salem

And so the gladness that replaced the sickening feeling of having to track down a rapist who was taunting his victims through voicemails once Hotch had called it a night was rather short-lived, only lasting until he informed you all that, actually, two members of the team would have to share a room due to a shortage of single ones available.

You weren’t exactly surprised that you’d ended up drawing the short straw, but you were a lot more than just that because you’d ended up having to share a room with Spencer of all people. On one hand, you were pleased about it. You certainly couldn’t handle having to sleep in the same room with either one of your bosses. Similarly, having to share with Morgan would’ve been equally awkward. And well, sharing with either Greenaway or JJ would’ve been better, for sure, but neither of them had warmed up to you enough to make it exactly welcome.

At the same time, you were goddamn terrified. Terrified in a way that you hadn’t been in a long time, nervousness overflowing through every part of you at the thought you’d have to be around someone who utterly fascinates you in such an intimate setting. You don’t know what it is about him that turns you into a version of yourself you barely recognise anymore, only that his existence seems to pull you in strangely. His demeanour is far from intimidating, he’d not once treated you with anything but restrained yet evident sincerity, and he is really the person you’ve felt most comfortable around so far during your short time being part of the team. Still, you cannot shake off that funny feeling as you now face the door to your shared room.

“Here we go, 320. Do you have the—”

“I’m sorry—”

You barely make out his words as you both speak at the same time. When you realise that he was apologising, you blink at him. Twice.

“What?” You ask, totally confused as to what he means. “What are you sorry for, Spencer?”

He’s not looking at you when he starts to explain, words jumbled as he rambles, “I just—I didn’t think there wouldn’t be enough single rooms available. I’m sorry you have to share with me, I know this must be awkward—”

You can’t fully bite back the smile that appears on your lips even if you tried. He’s too cute, too sweet for his own good, and he has no idea about it.

“I don’t have a problem sharing a room with you, Spencer.” It takes a beat for him to meet your gaze, but when he does, you don’t look away. You want him to know you mean it. Honestly. “Not unless you do, that is.”

“What? No! No, I don’t. I don’t have a—I have no problem with it.” 

You can tell he means it by the way his voice raises an octave defensively, as well as the fact that he cannot maintain eye contact with you the whole time that he struggles to form a full sentence.

Still, your quirk an eyebrow at him.

“Are you sure? I can still ask Greenaway or JJ if they could swap with me—”

“Wha—No! No, don’t—” He shakes his head in quick denial almost manically. “I mean, there’s no reason to do that. None at all. Really. I mean it. I do.”

You’re not sure why he seems so reluctant to the idea, if it’s truly because he doesn’t mind sharing a room with you, or because he’d rather not share with either of your female teammates. You’ve heard in passing about Greenaway’s struggles after The Fisher King case, two months before you joined the BAU. It was clear those struggles were still haunting her, especially during a case like the one you’re currently working on. From how much you’ve known Spencer, it wouldn’t strike you as impossible that this is him being considerate of his colleague’s space. Or perhaps it has to do with the crush he apparently once harboured for JJ, something you’d also been told about once, fleetingly, one of the times you’d grabbed lunch with Penelope. You wouldn’t be surprised if sharing a room with you seemed like a more tolerable option than sharing with someone he’d liked as more than a friend once. Or worse, someone he likes still.

You try to ignore the weird feeling the thought causes in the pit of your stomach, both because you hate nothing more than unforeseen inconveniences, and even more so because you have no name for it. Not one that could possibly make any sense or you could find any justification for.

By the time Spencer’s eyes meet yours again, the silence in the dimly-lit hotel hallway has almost taken a life of its own, becoming something like a ghostly third presence that only serves to remind you any tension needs to be suffocated before it has the power to suffocate you. 

“Okay. It’s settled then. We’re roommates for the night.”

He hums affirmatively under his breath, still hovering apprehensively opposite you, eyes wide behind his glasses and fingers clutching the straps of his valises much too tightly.

