this to end, you know.”  

There was nothing he could say to talk her out of it as she threw the covers aside, reaching for her clothes on the floor. Aaron offered an “I’m sorry” for good measure yet it didn’t feel like enough, probably because it wasn’t at all. But it’s over, she reminded him as she closed the door firmly, without looking back.

Or so they think.

A mishap at the hotel in Atlantic City leaves the team two rooms short, meaning the team will have to double up for the next few days. JJ is seven months pregnant, which automatically gives her the comfort of her own space, and it goes without saying Dave will get his own too. Reid shuffles his feet and makes eye contact with Morgan, looking slightly relieved when he nods in agreement. That leaves Aaron to concede and Emily to shrug her shoulders indifferently, even if her face is anything but that. The caretaker of the slightly run down hotel  only slightly leers in Emily’s direction as he passes over the two room keys, and Aaron can’t help but step between her and the counter and swipe them both out of the man’s hand with a curt “thanks.”

“You didn’t have to do that,” Emily says low enough for only Aaron to hear, snatching the key out of his hand and taking off in the direction of their room. “It’s just a damn key.”

“Did you see the way he stared at you?” Aaron questions with a hint of impatience in his tone as he goes to follow her, but she’s not listening.

“202 is the other way, you know.” The man chuckles with a jab of his finger, as if he’s seen this exact scenario play out many times before - two people disappearing behind a closed door, a disaster waiting to happen. “You two have yourselves a nice stay.” He doesn’t seem to care that just a few moments ago, Aaron’s FBI badge was in his face. He looks almost amused, which only adds to the visible tension between them both.

With an exasperated sigh, Emily turns on her heel and spins in the opposite direction toward their room. “I can’t believe this,” she mutters, staring at the tiny gold numbers on every door until she finds the one they need. Aaron doesn’t miss the way she squares her shoulders, the quick intake of breath as she twists the key in the knob.

The door squeaks on its hinges when she pushes it open; the room smells slightly of mold, but even that isn’t the worst part. The proverbial icing on the cake is when she stops dead in her tracks with him right behind her, shoulders sagging in defeat.

Fuck.

There’s only one bed. It sits in the middle of the damn room, practically mocking them both. Aaron doesn’t miss the subtle glance Emily throws in his direction, searching for his reaction just as he is studying hers. “I’ll take the couch,” he says immediately, keeping his face neutral, setting his bag down on the rickety piece of furniture that has clearly seen better days. “You can take the bed.”

“That hardly qualifies as a couch,” Emily tells him sharply. “That’s a chair, Aaron.”  

She’s right, he thinks in annoyance. It wouldn’t even fit half of him, and staring at it makes his back hurt in anticipation. But sleeping next to her for however many nights they’re here isn’t exactly an option, either.  “I don’t want to make you -”

“Let’s just agree,” Emily says through firmly clenched teeth, making it a done deal. “To be adults about this. We can share a room for a few days without it being an issue. That includes the bed.”

…

They should have known better, but it’s too late for that.

As expected, the rest of the day is exhausting. It only ends because of the promise to look at things with fresh eyes in the morning at the urging of the equally weary Atlantic City police. By the time they make it back to the shabby room, they’re both tired, hot, and cranky, hardly uttering a word after bidding goodnight to everyone else.

“You shower first,” Aaron says as he holds the door open for her, giving her enough space to pass him. “I have to check in on Jack.” He knows her routine once they get back from a case - a shower is always a necessity, and in the better days, they’d always taken turns on first dibs. Or just showered together, which was always his preference.

If she thanks him he doesn’t hear it, and the bathroom door closes behind her, the lock added for good measure. But twenty minutes later - how long does she need in there - he has to avert his eyes when Emily steps out of the bathroom in a cloud of steam, the scent of shampoo lingering in her wake. She’s wrapped in one of the hotel issued towels, which is a generous description for the scrap of fabric that barely covers her, awkwardly crossing the room to dig through her suitcase.

Look away, Aaron wills himself, struggling to get comfortable on the tiny couch. It’s a lost cause, and will undoubtedly be a very long night.

There’s a mishap with the towel, a soft curse under her breath as she scrambles before it hits the floor, and an inopportune moment when their eyes meet, succumbing to what they silently agreed would never happen again. It’s how Emily finds herself pinned under his weight, her back pressed against the mattress as Aaron lowers to his knees and dips his head between her legs. Any protest that falls from her lips is short lived, her hands in his hair, her legs curling over his shoulders as he slowly begins to take her apart. Emily arches into him, unable to stifle the moans that are now a constant stream of affirmation, and Aaron doesn’t bother with reminding her the walls are thin. He doesn’t care, and something tells him in the moment he coaxes her climax out of her, neither does she.

“I missed you,” he says when he slides into her to completion a few moments later, giving her a moment to adjust to him before starting to move. He kisses the space between her breasts and Emily all but ignores him, pushing him over onto his back to straddle his hips with a smirk.

The pace she sets is quick, the rhythm fast and rough, and it’s over almost embarrassingly fast. He’s gotten her down against his chest, his arms wrapped tightly around her as she whimpers into his mouth. Her body is shaking in the aftermath as he thrusts hard once more, holding her against him. For a few quiet moments, the only sound is that of their breathing, a heaviness falling over them both at the realization of what’s just happened. And yet, she stays on his chest, her limbs not quite ready to work, in the comfort of his embrace for a few moments longer.

Afterward, Emily puts as much space as she can between them, which isn’t much given the size of the bed. “If this was your way of not sleeping on the couch,” she says sleepily, her voice muffled by the pillow, “I guess you won.”

...

The next morning, as the sun rises over the shore, Aaron finds her on the balcony, wearing nothing but his undershirt that was abandoned on the floor, the sound of the ocean in the distance. He mumbles something about getting coffee, the first thing that comes to his mind. He knows she (and he) could use some, judging by the minimal amount of sleep they got. Emily doesn’t say a word, just pushes him against the sliding door and drops to her knees. His head falls back against the glass, his hand tightening in her hair as she brings him into her mouth, letting him hit the back of her throat. In between his eyes closing, his hips stuttering against her face, Aaron watches the brilliant mix of orange, yellow, and red fade into daylight, and wonders just how things got to be such a fucking mess in the first place.

They’re two for zero now, and as the day dawns hot and there’s another set of bodies found, it’s abundantly clear no one is leaving Atlantic City anytime soon. And much later that night, they hardly make it to that damn bed before the score becomes three.

…

Aaron wakes up a few hours later from a restless, uncomfortable sleep. The room is stuffy, the pillow underneath his head is flat, the hum of the air conditioner a constant nag even if it does little to cool the room down. Before he opens his eyes, he knows she’s gone. The space beside him is cold - Emily is nowhere to be found, and there’s thunder rumbling ominously in the distance. He dresses in the dark, grabbing his keys, doesn’t bother with an umbrella, and makes the short trek to the boardwalk.

It’s where he would go, and it’s where he finds her, sitting on a bench, her arms folded across her chest, long legs crossed at the knees. She’s ripping at her fingernails, a sure sign something is wrong, and wearing a blank expression that doesn’t change when she slowly turns her head to see him coming right towards her. “I had a feeling you would find me.”

Aaron shrugs, but doesn’t miss the way she flinches when he sits beside her. “Not many places to look. It’s 1 AM, you know.”  

She sniffs with disinterest, continuing to pick at her fingernails.“Why do we keep screwing up?” Emily says after a long pause, and what he sees is like a swift kick to the chest. She looks disappointed with herself, disgusted even. All because of him. “Why can’t I just … quit you?”

“Why do you keep coming back?” He challenges her right back. “If all you’re going to do is walk away again?”

Emily turns her head to stare at him with widened eyes. “We both know the answer to that, Aaron. We both know this was never going to work.”

“No, you decided that. All on your own.” He remembers the night in Seattle as if it were yesterday - the night she left. The sting of her words is still fresh in his mind. “But maybe you’ve already compartmentalized it,” he adds with a bite in his voice that wasn’t there before.

Emily recoils at his words, recrossing her arms over her chest. She rises to her feet, pacing  around the bench.  “What do you want from me, Aaron? What were you expecting when we drunkenly decided to sleep together once? It wasn’t supposed to be like this.”

“You. I want you. And not just this fuck then forget bullshit,” he says over the growing wind and thunder, the skies threatening to open. In the distance, the ocean churns, the tides crashing against the shore as his anger builds. “I want to be with you,” Aaron adds with a waver in his voice. “Regardless of how this started.”

Emily blinks with confusion and bites her lip, as if holding back tears. She shivers, rubbing her arms, her lip starting to tremble. They can’t. Her silence is an answer in and of itself, one he refused to accept.

“Well?” He demands, the anger rising in his voice, and Emily curses his resolve.

“Well what?”

“Well. Yell, scream, say something, anything,” he snaps, searching her face for a sign of anything besides the emptiness painted across her features. “Don’t just say nothing.”

But Emily indeed says nothing, just regards him with wide, darkened eyes that tell him what he needs to know. In the dark, with only the lights of the boardwalk to cast eerie shadows on her face, she looks almost ethereal, a haunting comparison to the fear he sees. That’s what it is, he thinks. Fear. Fear of what could be, fear of what might never be.

“Say it,” he pleads. “Please, Emily.” The rain starts to fall, coming down relentlessly and soaking them both to the skin almost instantly. “

“Aaron,” she whispers, barely audible over the thunder and now the rain. “It would never work.” She holds up her hands in defeat. “We can’t.”

“What are you so afraid of?” He grabs her by the shoulders, just tightly enough that she can’t duck out of his grasp. Emily squirms uncomfortably but he holds her fast, unwilling to let her go, for if he does, she may never come back. “Why are you so damn afraid of this actually working? Do you have any damn faith?”

She opens her mouth but snaps it shut, her chin trembling with effort. He expects her to slap him, to jerk away and disappear into the night. He’s waiting for her to leave like she did three weeks ago. But she doesn’t. What she does instead surprises the hell out of him. Emily kisses him, slanting her mouth against his in the pouring rain, pressing her rain-soaked body right into his. It takes a full ten seconds before he kisses her back.

It’s a compromise, an agreement to not make a decision one way or the other, at least for the time being. Even so, Aaron envelopes her in his arms, a hand cupped around the back of her head and the other anchored across her shoulders. He kisses her back with an urgency he can only attribute to the fact that he’s in love with her, something he’s known for way too long.

He doesn’t have to tell her that, because somewhere amongst all the doubt, she already knows.

An hour later, after a hot shower (taken together) the score becomes four. And a few hours after that, as the sun rises yet again, nearly blinding them in a cramped Atlantic City hotel room, Emily tentatively agrees to try.

It’s good enough for him.

[mxargo]

some days

spencer reid

summary: spencer takes his time with a girl that he thinks may be it for him.

pairing: spencer reid x fem!reader

warnings: mentions of past deaths, spence being in prison, age gap of ten years. honestly lmk if I forgot anything.

word count: 2475

most of this is from spencer's pov

○○○○

some days are better than others, some make it and some don't. that's just how life is now. people get hurt, good people.

bad things happen to good people. good people who decide to live their own lives fighting other peoples wars just so they don't get hurt.

they're total strangers so why do it? why do others let themselves feel great pain just to save someone they don't know?

if we started questioning the good and their good intentions, there wouldn't be any left. that's why we don't do it.

when new cases come around, we push the why in the back of our minds and focus on the how. how are we going to save these people in time? and what if we don't? how many bad endings can occur during these cases before we start questioning our own sanity?

that's where spencer was.

questioning his sanity.

after prison, everything was different. he wouldn't want to admit that because it was the truth. a truth he wasn't yet ready to face, especially not by himself.

he saw the world differently, things he used to be able to do before just faded away in a locked compartment he built for himself in the back of his mind.

the part of him he'd never want to open. why do we do this? what happens if someone takes away the important. the reason he'd believe kept him steady.

his mother.

she wasn't well. he knew that to be true, didn't mean he liked to admit that.

he would defend her world without a thought of his own, but that tasks he kept only for himself is what started to strip him of what he once was.

thirteen years ago, the once smaller man who was so innocent. the man who just joined the bau thinking that this, this is my way out.

his way out of his mothers world. he loved her no doubt, no one needed proof for that but he wanted his own.

that's what he that he was doing when he met maeve. only knowing her for his own redemption, his migraines.

he wanted her. he loved her but he couldn't admit it. he didn't want to. if he told her he loved her everything he once built for himself would be gone.

she was being hunted and he couldn't handle any more loss he was sure to happen, and when she did die, It was like a part of his soul broke apart and fell deep inside his locked box.

after gideon died, he thought he'd almost lost it. in a way, he was like a father to him after his own abandoned him.

in some ways more than most, some days are better than others, some make it and some don't.

after he got realised for prison early, he went straight back to work. that's just the kind of man spencer reid was. he wanted to continue to help others even though he clearly needed the same for himself.

so when emily decided to send him home, he was alone again, and he wasn't used to living in something bigger than a 6x6 cell.

but it didn't feel very much like a home anymore. he knows what it used to feel like, a warm place away from the harmful rays of the terrible people outside his green walls.

he couldn't stay here, at least not right now. so when he left his apartment walking around dc, he started to realize what he was losing. his sense of happiness, and he'd do anything to get it back.

maybe if he did his house would start to feel like a home again.

♡♡♡♡

sitting in a small cafe sipping on the same coffee he's had for the last hour he started resembling the coffee to himself, he loved coffee. it was one of his favorite things in the world, aside from books.

but as now, he couldn't finish it. on any other days he'd at least be on his fifth cup by now having read already a few of his books.

but he didn't have any with him now. just him and his now half empty cold cup of back coffee. since when did he stop putting sugar in his coffee? was it before or after prison? what changed?

when did the sweet and softness in his like go away?

it was all his could think about now, which was a good thing come in handy, since thinking about what was really bothering could have ended up with him causing a scene in the same cafe he's been going to for the last two years.

it was a bit far out from his apartment but there was a girl here. a girl he like to watch, not in the senseless creepy way but he liked to watch her.

he liked the way you laughed, the way you smiled as you passed along coffee to other people. he loved the way you'd hum soft melodies to yourself as youd clean coffee stains of the counters. he loved the way youd listen to him on his rambles and ask him questions as you made his coffee. and the first time he met you, he knew he couldn't walk away forever, but it was all by accident.

walking into a cafe, he was in a hurry. it wasn't the same one he'd been going to that was across the street from where he lived but it was close now to where he was and he needed energy.

as he waited in the small line inside the small building, he realized there was only one person working there.

a girl.

she smiled at the elderly woman who was complementing on the younger womans earrings.

"those are lovely, I would've loved to wear those and walk around like you when I was as young as you. so beautiful"

and after that she couldn't stop smiling, but by that time it was my turn and she was attempting to revive my attention after I'd zone out.

"oh I'm sorry"

"don't be, it's alright. what can I get for you?"

her voice was so sweet sounding, intoxicating, in the good way. she sounded almost angelic. the kind penelope liked to remind us are the best of this world, and now that I've heard it for myself, I couldn't wait to see her and thank her for it.

but as I waiting on the other side of the counter as she made my cup, I didn't like the silence. I wanted to hear her again and the only thing I could think of was the same thing I always do, rambling.

coffee facts, of course.

"did you know that coffee is originally from Yemen?"

she looked up a me and when her eyes met mind, my heart felt like it was going to crawl out of my chest and land in her hands.

"I didn't"

"yeah, coffee is consumed in such great quantities, it is the world's 2nd largest traded commodity, surpassed only by crude oil. It is our most beloved beverage after water. It's worth well over $100 billion worldwide"

"that's interesting, I don't know much about it I've only been working here for a couple months"

"why are you working here?"

"just extra cash, figured I could use it if I want to graduate college"

college. that word kind of hit me like a truck.

she must be what then, twenty-two? I felt almost weird trying to get her attention more.

"I just turned twenty-three a few weeks ago and having to work five years instead of four has been hard"

I didn't know what to say by then. ten years. ten. that's the distance between us and it felt dreadful.

he never did it. he never asked her out or poked around to see if she was every seeing someone.

he wasn't hers and a part of himself hated that. but what would his friends say if they knew he was with someone so much younger than him.

they wouldn't be very supportive. he didn't need that from his family, but this one girl. shes the only one that's been able to get under his skin since maeve. the only girl hes been able to admit that he had feelings for, and strong ones because if they weren't. he wouldn't be going out of his way to walk four blocks away from his apartment everyday to see this one girl. if his feelings weren't real he wouldn't spend his time sitting in the cafe from the time it opened till it closed on the days that he could.

he just liked seeing her. and they were friends, he didn't think they were. they didn't talk as much as he wished but when she told him that he was her best costumer he figured everyone else had heard the same. but when she told him that she'd probably quit if she didn't see him everyday, he couldn't believe that she had cared for him that much.

"refill?"

hm?

"what? oh hey y/n"

"hey"

she smiled at me and looked around the table sending me back a confused look.

"no books?"

"oh um no. I forgot to bring some"

"you forgot?, I thought your brain was all mighty, never forgetful. I remember when you told me that I also should tell you I remember all the little gifts youd leave me"

"wha-"

"what? you didn't think I'd know it was you? I've known since I found a copy of gaspty on my car. youre the only one I told I'd accidentally ruined my old one"

"yeah.."

"are you doing alright spence? you've been here only an hour and no books and only one cup of coffee which I'm sure is cold by now"

by now she sat across from me pleading those very same eyes I'd fallen for two years ago at me.

"just in a bit of a mess"

"I know that your job is super hectic but I haven't seen you in three months"

how could I tell her? would she look at me differently? would she leave me alone?

"just work stuff"

"oh. well whatever it is, I'm sorry and I'm here for you. you know that right?"

"of course"

she smiled at me grabbing the coffee pot and ruffling my hair as she walked away.

being in prison reminding me of how much I loved her. how much I'd miss the way she'd sit with me after hours reading books with me and listening to my ramblings. it took me a bit to admit that I love her, but when I did I'd made a promise to myself I wouldn't let her go, but I wouldn't let her get hurt either.

by the time the cafe started to empty and the clock hit 9pm I'd notice her walk up to me handing me a book.

"I figured you could use it."

"thanks"

when she sat by me she didn't too close, giving me space but not too far where I couldn't feel her next to me.

"what's going on with you spence? I'm really worried about you"

"it's just work"

"you serious?"

"yes"

"then why don't I believe you?"

"I just-

"you can trust me. I care about you spencer. you disappeared for months and I just- I was worried something bad happened to you. at one point I thought you mightve-

died? I couldn't do that to her.

"no. no, I'm okay. sorta I guess. about a week ago I was realised from prison, I was framed for uh- murder"

that was the first time she bad been made speechless. she didn't say anything. she didn't look angry, or upset. just sad.

"I'm really sorry. why didn't- god I should've-

"should've what? there wasn't anything you could've done"

"I could have been there for you. I just- I feel like I should've been there thats all. your not alone, are you?"

sitting back, resting my head against the back of the booth meeting her eyes, I realised if I'd told her how I felt, i couldn't have anything else to lose.

"I have you"

she looked in my eyes for what I'm guessing is the answer to her confusion.

"what?"

"I have you. you're here. you always have been, and I'm grateful for it. I really am. i- I didn't know how to tell you before but I care for you. in ways I probably shouldn't. I don't know of this would work or not but if there is even a 1% chance there would I'm willing to take it. I love you y/n, I always have. since I met you. y'know I didn't normally go to this cafe. I live four blocks away from here. I came here on convenience and after I met you i couldn't stay away."

"I'm glad you didn't"

grabbing her hand, she didn't pull away.

"me too"

she pulled herself closer to me letting her head rest on my chest.

"you're such a good person. I hope you believe that. some days are better than others, some make it and some don't. i really want you to make it, and if youd let me, I'd really like to be here and help you with it, because I love you too and I like seeing you happy. I'm sorry for what happened to you, I know it wasn't your fault. I hope you understand that."

"I do now, thank you hon"

I could feel her smile again the thickness of my coat, I guess she just had that ability. and when she leaned up to kiss my cheek, I had pulled away.

"oh, I'm sor-

and when I kissed her. I stopped feeling guilty about how other people might feel about us. I stopped worrying about the fact that maybe one day, this might all blow over, but if it did, at least I'd known I'd done something about my feelings instead of wallowing in regret of what could've been.

derek once said that penelope was his god given solace, and the only thing I ever wanted was to find mine.

to be honest I believe I did.

I have her now, and hopefully it doesn't ever end. another reason to keep me steady other than my mother, and being hopeful for the both of us in whatever this will be wouldn't hurt.

she makes me feel things, things I've never felt before. I used to hate it, I used to want to make her take it away but now, it's all I cant think about and I don't believe i could ever let it go.

spencer reid finally found the one piece of his soul and he let y/n gracefully put it back into place.

[write-orflight]

Like Real People Do. Chapter 3

*Gif not mine*

Prologue  Chapter 1 Chapter 2

Rating: M, eventually will be smut.

Words: 2.5k

Warnings: Sexual themes, talk about sex (not NSFW though), 

Request: OPEN/CLOSED

A.N Y’all are really benefiting from my insomnia rn. I do have a plan to go back to my regular posting schedule but for right now enjoy the things starting to happen. Much love, Cia

       Chapter 3: The bugs and the dirt  

You’ve been on the team for about 6 months now, and you were loving it. Sure it was long hours, constant danger, and mounds of paperwork but you couldn’t be happier. You felt like you were doing what you were meant to do. The team had fully accepted you in the family around month 2. You and Morgan had become close after your “personal day” in October. He expressed that he knew what it was like to lose a parent and though he’d never understand losing both so quickly he offered you condolences and free drinks with him and Prentiss that night. Since then, the 3 of you have become good friends. 

