#plot-based

           Instead of picking on you, he broke into a wide smile and beamed, brushing his hair back behind his ears and looking up to grin. His sweater vest made him look skinny and his lack of a gun made him look unthreatening. He looked more like a student from the college you’d just left than a suited agent prepared to take on killers, so you relaxed slightly. Maybe he wasn’t as rigid in the status quo you assumed existed.

           “I loved this one,” he told you with a big grin, turning it so the cover faced you as he handed it back over. “Let me know when you get to page 286. That one has some important foreshadowing; I hope you notice.” His face flushed, and suddenly he was just as embarrassed as you. “Well, I mean, not that you wouldn’t have on your own; although now that I’ve pointed it out and you know it’s there, it’s not like you’re reading it on your own-“

           “It’s okay,” you interrupted him, smiling nervously. Your heart still beat in your chest. “I’ve read them all at least a dozen times.” Your hands felt clammy and you held your book tightly. The man was cute, and nice, and you already shared an interest.

           You were quiet and soft-spoken. Spencer was… well, not always loud, but he certainly seemed to have trouble shutting up at times! That was okay, though. You were patient, and you liked when someone else would talk with you, even when you weren’t the most engaging partner. Spencer more than made up for your shyness, and you bonded quickly. He was adept at reading when you were having a particular bout of timidity and was always happy to help you out, whether it meant relaying a message to someone from the local department for you or asking what he assumed you were questioning.

           Elle and Derek took the two of you to restaurant to celebrate the successful capture of an unsub who’d been tormenting two twin sisters, going as far as to capture one and attack Derek to get to the other. Derek kept rubbing his chest where he’d been hit with a taser, but he insisted he was okay.

           Your handsome waiter came back over after you’d finished up your entrees. He looked like he could’ve stepped right out of a men’s health magazine. The shirt he wore was tucked into his pants, but pulled so tight to his body that you could see the defined tones of his abdomen. When he came over to ask for dessert, he took the orders from Elle and Derek, and when he looked to your side of the table, he winked.

           “And for you, gorgeous?” He flirted. He wasn’t lewd, but you’d become the center of attention, just like that, even from the people at the table across from you, who started to giggle at your deer-in-headlights expression.

           Spencer had come to your rescue. “She’d like the crème silk pie,” he said politely, setting his hand down near yours on the table. You quickly moved yours to hover over his and looked like you were holding his hand, staring down at the table in front of you and waiting for the waiter to go away. “And a refill of water,” Spencer added for himself as an afterthought.

           A little girl was kidnapped and your leads of finding her looked like they were all going nowhere. You’d broken into the suspect’s house, and couldn’t find her. Where were you supposed to look next? Everyone else had checked out with firm alibis, and the one person who didn’t had been excluded by the profile.

           You went and stood on the porch, wrapped your arms around yourself, and shivered. When you’d been recruited, the pitch had been that you’d work to bring justice for the families of victims, save lives and rescue the next victims – ‘when you stop a killer, you save their next victim.’ It had sounded nice, until now you were facing down a bleak prospect of telling a heartbroken mother and a father slowly falling to cancer that their daughter was nowhere to be found. You couldn’t even imagine how terrified the little soccer player must have been, if she was even still alive.

           “Are you okay?” Spencer’s voice made you look up. He stepped over the threshold and into the open air with you, hands in his pockets. He looked like the shy one for once, worried about approaching.

           You contemplated nodding. You had to be able to do the job. Everyone else seemed like they could handle it, even Hotch, who had his own child and could relate to the family more than you could. Then again, you’d known Spencer for six months and not once had he ever invalidated your feelings or treated you like he expected you to be tough. He had shown you his sensitive side the month before, confiding in you that he’d been having trouble sleeping from nightmares.

           You shook your head and covered your mouth before you could start crying. Spencer frowned, shuffling his feet, unsure what to do.

           “This always happens,” he told you quietly, looking up and scanning down the street of the residential neighborhood. “Something like this, I mean. We always do our best, but sometimes… we just can’t.” His voice broke. “But we won’t give up until we find who took her, even if we have to stay and work on our own time.”

           That was when you heard the most beautiful sound you thought you had ever bore witness to. “I’ve got her!” Gideon shouted from inside the house. “Hotch, she’s alive!”

           “A group of employees in a hospital in Las Vegas were actually fired because they had a betting pool on when certain patients with terminal illnesses would die,” Spencer told Elle, who listened intently, nodding her head. You suspected she was thinking about something else and just indulging him. “That was in 1981, but since then-“

           “1980,” you corrected quietly, and then froze.

           Elle, Spencer, and Hotch all turned to look at you.

           For a second, you couldn’t breathe. “I – I’m sorry,” you stammered, trying to look at Spencer’s eyes but unable to make contact. You flushed and looked down, feeling your stomach twist. “I shouldn’t’ve interrupted…”

           “It’s okay,” Spencer promised. You chanced a peek back up. He was beaming at you proudly. “You’re absolutely right, Y/N. I was distracted.”

           “By what?” Elle snorted, not believing that the boy genius was distracted by anything when it came to his trivia.