“Spencer?” 

Finally, his focus seems to return to you. The tiny smile that appears against your lips is entirely involuntary.

“The key?”

“The—Oh. Oh, right, the key. I’ve got it, let me just…” He fumbles through his satchel blindly at first, muttering unintelligibly that he knew it has to be somewhere here, before he realises he’s been holding it in his occupied hand the whole time, “Oh. Uhm, yeah, here.” You move permissively from in front of the hotel room’s door, your smile only widening as he struggles to balance his bangs and unlock it for a few moments. When he does, he turns to you, and you hope he can’t tell you’re holding your breath at the momentary closeness. “After you…”

You all but rush inside past him, thanking him quietly as he does the same, turning the lights on behind you. The room will do well enough, you think. The bathroom door’s to your left, followed by a closet that you’re positive can house both your things and his if it has to for as long as you have to stay here. Then, a desk with extra drawer-space, with a mirror hanging above it, as well as a kitchenette to its right. All in all, you’re more hopeful that it’ll be a convenient and comfortable experience for you two now than you were before you saw it.

Turning around once you’ve dropped your bags on the right side of the bed carelessly enough, you notice Spencer looking right past you, shocked and paler than you’ve ever seen him look before.

“What’s wrong?”

“The bed—It’s not—”

You barely make out what he tries to say, yet still you follow his gaze. It takes you a moment before it clicks.

Oh.

What you’re met with is two beds pushed together into a large queen-sized one that’d be perfect for a couple and is the epitome of inconvenience for two co-workers that are effectively forcibly paired together because of unavailability of space. You’ve never felt more mocked at by the universe than you do at that moment. 

Spencer watches you try to push the beds apart to no avail before he suggests, utterly horrified, “It’s alright, I can sleep on the floor—”

“You’re not sleeping on the floor, Spencer.” You scoff, already having come to terms with your circumstances. 

“But—But there’s only one bed!” He squeaks out in reply, dumbfounded at your suggestion.

“Technically, no, there isn’t.” You shrug, turning to face him once you’ve unzipped your bag and grabbed your pyjamas from it. “There’s plenty of space for the both of us, Spencer. We’re both exhausted after a terribly long day, and who knows if tomorrow will be an equally exhausting one. It’s more than reasonable for both of us to share it. I wouldn’t feel okay if I let you sleep on the floor.”

He practically gawks at you, wheels turning inside his brain, you’re sure, searching for reasons to convince you that this is a terrible idea. 

But it’s late, and he does recognise you’re both clearly exhausted, and you’re decidedly not going to let him sacrifice his comfort that way. 

“Come on, Spencer. There’s no reason to make this into a bigger deal than it has to be. Now, do you have a preference?” He seems even more lost at your question then, looking at you from behind his glasses with a softness that makes you dizzy. Goodness, he’s making this harder than you’d like him to, and he has no idea. You gesture to your left, then to your right, as you begin unholstering your weapon. “Do you want the bed closer to the door or the window?”

He thinks about it, if only for a moment, before he slowly shakes his head in denial. “Uhm, no… No, I don’t. Whichever one is fine.”

Finally then, you both begin to move around the room in silent agreement. Taking your jacket off, you walk around to the night table on your side where you leave your phone out to be charged overnight, as Spencer starts looking through his own things. 

You have to call out his name twice before he notices you’re talking to him, your pyjamas tucked under your right arm and your own bags left neatly at a chair you’ve left by the wall closest to your bed.

“I just asked if it’s okay with you if I can use the bathroom first?”

“Oh, yes! Yes, of course. Go ahead.”

You thank him quietly once more, striding to the en-suite and closing the door shut behind you.

And although you start undressing yourself and preparing the shower (which you have to turn on thrice before the water even begins to warm up to a decent temperature), the fact that Spencer’s just on the other side of the door, that you’re going to spend the night not just with him in the same room, but in such close proximity, fully dawns on you and makes it harder to breathe. Under the shower’s egregious pressure, your eyes fall shut, and you grasp at the nearest wall, not trusting yourself to stand in confidence even for the short duration of your shower. 