There was always the occasional girls night with Emily, JJ, and Garcia, Dinner at Rossi’s and afternoon picnics with Hotch and Jack(which eventually just turned into you babysitting Jack while Aaron took a deserved nap). Your favorite however, was Saturday’s with Spencer. 

The two of you had fallen asleep that Friday night him and Garcia came over to watch Doctor Who. You woke up laid on top of him, legs tangled while your head was resting on his chest tucked under his chin. His arms were wrapped around you, hand resting heavily on the small of your back. You try to get up without waking him but of course you do, he startles awake in turn startling you causing you to fall off the couch. 

“Oh, Y/N,I’m so sorry--” He starts, immediately flushing. He stands to immediately help you up.

“No worries, Spen. Not made of glass.” You laugh. 

He blushes more at the new nickname. “Spen?” he asks. 

“Uh, yea.” You say. “Do you not like it?” 

“No-no, I like it.” He says. 

“Ok then.” You smile. “Do you have plans today?” He shakes his head. “Well, Saturday’s when I usually get coffee and work on homework at a cafe down the street, do you maybe wanna tag along?” you ask. He nods furiously. 

And every Saturday you guys had free since Spencer would meet you in the small cafe near your apartment. He would order an Americano with an ungodly amount of sugar and you would get a cold brew, despite it being winter still and you would sit and talk while you did work. Often he would help you with your thesis, telling you things you should add or consider. Sometimes you would just sit and talk about books you’ve both read or often you would explain the plots to various reality shows you know Spencer would never watch but he would sit and listen intently just like he did with everything you said. He treated every word that came out of your mouth like it was the most important thing in the world, treated every minuscule fact he learned about you, like it was treasured information to solving the mystery in front of him. You had become his personal cryptid. 

Of course the rest of the team had caught on to your Saturdays together, you worked with profilers and a very gossipy tech analyst. The amount of times you two had walked in together from being called in for a case last minute was enough to give you away. You thought back to a very uncomfortable conversation you had with Hotch one morning. You had come to drop off files JJ just pawned off to you to take upstairs. You held up your hand in a small wave walking into the office door. You put the files on his desk, starting to walk out when he stops you. 

“Y/N, we need to talk for a second. Close the door.” Hotch says. You nodded closing the door. You immediately tried to rattle off everything you’d done wrong to Hotch that could possibly warrant a talk. I forgot his coffee order that one time it was my turn, I missed Jack’s birthday once, I took a nap in the file room. You thought, all weren’t good but none warranted a closed door talk. 

“Yes, sir?” you ask, he gives you a weird look before it dissipates into his usual scowl,  neither of you used to the professional formalities still. 

“I’m sure you’re aware of the FBI’s fraternization policy.” He says. 

“Yes, sir…?” You say, not knowing where he was going with this. You weren’t fraternizing with anyone and no one knew that more than you except maybe your right hand. 

“Now there’s things I’d be willing to overlook as long as you don’t let it affect your work. But you would have to tell me and you would have to fill out an office relationship form--” 

“Whoa-wait a second.” you say. “What’re we talking about?” 

“If there’s something going on between you and Spencer you would have--”

“Hotch! There’s nothing going on between me an--What?” You say, you knew you had to be beet red right now. God this is humiliating. You thought.

“Really?” he said. 

“Yes! There’s nothing going on.” 

“But you guys have been together every week--” 

God, how did he even know that. “He’s helping me with my thesis, Hotch!” you exclaim, if this conversation continued you were going to be the same shade of red as the shirt you were wearing. “Why do you even know about that?” 

“Garcia.” he says, matter-of-factly. 

Of course, Garcia. 

 “Well, there’s nothing going on so now you can save the fraternization speech for someone else.” You move to stand. 

“You want there to be.” He points out. “Something going on, I mean.” 

“Oh my god. Aaron, I have a deep amount of respect for you and I revere you very much as a role model.” you say. “That being said, I will not be discussing my nonexistent love life with my boss! Jesus!” You exclaim. You see the smile ghosting his lips. He always enjoyed embarrassing you. “Can I leave now?” you asked. 

He nodded, waving his hand to dismiss you. You walk out of the office back to your desk, conveniently across from Spencer’s. 

“What did Hotch need?” He asked you. 

“Nothing!” You say instantly. Spencer just shrugged, returning to the file he had been reading.

---------------------------------------

Now you were here in the present, at a bar with the team celebrating the final results you had gotten back on your doctoral thesis. The Diploma hasn't come in the mail yet but it was official, you were officially Dr. Y/N Y/L/N. 

“To Dr. Y/N.” Garcia said, raising the shots Prentiss had just handed to you, Morgan and JJ. Rossi and Hotch raised their beers and Spencer clinked his water he’d been nursing to your shot glass. You smiled at her, before taking the shot quickly grimacing at the harshness of the alcohol. 

“Thanks, you guys.” You say, smiling widely. Your plan before to celebrate your doctorate had been to draw a bubble bath and try not to think of the student loans you’d accumulated. But of course Garcia being the genius and snoop that she was found out your results and insisted on a night out. 

“Y/N.” Emily said, getting your attention. “I think you should get the next round of drinks because that guy at the bar has been staring at you all night.” She said, leaning close to you to point at him. You look up to see a fairly built, tan man, with brown eyes and a well-maintenanced beard. Due to the amount of drinks you had and your inhibitions lowered, you smile at him automatically. He smiles back, lifting his drink to his mouth still looking at you. You look back down. 

“I don’t know, Emily.” You say, looking down at your mixed drink. 

“Come on, Y/N. We both know it’s been a while and you said you weren’t going to focus on that until you finished your doctorate.” Emily smirks, nudging you. “Now you’re finished so, come on, write him a prescription, Doc.” She laughs, inducing a few giggles from the rest of the group. Except for Rossi and Hotch who weren’t paying attention and Spencer, who seemed bothered but you didn’t know by what. 

“Hold on, mama, I have to know what a while means.” Derek says, laughing. 

“It means a while~”  Emily says, exaggerating the last word so that it was extra long. 

“Yea, a long~ while.” Garcia says, joining in, giggling all the while. 

“Ok, didn’t know you guys were moonlighting as comedians.” You say sarcastically, rolling your eyes. You turn towards Derek, the alcohol clearly lowered your inhibitions enough to answer his question. “I mean, I went through the phase everyone went through in the first couple years of college. Partying, drinking, and unfortunately ending up in a frat guys bed, but after a while I realized that I had different goals then most of my peers so I put all my focus on getting my degrees. I’d say that was when I was what? 19?” You said, recalling. 

Morgan almost did a spit take, “6 years?” 

“Don’t make it sound so incredulous!” You say, drinking your mixed drink. “I was busy!” 

“Sounds like you and Pretty boy can start your own celibacy club!” Morgan says, patting Spencer back, laughing. 

“I’m not celibate, Morgan.” Reid says, rolling his eyes. 

“Pfft,” you blow a raspberry, incredulously. “When’s the last time you’ve gotten any?” Whoa, you had to have been drunk because you never would’ve asked anything like that sober. 

“It certainly hasn’t been 6 years.” He says back to you, smirking over his glass of water. 

“Whatever.” You roll your eyes. “Seriously, When?” 

“Wouldn’t you like to know?” 

You would. 

You would very much like to know. 

“Whatever, it doesn’t matter because I’ll still be the last one after I go get that guy’s number.” You say, downing your drink for liquid courage before standing to go to the bar, towards the guy who had been looking at you before. Sure, your game was a little rusty but you were a profiler and now a doctor of psychology, men were...simple. 

Reid watched  you go, your hips swaying way more as they usually do as you sauntered towards the man her and Prentiss had been talking about before. He saw you smiling at the guy who had just purchased you another drink. You trailed a hand down the man’s chest, as he moved closer into your space. Spencer looked away, he was going to be sick if he kept watching that. 

“Hey, Emily, do you see that?” Garcia said.

“No, Penelope what is it?” She said indulging her. 

“It’s our friend, slowly turning into the green eyed monster.” Garcia said looking back to Reid, the table erupting in laughter. 

Reid leaned back. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” 

“Sure, you don’t.” Emily says, rolling her eyes. “Look Spence, If you like her you should say something and if you don’t, you can’t get upset about her looking for something else out there.” Spencer didn’t say anything to that, opting to turn his attention back to you. He watched you laugh at something the guy had said and a smile crossed his face. That wasn’t your laugh, he knew your laugh. Your real laugh, and thanks to his eidetic memory he could (and did) replay it whenever he wanted. He knew your laugh and that wasn’t it. 

He watched as you sauntered back up to the group. He already had trouble focusing on anything that wasn’t your body most of the time and the dress you wore tonight didn’t make it any better. A simple, deep blue dress that held your curves perfectly with a large slit up the leg that was probably to make it easier to walk in though right now all it was doing was distracting Spencer. You slid into the both back next to Prentiss. 

“So…” Emily said, smiling. “How’d it go?”

“Oh, I got his number.” You say, nonchalantly. You knew you would, it’s not like regular men were a challenge to you. Every man wanted 2 things; to think they’re funny and to think they’re smart. 

“Nice!” She says, holding her hand out you instantly slap it with your own. “Are you going to call him?” 

“Probably not.” You shrug. “We’ll see if I get bored this week.” 

That causes all the girls in the group to giggle. The night continued, more drinks being put in your system by your friends who want you to truly celebrate. Eventually Rossi and Hotch leave, both hugging you tightly, Hotch whispering a quick “I’m proud of you” in your ear. You smile brightly back at him.

Towards closing time you all leave, you’re a little more sober than before but you’re definitely still tipsy. You all say your goodbyes, promises to see each other at work then Spencer stretches an arm around your waist, ushering you to his car as he agreed to be your DD before.    

He slides you into the seat before climbing in on the drivers side. 

“Thanks Spen, I know you hate driving.” You say, patting Spencer on the leg. 

“No problem, Y/N” He smiles back at you, before turning his attention back to the road. You notice your hands still on his leg. He hasn’t tried to move it or move away from it so the alcohol in your system decides to take a risk and inch your hand up his thigh. One of his hands leaves the steering wheel immediately grasping your hand. 

“Stop.” He says, not sounding entirely convinced that’s what he wants himself. So you ask. 

“Do you want me to stop?” You say, innocently. 

“Obviously, I don’t want you to stop but you’re not sober so you have to.” He says, moving your hand back to your own lap. You decide it’s probably best to concede and lean your head against the cool glass of the window as street lamps roll by. 

Eventually, you make it back to your house. You sigh before turning to Spencer. 

 “Thanks again, Spen.” You say, moving to grab  your bag and the door handle. “I’ll see you at work.” Before you can move fully, Long fingers are circling your wrist. 

“You shouldn’t call him.” He says. 

“What?” You say, dazed by the close contact between you two. 

“The guy from the bar. You shouldn’t call him.” He says. 

“Why not?” You ask. You know the answer, or you think you know the answer but you have to hear him say it. You need to hear him say it. 

“Because I-” He cuts himself off. “I don’t know.” he says, looking down very dejected. 

“Well…” You say. You lean close to him. You guys are close, so close if you wanted you could kiss him and you know he would let you by the way his eyes flutter, pupils dilating instantly when you do. “Will you tell me when you figure it out?” You ask. 

He nods, letting go of the wrist you forgot he was holding. 

“Well then.” You say, getting out of the car and leaning through the open window. “Goodnight, Dr. Reid.” You smile. 

“Goodnight, Dr. Y/L/N.” He smiles back, before driving into the night.

Taglist: @haylaansmi​     @yoruebeautiful​ @kianagilder-blog​ @l0ve-0f-my-life​ @bihoeofmanyfandoms @dreamer7black​ @baby-banana​ @drreidshands​

[goonandfightme]

Numbers Pt.1

After a particularly horrifying case involving a serial killer starving his victims, Spencer Reid of the BAU relapses into old habits as past trauma resurfaces. The team slowly catches on as Reid falls further into his eating disorder and addictions but will they be able to help him before it's too late?

Pt.1 Concentrate

Trigger Warnings - EDs, drug use and addiction, child abuse.

Spencer Reid knew he has a problem at age 10. He had a routine, and once Spencer Reid had a routine it became part of him. He would wake up at 6 am, ensure his mother was asleep, pick his outfit for the day. His messenger bag would be packed with textbooks, notes and pens. He would brush his teeth, shower, then get dressed He went through this mental checklist, these motions were fluid, practised and precise. The clock would read 7:30 am, he would leave the house to grab the bus to go to school. High school. He was two years short of graduation, his mother had insisted on it, he was smart, he was special, he could be anything he wanted, he could have anything he wanted.

He would leave his lunch behind.

He would get picked on, laughed at, kicked, bruised all too easily, then go home. If his mother was lucid, he would have a proper meal, if not, whatever he could reach from the cupboards. He was malnourished, the corner of his lips cracked from b-vitamin deficiency, the rims of his eyes white from anaemia, his hair messy and breaking. People only knew him as his shadow of himself, no concerns were raised.

He would complete his homework, lay on his bed, his heart would palpitate, his world would spin. No one noticed, his grades hadn’t slipped, he never participated in sports. No one noticed.

His alarm sounded; it was 6 am. He started again; his lungs screamed, his heart pounded, and his headache came back, he always had a headache, but Spencer Reid had a routine, and he would stick to it. He went to check on his mother.

--Present Day--

It was six-thirty and Reid was getting ready for his day at work, removing his pyjamas while he waited for the shower to heat. The top came over his head easily, it was baggy, it was more than a couple of months old, it didn’t fit him anymore. He looked forward towards the full body mirror, tossing the clothes into the hamper, his face was thin, as it always had been, even when he was a healthy weight he’d always struggled with his figure. Brushing his hair out of his face he looked closer running his fingers over his features, saw how his eyes were more hallow, he pulled the lower lid down the reveal the ghostly white colour it had become, his cheekbones slightly more pronounced and painful to press against, his jaw slightly sharper in contrast to how he felt. His hand dipped and traced over his ribs, he could count them all, name them if he wanted, then his hand lowered to his wrist. His thumb and middle finger enclosing the joint, measuring how far he could raise it, whether it would come past his elbow, would it fit past his bicep. It stopped just after his elbow and he squeezed as if trying to rip his flesh after, from the bone, the white marks lingered across the already pale limb.

“White marks that last after applying pressure to the skin suggest poor blood circulation, common among those with anorexia nervosa.” There was no one there to hear him but when he was alone, he liked to talk aloud it helped him think through things slower, it helped keep him calm. “It also causes the exterminates to become cold and discoloured,” he looked down towards his feet. He removed his trousers, the shower warm and producing a numbing white noise as Reid continued his routine. Checking how each bone moved under his skin, thin, grey and translucent. He had so much more to lose.

“Grey skin indicates poor blood oxygenation, which can be caused by anaemia, a low level of iron within the blood that prevents red blood cells from delivering oxygen effectively. A common symptom of malnutrition.” He breathed out slowly to calm himself as he turned on his heel to enter the shower, it was much warmer than his apartment, the floor cold and unwelcoming, he was always cold anyway. He made quick work of scrubbing down his body, no longer wanting to look at it, feel it. He spent longer on his hair, it no longer sat right, it would always fly away as it became more brittle, he wasn’t the biggest fan of the longer-haired look but it suited him, made his face slimmer, so he kept it.

Reid turned the tap off and jumped out as quickly as his legs would let him, he swiped his towel off of the rack and placed it on his face, holding the weight in his hands as his head stopped swirling, then used it to finish drying himself off. He walked back into his bedroom where his clothes laid neatly. He placed on his underwear socks and trousers, a cream shirt and striped tie, a thick soft orange jumper to go with it, then blazer, then belt, he tightened and placed it through the newest punched hole. It was a nice belt he didn’t want to get rid of it. Checking that the apartment was in order and that everything had been done, everything he needed was in his bag, he picked up his keys from the dish and left after briefly sorting his hair in the hallway mirror.

It was another day at the BAU for Reid. Walking over to the staff space he started the kettle and placed his bag down, he retrieved his favourite mug and placed three teaspoons of coffee in. Once the water was boiled he filled his mug and let the thick scent waft through the air, he grabbed the sugar and poured, originally he would have counted the spoons of sugar but decided that cutting out the middle man would save time, he was slightly late as it was. “Want some coffee with that sugar?”

“Had a long night, need something to keep me functioning” Reid retorted as he turned to face Morgan who stood behind him placing his lunch in the fridge. “Nice one pretty boy, what was she like?” Morgan smiled. “Not that kind of long night,” he picked up his bag and walked towards his desk before Morgan had a chance to reply. He slouched down into his seat while taking another sip of his coffee and reached down to grab a file from the bottom of his desk drawer and after rummaging for a while he found it. A wave of nausea hit and Reid lent forward over the desk to stop his stomach from protesting, his body wasn’t used to this level of starvation. He’d lowered his intake from 700 to 500 yesterday, it was taking time to adjust.

The BAU hadn’t had a case for over two days so the team was catching up on all paperwork that needed doing, anything that had been shoved in draws to be forgotten was to be finished and filed.

He opened the file and glanced over the first page, thumbing over the papers to spread them out. Emily Moore, aged 25, died of malnutrition after a serial killer had starved her to death. Reid placed his right hand beneath his chin and ran his thumb over his mouth as he traced a finger over the outline of her body and closed his eyes. That was four months, two days and three hours ago that case started, and it was four months, two days and three hours since Reid had relapsed. He could see them still so vividly, all of them hung up like puppets, so skinny and frail. He still couldn’t bring himself to finish the file.

“Reid?” Hotchner asked, Spencer, opened his eyes to see the team filling into the meeting room as Hotch stared at him from across the room. Reid quickly snapped the file shut and followed behind everyone else, Hotchner joining the line afterwards. Spencer enclosed his hand around his wrist to help his heart stop beating as fast. It calmed him down, he didn’t even realise he had done it. Hotch was absorbed in his paperwork.

Reid sat down next to Morgan in his unassigned assigned seat as Gideon began the brief and Reid for one of the first times since he had met Gideon, didn’t listen to him.

I shouldn’t have had that much sugar, how much did I have, right, the coffee cup was about 5cm in diameter so that means the area of the cup was five multiplied by pi, then to find the volume of sugar the cup raised about 1cm.

“The victim was found face down lying in a pool of her own blood.” Gideon turned to the board displaying pictures of the woman.

The volume of sugar would be 15.7cm squared, which equates to about 25 grams of sugar which is 80 calories.

“Nothing was left at the crime scene, but her hands were bound with what appears to have been some sort of rope shown by the burn marks.”

“Could have suggested the killer was physically weak, needed to restrain her to get his way” Elle interjected. “Judging that the unsub took the rope it probably means he also brought it, premediated, definitely an organised killer,” Morgan added.

Why didn’t I just measure it out it would have made this so much easier, I’ll round it up to 100 just in case.

“Local police teams have already sectioned off the scene,” Hotch added, “alright but why call us, nothing about this case seems extraordinary, seems like a run of the mill homicidal rapist,” Elle questioned while looking to Gideon. “Well,” Gideon started.

If I can get home by 8 pm I can burn off that coffee, wait no if I run home then I can leave later but still burn it so if I have the 500, well now I can have 420 no 400, then I can-

“Right let’s go, the jet leaves in half an hour.”

With that the team all stood up abruptly, creating a whirlwind around Reid that made him snap out of his thoughts, his head and eyes darted around the room trying to figure out what was happening. He jumped out of his seat to follow everyone out but was stopped at the door.

“You alright Reid?”

Spencer spun back round to face Gideon who was looking at him, seeming to expect an answer. “Sorry, what was that?” Gideon's face became stern as his eyebrow slightly lifted along with his chin, he was not just looking at him, he was analysing. “I just wanted to know if you were alright?”

“Me? Yeah, I’m fine” Reid frantically looked across the room trying not to meet the other man’s gaze, “I’m just going to go grab my stuff” he stated while starting to walk backwards out of the room, pointing behind him with his thumb. “Uh yeah, see you on the plane,” he turned almost bumping into JJ “sorry JJ I uh didn’t see you sorry,” and with that, he took off to go grab his bag.

JJ turned to Gideon with a questioning look. “Keep an eye on him” was all he said before also going to grab his bag. Gideon wasn’t a man to say anything unless he was sure unless it was important, but he was worried. His intuition was screaming at him that something was wrong, but Reid would be at least three steps ahead if he didn’t want anyone to know. Damn profilers.

They had all swarmed into the jet and had taken their seats. Reid lay in the long seat reading a book, but not at his normally inhuman speed, it was slower, only just noticeably. Hotch sat next to Gideon reading all the information they had on the case thus far again, making sure nothing was missed. Gideon watched. They were sat at the other end of the plane with Reid’s back to them, the other team members preoccupied with their activities.

“Something’s wrong with Reid.”

“Excuse me?”

“Look at him.”

Hotch looked up from his papers and looked towards Reid, Gideons line of sight hadn’t wavered since he sat down. Hotch looked back from Reid to the man next to him. “What makes you say that?”

“He’s anxious, jumpy, overreactive,” Gideon still looked over to the boy and Hotch joined back, “I asked him this morning after the brief, he didn’t turn his back to me once until he was out of the room.”

“He was being defensive, wouldn’t turn his back on the perceived threat,” Hotchner added, “he knew the answer but couldn’t tell you, he looks at you as a father figure you know, he doesn't want to disappoint you”

Gideon paused, “he probably does, he doesn’t know much about his father,” he said shaking his head, they sat and observed in silence.

“He’s not turning pages as quickly as he normally does,”

“He’s not turning pages as quickly as he normally does,” Gideon repeated, “how’s his paperwork?” he finely looked away from the younger man. “Still exemplary, maybe a little less than normal but handed in on time, it hasn’t suffered any more than anyone else’s while we’ve been busy.”