           “It’s possible,” he said defensively, sending her a betrayed look. “And I’m not the only traditionally-labeled genius on the team anymore.” The smile he sent you was encouraging and warm, and you looked down with a slight smile.

           You realized you liked Spencer when you saw the magazine cover that was printed the morning after you closed a case in Hollywood. It was of Spencer swimming in a pool with Lila Archer, a gorgeous, up-and-coming TV actress. He was holding his head up away from hers, while she tugged on his tie.

           It was a slow realization that took you a while to come to. After all, Spencer was just your friend, right? Sure, you liked spending time with him, and he helped you out when you were uncomfortable in social situations, and he comforted you when you were upset, but those were all things your best friend had done in college. Except – you’d never wanted to hug your best friend as frequently as you wanted to hug Spencer. You’d never wanted to kiss them before. It was just the scarily clever doctor whom made you want that romantic companionship. You’d fallen, and it was possibly you’d been falling since you bumped into him and fell into the wall.

           You showed him the magazine before you got on the jet to go back to Quantico, smirking shyly behind the safety of the paper. “You made a friend,” you said, disguising your subtle question behind an observation.

           For once, you weren’t the one turning scarlet. Spencer took the magazine from you with wide eyes and stared at the cover, cheeks going all rosy. “She wanted to kiss me,” he explained, justifying why he was in her backyard pool with all of his clothes on, gun holster included. “She dragged me into the pool and-“

           “Why didn’t you kiss her?” You couldn’t help your curiosity, although you thought you might have blown your secret.

           Spencer paused, tilted his head, and frowned thoughtfully down at the high-definition photograph. “I guess I had someone else on my mind,” he admitted to you, his voice small and quiet. You bit your lip and nodded, taking the diversion of Derek calling for you to hurry up.

           So Spencer liked someone. That was… it was fine. He was a coworker, and it was a crush. You would get over it.

           Except you didn’t get over it, and a few months later, after Rebecca Bryant had been rescued from her insane and apparently suicidal father, you stayed late to finish up your statements on the case so you could sleep in the next morning. You were getting ready to leave when you noticed the light in the kitchenette turning on. Investigative, you crept over to see who was in at the late hour.

           “Spence,” you said quietly. He jumped skittishly and “accidentally” dumped some more sugar into his coffee. “What are you doing here? You should be with your mom.”

           His mother had come to the FBI to help, and that was how you’d met her, offering to help the woman who looked lost without realizing that she was your best friend’s mother. Spencer had taken you aside and carefully explained to you with a frightened expression that his mom was schizophrenic. You’d smiled sadly at him and said that you were there for him if he ever needed help, or even just to talk, and then had kindly excused yourself to let him talk to his parent.

           Spencer turned around to lean back against the counter, leaving his coffee mug on the table. “She’s at the hotel,” he said, matching your low volume. You felt a little bit of a thrill, like you were being secretive by being so quiet. “I wanted… I wanted to see if you were still in.”

           Sympathetically, you smiled at him and held your hands behind your back unobtrusively. “I’m here. What do you need?”

           Spencer held his arms out, sucking on his lower lip. He was nervous and tentative. He wasn’t a very touchy person, so you knew it was special… you reached out for his waist, putting your hands on his sides, and slid your hands around to your back as he leaned over, tugging you to his slim form and holding you carefully, like you would change your mind and scamper away if he was too firm.

           “This always happens,” you told him softly, standing on your toes to rest your chin gingerly on his shoulder. His hair tickled your nose. You breathed in his shampoo and soap and shut your eyes, feeling him shaking slightly in your arms. “Something like this, I mean. We always do our best, but sometimes… we just can’t.”

           Spencer stilled as he recognized the words you were reciting to him.

           “But we won’t give up until we find who took her, even if we have to stay and work on our own time. … This time we don’t have to. We already found her. Her father chose to end his own life, but we saved her. This was a victory, Spence.”

           He sniffled. “I told you that.”

           “Yeah.”

           “You know… the reason I didn’t want to kiss Lila…”

           “The girl you have a thing for?” You asked, disappointed that the conversation was going back to the mystery girl you were definitely jealous of. Still, you couldn’t be too upset. He’d come back to you while he was upset, instead of going to her. That had to mean something.

           Spencer nodded against you while you embraced, his cheek rubbing against yours. “I want to tell her how I feel,” he whispered nervously, his long fingers dancing nervously as he loosely held onto the back of your shirt.

           “So tell her,” you gently urged, putting him before yourself. You were a genius, sure. According to every IQ measurement test you’d ever taken, at least. The one thing you weren’t able to do, though… the one problem you weren’t able to solve… was to tell him how you felt.

           Spencer pulled back from you. You sank back onto your feet and looked up at him tiredly. There were dark shadows under his eyes, just like there were under yours. He held your waist in his hands, reluctant to let go, and leaned down. You held your breath, internally panicking, as he closed the distance and touched his forehead to yours, the warm heat of his breath rushing gently over your face.

           “I am,” he answered, just as carefully.

           For once in your life, you did the bold thing and confronted your shyness head-on, reaching up to the back of his neck and pulling him down to kiss his lips, feeling the last year of friendship finally come to full fruition.

~~~

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