You want to tell yourself you have no idea why you’re being like this, why your skin feels cold even as you’re engulfed in sufficient warmth, but the truth is you’ve never been a good liar. And maybe that’s the problem, the fact that you, stubbornly as ever, are punished by your knowing. There’s not much to convince yourself about, you’d like to think so, but the very fact that Spencer exists makes it so hard to believe that. 

Spencer, the first person you bumped into on your very first day on this job, when you succeeded in landing your spot at the BAU, and who’d offered you his book to pass the time as you waited for Hotch to arrive. You still remember the one, his critical edition of the 19th-century Russian literary canon. In the original language. You remember the immediate awe you felt for him better than your polite decline, as underwhelming as it must’ve been, once you noticed you were not fit to read it. You remember much more than that, actually. The sparkle in his eyes when you asked him whether he preferred Tolstoy or Dostoevsky. His enthusiasm when, as he helped you set your desk up over the next few days, he noticed you’d brought a few books and journals for it, and how it only intensified when he realised you would share a desk-space with each other. How he always felt comfortable to share a highlight of his day over your first shared coffee every morning because you always seemed to want to pay attention. Spencer, who you were in no way prepared to meet when you came to this job, and who slowly but surely made it higher up the list of pros of it, the one you’d made to remind you what you’ve achieved and how far you’ve come at your worst when you needed it. 

And sure, half a year might be more than long enough for some people to put a word to whatever funny feeling upsets their balance and their sanity, but you’re not most people. You’ve never been most people. And this is the first time in your life you’ve been continuously pondering over whether that was a blessing or a curse.

Even now, as you dress up in your oversized academy crewneck and a pair of flimsy, darkened-by-time plaid pyjamas, once you’ve finished brushing your teeth and your hair and made sure that the bathroom is not a spitting image of the mess that exists inside your head, even now, you still ponder if that funny feeling is a darkness capable to destroy you like nothing else ever has or a light you never dared dream of because of circumstances and convictions and the terror that is your knowing.

The pondering doesn’t stop once you’re metres away from Spencer again, padding towards the bed he’s sitting on the edge of, books and manila folders open to his right and his bundle of nightly attire to his left. 

You’re not sure he’s actually reading the book he has open on his lap, and if he is, he’s doing so at the slowest speed you’ve ever seen him do the entire time you’ve known him. Even so, he doesn’t seem to notice your return. Not immediately.

Not until you clear your throat and quietly exclaim, “All yours now.”

And because you’re certain you deserve the very fact that the universe is pulling your leg in the cruelest of ways, Spencer looks up, practically gaping at you, as your words register in the air.

Godfuckingdamnit.

“I meant—You can, uh, you can use the bathroom now if you wish to, Spencer.”

“Oh. Oh, uhm, thanks. Thank you.”

The sight of him scrambling to get up, book tossed haphazardly open alongside the others as he glances at his stuff, only serves as a reminder of what you’re already thinking. That this isn’t something you’re good at, that this isn’t something you’d know how to deal with and that you know that.

What you don’t know is how, in seeing him struggle to undo the knot of his tie with his free hand, you find yourself speaking again, sending that ghostly third presence to hell once more when it threatens to suffocate you.

“Do you need any help with that?” 

He stares at you as if he can neither believe your question nor understand what you mean by it. Before you or he can overthink it any further, you approach him. Slowly yet steadily. 

“Here, let me…” 

And his breath catches, too, now, because you’re so close that he can see the droplets of water falling down your temple, so close that he can smell the vanilla in your shampoo and the detergent, something much more flowery he knows he could distinguish if your closeness did not turn his thoughts into mush, your shirt was washed with.