Gideon nodded “somethings eating away at him, I just don’t know what.” There was a pause.

"There was one file I never got back."

[spencersawkward]

switchblade faith // spencer reid - chapter 3

summary: one month after joining the BAU, Clea is still settling in. between solving murders and getting acclimated to DC, the only comfortable thing in her life is her friendship with Dr. Spencer Reid.

word count: 4k

content warnings: mention of rape and victim-blaming (talking about Clea's previous job in sex crimes— not her personal experience).

masterlist

this chapter is drawn from the season 1 episode 17 episode "A Real Rain," which is supposed to be in New York, but I didn't wanna write about New York so I changed it to Boston.

I drop a second sugar packet into my coffee before taking a tentative sip. my face twists in discomfort. previous to working here, I would bring my own thermos from home and it would last me all day, but I've had to up my caffeine intake to two or three cups.

"you get used to it." JJ walks over to me, steeping her tea. despite the fact that it's early, she's perfectly put together. her hair is tied up and her eyes are sparkling.

"how?" I laugh. she points to the coffee pot, which is fresh and yet somehow tastes slightly stale.

"when you've been up for twenty four hours, you won't care how it tastes."

I avert my widened eyes at this.

"you could do what Spence does and just add a bunch of sugars." she tilts her head towards Reid, who is rocking back in forth in his spinny chair with a huge volume open in front of him. he doesn't even notice us staring at him.

"ew, what?" I giggle. JJ nods.

"hey, Spence!" she calls across the office. his head pops up to frown at us.

"yes?"

"how many sugars do you use?"

"five. occasionally six." he says this without a hint of the shame it deserves. my eyebrows shoot up and I take another sip of the bitter drink, trying to ignore the taste. it coats my tongue.

"see?" she smirks. "just so you know, we have another case. meeting in five." she sashays away to the conference room, leaving me standing there with an overwhelming urge to sweeten my drink. I keep it at three and add a splash of creamer to drown out the bitterness, then walk briskly to my desk to grab a few of my things.

"we have a meeting, Reid." I say across the divider between our spaces. he holds up an index finger, slams the book shut, and grabs his things. I wait for him to get collected before we head up.

"what were you reading?" I ask, peeking at his workspace. books are lined up against the divider, loose papers scatter the surface, and there are three uncapped pens littered about. his disorganization surprises me.

"War and Peace." he replies, checking his watch.

it's not even nine am.

...

I'm staring out the window of the jet while Morgan and Prentiss battle out yet another card game with Reid. there's not much to see until we slice through clouds and fly over Boston, which is glittering in the early light. I sigh and turn back to my book, tucking my legs up beneath me.

"this is not how I planned to visit." Morgan notes, looks through his cards.

"I'm looking forward to seeing Boston." Spencer smiles softly. at this, all of us look up.

"you've never been?" Morgan asks doubtfully. Emily snorts.

"we've never had an unsub there." Reid doesn't seem to think this strange at all. Morgan and I share a glance before he speaks.

"Reid, it's an hour-and-a-half flight."

"I'll show you around if we have some time." Emily smiles reassuringly at the boy genius.

"it's an easy trip, man." Derek chuckles. Spencer isn't bothered by our teasing. instead, he draws another card from the deck and focuses on his game.

"I've never been either." I state. the team turns to me with surprised expressions, causing my cheeks to flush.

"you, too?" Morgan makes a face like I've disappointed him.

"I've been meaning to go." I shrug. "there's an exhibition at the Museum of Fine Arts that I wanna see."

"what exhibition?" Spencer doesn't look up from his hand.

"uh, Titus Kaphar." I haven't had the opportunity to travel much, so a lot of the art I've seen has been from a computer screen or in class in college. it would be nice to actually get some experience seeing things face-to-face.

"Shifting the Gaze!" Spencer's face snaps up to beam at me, referencing the piece so vehemently that it makes me laugh.

"yeah, exactly."

"I went to his talk a couple years back."

"no way. really?" I shut my book and lean forward while he nods. Prentiss and Morgan are watching our conversation like a tennis match. while Reid rambles about all the things he heard at the lecture, I listen intently. it's good, because I don't really feel like talking right now; my head is pounding all over again, and this is distracting.

"do you ever go to the art museums in DC, then?" I ask once he's finished. Reid gets this crooked smile on his face like he wants to say a bunch of things, but is holding his tongue. his face is animated when he tells me about the other exhibits he's seen at the Smithsonian and apparently abandons his cards. Prentiss and Morgan have lost interest in our conversation; they start their own game and let us talk for the rest of the flight.

when we touch down, I immediately feel overwhelmed by the crush of people around us. our first crime scene is a taxi cab in Hyde Park, where the driver has been blindfolded, shot in the chest, and stabbed right through his ear. the blade, broken off from the handle, is lodged in his brain.

despite the fact that his kills are violent and seemingly random, the unsub definitely isn't disorganized. he carries his MO out the same way each time, which makes all of us question if we've missed a connection between victims.

"it's possible he's a sort of serial killer groupie." Spencer notes as he examines the inside of the cab, which is splattered with a mix of rainwater from the night before and blood. I shift where I'm standing to try to follow his line of sight.

"what do you mean?"

"Lawrence Bittaker and Roy Norris drove ice picks into their victims' heads and broke off the handle." he explains.

"well, if he's doing that, then he's presenting a mixed profile." I frown.

"exactly."

"mixed profile?" the police officer next to me asks.

"yeah. the fact that this guy is shooting his victims first suggests that he needs a quick and effective means of controlling the situation, which means that he probably doesn't think he can overpower them." I say.

"he could have a physical problem-- or maybe he's just not confident because he's small." Reid is still examining the taxi for any further evidence, but it seems sort of pointless.

"plus, he's organized and hunts at night. that tells us he most likely has a steady job."

"so," the cop stares between us with a perplexed expression. "we're looking for a small, angry white guy with a day job?"

the sarcasm in his voice makes me smile a little.

"I know it doesn't narrow down a lot right now, but we know that this guy isn't blitz attacking his victims. it's more of an execution."

the officer nods at this and my phone buzzes in my pocket. I turn to Reid.

"we gotta go."

Spencer nods curtly, straightens, and starts to immediately walk back to the car. I shake my head at his behavior, then follow after.

...

we get called to visit a new crime scene in the morning, this time in a church. Hotch holds the door open for me and I walk in to see a body laid out in front of the pews. an older woman sits towards the back, comforted by a nun.

"how'd they find him?" Prentiss asks the police chief as she leads us to the victim.

"night janitor." she nods to a man being questioned by cops in the corner.

"did he see anything?" I ask her.

"no, but he remembered a parishioner who was here earlier," we walk past the older woman. she stares at us expectantly as the chief talks. "so there could be a potential witness."

we stop at the body of a priest, his eyes covered and a blade lodged in his skull, unsurprisingly. Emily and I stare down at him, realizing the same thing.

"first public killing." she notes as she bends down to examine his wounds. "he's getting bolder."

"the presentation is just as important as the kill." I join her on the ground, snapping my gloves tighter on my hands and turning his head to the side to get a better look at the blade. semi-dried blood coats the tied fabric around his eyes.

"I'm gonna go talk to that woman." Emily leaves. the crime scene agent crouches down on the ground across from me, and I bite my lip before making a strange request.

"would you mind... sliding that thing out of his ear?"

the agent blinks at me in disbelief, probably not wanting to pry a knife out of someone's head, but nods and does so carefully. I squint down at the wound. then I realize something.

"Reid?" my voice carries across the room. Spencer is talking to an officer when he hears me and walks over.

"this doesn't look like a normal blade, but I don't know what it is." I point at the now half-buried weapon. it sits unpleasantly out, the blood catching warm light. Spencer gets down next to the crime scene agent and examines it more closely.

"this is flint." he says slowly, turning to me with a concerned expression.

"like the stone?"

"flint is the symbol for protection and retribution in Egyptian mythology. with hieroglyphics, they used to display dangerous animals like scorpions and snakes being cut with flint knives in order to render them powerless."

"oh." is all I can manage while I process what he's saying. Spencer waits for me to say something else, but instead I bend my head down to pull back the silk tie.

"there's no way that using flint is a coincidence." I reason. the blood is all on the inside of the tie as well, which gives me pause. Reid recognizes this a second later, his eyes lifting to mine. they look almost brown in the candlelight, flecks of gold sparkling in them while his mind whirs endlessly.

"I'm gonna call Garcia to see if any of the victims have been charged with a crime." he tells me.

"good idea." we both stand, the crime scene agent scurrying off to do something else. I head back over to Emily and hope that we're right about this. flint is too specific of a weapon for it not to be intentional, right?

...

we deliver the profile by the end of the work day, our unsub a serial vigilante with a personal edge to all of his killings. my body is slightly shaky from downing cups of coffee without any actual food, so the promise of eating out after we finish makes my stomach eager.

we go to a Chinese restaurant by the station and keep talking about the case, despite having promised ourselves not to do so. I sit between Prentiss and Reid while I dig into my dumplings. I like listening to them swap theories and past cases, how they weave together all their stories.

"you forgot to add something to the profile earlier today, Aaron." Rossi says as he piles more noodles onto his plate. our attention immediately focuses on the Italian.

"what did he forget?" Prentiss has a ghost of a smile on her face. I've noticed that she tends to speak like she's on the inside of a joke that other people don't understand. the intonation of her words feels like a secret.

"I didn't mention the possibility of our unsub being a cop." Hotch takes a sip of his ice water. there's a moment where we all reflect on this information before Morgan breaks the silence.

"I mean, they do know the system."

"they could easily take matters into their own hands, given what they see every day." Prentiss adds. I nod.

"when someone like our victim is killed, police refer to it as a public-service murder." Reid struggles to get the noodles onto his chopsticks, which I notice but don't say anything about. he tries again, the food slipping back onto his plate. Morgan notices this shortcoming of Spencer's and I see that he's about to start teasing him, so I change the subject.

"I saw a lot of rapists walk when I was in sex crimes," I put down my dumpling while I talk. Hotch watches me intently. I haven't spoken much about my previous job with anyone on the team, especially not him. in fact, he barely knows anything about me. "a lot of the victims didn't feel safe pressing charges, or the juries said they were asking for it. it's enough to make you wanna explode."

"it's a long way from feeling like that and actually committing a murder, though, don't you think?" Emily asks.

"not really." I turn my gaze back to my plate and start to feel nauseous. there's a clinking of plates and silverware as we continue in silence. Emily nudges my arm gently with hers and offers me a supportive smile.

I hear Spencer next to me, getting the attention of a passing waiter.

"excuse me," he says in a low tone. "can I get a fork, perhaps?"

Morgan snickers as the waiter takes off to get the utensil. at this point, there's a palpable tension as we wait to see who makes fun of Reid first. he drops his chopsticks into his bowl with a defeated clatter and Derek gently pushes his knuckles against Spencer's cheekbone.

"having some trouble, kid?" he asks. Spencer smacks his hand away.

"don't be mean." I giggle, reaching onto my wrist to grab a hair tie. "here, try this." I wrap the thing around the end of Spencer's chopsticks so that they're easier to use, handing them back to him.

Spencer tries again and it works-- if not somewhat clumsily. he gives me a little appreciative smile and I smile back before returning to my food, listening to the stories that Rossi doles out. he even pays for dinner despite our half-hearted protests.

the entertainment for the evening is pretty nice, but when I've stuffed myself with Chinese food, Emily leans over to me.

"do you wanna go to that museum you were talking about earlier?" she whispers. I peek at my phone to check the time.

"I doubt we'd have much time before they close, but yeah, definitely." excitement bubbles up in my stomach as I realize I might actually get to poke around for a while. Prentiss throws her napkin on the table abruptly.

"Clea and I are going to the Museum of Fine Arts. anyone wanna join?"

I look around to gauge some reactions.

"I'm interested." Morgan nods.

"I've already been several times." Rossi takes a sip of his drink as he politely declines. Hotch shakes his head.

"I have some paperwork I need to finish."

"again?" Prentiss complains.

"I'll go." Spencer sits up straighter as he looks at his brunette friend, folding his napkin neatly on his plate. my eyebrows raise a little, although I'm not surprised that he'd be interested in visiting any museum. we stand and get ready to go; Hotch warns us to be ready to go at seven in the morning tomorrow. a little weight is lifted off my chest as I realize that there will be some reprieve during this case, and then we're wandering out into the evening air.

we ate dinner sort of early, so the sky is still slightly aglow with a bruised shade, preparing to sink into its favorite darkness. after finding the route to the museum, we hop on the train.

Boston is lovely in the kind of way that aches of neat corners and airy lights. stores crammed with antiques and novelty products line the sidewalks, people wander about as they take in a pleasant night. somehow disjointed and cohesive all at once.

whatever bit of conversation we had on the way dissipates into breathlessness once we get inside the enormous entryway. it's cavernous, extravagant, gorgeous. we flip through brochures advertising different exhibits. Emily raves about Impressionism and decides that that must be our first stop, so we head off with the rest of the museum stragglers who have decided to feed themselves with art until they're forced to leave.

my head is constantly spinning to admire something else in the enormous white rooms. it's a bit overwhelming at some points, what with the gargantuan canvases that greet me at every turn. but it's impressive, too, and I find myself hungrily reading all the small plaques. I venture out of the Impressionism vein and into Korean art, my feet carrying me away from Morgan and Prentiss. Spencer broke off a while ago; to where, I have no idea.

I check out vases and pottery, sculptures, renderings of historical events. images from the crime scenes fill my head intrusively. there's no use in trying to shut them out; they've been in my dreams for a while now, the kind that wake me up in a cold sweat. I haven't told anyone about them— I'm sure others get them, too— and I don't want to seem like I can't handle it. every time I close my eyes, I begin to feel the pressure of a knife against my temple.

"a lot of these are from private collections."

the voice causes me to jump, my skin erupting in goosebumps as Spencer stands beside me. he holds his bag against his side and follows my line of sight to the 18th-century bookshelf screen.

"that's interesting." I reply. what else is there to say to that?

"really makes you think about what other art pieces won't ever be seen by the public." he turns and starts walking onto the next work, seemingly done with this conversation. my brow furrows while I watch him go, his posture miserable as a result of his skinny build. he's quite tall.

"what do you mean?" my voice comes out quiet, but it carries in the otherwise empty exhibit. Reid turns around and stops in his place, allows me to catch up briefly. we start to read another plaque by a silver basin.

"you could have a Cézanne just rotting in your attic and it would never be examined by the right scholars." he shrugs.

"I really doubt there's anything nearing that value in my attic." I laugh.

"you ever seen 'Antiques Roadshow'?" he asks non-sarcastically. I balk.

"sure."

"you never know." he's not a man of many words, apparently. I get his message regardless and we continue to walk, him setting out facts for me in neat rows, simple and easily taken in. he's definitely a know-it-all, but not in the way that makes me want to escape his presence. it's sort of comforting, having someone around who just understands everything. his absolute lack of social graces makes him easy to be around, too; I don't need to force conversation because he doesn't care.

we wind up in the mummy section, where the walls tingle with an energy that could only be described as magical.

"spooky." I nod to the domineering sarcophagus lid of Kheperra. a spotlight illuminates all of its intricacies and I make a beeline for it. Spencer trails behind me and we fall into silence as we peer at the exquisite details. it's intimidating, for sure, hulking and made of carved black stone. "you feel that?" I whisper to Spencer, who is enthralled in the image.

the way the spotlight spills over onto him is interesting; it emphasizes the shadow below his jaw and the delicate quality of his bone structure, his cheekbone prominent at the place where his ear meets his face. his lashes are long and lovely, his Adam's apple poking out of a slender throat. he turns to me with a curious expression.

"feel what?"

"the energy change," I smile. "from the ancient dead bodies."

"it's probably just the dark lighting and the media associations you have with mummies." but his eyes begin flitting about the room in a slightly panicked manner. I feel a smirk tug at my lips as I step closer to him.

"are you scared?"

"no," he scoffs and makes a face like I've made the world's most absurd accusation. "why would I be scared?"

"because we're all alone in here..." I use a lower tone to freak him out a little. "who's to stop them from coming out and... snatching us?" when my hand snakes around behind him to pinch his arm, he jumps.

"what the--" he catches sight of the devilish grin on my face. "don't do that!"

"sorry, Einstein." I laugh and turn in the other direction, him following me to the next piece. Spencer doesn't seem to have more thoughts to give on the exhibition, probably still a little creeped out. part of me begins to feel guilty for startling him, even though he constantly does that to me. his footfalls are weirdly soft.

I wonder what Spencer is like outside of work. what he does when he gets back to his apartment. how could someone like him entertain themselves? maybe he just reads books until his eyes glaze over. he definitely doesn't go out often, but maybe he has other nerdy friends. I hope he does. there's something in his eyes that's too viscous for me to grasp, something swimming and pocketed. I'd like to understand it, although that doesn't seem like a great idea to pursue. he barely gives his closest friends information about his life.

we end up at opposite ends of the room, him still examining an entombed husband and wife couple while I check out a canonic jar. the silence in this room is tangible. I wasn't lying when I felt an energy shift— it's like gold and clay and it smells like cracked cinnamon.

I'm trying to get a better look at the detailing when I feel a cold hand wrap around my forearm, easily encircling it. I jolt.

Spencer stands behind me with a playful smile, like he's quite pleased with himself.

"Reid!" I yank my arm away from his long fingers and see him let out that rare laugh. it's pleasant and fills the room with a warmer light as I rub my arm where his fingers held me. I'm surprised he was willing to touch me at all; it's pretty obvious that he's got a problem with germs, which is understandable.

"who's scared now?" he tries to defend himself with his palms when I reach out to gently smack his shoulder.

"you know, I was starting to feel bad for you." I laugh. he smiles brightly and keeps walking into the next room. I realize that the way we move is like two weighted ends of a string. he drifts out on his own, I follow, and vice versa.

I appreciate that he's beginning to loosen up around me, so much so that he smiles at a joke I make in the English Regency section. we walk quickly to absorb as much as we can before the museum closes, but we still don't get through all of it. Spencer isn't much of a conversationalist, and he doesn't really need to be. he listens to me talk, I listen to his erudite observations, smiling when he uses certain terms that sound like they're from someone much older.

by the time a curator tells us we have to go, we've completely lost Prentiss and Morgan and end up meeting back at the entrance. it's pitch black outside; Boston is still bustling, except my legs are tired and I'm ready to crash in bed. we have another packed day tomorrow.

[teamhappyme]

a series of promising events (4/5)

aaron hotchner x female!reader

word count: 6.7k

a/n: happy new year!! we’ve made it to part 4! this part differs from the 3 previous ones, as it takes place all in one (and a half) days. But there are flashbacks, represented with italics. if anything is confusing with the timeline, or anything else is confusing you in general, please let me know! my brain is a weird place and does not connect the dots when i post for a public audience. i hope you guys enjoy this part, it was really fun for me to write!

get ready, let’s go friends!

here are the links to part 1, part 2, & part 3

****

October 2012

“Some people care too much. I think it’s called love.” - Winnie the Pooh

You’re known for your predictability. Yes, you’re overly kind, extremely perceptive, and a little bit of a literary genius. But those closest to you knew the predictability of your life.

You craved routine. You woke up at 5:30 every morning, had breakfast, watched the news, and caught up on some domestic things before heading into the office. You stopped at the same bagel cart every morning, an Asiago bagel with butter for you and a coffee for Spencer. Monday’s, you treated the whole team. You got to work at 7:12, second only to Hotch. 

The team knew how you would react to every case. Missing or dead children would cause you to go silent, families being the target would choke you up, and anything including a scumbag with a signature kill made you nauseous. 

So it was safe to say they were more than surprised to find out that you’d left for a month long european holiday, from an email, with Strauss cc'd on it. The team couldn’t remember the last time you went on vacation, because you hadn't gone further than two hours in one day. 

In your travels through Europe, you stopped in countries that you’d only dreamt about visiting in your dreams. You saw Nyhavn, Denmark, the colorful canal right outside of Copenhagen. Hopped through Warsaw and Gdansk in Poland, before being silenced by your tour of Auschwitz. Next was France, the country you always said you would flee to once you aged out of the system. Besides hitting all the touristy attractions in Paris, you traveled through the alps, and made sure you stopped to see Giverny, the little village that inspired Claude Monet and his water lily paintings. The last true destination was Spain, jumping at the chance to flex your spanish minor muscles. You roamed Barcelona and Madrid, feeling a little like the Cheetah Girls as you stood in front of La Sagrada Familia.

The more you travelled, the more you’d thought about quitting. Thought about sending your resignation to Strauss through an email, leave your desk full of the mementos and picture frames, and continue falling in love with the continent you’d never been to before. 

But then you made your final stop in London, to the sister who you missed immensely, and lost the nerve entirely.

“You’ll regret leaving them for the rest of your life,” Emily said to you, and you wondered for a second if she was projecting her decisions onto you. 

“They don’t deserve me.” You’d mumbled out, just loud enough for her to hear. “I can’t continue on like this.”

You’d given the team everything you had for seven and a half years. The job demanded personal sacrifices you never thought you’d be capable of, until you met the people who signed on for this before you. The people who shared the same commitment to helping others, the responsibility to improve the world around them before the one that housed them. It was the first time you felt at home in your quarter century existence.

But the work never seized. The jet began to feel more like home than your apartment, hotel beds provided more comfort than your own pillow covered mattress. And no matter how many people you saved, no amount of gratification from loved ones could quell the loneliness building back inside you.