He finally nods, because he wants to and because he feels sorry that you’re still lingering cautiously out of kindness and consideration, and realises at the same time as you do that he’s never been this close to you before. His hands hover uselessly by his sides, palms sweating an embarrassing amount, when your nails just barely graze his lapel. 

He tilts his head back, calculating the approximate amount of atoms existing in this 347 square-feet hotel room you’re in. Roughly an octillion, he guesses to himself, thirteen seconds later than it usually takes him to, at the same time as you lightly tug at his tie and announce his tie should be loose enough now.

There’s a beat after he asses your statement, after he mutters the smallest of thank you’s and you an even tinier of course, when he looks at you and swallows hard, and you notice the gold on the inside of his eyes. When you think you’re ready to put a word to that funny feeling that only gets funnier the more you realise he’s him and you are you. 

It’s only a beat, and unsurprisingly, it’s not enough. 

Soon enough, he’s in the bathroom and you’re readying yourself for bed.

That’s until you notice he’s forgotten to pick up his nightwear.

Godfuckingdamnit.

Minutes pass when Spencer doesn’t resurface, when you hear the water turning on and off repeatedly, when you wonder if the universe has completely forsaken the existence of boundaries for tonight and for you two. 

For the third time, you refuse to let yourself be suffocated by some ghostly presence in this hotel room in Ohio, and so you walk to the en-suite and knock on the door before you can regret it.

“Spencer? You forgot to grab—“

“Yeah. Yeah, I know…” He replies quickly, “I know but I can’t—”

“Stay there.” You can hear his bewildered protests from behind the door as you rush to gather his things and grab a free chair, placing them neatly on it, before you knock to alert him. “I’ve left them on a chair in front of the door for you. I’m going to make myself some tea so you can grab them. Is that alright?” 

You’ve already made your way to the kitchenette, having your back completely turned towards where the bathroom is, when you hear the door open and close approximately two seconds later. 

The door opens once more when minutes have passed, only now you’re sitting cross legged on top of the covers, a book and a notebook perched over your lap, and Spencer’s fully clothed and ready for bed himself when his voice sounds, gentle and non-imposing, as he calls out your name. “Do you mind if we keep the door half-closed with the bathroom light turned on for tonight?”

“Of course.” You nod, barely looking at him from behind your mug in case you’re not meant to and for fear of screwing things up exponentially, “That’s alright with me.”

You return to your notes as he makes his way to his bed, putting away his used clothes, scattered books, and case folders, before he walks to the kitchenette himself and pours a glass of water to drink.

“Is that your favourite?”

You look up at him over your last-written sentence, brows furrowed in confusion. “Mhm?”

“The song,” He motions towards your phone on the nightstand next to you, “You listen to it a lot.”

“Oh—Oh, fuck. Yeah, sorry. I’ll turn it off…” You reach for your phone and turn the music off quickly. 

“You don’t have to. That’s not why I mentioned it.” He places his water on the nightstand next to his bed and takes his glasses off to wipe their edges clean from the bathroom steam and any traces of his fingertips having stained them before he washed them. “I don’t mind if you want to listen to it.”

“Oh no, that’s not necessary. I tend to listen to music when I write is all,” You explain, clicking your pen and notebook shut. 

A strange tightness constricts between your ribcage at the sight of him in a strangely-patterned buttoned-up pyjama shirt, pants equally dark as yours, as well as his signature pair of mismatched socks you’re sure he has some kind of system for, a version of him so much simpler than the one you’re normally used to. Not even the harsh big light of the room can ruin the softness of him or taint him by its unfamiliarity. He is too honest for that. For the whole world, it seems to you, the more you study him going about his routine until he climbs onto his bed and you return to hiding behind your mug.

“So… Is it?”

You turn to look at him again, still confused. 

“The song,” He says, a hint of a shy half-smile playing at his lips.

“Oh. Uhm, yeah…” You glance at your phone, fingertips tapping at the porcelain of your mug, “I think it is. Or at least one of them.” The small, acknowledging hum that he offers in response has your cheeks tingling with heat. “Do I really listen to it a lot?”