So you listened to Emily, and came back to the states on your original return flight, October 23, 2012. You returned to the real world in less than seventy-two hours and promised Garcia you would brush up on the next case before debriefing on Monday morning. 

You were betting on the fact that the team wasn’t lingering around the office, considering it was seven thirty on a friday night as you headed up in the elevator, fresh off your flight from the UK. The last thing you wanted was someone to corner you, when all you wanted to do was sleep off the lingering memories of your last night here. 

The glass doors leading into the BAU gave you a view of the bullpen; empty. Opening the door, you walked over to your desk, quickly glancing around the other spaces to see if anything had changed. It hadn’t.

Grabbing the files Garcia left on your desk and your car keys from the drawer, you tidied up the space the tiniest bit. You made sure everything was squared off to your monitor, updating the days passed on your desk calendar. You wrote a reminder on a yellow sticky to thank Reid for watering your small desk plant and stuck it to the screen for Monday. Everything looked like it was in its place, until you saw a blue stress ball sitting on your chair. Your head whipped up to the office at the top of the stairs, but the lights were off and the door shut. He wasn’t here. 

But you could feel the stare of his eyes from four weeks ago on you just the same.

You guys were working a local case in the District. 

The unsub had murdered three men, each with one shot to the head execution style. There were no signs of torture, and all three men were found with their eyes closed and arms crossed over their torsos; signs of remorse. 

It took the team thirty hours to stick the profile and find the woman responsible. Her name was Kathryn Downey, a forty two year old mother of three, with a law degree that hadn’t been used in fifteen years. After digging into the victims personal lives and her own, the motive and stressor became clear to everyone; her husband had cheated on her. 

You found Kathryn with a gun pointed to her husband’s head, his hands and feet duct taped, and a strip around his mouth keeping him silent. 

Her hands were shaking, and you knew from the second you saw her that she didn’t want to kill him. She was angry, and full of rage, but she wouldn’t be able to follow through with this.

As long as you use the right language.

“Kathryn, put the gun down, we’re with the FBI.” Hotch started in a calm voice, but she shook her head, hands shaking faster. 

“No. I have to do this. He,” She took a breath, pushing the hair out of her face with her free hand. “He has to pay.”

You glanced at Aaron before taking a step closer, slowly lowering your weapon. She needed to feel safe, and she needed to feel like an equal. 

“Kathryn, my name is y/n l/n. I’m with the Behavioral Analysis Unit from the FBI. I really want to help you through this situation, so I’m going to put my gun down, alright?” You slowly lowered the gun to the ground, kicking it back gently to Hotch. 

“Now Kathryn, I know your children are here. I don’t want anything to happen to them, and I know you don’t either, so could you tell me where they are so we can help them?” 

“In the basement, I locked them in the basement. I didn’t want them to,” She let the thought end, not wanting to manifest it into the universe. She didn’t want them to see their mother kill their father.

Hotch spoke gently into the comms, getting Morgan and Rossi down to the kids. 

“Kathryn, I want to know why we’re here in this situation. I’ve read the file, I profiled you and your family, but I want to know your side of the story. Why are you holding a gun to your husbands head?”

Her eyes widened in the slightest, and you were sure it was from the empathy in your voice. But this was your specialty, and you were determined to talk this woman down. 

“He cheated on me,” She whispered, and for a split second, you thought this was going to be easy. But then she pressed the gun harder into his head, and let out a low laugh. “After everything I’ve done for this family, for him, he just takes his pants off for another woman?”

You heard the safety click off, and Hotch’s own in return. Please do not end in a shootout.

“Kathryn, don’t look at him. Don’t think about him kneeling in front of you. Just focus on me. Tell me how you got to this moment right now.”

“How did I get to this moment? I got here by following around this sad excuse for a man for the last twenty years. Like a moth to a flame, I couldn’t escape this life of mine.” Her eyes started to water, and you internally sighed. You were getting somewhere. “I have a law degree, you know. Fifth in my class at Columbia, and I only used it for a year. And it was in sleazy corporate law. Because I got married, and I got pregnant, and Sean wanted someone to stay home with the kids.

“I went from the intelligent corporate attorney with her eyes set on the attorney general’s office, to a cliche housewife who spends her days cleaning and dotting on her husband and kids. I never wanted to be this woman,” She closed her eyes, letting the tears fall down her face freely. She looked so young in this vulnerable state, too young to have three children. Yet she looked so tired, and so defeated. “I gave up everything for this family. I gave up my career, friends, bucket list dreams, and a life that was waiting to be lived, for this man. I cater to his every need, I listen to him drone on about work, assure him when he’s feeling anxious, and give in when he needs a release. I am my children’s rock; when they need a shoulder to cry on I’m there in a second. They need help with their math homework, I’m the number one girl. But when it’s my turn to fall apart, when it’s my turn to be lifted up and supported, nobody is there for me. And he should be able to be there for me.”

If you hadn’t undergone intense training at Quantico, you would’ve been in tears by now. You empathized with this woman more than you should, and you were trying so desperately to help her out of this situation. So you continued to dig your fingernails into your palms, and spoke again. 

“I know what you’re feeling, Kathryn.”

“You don’t know what I’m feeling!” Wrong move. She ripped the gun away from her husband and fixed the trigger on you. Hotch moved so that he was only one step behind you, trying to get her to lower the gun. “You have no idea what this is like!”

“I do, Kathryn. I promise you I do. I may not be a wife, or a mother, but I know what it’s like to give yourself completely to a person. I know what it’s like to hold onto the stress and fears of the people you love. I understand, because I’m this person too.

“People like you and me, we feel the need to be the emotional support for everyone we love. We never want to see them struggle, and we never want to see them in pain. So, we listen. We overcompensate to make them feel better, and we check in regularly to make sure they’re okay. Our happiness, as strange and sad as it may be, is directly linked to theirs. We can’t be happy unless they’re happy. But once they come out of their depression, once they thank us for being the light in their lives, they walk away, and take the happy rainbow with them. And they don’t leave any for us.” Tears continued to fall down her face, but you needed to go further. She was going to break if you kept going. “Kathryn, I was in your position not long ago. I remember what it feels like when you realize that the love you have for someone won’t be reciprocated. That after everything you’ve done for them, all the small moments that you succeeded in taking their grief away and bringing happiness back into their life, they still don’t appreciate you. And it’s heartbreaking.

“But I’m standing across from you today, on the other side of that pain, trying to tell you that it gets better. It doesn’t go away, but it gets a hell of a lot better, Kathryn. So please, do not let this one moment that you couldn’t take the pain away ruin all the times you did.” 

You expected the tears. You expected an emotional end to this situation. You didn’t expect Kathryn Downey to drop her gun in the middle of the room, and collapse onto you. But that’s exactly what she did. And instead of letting go to untie her husband, instead of joining Hotch in cuffing her, you held her for a minute. You held her breaking heart in your hands, and tried your hardest to take away all her fears and pain for once in her life. 

After a minute, you pulled away and grabbed a hold of her upper arm. She gave you a slight nod, knowing this is what was always going to happen. You led her down the stairs and into the back of a squad car, as Aaron helped the husband to his children once outside of the house. 

You were leaning against the suburban that you came in, watching as the team debriefed with the local pd before being dismissed. But amongst the chaos, Hotch found your eyes, and gave you a knowing look. One that meant you were going to talk through the very personal negotiation you gave.

The team arrived back at the office just shy of ten o’clock, Penelope waiting for Derek at the elevator. He wrapped an arm around her shoulder as you led the gang into the bullpen, everyone dropping their go bags at their desks. 

You lingered for a moment as Hotch made his way up to his office, knowing you’d be joining him in a few seconds. You grabbed your blue stress ball, complimentary from the C.A.L.M. department meeting, as through the curtains you could see him drop his bag before checking his phone for any messages from Jack.

“L/n,” Here it comes. “Can I talk to you in my office please?”

You and Spencer shared a look, and he gave you a comforting smile in return. You took the steps two at a time to his office, and shut the door behind you once you arrived. He was standing behind his desk, so you didn’t feel the need to sit yourself.

You waited for him to speak, since he was the one that called you in. It was a little childish, but you weren’t the one who wanted the discussion.

“I want to talk about the negotiation.”

“I thought it was pretty successful. I empathised, I got her to drop her weapon, and no one was injured in the process.”

“Y/n, you know that’s not what I meant.” He uncrossed his arms, letting out a sigh. The two of you were too exhausted to have this conversation, but that wasn’t going to stop Hotch from going on. “I told you that you could lean on me when it all became too much.”

“That was six years ago, Hotch.” Defensive, but not rude. A fine line. “And this wasn’t about work, this was personal. You’re not obligated to listen to our personal issues that take place outside the office.”

“And you are?” Stop spinning my words, Hotchner. “I know you, y/n. This isn’t just something that can be brushed back under the rug.” You scoffed. “You don’t know me.”

“Excuse me?”

“You don’t know me, Hotch. None of you do. You know my file. You know that I got a full ride to Bowdoin, that I was a social worker before transferring here, and that most of my life before eighteen was sealed away. I confided in you six years ago about my childhood and now you think you know me?”

“Why are you getting so defensive?”

“I’m not-” You paused, knowing that if you finished that statement it would, in fact, be defensive. “I’m just really tired and I don’t want to be having this conversation right now.”

“It’s not healthy for you to keep everything in while people spill their lives to you. And you know that.”

“Hotch,” You warned, your exhaustion quickly turning into rage.

“What, you really think I’m just going to drop this after hearing you confess to a serial killer that you have no joy in your life? And now you’re going to try and convince me that I don’t know anything about you? Bullshit, y/n. I know that you talk to your foster siblings every sunday to check in and make sure they’re all doing okay. I know that you volunteer with Garcia to help the families of victims cope with their loss. I know that you cling to Spencer like gum wherever you go to make him feel less insecure in a bar.”

“Stop it,”

“I know that your favorite color is purple, that you still write articles for CNN and The Times under a pseudonym. And I know, more than anything in the world, you want to be the mother that you never got to have.”

“Stop it!” You threw the blue ball into his builtins, hitting one of his stupid administrative awards in the process. He didn’t even flinch. “You don’t get to know me like that.”

“Why not?” You let out a low laugh as tears started to fill in your eyes. He was oblivious, and that's what made it hurt even more. You cracked your knuckles for a few seconds, waiting for him to connect the words you spoke at the Downey house and your frustration with him in this moment.

But his face softened, the wrinkles disappeared from his forehead, and you knew he figured it out. He didn’t need to say the words for you to know exactly what was going through his head. But he was with Beth, and you were not going to interfere. This wouldn’t change anything.

“It’s late, I should head home. I’ll get you my report before monday.”

You left his office without saying goodnight, and you tried to ignore the rest of your team huddled around Morgan’s desk, pretending not to be eavesdropping. But they totally were. 

Instead you grabbed your bags, giving Spencer a reassuring smile as his gaze lingered on you for a second longer. You had no intentions of turning around to see Hotch’s face. But if you had, you would’ve seen the same heartbroken expression across his face, realizing he let you walk away.

You tore your eyes away from the office, not wanting to relive the memory any longer. You stashed the stress ball under your monitor before turning out the light, and making your way back to the elevator.

Once you were settled back in your apartment, you sent a text to Reid and JJ, letting them know you got in okay and that you’d see them at the office on Monday. After getting a thumbs up and a ‘glad you’re home’ in response, you turned in for the night, trying to dream of nights in Paris and Barcelona instead of at the BAU.

---

It was hard for you to get back in the routine of consulting and profiling. Garcia had left you copies of three cases the team was going to be working on when you returned, and you’d barely worked through the first one in two hours. 

Three teenagers went missing from their small town in Idaho, and all were found in Seattle in the same week. Of course, your first case back included kids. 

You resorted to calling Spencer when you really had no idea where to begin. You felt like a rookie all over again, asking for help when creating a geographical profile or running new negotiation tactics. But your best friend was quick to help, assuring you that once you got back to the office, you’d fall back into the routine.

“Did you have a good time?” He finally asked, albeit apprehensively. You didn’t leave on the best terms with anyone, and they all seemed to know what pushed you over the edge.

“I did. It’s amazing to know that there is a whole other world out there that we don’t even know about. It’s so different over there, Spence. It’s peaceful, and beautiful, and everything the place you call home should be.”

You could hear the intake of breath over the line. “Does that mean you’re moving to Spain?” A smile crossed your lips just thinking about Barcelona. But, it wasn’t home.

“This is my home, Spencer. I’m not leaving anytime soon.” You left out the part about contemplating a new life for the better part of three weeks, knowing it would only cause him more paranoia. You were staying in Quantico, continuing what you were born to do.

After drafting a rough profile and reviewing family statements, you took a break from the paperwork staring back at you all morning. 

You made your way into the kitchen to find something for lunch, the afternoon approaching quick. All you really wanted to do was crash on the couch and watch old movies for hours, until monday morning inevitably rolled around. Selfishly you wanted your vacation to last forever. But your mind, and your bank account, thought differently.

After consuming a sandwich and some chips, you brought back the fresh mug of hot chocolate to the kitchen table, ready to take on the second file. Two women raped, tortured, and murdered outside of Miami. Why the fuck did it always have to be Florida.

Halfway through the family statements, there was a knock at your door. You grabbed your gun from the side table, just in case. Only three people had a key to your apartment. One of them was in England, one you just got off the phone with, and one… you didn’t exactly know where you stood with him.

After checking the peephole and seeing Hotch on the other side, you let out a sigh of relief. No one is coming to muder you. But it was quickly replaced with the memories of your last encounter, and the unspoken realization of feelings unrequited.

You placed your gun back on the table, and unlocked the door for him. He was wearing a navy blue quarter zip, jeans, and sneakers, the ultimate Aaron Hotchner not on duty look. It made your heart beat just a little faster noticing his hair was free of any gel, flopping naturally as he walked. 

“Hi,” You greeted him, half of you hidden behind your front door. 

A shadow of a smile crossed his lips, and he placed his hands in his pockets. “Hi. I’m sorry for stopping by unannounced. I know you must be tired and getting ready for Monday.”

“No, it’s okay. Did you want to come in?” You opened the door a little more, stepping out to show your sweatpants and sweatshirt look from behind the door.

“Thank you.” He murmured as he walked through the entrance, moving to take off his shoes. You told him a million times that you didn’t follow that rule, and that you hated it when people made their guests remove their shoes. But he told you once that it was a sign of comfort, that he felt at ease in someone else's home.

“Can I get you something to drink? I have some tea bags left over I think, or I can make you a cup of coffee.”

“No, I’m okay.” 

“Are you sure? It’ll only take a second. Oh, are you hungry? I still have some sealed crackers from before I left, might have something in the freezer if-”

“Y/n,” He interrupted you and you stopped in the middle of your path to the kitchen. “I’m fine.”

“Okay,” You nodded, making your way back to the living room. “Oh, I um, got something for Jack while I was in England with Emily. I know it’ll probably keep him holed up in his room for a week, but I couldn’t resist.” 

You pulled out the bag of souvenirs you got for the team, grabbing the London attractions lego set you bought for the young boy. Aaron smiled when you handed it to him, knowing the two of them would no doubt be starting this when he got home. 

“You didn’t have to get this for him. But he’s gonna love it.” 

“I know.” You reached in the bag once more, pulling out the gift you got for Aaron. “And I know you’ll probably never wear this, but I had to get it for you.”

He opened the box, a british flag tie on the inside. He couldn’t help the laugh that escaped his lips, the tacky gift really meaning a lot to him. “Thank you. I can honestly say this is the most unique gift I’ve ever received.”

“Glad to hear it.” You tucked your foot underneath you as you settled onto the couch, letting Aaron set the gifts aside. You knew what conversation was coming next, but you didn’t have the courage to start it. Especially since he was the one to come to you.

He settled in on the couch, a cushion between the two of you, a clear boundary that he’d set. 

“Did you enjoy your time over there?” 

“I had a really great time. I can’t believe I’d gone thirty two years without leaving the country. You don’t realize how much of the world there is to see until you go and uncover a small fraction of it.”

He smiled while beginning to pick at his fingernails. This was a new tell of his, he was usually extremely reserved with his anxiety. “You sound like Emily.” 

“I’m going to take that as a complement.” You said with a small laugh, adoring the woman across the ocean. 

“It is. She called me a few days ago, told me you guys had a nice visit.” 

“We did. Prentiss knows how to have a good time no matter the city. It was a little too much for me, though.” 

“Nobody can quite keep up with Emily.” He added before letting out a breath.

“She also told me that you were contemplating leaving the BAU.” There goes the first shoe, dropping from the ceiling. “Are you still thinking of quitting?”

“No.” It was the truth. Em had spoken some sense into you, and you knew deep down, like you told Spencer, this was your home. “I just needed a break from everything. And Europe was an amazing distraction. But I’m back, and ready to get back into the swing of things.”

He nodded, some tension slowly released from his shoulders. He couldn’t lose another member. It was too soon.

“Was it because of me?” 

“What?” Even though you were expecting this conversation, it still caught you off guard. 

“I’m not conceited enough to think you fled to another continent because of a fight, but is that what pushed you over the edge? What led you to want to quit the BAU?”

In a word, yes. The argument was the last straw on the camel's back. You’d spent years with this unit, fulfilling a destiny that you made up for yourself so that you wouldn’t feel guilty for not having a family or friends to confide in. You spent the better part of the last three years pining for a man you couldn’t have, trying to fill the holes in your life by playing pretend. So yes, it was Hotch that pushed you over the edge. But you learned a hell of a lot about yourself in those four weeks.

“Hotch, did you know that this was the first time I went on an airplane for my own enjoyment? This was the first vacation I’ve been on in my life. I booked a flight on a Thursday night that left at six a.m. the next morning. I was spontaneous, and in control of all the moves I would make for the next thirty days. I’ve never felt more liberated in my life.

“But then I landed in Copenhagen, and had an anxiety attack. I can’t speak Danish, I have no idea how to get around a new country, and I only had thirty dollars in cash to my name. And the only thing I could think of to help me get through it, was calling you. I had your contact pulled up, ready to call you and tell you what a stupid fucking mistake I made. But then I could hear your voice in my head, saying ‘I know you’, and I’d never turned my phone off faster.”

“Y/n,” He sounded exhausted himself, but you weren’t going to give in to the apologies. Not yet.

“I had the time of my life there. I went to places that I never thought I’d get to see in my life. Places that my foster parents told me I’d never be important enough to go to. But I made it. I made it to Giverny, and I saw what inspired Claude Monet to paint the Water Lilies series with my own eyes. I went inside La Sagrada Familia and walked on the steps that Gaudi dreamt of. I saw everything I wanted to, and I wept every place I went to. Because I got myself there. I persevered and worked my ass off my whole life, to get there. I didn’t have any parents, I didn't have any siblings, a spouse, or children. I did it all by myself, and it felt pretty amazing to accomplish that.

“No one knows me like I do.” You finished. Your walls were back up starting to feel secure in your own skin again. 

He stayed silent for a few minutes, maintaining eye contact with you the entire time. He was calculating his response, trying to formulate the perfect response to get the two of you back on track. It was exhausting watching his brain work, and you wondered how tired he must always be.

After another minute, he sighed and dropped his hands into his lap. “Beth and I broke up two weeks before you left.” The other shoe had dropped.

“What?” For the second time tonight, you were rendered speechless by Aaron Hotchner. This was not the response you were expecting, and not the news you expected to hear anytime soon. The two of them were obsessed with one another, how could they just end it?

“We ended it two weeks before your trip. She accepted a job in Kyoto, and didn’t want to string me along with long distance. But she also said she knew my heart wasn’t in it anymore.”

You stood up from the couch, not being able to sit still with this new information. Hotch and Beth were no longer together, he said all those things to you as a single man, understood what you felt for him, and still let you walk out of his office. For four weeks. 

“Why didn’t you tell me?” It was his turn to stand, still leaving enough distance between the two of you to continue your pacing. 

“Don’t deflect to another conversation.” 

“You’re the one that brought it up!”

He sighed, running a hand through his perfectly shaggy hair. “I don’t want to have this conversation with you again. So please, get it through your thick skull when I tell you that I know you. And I don’t mean that on a bureaucratic superior level. I know you, y/n. And just because you’ve been alone your whole life, doesn’t mean you deserve to be alone for the rest of it.” 

Your eyes started to water, so you looked away, gluing your line of sight to the wall next to you.

“You give us all one hundred and ten percent of your attention when we need you. And when I say all of us, that includes Jack and Henry. I’ve never met someone so intune to another person's feelings, who exudes so much empathy with one look and a smile. And we’ve taken you for granted for seven and a half years. Me the most.” Your eyes found his brown ones, begging you to continue looking at him. “I couldn’t have gotten through Haley’s death without you. And that is the biggest understatement of the decade. I am eternally grateful for all that you’ve done for me and Jack. But at the same time, I’m so sorry that it pushed me further and further away from you.”

His own eyes started to water, and he choked out a laugh. “What you said to Kathryn Downey, about giving yourself completely to a person and not getting the love reciprocated. I felt like an absolute idiot for not realizing that you felt the same way I did.” You closed your eyes with his confession, letting the tears roll down your cheeks. 

“There were so many times I wanted to tell you. But then Haley took Jack, and Foyet came, and the world got away from me. And I’m so sorry that you’ve felt the need to carry all our problems on your own.”

“Hotch, you don’t have to apologize.”

“Please, don’t call me Hotch right now.” He took a step toward you. “It’s Aaron, when I’m standing in front of you, begging you to just let me in.”

“I don’t,” Your voice cracked, and you rubbed your hands over your face in frustration. “I don’t know how to let someone love me.”

“I know,” He took another step closer. “You’re just going to have to trust me when I tell you I’ve been in love with you for years.”