Spencer presses his lips together, his skimming through the pages slowing down uncharacteristically. 

Your face warms up further. “How many times?”

He peeks at you out of the corner of his eye. You can tell that he’s trying to asses whether the way his mind works has creeped you out, too, the way it has done all the other people he knows. Your tone, however, does not seem to carry any hints of sarcasm or hostility. On the contrary, you’re looking at him as if you’re genuinely interested in his answer, whatever it might be.

A silent beat passes before he gives in and offers you it.

“This week? Seven.” He scrunches his nose up, finally turning a page in his book. “If you’re asking since I met you, it has been seventy-three. Well, seventy-four counting tonight.”

A self-effacing laugh slips past your lips, “Okay, yeah, that is a lot.” 

“It’s a good one.”

You can tell he’s holding back on more than just that and you’re, frankly, rather interested in hearing his opinion. You always are.

“However, the lyrics are quite sad,” He starts, feeling the weight of your curious gaze where you settle against your pillows. “I mean, they are beautiful, but sad.“

It’s the way that he says it, the way that it sounds as if he’s talking about more than just a song, that causes something to flutter, to stir inside of you. The room feels too bright, suddenly. In a mystifying sense that has nothing to do with what cascades of light paint either of your edges from the tiny reading night-lamps above your heads. You feel as if he’s trying to read you the way he’s trying to read the pages of the book in his hands, an undecipherable-to-you French tome; one that carries signs of fervent wear, one which cannot hide how many times it’s been chosen behind the fancy leather it’s bound in. And yes, it’s nothing new that Spencer pays attention. To anything and everything. Everyone knows that. Hell, it was one of the things that Hotch had told you differentiated him the most from every other person on the team, that first day he’d briefed you in on them. 

But right there, right then, he’s paying attention to you. To your choices and your habits. You’re not used to that, you’re not used to the earnestness he’s made out of. It threatens to suffocate you worse than any tension-filled silence has done so up until this point tonight.

It’s why you stand, why you strive to occupy yourself with sorting your belongings out and putting them back in your go-bag in an attempt to control your environment, the fragments of yourself you’ve left unguarded.

Spencer is already cursing himself for being too much, for analysing what you’ve allowed him to know instinctively for reasons that have nothing to do with your line of work. It’s true that at times it’s hard for him turn his profiler brain off, like everyone else on the team does, but it’s not that fact that has him craving this proximity with you. No, it’s something different. Something eager to bloom, something unwarrantedly new. Something he both wants to accept and run away from.

And it’s why he keeps talking, why he follows you with his eyes as you zip up your bag and tug your shirt’s sleeves down and cling to your book with your finger tucked inside a specific page, too. 

“You know,” He begins again, evidently self-conscious. “Statistically speaking, the vast majority of people who listen to music to focus choose classical instrumentals instead of songs with lyrics that can be distracting. Alternatively, even ambient naturescape sounds do the trick, too.” 

If he’s right in reading you now, you’re actually still listening to him, and he hasn’t screwed this (what he doesn’t have a name for, either) up.

“But I do think that… uhm, that it makes sense you’re not part of that majority, though.”

Or maybe he has just done so.

Your head tilts, glints of repressed fascination painting your gaze. “I think it makes sense that you listen to Mozart whenever you take a break, too.”

Spencer shouldn’t be so taken aback that you’ve managed to fluster him, that you’ve turned the tables on him like this, but goodness, he is. He is because your observation drips of something he can’t quite pinpoint but that he can recognise lacks irony or malice. You’re not judging him, you’re not making him regret the fact he’s being seen the way almost everyone else has done since he was a child. It shocks him. It exhilarates him. It makes him feel like, maybe, right then and there, in your presence, he’s not too much for what he chooses and what he likes. 