He didn’t see the rest of your tears fall, because you threw yourself at him, wrapping your arms around his neck and burying your face in his shoulder. His arms found their place around your waist, pulling you two impossibly close.

“I love you, Aaron.” You could feel him laughing with his chest pressed against your own, and he moved to kiss the side of your head. 

“I love you.” He whispered back, causing the last of your tears to fall onto his sweatshirt.

He started to pull away, just enough to get a look at your face. His eyes were no longer filled with tears, but his cheeks still glistened when the light illuminated the damp spots on his face. He brushed a piece of hair behind your ear, letting his knuckles gently graze your temple. You caught his hand in the middle of his movement, lacing your fingers with his own. You’d been dying to know what it felt like to hold his hand like this for years, when you found yourself comforting him in his office one night, lightly holding his hand in yours. But this was so much better.

“You good?” He asked, and the corners of your mouth turned up the slightest. 

“I’m good.” He traced the lightest check mark on your laced hands, causing a true smile to grace your face.

“You have a tally to see who can make me smile the most?” 

“It’s just mine. Been keeping it for years. But I’m always in the lead.”

You laughed while letting go of his hand, wrapping your arms back around his neck. His eyes flickered to your lips for a second before looking back at you. You gave him a small nod, knowing he was asking for your permission. 

When his lips met yours, you knew this was the feeling that all the fairytales sang about. He was gentle at first, slotting your upper lip between his own. It was slow, and full of love from the years of knowing one another inside and out. He bit your lower lip softly, barely there, and you slowly parted your lips, letting him trace your tongue with his own. 

All you could think about was how warm he was, how his breath was actively leaving his lungs and entering your own as if you were one person. It was all consuming, and you were grateful that he took the lead, because you couldn’t focus on anything but him.

His hands slipped under your sweatshirt, resting on the skin just above your hips. You let out a small gasp as his cold fingers made contact with the sensitive skin, but it only made him laugh into the kiss. 

After a few more moments of getting lost in the feel of one another, you reluctantly pulled away, needing air to fill up your lungs. But Aaron didn’t go far, gently resting his forehead against your own. 

“I love you. And I don’t think I’m ever going to be able to stop telling you.” You closed your eyes and tilted your head up, slowly kissing him again. 

“I’ll never get sick of hearing it.” You mumbled, your lips still grazing his own. He smiled into the kiss, which only made your heart glow brighter and brighter the more he showed you how he felt.

You pulled away first, tracing the outline of his jaw with your thumbs. “You are the best thing that’s ever happened to me.” He tilted his head to the side, just enough to press a kiss to the palm of your hand. 

The tenderness this man exudes is beyond belief. “I really love you, Aaron.”

He laughed while pressing a kiss to your forehead. “I’m glad to hear that.”

You let him hold you for what felt like an eternity, but in reality was only a few minutes. “I promised Jack I would take him out for ice cream to make up for missing his soccer game last night.” 

“Okay,” You said and started to pull away, but his grip on your waist only tightened.

“Really? You’re just gonna let go without a goodbye?” You laughed at his fake hurt expression, so incredibly happy that you get to see Aaron in this light, enjoying his son, his life, and you. 

“I’m not about to stand in the way of Jack Hotchner and a sugar rush. That guy loves his sugar.”

He let go of your waist, but not without a light squeeze to your sides. “I know we literally just started this, but I really would like to tell him. I don’t want to keep any more secrets from him than I have to.”

You smiled at the thought of Aaron telling Jack how in love the two of you were. It made you feel complete, in a way you never thought you’d get to experience in your life.

“Tell him. As long as he doesn’t blab about it to anyone on the team just yet.” 

“You sure?” You nodded while passing him the souvenirs as he slipped his sneakers back on. 

“Aaron, he’s your son. I’ve loved him as long as I’ve loved you, maybe even longer.”

He stood up once again, that stupid smile not willing to leave his face any time soon. 

“I don’t know what I did to deserve you.” 

“Must’ve been something pretty good.” You said with a laugh, which he silenced by placing his lips on yours. You hoped the butterflies you felt now would be there every time he kissed you, no matter how many years have passed. 

“Like that.” You said once he pulled away. His dimples were showing now, and you wished that you could take a picture of him in this happy moment and remember it for the rest of your lives. 

“I’ll call you tonight.” He said and opened the front door. 

“Okay. Have fun, tell Jack I said hi.” 

“I will.” He kissed your cheek before starting the walk back down the hallway. He didn’t even make it halfway before turning around, and giving you one final kiss in the doorway. 

“Love you,” He said and gave you one more peck, before you shoved his shoulder. “I love you too. Now get outta here, Hotchner.”

****

tags: @simplyprentiss @michaelahah @ssahotchner99 @svrgicalhands @hotchtopic @unionjackpillow @philcoolson @tommhollandzxhaz @kathleenjasmine @canimarrypizzaornah @reaperwalking @inlovewithaaronhotchner @shelbymm11 @mrshotchner23 @tropicalwrites @averyhotchner @dreamy-moments @softhxtch @crazymar15 @theinsanespaceship15 @wecouldbreakthedistance @jeor @funnycuteandannoying @andherestograce @thisisntjuliana @captwilson @kennedyblair @lovelysunflowerxoxo @rcompton @iifaequeenii @iwaizumiee @mrsaaronh0tchner @abbeyannsmith-blog @becausehello @rinacriedpower @ssa-raye @ephemeral-barnes @slxtherinchxser @baueoud @lieswithoutfairytales @hug-a-bug-boo @blogmythoughts @freebanditghostcalzone @sugarbutterbailey

[maybe-itll-be-someday]

How Far We’ll Go

Chapter 15

Definitely some mature content in this one, so if you’re below 18, there is absolutely nothing here for you.

However, if you’re above 18 and into break-up sex.... 

Read on AO3

--

He never thought he could feel her absence more potently than her presence.

Emily always seemed to overwhelm him any time she was near - a comforting figure he always had in his periphery, his gaze stuck on her long before he realized it. He had stolen tiny tastes of it in the past, in a past lifetime before Foyet and Doyle where she was just his subordinate and he her superior. Aaron had long ignored the slight flush of his skin when she was near, the way he'd look back to her for a split second longer than he knew he had to. It was a magnetic pull he was barely conscious of, an unnoticeable habit swamped by mountains of paperwork, close brushes with their demise, and an unspoken understanding.

It wasn't until the walls between them started toppling, the neat bricks of their professional relationship crumbling whenever she smiled and his heart lurched a little further towards her, that he truly started to feel her presence. He couldn't stop the way she pulled his gaze around a room, noticing the soft dip of her collarbone and the supple pull of her waist. Catching tastes of lavender and clean laundry when she hovered over him, pointing out a tiny detail from a file with a slender finger. Small moments, easily maskable and explainable, that soon became the solace that he stole away to at night.

When she kissed him for the first time, tinged with an impatience and neon lights, she overwhelmed him. He remembers how she tasted - sweet and buttery, remnants of maple syrup in the small factions of her lips, and he was left heady. Thoughts unable to form, barely focusing on her words because all he wanted to do was feel her. He wanted to feel the way her breath, laced with decaf coffee and a spearmint she offered him, brought a welcome contrast to the biting cold. His fingers twisted on her waist, finding purchase on the curves he'd thought about more frequently than he'd ever admit. When he undressed her for the first time, an endless expanse of smooth skin that formed hills and mountains his fingers travelled with a soft touch, a fire consumed him, burning through every limb of his body. An unexplainable need to orbit around her - the center of his universe.

But now, it’s over.

Torn up by Doyle, his influence still reaching from beyond the grave. He had branded her memories of that night into a messy four leaf clover on her chest, staining her for life. She slipped through his grasp, almost as easily as she came.

Her absence burned through him more than Haley's had when they divorced. He thought his ability to compartmentalize was stronger than it was - he was always able to put his home life in a separate thought than work, refusing for the two to mix because he knew only certain disaster would await. Haley and their problems could easily be compartmentalized, tucked away in the confines of his mind and saved for a time when other lives didn't depend on him.

But now there was an emptiness that followed him everywhere he went. Small reflexes that were remnants of their time together - seeking for her in briefing rooms and precincts, wanting to ask her opinion. A lone shampoo bottle in his bathroom, tucked away behind his body wash and a mug with a faint outline of pointy ears and whiskers drying upside down on his counter. The old faded Yale t-shirt he had found in his laundry, an item easily overlooked, forced the air out of his lungs when he gripped a million memories sewn into the soft fabric in his hands.

He had a taste of bliss, only for it to falter on his tongue the moment he had it.

He always ached for her presence.

But now he was drowning in her absence.

--

In the first month, Jack takes it harder than Aaron notices.

The apartment is unusually clean, Jack's books neatly tucked into their assigned spaces on the bookshelf and toys put away in their proper bins. Jack finishes his vegetables and fruit with an unrelenting concentration, even finishing all of his peas despite the fact that he hated them. Aaron had chalked it up to him growing up a little bit and didn't pay it much mind, the grief of losing Emily a heavy burden he thought he was carrying alone.

Not until one Sunday morning, one of their very firsts without her, when Aaron is working on some paperwork in his office and hears a loud crash coming from the kitchen. Jack had said that he wanted orange juice and insisted on getting it himself, the streak of independence Aaron could've sworn he'd gotten from her. He sighs to himself, making his way to the kitchen.

"Jack, are you alright?" Aaron calls. He frowns when there isn't a response and walks in, only to see Jack standing in a sea of shattered glass as tears streaked his cheeks. Aaron carefully steps over the shards of glass, moving to pick Jack up in his embrace and quickly inspecting him to ensure that he wasn't hurt.

"I-I'm sorry, Daddy." He says between ragged breaths, and Aaron lets out a breath of relief at the lack of blood on him. Jack continues to sob into his shoulder, a sting of worry still lingering at the tears that fall from the eyes that looked so much like Haley's it still stole his breath away.

"You don't need to be sorry, Jack. Accidents happen. We'll clean this up together, okay?" Jack slowly calms down, as Aaron cradles him to his chest. It was too reminiscent of the way he'd comfort Jack when he was younger as he bounces him up and down, running a soothing hand down his back.

When the tears cease, only bubbling hiccups remain, that's when Jack asks him a question that nearly brings him to his knees.

"You're not going to leave me too, right Daddy?"

The pain is hot and prominent in between his ribs, his own tears rising in the corner of his eyes. Aaron had been so consumed in his heartbreak, assuming that he was the only one that was devastated by Emily leaving. He forgets that Jack had a taste of life with Emily as well, of stories with funny voices, weekends spent with his hand in hers as they explored DC, and a love that had filled the both of them. She had carved out a new place in his heart, right next to where Haley was, and her departure had left a hole in him too.

Aaron is quick to shake his head, tightening his hold on the young boy.

"Jack, you listen to me, okay? I will never leave you." Jack is easily placated with promises of chocolate ice cream as Aaron suggests he go grab the broom so they could clean up the broken shards of glass together.

Aaron is left standing with shards of glass around him, and wonders how you put something back together that has shattered beyond recognition.

--

In the fourth month, Emily starts to get used to the London streets.

A coffee shop with croissants that melt on her tongue is only a ten minute walk from her flat, she's learned the particularities of the personalities of her team, and she actually knows of the Sunday market taking place downtown. The fear that pricks the back of her neck and fills her fingertips with a nervous energy dissipates slowly as she carves familiar pathways in London streets.

The nightmares cease and she builds a new routine. A black coffee in the morning, a splash of cream and sugar from the break room (she avoids Splenda at all costs because when the sweetness hits her teeth, all she can remember is the small box of Splenda he had added to his grocery list, just for her, tucked away in his kitchen), followed by hours of meetings with superiors and colleagues or a case that whisks her to whichever part of the world beckoned for them, only to crawl to her flat when the work had ceased and pour herself from one of the multiple bottles of red she kept with worn paper labels printed in French.

She savors the warmth of the expensive sheets she splurged on, the soft silk a gentle caress on her skin to soothe the dull ache in her chest when she crawls into bed alone. She throws herself into social nights spent with her team, trying hard to recreate the feeling of family that she had left behind in an attempt to try and build her own. She flirts, admittedly poorly and without any true effort, when a few glasses of wine had entered her system in an attempt to shield the emptiness she feels when she thinks she caught a glimpse of his brown eyes in the dim lights of the bar and the following disappointment because of course it would never be him.

She tries to keep in contact. Penelope and Derek are the easiest, because they had both insisted on flying with her to London to properly see her off. Derek had realized that she was leaving before she even told him, understanding as she had expected him to be. Penelope had, of course, found out from Derek that she had accepted the Interpol Unit Chief position and came to her with tears beading behind her sparkled frames and booking flights for her and Derek before she could protest.

But it's obvious from the first few phone calls that they were skirting around the team to talk to her. JJ had been a little more confused, given the fact that she knew that there was more than just the BAU she was leaving behind.

"Are you sure about this, Em?" She had asked, when Emily pulled her aside for their last coffee date. Emily remembers the concern in her look and the mild disappointment, but she had just swallowed the words I'm not and said that she was. She doesn't tell JJ of the nagging voice in the back of her head, the one that insisted that she must have been making a mistake.

But the voice was small, insignificant compared to the fear that plagued her for months. So she accepts the hurt on JJ's expression and pulls her into a tight hug, promising that she would call, visit, and they could still play Scrabble.

Reid had pulled his eyebrows together, reminding Emily of how Jack looked when he didn't understand something. He had snapped away from her eyes the moment the words I'm leaving left her lips, his body language stiffening as she told him of the opportunity with Interpol. Spencer had been in the room with her when Clyde had first made the offer and he felt betrayed and lied to once more. It was obvious in the way he slightly pulled away from her last hug before telling her he had a meeting and stalked off towards the elevator without another word. Spencer still hadn't spoken to her directly since.

Dave just sat in silence, listening as Emily filled in the gaps she purposefully left out the past few months because he deserved an explanation. Disappointment had flashed on his face when she finally told him that she had accepted another position, his expression unreadable as he plucked out the question that she knew everyone else on the team was wondering as well, even if they didn't voice it.

"What about Aaron?"

"He'll find someone else." She had said, her tone joking but her eyes betraying the sharp pain that throbbed in her chest at the idea of someone else loving him. Dave had just nodded, wishing her good luck and promising to send her the names of restaurants in London that she'd enjoy. She knew that Dave still didn't understand, hiding his disappointment from her until she caught his eye right as she emptied her desk on her last day. His gaze had landed on her, heavy for a split second, before straightening up and walking into Aaron's office and closing the door behind him.

So her phone calls with Penelope and Derek were taken behind closed doors and with hushed voices, not wanting to agitate the hurt that palpated from the team. She stops reaching out and they do too because maybe they all needed a little space.

She builds a new routine, because this is what she wanted. It was the new life promised that gave her a reason to fly out of Dulles, leaving the sparkling city skyline and the only family she's ever been a part of.

It's 3:40 AM on a Tuesday night when her phone cuts through the silence of the night, groaning as her sleep was abruptly interrupted by the shrill ringing on her bedside. Her eyes are half open as she squints at the bright screen, only to pop up into a full sitting position when she realizes who's calling.

"Aaron?" She calls out, fear and anticipation tight in her throat as she waits to hear the voice that plagued her memories more than she would admit.

Instead, an excited high-pitched voice comes through the phone, flooding her with a familiarity and a sharp ache all at once.

"Hi Emmy!"

"Hey honey." She says, her voice cracking as tears build in her eyes at the sound of his voice. Jack was one part of her routine that she had never quite replaced. It was a different emptiness that she felt when she realized that her apartment was devoid of his dinosaur sneakers, his crayons and books left open and scattered on communal surfaces, and the sounds of his make-believe echoing from his bedroom.

It was an emptiness she didn't bother to fill, because she knew that nothing could.

He had been devastated when she told him that she was leaving. She had insisted on being the one to tell him, knowing that she had the rare chance to explain herself to Jack instead of having Aaron make up excuses on her behalf. Jack deserved that much and Emily felt like the reaction he gave her was something she deserved too.

He had flinched, like he had been burned, when she told him that she wouldn't see him for a little bit. His brown eyes grew wide, tears sparkling when she explained to him that she was moving to a city called London that was far away and that she wouldn't see him or Aaron after work or during his soccer games.

"You're leaving?" Jack asked, voice hard and sounding much older than his six years. Emily had reassured him that she would always love him and that he could call her anytime, but yes, she was leaving.

His tears came fast after that, and he bolted to his bedroom and slammed the door behind him.

"Are you okay? Is Daddy okay?" She asks after a split second, because Jack was still calling her in the middle of the night and she was under the impression that he didn't really want to speak to her, especially since it had taken so much coaxing to convince Jack that she wasn't leaving forever and that she'd come see him, it just wouldn't be as soon as he was used to. This had to be an emergency call of some kind.

"We're okay. Daddy's in the shower but I did a school project on chameleons today!" Jack starts to ramble on about some of the facts he knew about chameleons: that there are over 160 of different kinds, that their tongues suction cupped their prey ("Like the things we hung on the window that one time Emmy!"), and that chameleons aren't deaf but don't have ears. He launches into his grand review of his project and Emily thinks that maybe she should stop him because it was too late into the night for her, but she just stays quiet and lets a small smile curve at her lips as she listens to him recite facts like he was reading them. She knew that he wasn't, that he was probably sitting at the dining room table and kicking his feet while he talked.

She had tried so hard to forget that this is exactly what she left behind.

Tears catch in her throat as Jack's voice is suddenly interrupted by a much deeper one.

"Jack! Why do you have my phone?" Aaron's voice, soft yet disciplined, was somewhere in the distance. It was the first time that she had heard his voice in over four months and she shifts awkwardly on the bed, curling her legs tightly to her chest as she hears rustling on the other side.

"Hello?" He says, the tone as smooth and deep.

"Aaron. Hi." She breathes out, cursing the relief that filled her at the sound of his voice.

"Emily. I'm so sorry about Jack - I didn't realize that he had my phone, let alone that he knew to dial your number..." She had emailed him her new number after her first week in London, along with a short update on how the move had gone, that Garcia and Derek were driving her crazy trying to organize her flat and hoping that he was doing well.

The email went unanswered and it hurt her more than she would ever admit.

"It's okay. I missed hearing his voice."

I missed yours too.

"Isn't it late over there?"

She chuckles, glancing over at the bright neon clock on her bedside that tells her it's a little past 4 AM now.

"Early, actually." Aaron sighs, doing the quick math in his head and realizing that Jack probably had no concept of what a time zone was.

"Were you asleep?"

"Yeah, but it's okay." She says. There's a stiff silence on the other end, stretched over thousands of miles across the ocean. Her legs curl tighter around her chest, shielding her heart from the pain that she knows will follow. This was the first conversation they've had in over four months, and she's never found herself speechless in front of him, unable to pull any words that would sound right.

Because there are so many things she wants to say, sentiments that she should have said.

"I'll be sure that he only calls you at appropriate times." Aaron's tone is too reminiscent of how he would talk to police chiefs and their superiors on the phone, clipped and stringent - more Hotch than Aaron.

More impersonal than he had ever been with her.

"You don't have to do that, Aaron."

"You know that I have to." He says, and she knows what he means.

It still hurts too much.

She doesn't know what the appropriate words are. If I'm sorry would ever encapsulate the regret that she has for hurting him.

The regret that still lingers in the back of her mind- that she had walked away from the best thing she's ever had.

"I should go." She says instead, giving him his escape. He takes it immediately and without a second thought.

"That's probably for the best. Get more sleep, alright?" The call ends before she can say goodbye. She's left with the dial tone in her ear and the ache she's been trying to forget echoing in her entire being.

When she finds the strength to end the call, she finds herself drawn to a file box tucked away in her closet. It was the only box she never unpacked, knowing that its contents were better kept in cardboard.

But tonight, for just tonight, she wants to remember instead of forget.

She finds the box right where she had left it, in the back of her closet still untouched after four months. She lifts the lid and her breath stalls as memories wash over her, every single moment she's kept locked away in this box rushing to the surface and stealing all her air from her lungs.

A drawing of her, Aaron, and Jack that was done in crayon and presented to her on one Sunday morning that had lived on her fridge door. An old cotton shirt with a faded Georgetown logo, one she had convinced Aaron to part with in their early days with promises of indecency and ice cream. A napkin she had swiped from the diner where they had their first date, the logo imitating the neon sign that had shone above them when she kissed him for the first time. A handful of pictures she had printed of Jack and Aaron, intending on showcasing them in frames instead of living in a box, shoved to the back of her mind.

She finally reaches the picture she's been looking for.

It was the picture that Aaron had in his wallet, his panicked handwriting on the back. Its edges were now worn from the numerous times she had pulled it out of her pocket that day that she had almost lost him. She never gave it back, the right opportunity slipping from her fingers along with her confession.

It could've been different. If they had figured this out sooner, if Doyle hadn't stolen her sanity and her life from her from the grave, if she was just a little less broken than she was.

Her fingers trace their figures, pure and unbroken captured in a perfect moment.

All she had left of him was a box of their memories and list of if and buts she had left unanswered, dotted with the finality that it could never be.

--

Aaron tries to ignore the date. He briefs the team on cases they had on deck, finishes up the paperwork that was piling on his desk, and wills everything in him to not think of the only person that's plagued his every thought the past six months. He had come into the office early, way earlier than he normally would because Jack was off at summer camp. It was an old decision swayed by the hope that having Jack away for a week or so would give them some time together, maybe in some cabin tucked away in a remote mountain range, spending their days encased in sheets and walking underneath canopies of dense trees hidden away from the rest of their world.

And maybe, just maybe, he would've taken the time to ask her something that had haunted him for months.