“Well, that’s not—” He really, really, really hopes his face doesn’t betray him as offensively as his lack of wit does. If it does, you’re at least kind enough to ignore it although your eyes are on him. That’s a welcome reprieve for his sanity. “I guess I do find Mozart to be fitting for many occasions. Especially for when I need to…” Forget. Ignore my mind’s more of a prison than a haven. Don’t have to pretend I’m someone I’m not— “…decompress.”

“You’re right to.” You offer after you finally decide to get under the covers, your book now open and partially obstructing him from your view. “Although personally I’ve always preferred Bach, if I’m honest with you.”

You can’t see it but Spencer’s half-smile takes on a prideful quality. One that says, that doesn’t surprise me. It’s borderline sinful how good being right about you makes him feel. 

In this stretch of unfamiliar silence littered with countless of questions and answers you’re both holding back from, while you struggle to make yourself as invisible as you can in shapeless clothes and carefully-curated nooks of sheets, Spencer realises that hiding yourself comes to you naturally, however much you may try to fight it. You’re not a mystery. You’re not even a paradox. You’re a conjecture or what proof of it remains once the instinct of self-preservation kicks in. If there’s a solution to you, if there ever needs to be one, Spencer’s certain that no one’s ever tried to understand you to get close enough to it. 

It’s not a conquest he’s willing to set himself out on, he doesn’t see getting to know you better as a prize to be won. He’s not like that. This job has only proven it to him further. Instead, the fascination that he’s drawn towards you out of lies in another truth; the fact you’re real. Tangible. Not asking, not seeking. You’re unapologetically honest, even in the way you guard yourself. 

He admires that, admires you the more that he gets to pay attention to you. The more that you frown over sentences you deem subconsciously important enough to revisit. The more that your first instinct is to gravitate towards who the gun is aimed at than the one who is aiming it. The more that you choose the long way to and from somewhere than the surest well-known shortcut. The more that you crave the words than the setting defining a moment. The more that you only call him by his first name and the rest of the team by their last ones. It’s inconvenient and perhaps uncalled for but he doesn’t want to ignore it. His mind has been made up, he thinks, ever since the day he met you, and even more each day that passes.

He wants to understand you, so, is it really any surprise he cannot take being suffocated by that ghostly third presence in the room with you tonight, either?

“I guess that affinity for tragedy translates in your reading choices as well.”

Unexpectedly, you laugh. It’s bright, sudden. Not soft, not this time. Most importantly, it’s once again honest. As if you’ve been expecting this, put the puzzle pieces in all the right places.

“Ah, of course, I’ve given that away, too.” You half-joke, peering up at him from behind the pages. “You can’t have seen this one too many times at work, though.”

“Are you asking me for a number? Because I’m not sure you’d like the answer.” 

He teases back and the air shifts — you’ve led and he’s followed. 

Damn you, Doctor Reid.

“However, it’s not the number of times that has stuck out to me,” He explains, unyielding. “It’s the fact you usually seem to open it at a specific page. The part where he has her grave dug up, if I am not mistaken.” He knows he isn’t. “Of course it’s not the only tragic moment in the book but it’s… more haunting than others.”

“It’s not the fact I reach for that page but the meaning behind it,” You finish his thoughts for him. You close the book, tracing the cover of it almost chastely. “So much for the moratorium on intrateam profiling…” You surrender before he calls for it. You don’t see how you can outrun it, although passivity has never been your forte. Spencer doesn’t deserve the threatened outburst you’d offer anyone else if they’d probed you this way. About this of all things. “You’re right, it’s a special one. It reminds me of my father.”

Spencer’s features drop. For someone who’s constantly being told he’s not good at reading social cues, it’s clear he understands he’s got too close. “Your father—He—”

“He’s passed away. It’s been a few years.”

Good job, Spencer. You’ve definitely screwed this up. Forever, probably, the ghost in the room chirps from somewhere behind his shoulder, thriving.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to—”

“You couldn’t have known, Spencer. It’s fine.” Surprisingly enough, it is. You don’t threaten to break the way you have before. It doesn’t change when you look at him, hoping he doesn’t beat himself up over it. That’d actually make you feel worse than him opening up a door he didn’t know what was behind unintentionally.