A headache builds at the base of his skull, the tension of being hunched at his desk with his pen tightly gripped in hand pinching the muscles around his neck. He doesn't know what time it is, instead pouring all of his attention on reviewing the team's reports and filling out his own. The sun had set hours before and most of the team had already left for the day, but the time was lost on him.

"Aaron." His head snaps up and he winces at the movement that causes his neck to ache, spotting Dave hovering in the doorway with two glasses and a bottle of his oldest scotch tucked in his arm.

He wordlessly crosses into the room, setting the two glasses against the dark mahogany of his desk and pouring trickles of amber into the crystal. He slides one of the glasses over to him before settling in the seat across from his desk.

They let the pregnant silence blanket them and Aaron doesn't have to ask why Dave's in his office this late at night.

"Are you allergic to looking at the time today?" Dave asks, motioning to the lack of a watch on his wrist. "I haven't seen you without a watch in the fifteen years I've worked with you, Aaron."

Aaron doesn't even pretend to be surprised that Dave had caught on. He was the only one who ever did.

Instead, Aaron tips his head back, letting the harsh sting of alcohol soothe out the emotions that have been lodged in his throat for the most of the day. He was wondering how long he could get away with shunning himself in his office, willfully ignoring the thoughts of her skin and her smile that were smattered between the words he wrote in his reports.

"You know what today is." Aaron says, the words bitter and heavy on his tongue along with the whiskey.

"How are you holding up?" Dave asks, his concern evident. Aaron doesn't know if he has the right words to answer that question - if he could describe to him how amplified her absence was that he couldn't bear to walk into the apartment that was now devoid of any of her belongings but cradled some of his favorite memories. How those memories, once sweet and wanted, now felt like they had been soaked in a poison that wrought his thoughts.

How badly he wished that she was still here.

How much he longed for her.

And how much he hated that he did.

So instead, he doesn't answer, and finishes the rest of the whiskey in his glass because there weren't any words. He would rather leave them unsaid, like so many things between them were, and hopefully it would wither away the same way that flowers perished in the winter. Slow but guaranteed, that one day he would wake up and the memories of the slope of her cheek and the way his chest would clench when he realized she wasn't next to him would dissipate.

But today wasn't that day.

"I think I should head home." Aaron croaks out, when the whiskey has bloomed warmth into his abdomen. Dave doesn't stop him, polishing off his glass of whiskey before wishing him a good night and retreating back into his own office.

His apartment is as dark and as empty as he feels. He finds himself being drawn to his safe, unlocking it and reaching in to pull out something he hasn't had the chance to look at since she had left DC all those months ago. It was a thorn in his side, a dull ache that was easy to tuck away in a metal safe underneath his suits and old coats. His fingers touch the velvet box and Aaron almost expects it to burn to the touch.

He doesn't have the strength to open it. He doesn't want to because he still thinks that it's perfect for her. Instead, he lays the unopened box on his coffee table and opens up a bottle of red wine. It was her favorite, a bottle he had managed to track down from an old winery in Châteauneuf-du-Pape. He wanted to save it for a special occasion, one that ended with the ring sparkling on her left hand, but there weren't any occasions for it anymore. He pours himself a glass and raises it to no one.

"Happy anniversary, Em."

--

3,000 miles away, Emily buys a bottle of whiskey before she retreats to her apartment for the night.

She lets the whiskey burn her throat and drip down the old cotton shirt draped over her frame, his scent long gone and faded. Her tears prick at the back of her eyes as she traces the outline of his face with the pad of her thumb, a memory pulled from the box still left untouched in her closet.

"Happy anniversary, Aaron."

--

The wedding invite comes as a surprise.

JJ had gushed to her the previous month that she and Will had decided to marry after he had a brush with death as a suspect gunned him down in the middle of DC. It was in a hospital room that she told him to ask her again, a redo of a night that ended in more tears and harsh words rather than in celebration. She wanted him, all of him, no matter what tomorrow brought.

The off-white envelope embellished with her name comes in the mail on a Wednesday morning bearing an invitation to their wedding in DC.

She calls JJ, confused that she had gotten an invitation.

"Emily." JJ starts, indignant at her assumption that the wedding invite had been a mistake. "Of course I would send you an invitation."

"It won't make things.. awkward?" She asks. Months had passed now and while it had already felt like another lifetime, she knew that there were still some harbored feelings. Reid had only started speaking to her in the last month and she hadn't heard from Aaron outside of the emails that he had helped Jack write. She didn't want to aggravate the healing wounds she knew that still lingered, not wanting to cause any more pain to the people she loved.

She's had her fill of all that for this lifetime.

"Em, you're one of my best friends. I know it might be a little weird, but I want you there with me."

"Just let me think about it okay?" She says, promising that she would give her an answer by this week. She decides to talk to Clyde about it, ignoring the half-hopes that she was sent on a case so that she had an excuse not to go as she taps on his office door.

"Darling! I had just sent you an email - The CIA needs a consultation on one of their current cases, interested in going stateside?"

"I actually wanted to talk to you about that. JJ, the Communications Liaison over at the BAU, is getting married and she wants me in DC for the wedding."

"That sounds like wonderful news, darling. But why, may I ask, do you look disappointed?" Clyde asks, a twinkle in his eye and she curses her inability to shield her emotions from him. He was one of the only people, outside of Aaron, who had the ability to dissect her motives with a fine precision.

“I’m not exactly racing to head back to DC.”

Clyde hadn’t questioned her decision to leave Washington, thrilled that she had accepted his proposal. It wasn’t until weeks later, when she had settled into her glass-walled office that overlooked the messy streets of London, that he had asked about Aaron.

“Are you and Aaron still…?” He asked, as he had grazed a wound that felt like it would never finish healing.

She had just shaken her head, smiling weakly at Clyde, before changing the subject.

"I know you're dying to see him."

“I’m not…” She starts to protest, but Clyde just holds up a hand to stop her and Emily’s jaw tightens, doing the math on how many seconds it would take to completely snap his fingers in half.

“Darling, as much as I love having you here, you haven’t exactly been the happiest camper. And I’m not going to question your decision because it benefits me, but go see him before you start to depress all of London.” Clyde dismisses her then, a call coming in from one of their contacts in the CIA and told her he needed her in the US for the consultation. She was ordered to stay there for the week - no matter what she decided to do with her time.

She books her flight back to DC when she gets back at her office.

She hated it when he was right.

--

Aaron fumbles with the small knot on Jack’s tie, his fingers filled with nerves that crackle with anxiety. JJ had let him know that Emily was coming to the wedding, a conversation she chose to have with him behind the closed door of his office - an indication that she knew more than she let on. Emily had told him in an email, letting him know that she was going to be stateside. He wasn’t sure if it was a warning or an invitation.

He had been unwillingly counting down the days, JJ’s wedding invitation was now taking prime real estate on his fridge next to Jack’s drawings and appointment reminders. The days had passed quickly and unbearably slow at the same time - the end of each day a surprise but the rest of the days after seemed to stretch out into eternity.

“You ready, buddy?” Aaron asks, taking a shaky breath as he brushes the small shoulders of Jack’s suit. He walks into Dave’s house, following the slew of caterers that are doing last minute tasks, bustling in and out of numerous hallways and doors.

That’s when he hears it.

A sound that he had played over and over again in his head, simply replaying a fading memory of a memory until he convinced himself that he actually didn’t remember what she sounded like. He follows the sound, calling him in like she was a pied piper. He steps through the doorway, Jack in tow, to see Penelope animatedly talking to an overwhelmed Emily, who had an amused smile on her face as Garcia asks her if she had liked the tea she had recommended.

Her eyes find him from the corner of the room, barely a glance in his direction but he catches it with ease, a dance they’ve practiced to perfection. Jack breaks from his grip before he can truly register what happens, flying right into Emily’s legs and bursting into tears.

He wails as Emily scoops him up in her arms, already too big to be held, with an old reflex. Derek and Penelope have the sense to avert their gaze, shuffling awkwardly in their spots as Jack’s cries into Emily’s shoulder.

“Hey honey.” She says, voice cracked and laden with her own tears that she refuses to shed. He’s heavier already, his feet dangling an inch or two farther than it used to when she would hold him.

But he still wrapped his arms around her in a ferocity that grounded her to him, just as unwilling to let go as she was. Slowly the tears bubble to soft sniffles, snot running down his nose and wiped with the back of his new suit's sleeve much to Aaron’s chagrin. Emily puts him on his feet, wiping his tears with the back of her hand and smiling softly at him.

“You’re here.” Jack says incredulously, despite the fact that Aaron had told him in previous days that she would be.

“I’m here.” She confirms, unable to stop herself from running a hand through his hair in a familiar gesture. Aaron catches it and his eyes lock on hers, their gazes heavy and weighted as Derek and Penelope take that as their cue to leave.

“Hey buddy. They got a really cool fountain here.” Derek says, catching Jack’s attention and knowing that they probably needed a moment alone. “Want to go see it?”

They wait for their footsteps to fade in the distance, along with Jack’s excited ramblings about some dinosaur she’s already forgotten the name of. Her gaze is stuck to the back of Jack’s head, not turning back to face him until he speaks first.

“Hi.” He says, the smallest of smiles edging his lips.

His eyes follow the form of her dress, admiring the way the dress hugged her form tightly. The deep neckline teases the top of her breasts, the curves triggering a million memories of worship for them. The dress flows across her skin in waves of soft fabric, painting her skin in a shade of red invoking his own skin to flush to match the shade. Her lip wedges itself between her teeth and he can feel a sharp current of electricity go straight to the pit of his abdomen.

He hates that his reaction to her is stronger now, triggered by the pull of her teeth over her lower lip. A taste of water after almost a year in the desert.

“Hey.” She says, the corners of lips turning up as her eyes raked over his form, making him squirm under her scrutiny.

“You look good.” Is all he can manage to say, averting his eyes towards the mantle with a few lone decorations, an attempt to stop himself from outright staring. She giggles, light and airy, and his own smile breaks on his lips.

“You don’t look too bad yourself.”

It’s the first conversation they’ve had in almost eleven months, and it makes her stomach curl when she realizes that she hadn’t heard his voice in her own ears in that same time period. Aaron was once her solace, a listening shoulder she had relied on more times than she could count, his wisdom and words of affirmations constants  - only to be reduced to strained conversations stripped of the foundation they had built for themselves

“Dolcezza. Garcia told me that JJ’s looking for you.” Emily glances at Dave, who breaks the tense atmosphere with his sudden presence. Emily shoots Aaron an apologetic look and heads further into the house, leaving him standing with the traces of her perfume and a longing that roared in his chest with an unrivaled ferocity.

--

JJ is beautiful, gliding down the aisle in practiced steps before smiling at Will, who twists his hands nervously but the excitement on his face obvious. Their story finally had the happy ending that they deserved.

Aaron can’t help but let his gaze linger on the one person he was sure he’d meet at the end of an aisle.

She would have been a gorgeous bride.

--

He’s jealous.

Derek’s arm is tight around her waist, dipping her as a laugh bubbles out of her. They were all a few drinks in, the alcohol imbibing looser tongues and muscles. The team was paired off on the dance floor, the kids being occupied by Reid’s nimble fingers as he pulled the card he had told them to memorize. Dave was dancing with Erin, JJ and Will swaying to the soft music while Emily was swept away in Derek’s arms.

He breaks his gaze to finish the rest of his whiskey, an old crutch that was reminiscent of his father’s tainted breath.

For a brief moment, he understood why alcohol was his vice.

He watches as Jack cuts through the dance floor and tugs on Emily’s dress. She smiles, blinding and bright, as Jack giggles and tries to tug her in Reid’s direction, no doubt in search for her attention even after months apart, easily sliding back into familiar routines like she had never left.

Emily picks him up, plopping Jack on the angle of her hip as Derek retreated, hands up in defeat.

Jack’s smile is wider than Aaron has seen for a while, his giggles loud and delighted as Emily tickles his sides. His arms wrap around her neck tightly, resting his head against her shoulder and molding into an intimate scene that will never stop stealing the air from his lungs.

They sway gently, and Aaron can see Jack’s eyes softly close, the lateness of the night amplifying how exhausted he was. Emily’s lips move against Jack’s ear, soft whispers of sweet nothings as she rocks him to sleep.

His chest is heavy, twinging tightly with a pain he thought had dulled enough to be ignored. An old wound that’s burst at the seams, bleeding with nostalgia and regret.

They had been so close to having it all.

--

She catches him alone, his whiskey glass filled for the third time that night, as he leans against the marble balcony in a quieter section of Rossi’s mansion. Every inch of Dave’s house reeked of well-deserved success, tall columns and elegant furniture that she had no doubt had cost a fortune.

She steps out into the cool night, a slight shiver running up her spine as Aaron turns his head towards her, eyeing the glass of red wine in her hand.

“Hi.”

He smiles, an actual genuine smile that deepens the dimples on his cheeks and causes her heart to stall in her chest. The whiskey slicked his muscles, now unable to keep his guard up around her. All he could process was the soft scent of lavender and roses.

God, did he miss her.

“Hey.” He says, turning back towards the city view in front of them. Buildings that lined the skyline, dotting the black night in soft dots of light. They were in a nearby suburb, creating a barrier between them and the noise of the city - a carefully curated landscape of artificial life.  

No words are passed between them, Emily reaching for the glass of whiskey in Aaron’s hand, knowing that she needed more liquid courage to survive an interaction with him.

“I thought you hated dark liquor?” He asks, his expression amused as she swallows with no hesitation. Aaron’s eyes can’t help but linger on the column of her throat, following the supple movement of liquid under her skin, smooth and taut.

He still remembers the tension of her muscles as his lips explored the path from her jaw to her collarbone.

He turns away, letting her polish off his drink and bites at the inside of his cheek to regain some form of control.

“I actually learned to like it.” She says, the alcohol flooding her in a warmth that draws her a little bit closer to him. She ached to crash into him, to feel the warmth of his skin and the weight of his solid form, anchoring her down to Earth.

But she had given it up, she reminds herself.

She chose to walk away from this.

“What are you doing here, Emily?” He asks. She knows that he’s not referring to the wedding, or DC, but in this small balcony that overlooked the city. She stiffens, tears beading in her eyes before she can stop them, his presence shielding her in a safety that she had missed.

“I don’t know.”

He looks at her, eyes growing wide at the tears in her eyes. He reaches up to brush a tear that had strayed, her cheek resting in his palm as Aaron’s fingers brushed against her skin. His touch was hot and wanting, stepping closer to her and nosing the hinge of her jaw, pulling her scent to his senses.  

She still smelled the same.

“Aaron.” She whispers, unable to find the air in her chest to tell him to stop. He pulls back, her eyes locking on him with a question.

Are you okay with this?

He nods, imperceptibly.

Yes.

Her lips brush his once, twice, with a hesitance that he hasn’t seen since they had first started to dance around each other almost two years ago. His senses flood, an addict being given a taste of their vice, and the dam breaks.

He pushes her back away from the door, pressing her right up against the brick wall and covering her body with his, shielding her from view. He could feel the warmth of her, already slick, against the fabric of his suit. He kisses her, the desperation dripping off his actions as if she was going to evaporate in his grip.

She moans, the noise strangled in her throat at the contact and his skin feels like it’s aflame underneath his suit, the cool night air a welcome contrast to the heat that was building. She hikes a leg up on his hip, the fabric of her dress falling to reveal the long expanses of thigh that he’s spent many mornings and nights between. His teeth edge the skin of her collarbone, causing the expected sigh to fall from her lips.

He still remembers.

His fingers reach down, pushing the damp fabric of her underwear to the side and slides one finger, then two, pumping and stretching in an old rhythm he created on a Sunday morning. Her head falls back, exposing the object of his fascination. His lips quickly latch on, running his tongue down an old path as his fingers follow the same pattern.

“F-Fuck. A-Aaron.” His name tumble from her lips, and his throat catches at the familiarity of it all.

Her hips roll in tandem with the flicks of his wrist, the palm of his hand grinding against her until he feels her fingers thread through his hair, curling with a force that makes him wince. She feels the tightening of his eyebrows against her skin and she smiles.

“Sorry.” She says breathlessly, a laugh and a moan tumbling out as her hips start to buck against his hand. He curls his fingers, brushing her in a spot that causes expletives that would cause her mother to cringe to fall from her lips. It doesn’t take long until she flutters and shakes underneath him, her limbs curling around him with stars bursting in her vision. He anchors her to him, a strong arm looped around her waist to stop her from tumbling to the floor.

“Jesus Christ.” She whispers when she’s caught her breath, her muscles shaking from the force of the orgasm he had drawn out of her.

“Actually, it’s Aaron.” He quips and she shakes underneath him in laughter, a gentle slap to the back of his head and he can’t help the grin that stretches against her shoulder. His finger slips from her and she whines in protest, her hands reaching down to undo his belt with a snap . She wraps her fingers around him, heavy and rigid in her palm. She squeezes him gently, her wrists twisting in practiced precision that causes his hips to stutter to follow her movements, his head dropping to her shoulder.

“No.” He growls into her ear. “Inside you.”

She nods, a whine bursting from her lips and he seals his own over them to silence her. He was still acutely aware that they were on a balcony, with his team in various states of inebriation and could walk in on them at any time. He nudges against her, so slick and aching before pressing in, her name chanted in prayer as he split her open. He can’t think, can’t form the words to describe how she feels around when he’s fully sheathed, her fingers tight in his hair and her walls even tighter around him. She can’t stop the soft sighs, drawn out by the feeling of him filling her with a fullness that plagued her fantasies. He drops his lips to the plane of skin that he had once whispered his reverence to, savoring the vibration of her moan as her spine curled into him, already desperate for more contact.

She still feels the same.

But everything between them had changed.

Tears bead in her eyes as his hips stole the air from her lungs with every thrust. She stretches and burns, a feeling she’s tried to chase underneath her sheets with thoughts of him guiding the feeling of her fingers. His hips start to vary in rhythm and she knows he’s quickly losing control.

“F-Fuck. I missed you.” He croons into her ear, reaching down between them to swipe at the sensitive flesh, determined on bringing her over the edge with him. He bends his knees slightly and changes the angle, pressing harder and deeper into her until her chest starts to rise and fall rapidly underneath his. He covers her mouth with his, muffling the increasingly loud moans that were lodged in her throat.

She can feel his lips mouth the words he doesn't say out loud, caught in the shell of her ear along with a moan and her heart clenches because he shouldn't say it.

She didn't deserve it.

She falls apart between him and the brick wall and he’s right behind her, filling her to the brim like the city lights in the night sky.

Another three words left unsaid between them.

--

He descends the stairs into the living room, the imprints of their indiscretion hidden in a wadded up handkerchief in his pocket and the slight wobble in Emily’s step as she follows a few minutes behind him.

No one in the team seems to have noticed, all of them flushed with warmth from the open bar that Rossi had set up in the garden. Aaron heads over to JJ and Will, explaining that it was getting late and that he needed to put Jack to bed. JJ nods, eyes glazed and skin pink as she settles an unfocused gaze on Emily.

Her eyebrow quirks in question and Emily ignores her pointed look, instead reaching for her phone to check the time.

There’s a handful of emails from her team with status reports on the cases that she had assigned them and she’s suddenly hit with the sickening reality that this wasn’t home anymore.

She wasn’t going to crawl home to Aaron, curling up under his duvet while he put Jack to bed with a promise that he’d be there afterwards, a teasing kiss pressed to her lips on things to come if she was up for it. She would crawl back to the hotel room she had booked in the middle of the city, large and empty, and she would curl up underneath unfamiliar sheets with the dull ache between her thighs as the only remembrance of him. They had fucked, quick and dirty, in Rossi’s balcony upstairs. They weren’t a couple, routines threaded into their reflexes.

She had given that up, months ago.

She ignores the way Aaron is baring his gaze into her, an unspoken question in his eyes until he heads out the front door with a sleeping Jack in his arms. She couldn’t keep dragging him along, stealing tastes of him whenever she could because she was lonely and missed him. She had chosen to move to London, thousands of miles away from here, and she didn’t get the luxury of him anymore.

She had done enough damage.

--

When Aaron calls the next day, she stares at the ceiling and lets the ringing echo in her hotel room, intensifying the dull ache in the base in her skull and the heavy sting of tears in her eyes.

She doesn’t answer.

She flies back to London two days later, ignoring the vibrating in her pocket and the flash of his name on her screen.

Later that month, she crawls to a dirty bar in Central London after a long case in Turkey. There’s a man by the bar, dark and brooding, his eyes on her as she tipped back her second whiskey for the night.

Her phone vibrates in her pocket, her whiskey blurring the edges of her memories and for a split second she thinks that it’s him.

She’s disappointed when it isn’t, cursing herself for the longing for him that never seems to stop following her around. She tucks away the memory of him, shaking the invisible ache between her thighs and in her chest. She moves towards the stranger at the bar and asks him to buy her another drink.

She tries to ignore the bile in her throat when he says yes.

--

[readyourimgaines]

Age Doesn’t Mean Much

Summary: Five times the BAU remembered Reid’s younger than them plus one time they were violently reminded he’s not a child. 

Spoiler/Trigger Warning: The entire ending of the second season’s 15th episode: Revelations. 

Dr. Spencer Reid was merely 21 when SSA Jason Gideon convinced him to join the BAU. With the exception of Aaron Hotchner (who had also read the young doctor’s file) the team wasn’t sure how to feel about the inexperienced man. 

Other than giving a pointer or two to a professor lecturing on a cold case, Reid had no experience working in the field. The others figured that was why the poor kid pushed himself so hard: to prove himself. 