“Point is, you’re right. It’s a special one. Not just the specific scene but the book as a whole. When I was a child, we used to spend every weekend buying books and reading them together. This was the first heavier read when I’d grown old enough and the one I turned to after I lost him. The graveyard scene hadn’t stuck out to me before but ever since I saw…” There’s that crack threatening your balance, the one that tells you to stop talking before it’s too late. And while Spencer might not deserve to be punished the way others have, you’re at the mercy of self-preservation. And you stop. “Anyway, I guess I recognise the need to cling to what’s lost. To try to compensate with the past.”

Spencer doesn’t think to do anything other than listen. He’s always been a good listener. Or so he wants to think. The team might agree. His mum would definitely agree. He listens because listening is the way to understanding. And if he understands, then maybe he can do something with the knowledge. Care for it, fight against it, offer it the space to exist in peace, love it.

He knows grief, can recognise it in practically every aspect of it. He’s grieved the healthy version of his mum that he never got to meet. He’s grieved his father’s absence and the fact he never was enough for him to stay, to love. He’s grieved the life he saw other people his age living, knowing he’ll never get to have it. In this job, he’s grieved what people could have been had they got the help they needed, and he’s grieved the loss of life to happenstance. 

Now, in this two-made-into-one bed in a dusty hotel room in Ohio, he’s grieving for the loss you’ve suffered and what it’s made of you. It doesn’t matter that he never knew that young girl who spent her weekends reading books with her father. He knows you now and that’s enough.

“He sounds like a wonderful man. I’m sure he’d be proud of you.” 

Your reaction comes in a sharp inhale that, under these circumstances, this proximity, is impossible to miss.

When your eyes meet, you wonder just why it is that in opening up the way that you have to him, more than you’ve done so in a long time, you don’t pity yourself. Why this vulnerability is vastly different than the one you’ve been used to. Why it doesn’t feel like a knife lodged inside your chest but sunlight seeping through the crack between your ribcage and filling it up. Overwhelming, yes, but warm. Comforting, not threatening. Perhaps it’s because of Spencer’s kindness. Or perhaps it’s because, for once, you didn’t do it as a transaction. You did it because you felt like it and because Spencer welcomed it.

At the same time, he ponders over so many other things he wants to say. That he can only imagine how hard it must be to live with a loss like that, to carry it with you. That it’d be okay if you told him more and if you didn’t. That you’re strong even if you don’t feel like it, even if you don’t want to be, not all the time. That you took something awful and turned it into something beautiful; your time at the BAU has proven that already.

But he doesn’t.

Instead, he leans into that same discomfort that comes with being vulnerable about the past, if only to even the ground. 

“My mother and I used to do something similar. She would read to me for hours upon hours growing up. Anything from poetry to philosophy to the classics,” His smilechanges into a wistful, nostalgic one. “She always said that’s the best way to learn.”

“I think she’s right about that.”

“Probably. She’s right about a lot of things.”

Spencer doesn’t talk a lot about his mother but from what you do know about her, you can tell she is the most important person in his life. He tries to write to her every day, has spent his few days off since you’ve become part of the team travelling to see her, and can bring her up no matter the conversation topic. You already think it’s sweet, but even if you didn’t, you’d do now; seeing how his features soften, how his voice takes on an even warmer quality. 

“It’s how I first read War and Peace and probably why I’m still so fond of it.”

“I should’ve guessed that’d be one of your favourites.” You scoff lightly, “I’ve never been able to actually get through it. I think the amount of praise for it compared to my experience reading through it has… confused me.”

Spencer leans back against the headboard, his body shifting into a lying position. He’s immensely intrigued with the conversation, with you. “You didn’t like it?”