Right after the first case, Elle stopped talking down to him. Half way through the same case, Morgan decided he’d taken the doctor under his wing. JJ was the first of Hotch’s subordinates to warm up to Reid. Their friendship was an awkward one for a couple of days. To an outsider, it looked as though a childhood friend was trying to help the other through a bout of amnesia. 

Though the team never again questioned Reid’s ability on the field, there were times when they were suddenly reminded of Reid’s age. 

1: Trying to Balance on a Curb While Walking

Hotch lost count of how many times Jack would walk on the curb, one foot in the front of the other, both arms outstretched for extra balance. Almost always, one of Jack’s hands would be firmly holding one of his father’s. SSA Hotchner almost laughed at himself when he nearly held Reid’s hand on instinct. 

Reid and Hotch were walking alone to get lunch for the unit while between cases back home. They’d been walking side-by-side while Reid babbled happily about the last book he finished. Hotch contently listened, his mind occasionally wondering. 

Hotch’s mind was pulled back to reality from one of its wonderings when his hand had brushed against Reid’s. The doctor’s hand quickly formed into a fist as he concentrated on his balance, his lips pressed tightly together. While Jack had his arms stretched straight out, Reid held his at more of a slant. 

One thing Hotch quickly noticed, and was surprised the scientifically minded doctor missed, was that Reid’s ever present satchel was throwing him off balance. 

“Reid.”

“Hm?”

“Let me hold onto your bag.” Hotch held his hand out to take the leather bag.

“Why?” Reid’s foot touched down on the road as he lost balance now that he was doing more with his brain than focussing on his footing. 

“It's a hypothesis.” Hotch smirked but Reid missed it, not taking his eyes off his sneakers. 

Carefully, as not to fall, Reid removed his satchel and held it out, blindly, for Hotch to take. The older agent held it by the shorted of the two handles as he continued to walk alongside Reid. 

Hotch chuckled to himself upon seeing the look on Reid’s face. The young doctor was looking at his feet, almost in awe. He hadn’t needed to touch down since Hotch took the bag half a block back. 

Once he walked two blocks on the curb- without losing balance- Reid was content and took his bag back, putting it back over his shoulder so the pouch of it bounced against the opposite hip.

“Did you know the position of an object’s center of gravity affects its stability? The higher the center of gravity is, the easier it is for the object to fall. That’s why a small boat- like a kayak or canoe- is less likely to tip if the occupants are seated lower in the boat. 

“Textbooks usually demonstrate this with either a bus and or two cars of different heights and lengths…” 

2: Mismatched Socks

One of the first things Emily Prentiss noticed about Reid were his mismatched socks. Of course, the other BAU members noticed it too, but they never questioned it. It’s just part of who Reid was. Curiosity got the better of SSA Prentiss. 

“Reid?” 

The doctor looked up from his case file. “Yeah?”

“Why do you never wear matched socks?” She looked down at Reid’s ankles and he followed her gaze. One lavender sock, one pink with blue stripes. 

“My uh- When I was a kid, my mom would tell me it was bad luck to wear matching socks.” Reid pulled the lavender sock back up to where it should be. 

“That doesn’t sound like something that could be scientifically verified.” A slight smirk spread across Emily’s face. 

Reid huffed slightly. “The night I was taken by Tobias… It was the first time I wore matching socks in five years. Burgundy with orange stripes.” Reid blinked heavily, clenching his eyes shut. “I don’t wear socks if they match.” He paused again. “Besides, matching socks are boring. Some people say socks should be a shade darker than their pants or a shade lighter than the shoes- Hotch does the former.

“Also, 82% of men in my age bracket wear mismatched socks at least once a week because we keep losing one of a pair. And a family of four- on average- loses 60 socks a year.” 

3: Playing With Jell-O

Reid loved Jell-O. No-one was really sure why, but didn’t ask, either. Everyone had their favorite dessert, so maybe Jell-O was just his? He liked cake, sure, but he didn’t eat it nearly as often as he ate Jell-O. 

On jet rides back home, no-one ever knew what conversations were bound to come up. This week’s was what the team was going to do with a three day weekend and morphed into best desserts. 

“What about you, Reid?” Prentiss drew Reid from his train of thought.

“Hm?”

“You like Jell-O, don’t you, Pretty Boy?” Morgan checked.

“Yeah.”

“Not even Henry likes Jell-O,” JJ smiled at the thought of her young son. 

“It doesn’t have much of a taste,” Rossi added. 

“I think that’s part of why I like it, actually.” Reid fidgeted with the hem of his shirt. 

“Because it tastes like watered down Kool-Aid?” Rossi frowned.

“Yeah. All the other foods are so strong and Jell-O’s not. It’s cool, but not cold, and it’s fun to play with.”

A ghost of a smile danced across Hotch’s face. “Jack likes playing with it. He gets sad when I don’t buy finger Jell-O on accident.” 

“That’s the only kind I buy.” Reid nodded. “The red is my least favorite- It takes like Red 40.” 

“What is your favorite kind, then?” Rossi couldn’t help but ask. 

“Pineapple. Minimal amounts of dyes and you can see through it.”

“No numbers about Jell-O?” Prentiss challenged with a grin.

JJ, Hotch, and Morgan all smiled while Rossi teasily groaned. The groan got a smile from Reid too. 

“Actually, in the US, the Jell-O brand is recognized- by name and product- by 99% of the populous.” Spencer chortled. “That means that if you got a group of 100 people together, only one person would have no idea what Jell-O is.”  

4: Doodles on Everything

Dr. Spencer Reid didn’t always carry his leather satchel with him. Hotch more or less ordered him to get a notebook he could keep in a pocket. The unit chief didn’t care if Reid drew on his arms. The unit chief cared when Reid jotted down notions or points for the running case.

Garcia loved Reid’s little doodles and had a decently sized collection. She referred to him as a “chronic doodler”. The analysis tech found it almost funny that someone as brilliant and talented as Reid had so little artistic skill outside of his geographic profiling maps. 

Reid knew full well that Garcia collected his doodles. After a particularly stressful case- which always resulted in more doodles, Reid would sign and dare the flip book page before tearing it out and leaving it in Garcia’s bunker. 

There were times when Reid would doodle on his arm rather than the flip book simple because it was more convenient. That didn’t mean Garcia didn’t see those ones. No, no, no. These ones, Reid would take pictures of and send to Garcia when a case was getting to her.

Morgan talked to Garcia more than anyone else on a case. Whether or not Penelope voiced her unease, Morgan- ever the profiler- could tell. He’d have Reid a certain look and the younger man would send Garcia texts of his doodles- evenly spaced- throughout the case. If he did the math and found he didn’t have enough, nothing stopped him from drawing a couple more. 

Hotch and Gideon thought of the times their sons would draw a picture or make them a card when they had a bad day at work. Morgan was reminded of the beaded bracelets his sisters used to make him when he was injured in football or his team lost a game. 

The one hitch with their theory? Garcia was the one person who got to keep the drawings. Not even Reid kept them. She knew this fact and gloated about it to the team whenever she got a new one. All of her computer screens in her bunker had a different doodle as the screen saver. 

5: Dependent on the Team

For the most part, the BAU stuck to themselves after hours if they weren’t going out for drinks. Reid was the one exception and the rest of the team found they didn’t mind. 

JJ was the first one he texted. The message was a simple worded question: How can you tell the difference between romantic feelings and transference? The gentle blonde took it upon herself to explain to the doctor that he’d know when he was in love because how being near the person or even just thinking about them made him feel. 

The media liaison assumed she’d never really see the person Reid texted her about that Sunday evening. She was a little less than shocked to see the light in the young doctor’s eyes shift when Morgan wandered into the bullpen Monday morning.  

A month passed before JJ got a message along the lines of the one she was expecting: Reid asking for advice on how to ask someone out. How to better the wording, how to keep from straying off the point. 

The next day, he texted Elle about flowers: I have a date next weekend. Are flowers too forward?

Elle smiled down at her phone, at Reid’s innocence. She told him that flowers were a nice and caring gesture, but that he’d want to be careful with what flowers he got because different flowers sent different messages. 

This was the first of this Reid was hearing. He thanked Elle and thought more. Hotch was married. He must know a decent amount about flowers and such romantic ideas, right? So he texted Hotch: Do you know anything about flower symbolism? Elle says flowers have different messages to them.

Hotch chuckled, getting Haley’s attention.

“What’s so funny?”

“Do you remember Dr. Spencer Reid?” Hotch looked at the blonde. 

“He’s the shy, Autistic boy, right?” Haley glanced up from feeding Jack.

“Yeah. He’s nervous about an upcoming date and texted to see if I know anything about flowers.” Hotch’s thumb was dancing across the flip-phone’s buttons.

“What are you telling him?”

“That roses have the highest chance of getting him in his date’s bed. Pink camellias and carnations are signs of love and longing; ivy means friendship.” Hotch typed this by naming the flowers, placing an equal sign, and the meaning. 

“Do you know who his date is?”

“Not as far as Reid and his date are concerned.”

So yes, he did.

Friday morning- the morning before his date- Reid sat by himself on the jet ride home, trying to read a book he brought. He couldn’t focus on it for the life of him. He’d been staring at the same page for then minutes. He jumped a little when Gideon sat down across from him.

“What has you so nervous?”

“Noth-” Reid stopped short. That wasn’t the right word; the date meant everything to him. “I uh… I have a date tomorrow evening and I’m worried, I guess. I’ve never actually been on a date, but I really like this person.”

“Okay. So what about it has you worked up?” Gideon’s eyes were gentle and fatherly.

Reid thought about how to answer the question. “We’ve been friends for a while and I don’t- I don’t want to mess up so badly that he doesn’t want to be friends-” Reid froze, his eyes wide. “G-Gideon, I-”

“There’s nothing wrong.” The older man squeezed the younger’s shoulder. “If your friend know you as well as you know him, I think it’s safe to say he’s not too worried about the friendship failing. Sometimes, Reid, you have to take a leap of faith.”

+One: “I choose...Aaron Hotchner.”

“Choose, and prove you’ll do God’s will.”

“No.”

Click. “Choose.”

“I won’t do it.”

Click. “Choose.”

“I...I choose...Aaron Hotchner. He’s a classic narcissist. He thinks he’s better than everyone else on the team. Genesis 23:4, “Let him not deceive himself and trust in emptiness, vanity, falseness, and futility, for these shall be his recompense.” 

Bang. Raphael took a bullet from Tobais’ pocket and held it up, showing it to Reid. “For God’s will.”

Morgan’s heart shattered at seeing his boyfriend crouched over the body of his captor and tormentor. The side of Reid’s head was coated in dry blood, he was avoiding putting weight on his sock-less foot.

Reid limped his way over to Hotch and hesitantly put a hand on his superior’s arm as though he wasn’t sure the man was there. The young man quickly and tightly hugged Hotch.

“I knew you’d understand.”

JJ was the next to hug Reid, the doctor losing his balance slightly and the liaison easily caught him. 

“I am so sorry.”

“It wasn’t your fault.”

The second JJ let go of Reid, Morgan stepped forward and pulled Reid into as tight of a hug as he dared. He needed to feel his boyfriend in his arms but he’d seen the same video as everyone else and didn’t want to hurt him more. 

Prentiss was shocked and looked at JJ with wide eyes when Morgan kissed Reid and the doctor eagerly reciprocated. The blonde just smiled.

*****

@stxrryspencer​ @chaoticgremlinwholikescheese​ @the-need-for-reid-speed​ 

[criminalminds4days]

Family Matters | Chapter 5: Emily's Intervention

Hello people of tumblr!!

I hope all of you had an excellent New Year's! I got so trashed that it lasted until yesterday 🤣 I guess that makes sense considering how horrible 2020 was.

Anyway, I hope all of you had a great time and that 2021 becomes a good year for you all. Because I will be spending a lot of time with family until the 11th of this month, I have decided that I will take January to write as many chapters as possible and I will return to posting in February!

Also, I have posted the story on Wattpad, and I will be updating simultaneously.

With all that said, I hope you all enjoy chapter 5 of Family Matters 🎉🎉

Warnings: Swearing, sexual references, violence and murder references, public embarrassment, and very bad jokes!

Word Count: 3.2k

Previous Chapter | Next Chapter

Tag list: @mcntsee @lets-be-gay-for-the-angel @evelyncade @haylaansmi @paulaern @myfandomlife-blog

*************************************************

(This gif is not mine)

Chapter 5: Emily’s Intervention

The importance of the following couple of days is the only reason our story will address them. Understanding the events that occurred is vital for the upcoming chapters that our favorite agents will face.

The following questions needed an answer:

What did Emily and Spencer talk about?

Why was Spencer so upset?

And perhaps, the most important, why was Emily at Spencer's apartment with Hunger Games Pajamas?

Well, let us do a quick rewind before we move on to the consequences of the visit of Tyler Hemingway and the answers to the questions above.

Emily opened the door to his room, a very surprised Derek and Spencer observed her. She didn't say a word until she was right in front of the two men, taking a few seconds to observe their reactions, making sure it was known she didn't come in a friendly mood.

"You, out." She said to the dark-skinned man, with no emotion, and a serious face as she pointed to the door.

"Excuse me? Emily this is my room, I don't know what-"

"I said, get out." Her tone was deadly, "now." She didn't raise her voice, but the message was clear.

"I am leaving, but it is definitely not because I am scared of you, it's simply because I have an appointment with a cup of coffee." He stood and walked towards the door, careful to avoid any close contact with her.

"Yeah, let's go." The brunette said, standing up and walking towards the door, only to be stopped by the woman.

"You, sit."

"I am sitting." He returned to the edge of his bed, "and it is definitely because you terrify me."

"Derek, if I find out you're spying on this conversation..."

"It's not like I want to know." He said quickly looking at the doctor one last time, with pity clear in his eyes and he rushed out the door making sure to close it behind him.

The man left in the room gulped before speaking again. "Am I going to die?"

"Not if you listen to me." She sat at the edge of Morgan's bed and her demeanor changed. She seemed more relaxed and even excited. That shift alone had the man planning for ways to run out the door without falling victim to Emily Prentiss. "Now, Spencie-"

"Please don't call me that."

"Fine, Baby genius." She smiled at him, in a slightly more terrifying manner than her demeanor when she arrived. "We need to talk about the situation that occurred during our drive to the hospital."

"What is there to talk about?"

"Can you explain to me, honey, why you are upset with our friend?"

"Please don't call me honey, it's somehow worse than Spencie."

"Answer. My. Question."

"I already told you guys, I'm upset that she's letting this guy walk all over her."

"See, I can't believe that, because you stated that part of the reason for your anger was that you still came after this Tyler character, so please tell me, what's that about?"

"She left me behind, remember? She didn't pick me up." He said as he played with his hands. Jumping out the window wasn't sounding so bad, even if they were on the third floor. If he calculated correctly, he could probably survive it.

"And that's all?" He nodded, and she sighed, clearly frustrated. "Let me try a different approach."

"I'm scared." He mumbled.

"Spencer Reid," she began, that smile still on her lips. "Is there anything you don't like about her?"

"Yeah, I mean, for once, she sleeps on the right side of the bed, which is my side, so when I had to sleep in the same bed as her I had to sleep on the left side! The left side Emily!"

"Did she ask you for that?"

"No, of course not. I just kind of did it."

"Okay, what else don't you like?"

"That she's so naive, she believes people always have good intentions, and she's always getting hurt because she doesn't understand that not everyone comes from an honest and good place. I mean she's a profiler and yet she falls for the same tricks over and over again. But that also means she's really empathetic, and nice which I guess is not a down falling but a virtue, so I guess I can't really say I don't like that of her."

"Interesting." Emily's smile turned more genuine. "Now, what are some of the things you like about her."

"I mean, she's a great friend, a reliable agent, and she's so funny. She has similar interests to me, and whenever we hang out there is nothing we can't talk about." A smile appeared on his face as the memories of their time together became clear in his mind. "She has this bright energy around her, and it simply pulls you towards her, I also love her clumsiness, it makes her, well her. I love when she laughs, and I love being around her, and there are these times where she'll rest her head on my shoulders or she'll accidentally brush her hand on mine and I get this feeling, that I have never-" He stopped, looking straight at Emily as he reached the same conclusion as her. "Oh."

"Yeah."

"I like her. Like really like her, don't I?"

"Yes, you do." Emily hugged him, "I am so glad you finally came to terms with it." She let go of him and grabbed him by the shoulders. "Now, what are you gonna do about it?"

"Nothing."

"WHAT?"

"I mean, she obviously doesn't feel the same, and even if she did, you know the rules. I wouldn't want to make her transfer, nor do I want to transfer."

"Spencer, you are seriously going to let the love of your life walk away simply because of your job?"

"I never said she was the love of my life." Emily rolled her eyes, "besides, we're really good friends, and I don't want to ruin that."

"Ugh, you are so dumb for a genius." He wanted to object, but she continued. "This is what we are going to do, you can take the rest of the week, to think about her, and if you two are worth the trouble. Once this case is over, I will go to your apartment and we will discuss the next steps over some glasses of wine. Those are more for me than for you because I'm gonna need a lot of patience." He furrowed his eyebrows but she didn't even register it. "Now, because of your little scene from earlier, you have some space, so use this to your advantage. Make me proud son."

"No, no. Please never call me son again. That was very disturbing."

"Well, then do the right thing." She walked out of the room, and he sat there, wishing Emily had never made him realize how he felt.

Now, ignoring her was torture, because all he could think of was her lips on his, or their hands intertwined, her laughing at something he said as they ate dinner, or watching a movie as they cuddled on her sofa. This was bad, it was a bad thing that was happening right now.

She was his friend, and even then, he still thought she had feelings for her ex-boyfriend. It was a disaster.

"So, what's your conclusion?"

That was the first thing Emily said when he opened the door. She was wearing black pajamas with the Mockingjay symbol from The Hunger Games, her hair was in a ponytail and she had a big reusable grocery bag on her shoulder that seemed full of something he couldn't quite make out, at least until he heard the glass clink and reached a pretty solid conclusion of what was in the bag.

"I need new friends."

She seemed unfazed by his comment and simply moved past him towards his living room. "No, no, please come in. I insist." He mumbled as he closed the door. "What are you doing here?"

"I told you, we need to make a game plan, but we need to hurry, we don't have much time before she arrives."

"Did you invite her?"

"No, but she's on her dinner with Tyler, and if he's as horrible as I think he is, she'll be here in about an hour or so, after realizing he just wanted to have sex with her."

She pulled a wine bottle out of her bag and roomed through his drawers to grab a wine glass and opened the bottle. "I would offer you, but I need you sober tonight."

"That just sounds so wrong."

"Don't worry about it, Doctor. Now, have you thought about your options?"

"I already told you Emily, our friendship and our jobs are not worth risking for some feelings that will most likely fade away."

"Why are smart people so dumb?" She asked no one in particular.

"First of all, that's offensive. Second, we don't know if she feels the same way, and third of all, in the extreme and highly unlikely case in which she did, the probability of us working out would be almost null."

"Spencer, I love you. I really do, but you need to learn how to read social cues. I am almost one-hundred percent sure she likes you, you've both liked each other for longer than you think, and I get it, your jobs are important, but when you decide to leave, what's gonna be waiting for you?"

He remained silent for a couple of minutes taking in her words. She stared at him, as she sipped more and more wine.

"I don't do, relationships really well. What if I lose her and then it all becomes worse?"

"What if you lose her because you're scared to 'do' relationships?"

"I hate it when you're right."

"Now, let's see, how should you tell her? We should make it a grand gesture, but we need to keep it between us." She opened the second bottle as she spoke. "Oh, I'm gonna have to be a third wheel for a really long time, but I guess I can deal with that." She kept drinking. "I am totally gonna officiate the wedding. Also, I think you need to do it soon, maybe when she comes to tell you you were right?"

"Emily, let's calm down for a minute."

"Can we watch Dance Moms?"

"No, I don't even know what that is, but it sounds awful."

"It's so good. The kids are so talented." She sighed, as if somehow proud of said kids. "Anyway, going back to your love life." She began once again and he simply tried to not scream.

A drunk Prentiss continued to increase the level of alcohol in her system while simultaneously rambling about the beautiful life they would have together. He hadn't said a word in what seemed to be an hour, but that didn't stop her, she kept speaking of possible destination weddings and how she needed to be the godparent of one of their kids, even if JJ and she had to share because she knew that JJ was Spencer's best friend before any of them had even joined. She also expressed that she had shipped the two of them, but decided against it once JJ had found Will and they had children.

"I told her I was definitely the best friend." She smiled, as the third bottle came empty. Her rambling had returned to Spencer's current crush. "And I am an amazing wing woman. I got Spencer Reid to accept his love."

"I did not say I was in love. I like her, but love is a strong word." He tried to take the bottle from her but she was fast, even under the influence. "You've been talking for almost an hour, and drinking that in record time. I'm a little concerned for you."

"I've just been trying to pass the time."

"Time for what?"

"For the show to begin." She wiggled her eyebrows, as she drank the last bit of wine left. "I'm gonna have to go get more."

"How about we talk about my feelings instead?" That was the last thing he wanted to do, granted it was also the thing she had been doing for the last hour, but if Emily got any more wasted, they were gonna have a problem tomorrow.

She smiled, but before she could try and convince him to propose, there was a knock at the door. "Right on time!" She whispered.

"What?"

"Just go open the door."

He walked towards the door and opened it slightly, only enough to make his figure known. He was so perplexed to see her standing on the other side that he forgot for a moment he was supposedly still upset with her. Though the fact that Prentiss had been right and she was at his door was making the air get caught in his lungs. Nonetheless, he maintained a neutral expression, waiting for her to speak.

"I came to tell you that you were right. He just wanted to get in pants." He stayed silent, simply observing her. She was upset, and he wasn't sure if it was because of the fact that he was right or because of something Tyler had said. "I actually thought he wanted to apologize, and I think part of me just wanted to believe that for the first time I was not being used, that people actually cared about what I felt."

"There are people that care about you, they are just not the wants you wanted to." He tried not to sound defensive but it seemed impossible. He cared about her, Emily cared about her, the whole team and her mom, even her cousin Nicole cared about her. He wanted her to see that, and maybe for it to be enough one day.

"No, they are! I thought I needed the people who wronged me to fix it, to show me that I was worth the trouble when in reality all I needed was for me to understand that I was. And I just needed a reminder that the people that care about me are the ones that should matter the most." A trace of a smile formed on his lips. He was included, at least he hoped he was, because what a wonderful life that would be. "I am so sorry about how I acted, and I am sorry I left you here waiting for me. Spencer Reid, you are my best friend and you come before any other jerk out there. I need you to know that this time in which I didn't have you with me was miserable. I missed you so much I spent the whole dinner with Tyler talking about you."

"You did?" He seemed genuinely surprised. Emily had predicted this too, and the meaning behind it. He wished he could control his emotions and not read too much into it, but the seed had been planted and now all he could think of is how to tell her he liked her. He was ready to say it, but thankfully he waited for her to finish.

"Yeah, I did. I missed you, and I hope we never fight again, I don't know what I would do without your friendship."

"I missed you too." She bit her lip, and he smiled, though he'd be lying if he said that her seeing him only as a friend was didn't hurt. Here he was, wishing to tell her that he wanted to be more than friends and she had inadvertently stopped him in his tracks. Instead of mopping and wishing to vanish, he decided that her friendship was better than anything else, and he couldn't lose that. He would get over here and she wouldn't even have to know about it. "Wanna come in and watch TV?" He asked, already taking his plan into action.

"I would love that." She smiled, Spencer was about to open the door and let her in when Emily spoke once more.

"That's good to hear, I am trying to get Spence here to watch Dance Moms with me but he refuses, maybe if there is two of us, he'll change his mind." She frowned, clearly confused by the presence of another voice, he opened the door to the view of a very drunk Emily in pajamas.  Her frown softened and she smiled again, seemingly relieved to see her. "May I say, you look hot. Blue suits you."

"So I've been told." She gave him a knowing look and he couldn't help the beat his heart skipped. This feeling was going to kill him one of these days.

"Are you sure you can handle being in that close all night though? Maybe Spencer can lend you one of his shirts." She said, winking at them. He tried not to look completely horrified by the implication that comment had due to the fact that the girl next to him had no idea it was there, but with Emily staring at him as she was, it had become a difficult task.

"Has she been drinking?"

"It's her third bottle of wine."

"We need to cut her off."

"Yeah, we do." He smiled at her, "She's right though, if you want to borrow something more comfortable let me know." The image of her in his shirt, and the idea that her smell might stay in it even after she was gone made him want to rush into his room and get it for her.

"Careful Spencer Reid, I might take you up on that." She joked, and he prayed to all the gods he knew about that she would.

"Awwww, YOU TWO ARE ADORABLE!" The woman screamed. "Just get married already!"

The pair laughed and made their way to the sofa, she closed the door behind her and sat down,  him very aware of their closeness. Emily grabbed the control and looked for the show, cheering like a little girl when she found it. Spencer felt her rest her head on his shoulder and his body immediately tensed up at the notion. He didn't really know for how long he had been feeling this way about her, but he wasn't sure he wanted to ever stop or fade away.

"Your birthday is coming up." She whispered.

"Yeah, I'm turning thirty, can you believe that?"

"You're old." He chuckled. "Do you know what you're gonna do?"

"Probably get a haircut."

"Besides that."

"I don't know. We might have a case."

"What do you want?"

"What do you mean?"

"Well, I need to get you something extra special for your birthday number thirty, so what do you want?"

"I don't need gits."

"You are no fun."

He had a pretty good idea of what he wanted, but he wasn't sure she was ready to hear it, or that he would ever get it. That was just life, and he had learned early on that he couldn't be greedy, he had a mom he loved, friends he could rely on, and that should be enough. Relationships were hard, feelings faded and he didn't want to be caught up in a situation where he would lose his favorite person in the world. So as he sat there, her head on his shoulders, a drunk Emily singing the themes song of the show they were watching while also giving the dancers advice, he decided that was the best he could hope for, reaffirming once again that his romantic feelings for the girl sitting next to him needed to disappear.

[everyhowlmarksthedead]

❛ ROJO ❜

Songfic with ‘Rojo’, J Balvin.

Translation of the lyrics.

with Nestor Oceteva.

Request #1: Can you maybe do a Nestor imagine where you're Emily's cousin or half sister and you're living with Emily and Miguel temporarily. You've been flirting and teasing him and it finally comes to a head. Smut involved please?

BY ANON.

Request #2: hi hi! I have a steamy request~! (If it's not a bother, of course) Nestor + reader are at a club and they keep teasing him,, maybe you can include lines like “shit, mami, you made a mess” and “you just want the others to hear me fuck you, huh?” 😗👉🏼👈🏼 thank youuu c:

BY @glitchinqhoul.

Warnings: nsfw, smut.

Word count: about 3.6k

Aurora says: this writing hasn't been edited, you may find some grammar mistakes, I'm sorry about that!

Gif credits: to the author, I found it on google.

Masterlist.

A quién le mientes si en tu soledad quieres verme otra vez. Por ti respondo lo que tú me das, lo que nadie sabe…

Being Emily's half—sister hasn't been easy. She was a good student, the modelic daughter, always being kind, correct and polite. You used to be like the day and the night. But you supposed that this has to be with the fact that your blood isn't the same. She's american, and you're half—mexican. Different cultures, different cities, different people… Different lifes. But that wasn't a problem to adore each other. Emily and you have been best friends since ever, and even if you're the wild side she doesn't have, you admire her temperance.

When your college in Mexico told you that you could do the MIR at Santo Padre, you both were screaming by the phone for two minutes non-stop, until you heard Miguel telling you to stay at his home. That wasn't a bad idea, keeping in mind that you also could see Nestor every day, for the next six month. That man drives you insane since you met him, and he isn't very sane either.

You're checking the hour on the clock of your car, almost reaching the border with California, checking again that your passport and your papers signed for the University are on the copilot seat. So, when you stop at the frontier, you just have to roll down the window and offer them to the agent. Once that you're actually in American territory, you speed up by the empty road a little confused from not seeing any cars. Actually, you're just tired after almost two days driving. Because yes, you could have flown to San Diego, and rented a car. But you like your old Mustang. He has been with you since seven years ago. Coming back to reality, you see through the rearview two big black SUVs coming closer until one of them places itself after you, making you a signal to stop.

Stopping by a side, you step out of your car as Emily does, both running to each other to collide in a happy hug, screaming again and almost jumping.

“Look at you, doctora!” She says laughing and holding your hands, pulling herself away some seconds, before hugging at you again. “C'mon, let Frankie drive your car, so you can rest a little in ours”.

To your surprise, Nestor isn't the one who is driving, supposing that he's in the other black car before yours. But you're sure he's as excited as you are, waiting to have five minutes alone.

Me decido por ti, te decides por mí, a la misma hora. Me dan ganas de ti, te dan ganas de mí, a la misma hora.

Miguel has organized a party with his sober friends. And you're not in the mood to partying, but the tequila helps a little. You're jumping from senators and other politicians, to lawyers and other rich men, just because your brother-in-law is proud of you. And that makes you feel good, but it's kinda boring. So, when you find a space to disappear, you do it at the speed of the light. Finding shelter in the big garage between expensive cars of different sizes and kinds. Resting your back against the classic red Porsche, you light up a smoke among your lips to take a deep drag. You appreciate all the love that Mikey feels for you, and all the help he always gives you, but you're not the kind of girl who has these kinds of parties.

Turning around for an instant, when you hear the door getting opened, to watch Nestor walking towards you. Rolling your eyes, you smirk at him.

“Ay, ya, no me digas que te pusieron en modo perrito guardián, flaco”. (C'mon, don't tell me that Miguel made you be a guard dog). You laugh shaking your head.

“Más o menos”. (More or less). He says taking you off the cig to smoke from it.

“Okay, ládrame, ándale”. (Okay, bark at me, go ahead).

“Soy más de morder”. (I'm more into biting).

“Mírale… Isn't too early to start with that game?”

“Nah”. He replies bowing to the floor to leave the cig, before placing both hands on your ankles, pulling up the long white skirt of your dress too slowly.

Your eyes are fixed on his, getting somewhat darker as his fingertips touch slightly your skin, until he's able to settle between your legs, that you have been opening for him unconsciously. Soon, his lips find your neck, twisting it enough to give him all the space possible. Your hands go to his head, uttering a soft moan when he nails his hands on your ass under the dress. This is your game. You have it since you met, and it's one of your favorite things. A tug of war to see who gives more.

“Fuck, Nestor”. You mutter biting your lower lip, at the same time his teeth catch your skin, putting himself somewhat closer.

Te quiero sentir aquí. Me dan ganas de ti, te dan ganas de mí, a la misma hora.

“Hey, teens in heat, we're going to serve the coctel!” You can hear Emily's laughs from the other side of the door, making you feel your cheeks burning.

“We're going!” You reply a little loud, with Nestor chuckling against your neck.

Pulling him away to put on your dress well, you arrange your mane behind your shoulders before starting to walk back to the house. But when you're about to open the door, he grabs your wrist to make you turn around. Crashing your mouth with his, the man kisses you trying to hide how much he has missed you after five month without seeing each other. Even so, it becomes softer, slow, as if you have all the time you need. His arms surrounding your waist, and yours the back of his head. You're sure that he has never kissed you like that, but it feels too good. Nestor's touch has been ever so warm that could melt the coldest heart, actually, more or less like yours.

Tres y cuatro de la mañana, ven, mata estas ganas. Vamos a llegarle a mi cama, que todo lo he ignorado por ti, todo ha sido por ti. Mi cuerpo sin saber te llama.

You like to eat. You enjoy eating, and that coctel wasn't enough for you. So, waiting by reading some emails until the family is already sleeping, you step out of your new room silent like a cat. Going downstairs, you walk towards the kitchen to assault the freezer.

“Bendito Miguel”.

You whisper finding all the chocolate ice cream he has bought for you. Grabbing one of the tubs and a big spoon, you sit at the island in the center of the kitchen, with the lights off. And you were so concentrated on your task, that you didn't hear Nestor coming. Not even noticing his presence until he nails a second spoon into the tub.

“Shit! Nestor! Fuck… You're gonna fucking kill me one of these days”. You mutter, placing both hands on your chest, with the covered inside your mouth.

The man chuckles almost in silence, having some ice cream.

“Seriously, you need to stop of being this fucking silent”.

“Yeah, I know you like me being loud”.

Raising your eyebrows, you finally shake your head before such an occurrence.

“What about the kiss?”

“What kiss?” He asks a little confused. “Oh! Ya. What happens with that? It was just a kiss?”

“Yes, for sure”.

“I was just happy for you being here. We're friends, it's been five month since we met last time”.

Right in the friend-with-benefits zone, while you were thinking that finally he was catching the same feelings you have for him.

“Cool”.

“Cool?”

“What?”

“It sounded as if I just stabbed you”.

“Why would my friend like to stab me?”

Y estas no son horas de llamar, pero es que el deseo siempre puede más. Podemos pelearnos y hasta alejarnos, pero cuando llega la hora.

You didn't know that Miguel was a friend of the director of the hospital you're going to work at. And he settled a dinner to meet him. Another boring one, and you start to think that your brother-in-law wants to kill you and doesn't know how to do it. You love your work and what you do, but the work stays in the hospital, and you were too distracted about Nestor's words last night. You have been avoiding him the whole day, not even looking at him in the dinner, placed some meters away from the table studying the perimeter. And you know that he's getting more nervous as the hours pass by.

After finishing the meeting, you finally can breathe again inside the big car, checking some messages from your father asking how everything is going. You better don't reply. Keeping it inside your small bag, before leaning towards the front seat with both arms on them.

“Hey, Cartel daddy”.

Your sister breaks into laughs because of the sophisticated name, while Miguel turns at you frowning.

“Listen. Why don't I pull out the stick inside your ass and we go to a real party, ah? There's a new club some minutes ago from Santo Padre, and looks cool”.

“Did you ca—”.

“Hey, Pocahontas, that's the address”. You say to Nestor, offering him your phone to grab it.

Emily is drowning with her own laughs by your side, making you laugh too, when she remembers that you're not allowed to drink red wine because of this. You have the mania of giving funny names to everybody around you.

“What? Cartel daddy and Pocahontas. Sounds like a bad netflix tv-show I would watch”.

Tratan y se caen de la mata, quieren comprarte siempre con plata, pero ese tesoro tiene pirata. Me voy a toda por ti.

While the men prefer a reserved, watching the whole dancefloor from there, and talking about business and appointments, Emily and you enjoy a bunch of mimosas among the crowd jumping and having fun. You really needed it. And you're aware that she already knows that something is happening between the head security and you. Something bad. She doesn't have to be the most intelligent person of the world.

“I would tell him what I feel!” Your sister says, trying to make you hear her above the noise.

“He kicked my ass to the friend zone last night!” The blonde wrinkles her nose confused, seeing you nodding and drinking by your straw.

“Are you kidding me?! He was super excited to see you again! Like super excited!”

“Yeah! He kissed me! But he kissed me like Miguel kisses you! Then he told me it was just a kiss!”

“He's in love with you!”

“No, sista! He's only in love with your husband and with himself!”

“Tell him you don't want to be just his friend!”

“Me?! Oh, no, darling! I'm not gonna humiliate myself like that!”

“C'mon! You fucking pendejos!” She pouts at you.

“You just want Nestor to have a girlfriend, so you can spend more time with your husband! Bitch, I know you better than anyone!”

“I want my little sister to be happy!”

“You want your Cartel daddy!” Breaking into laughs, you place an arm on her shoulders to come back to the reserved.

“What's so funny?” Miguel asks pouring some champagne on two glasses.

“Your wife wants to settle me on a blind date”.

Me decido por ti, te decides por mí, a la misma hora. Me dan ganas de ti, te dan ganas de mí, a la misma hora.

“I'm not going to let you go on a blind date”.

You were refreshing your nape and wrists with water, when you heard him coming closer after locking the bathroom door of the reserved Miguel rented. Looking at him through the mirror, you give him your back to grab some paper and dry your hands. Throwing it into the bin, you turn around to face him.

“Why?”

“It's dangerous”. He just says, tangling his hands on a fist under his abdomen.

“You stabbed me last night, and I survived. I'm pretty sure I will survive to a blind date”. Good point, taking the advantage to pass him away.

But he stops you with an arm surrounding your waist. His chest meeting your back, while his free hand wraps your throat. You're feeling the characteristic heat that Nestor produces in you being so close, running up your legs to your low belly. His thumb caresses your skin, over the jugular vein, leaning towards you to kiss the line of your jaw. Biting your bottom lip, wrapping his wrists letting the free hand goes down by your stomach with a clear destiny.

“We are made for each other”. Nestor mumbles into your ear with a horse tone of voice.

“Yes, to be friends”. You tease him, grabbing his wrist to make him stop, wanting to hear the reality coming from his mouth.

“To be together”. He corrects you then, without a single doubt hitting his vocal chords and turning you under his hands.

Crashing his lips on yours, he makes you walk backwards until your body finds the cold wall. He's as eager as you are, lifting up a leg to surround his waist, while his hand toures your skin until being able to squeeze your ass with a warm growl dying inside his throat.

“I want you in all the ways possible, (Y/N)”. He mutters, trying to hide the anger he feels imagining you with another man. “I want you with me. Only with me”.

Pulling him to the black and golden velvet armchair, you watch him undoing his belt and his pants zipper, noticing the rock under his clothes. Seeing him rolling them down his legs to his ankles, while you take off your dress to leave it over the sink, to sit over his lap with his body between your legs. You haven't taken off the white lace panties, because you know how much he likes the friction of them in every move he does, on a side of his sensible skin. While one of his big hands massage your breast with some strength, the ringed one strokes his needed cock, lying back on the couch.

“Do you wanna fuck me?” You whisper into his mouth, unbuttoning his shirt to stroke his bare chest.

“You don' know how much I need your pussy, cariño”. He just says, looking at you with parted lips grabbing his erection between your fingers.

“I don't think that's enough”. Teasing him, you guide his throbbing and warmth glans to your folds, pressing it against your wet clit and swinging softly your hips.

“I've been waiting five months for you jumping over my cock, mami. You know I am fucking desperate for your soaked pussy suffocating me and pushing me into the limit”. Nestor almost begs, placing his hands on both sides of your waist. “Ride your cock, baby. Look at how hard it's because of you. It fucking painful”.

“And what if I punish you about what you said last night… putting my clothes on again and leaving you there alone, ah?”

“Don't do that shit, (Y/N). I fucking implore you”. He quickly complains pecking your lips with short kisses. “You're already fucking killing me”.

Leading a little back his hardness between your legs, you dig it into you slowly, feeling every inch of his erection pressing your tight walls. He's thicker than you can remember, having passed too much time since the last time, needing some seconds to mold your body to his. A soft moan escapes from your mouths when his glans pushes your g-spot, urging you to spread more your legs forcing you to feel him completely. And you can't describe that sensation.

“Tell me you didn't miss my cock…” He chuckles, erasing that fancy smile from his lips by swinging your hips just one time.

His growl echoes throughout the bathroom, before catching your lips between his to bite them, making you dance on top of him. The pleasure is immeasurable, bouncing over his hard rock once and again. Once and again, arching your back under his arms, while his mouth now devours the skin of your neck, wetting it with his saliva and marking every inch with his teeth. The pace becomes rough and faster, slapping your ass with both hands to squeeze your buttocks so needed that you're desiring to feel his cum filling you up. But you like his cock pounding you.

“I'm going to make the others hear you being fucked by me, mi amor…” He bellows, making you beg when pulling out himself from you to get up.

Guiding you quickly to the sink and giving him your back, placing a hand on your nape, he makes you lean over the sink before putting aside your panties to thrust his soaked cock back to your pussy. The scream you utter when his pelvis hits you so rough, isn't normal. Being sure that your sister and Miguel already heard you. His hands nailed on your hips make each lunge deeper, watching him through the mirror the pleased look on his face, while his gaze is fixed in your. He enjoys seeing you bite your bottom lip and closing your eyes, every time he slaps you with his ringed fingers, knowing that this pleasure it's going to fuck you up tomorrow. But you love the way he has to uninhibit himself, after being the whole day following orders.

“Shit, baby… I want you all my fucking life”. He gasps leaning his head back with closed eyelids, impaling you against the marble counter of the sink.

Maybe you should have taken off the heels to not lose the balance, but you didn't think about it, and now you're fighting against your shaky legs.

“Look how good you take it all… my fucking god, (Y/N). You're fucking drenching me”.

Yes, you can feel it. You can feel your juices and his slipping down your thighs, producing a soaked dirty sound every time his body collides with yours so hard. Urging you to incorporate your chest from the sink with a hand grabbing your throat and the other arm surrounding your waist, Nestor arches your back, placing his face on your shoulder.

“Drown my fucking… dick with your cum, mi amor…” He begs you, biting your love, without removing his darkened orbs from yours, through your reflections.

“Shit, Nestor…” You're not sure when you start to cry because of the pleasure, needing more, needing to reach the orgasm. “Fuck me harder, I fucking beg you… Por favor”.

You can't barely breathe when his finger finds your clit, stroking it with the same pace he's embedding you against the furnishing. Your moans dance all around the bathroom, while he's gasping over your ear how much he wants to fuck you for the rest of his life, everywhere, at anytime you want it. And by crying out his name and clinging to him, a lash of heat evolves you, making your pussy twitch uncontrollably as the tears fall down your cheek. Your palpitating walls clenching his cock, making his vocals get louder as long as he continues diving his warmth hardness into you, closer from his own ecstasy.

You don't need to tell him that you want him to cum inside you, mixing it with yours, because he already has other plans. Pulling himself out and jerking off his dick, he spills his seed over your wet panties, bathing them on it as his throat collapses because of the pleasure. But don't waste time putting them to the side again to pound you again, pressing his body against yours as much as he can, holding your anatomy into his arms.

Te quiero sentir aquí. Me dan ganas de ti, te dan ganas de mí, a la misma hora.

It's four am and you can't sleep thinking about what he said to you. Sighing, you sit up on your bed, curling your knees against your chest and surrounding them with both arms. He already told you that he wants you, but was he talking or his jealousy? You're doubting about going to his house, or texting him, or doing anything. Grabbing your phone from the nightstand and a cig from the packet, you step out of your dorm to walk downstairs towards the terrace. Sitting on one of the sofas outside, you light the smoke to have a drag, unlocking your phone. Your trembling fingers touch the screen over the keyboard; writing and deleting, writing and deleting. But you're unable to send any message. Feeling stupid, you finally write him that you can't sleep, listening the ding of your own notification so close that makes you frown confused.

“Me neither”.

With your lips pursed and a leg curled over the sofa, you turn ashamed towards him. Nestor is wearing a pair of grey sweatpants and a white big shirt. You're sure that you have never seen him before without wearing a suit. And you are falling loudly for him much more than ever. Putting out the cigarette, you stand up on your feet to lead them towards you.

“Stay with me, at least tonight”. You mutter, tangling your fingers with his.

“But move with me tomorrow”. Nestor asks you then, before hugging you as close as he can.

“Deal”. You reply, placing your chin on his chest to look at him, receiving some short kisses all around your face that make you laugh.

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