“It’s not that,” You shrug, “As far as I’ve read, it did a good job at keeping me interested. I think it’s sufficiently complex for all intents and purposes. There’s depth to it — the characters, the story, all of it — and maybe it’s the only kind that matters for a book like it. Maybe I’m just looking for more when there’s already enough.”

Spencer mulls over your words in silence — not unkindly, not at all — but until you feel too scrutinised not to speak.

“I’m probably not making any sense. I’m being too judgemental for not having finished it—”

“No. Not at all, I don’t think you are,” He is quick to reply, forcing his glasses back in their place where they have slid down. “I think I understand what you mean. And there’s obviously no right or wrong way to view literature or how you feel about it. But what exactly did you think it lacked?”

“The kind of omniscience that pulls you in before you realise it. One that’s more personal than detached, almost cynical.”

His brow furrows, the meaning behind your words finally clicking. “Mhm, so it’s realism that’s not your thing, then.”

“Perhaps not Tolstoy’s kind.”

“That also makes sense.”

Your book falls shut, abandoned somewhere close to the pillow’s edge. You’re beyond taken by this conversation — both what’s being said and what’s not being said — to continue reading. In reality, you’d picked it as a shield, anyway. You don’t want to ignore him, you have to. You have to protect the walls you’ve built around you a long time ago and that Spencer threatens to tear down just by existing. It’s a matter of self preservation, of not being seen in a way that leaves you stripped to the bones, bare with nothingness. 

But again, how he pulls you in is strange. Unfathomable. The need to be seen by him bites more, with sharper teeth, than the need not to. Because he’s different. Made of gentleness and understanding and that fine-tuned capability for observation that’s not disruptive whatsoever.

“You’re lucky I’m too exhausted to feel insulted by whatever that means, doctor Reid.”

You’re more so teasing him than anything else.

Spencer notices that, just like he notices the curiosity that remains unmissable in your tone. Just like he also notices the warmth that seeps across his skin at the sound of you calling him by his title.

“What I mean is that it makes sense you prefer Dostoevsky to Tolstoy,” His smile turns into another prideful smirk when you blink up at him, doe-eyed and kind of flustered because he has once again seen right through you. “Anyone who’s more interested in why things happen would.”

He makes a mistake in turning to look at you. Soon enough, his cheeks and the tips of his ears start to burn, tinting a bright shade of pink. 

It only gets worse when you ask what you do next.

“Isn’t that true for all of us in this job?” 

He doesn’t immediately respond. You shift closer to him, imperceptibly, lying on your side. You’re more intrigued now than you were minutes before.

“Fundamentally, I think it is. At the same time, I’m not sure whether that belief alone is enough. Not anymore.” 

Spencer doesn’t want to discourage you, that’s the last thing that he wants to do. You’re new to this, newer than everyone else, including him. You’re far from naïve and you’re more than capable in all the right ways. An asset, if ever there was one. But he’s seen it before, how that’s not enough to keep you holding on and how it’s enough to break you if you let it. How the need to understand everything can become a weapon whose aim you’ll be on the receiving end of sooner or later. How the ones you chase cannot be reasoned with, not always. Sometimes, he’s come to learn, what matters is survival. Moving forward. Coming close enough to the point of no return and choosing not to slip into it.

“Sometimes focusing on the why doesn’t matter as much as the fact that we can’t change what’s been done nor what we’re supposed to do about it.”

In the back of his mind, a memory flashes. Him, on the floor of that hospital’s emergency department, a rifle pointed right at his head. How Hotch had to offer his inner turmoil on a silver platter to the unsub if they (and the hostages) were to make it out of there alive. How he had one chance for the killshot, and despite what he thought himself capable of, he achieved it. How the only thing that lingered afterwards was emptiness, not satisfaction. Despite Gideon claiming that not knowing what he felt and not feeling anything were completely different things, Spencer still ponders over whether that was true, more than he likes to admit. 

“You also agree with Dostoevsky, then.” You rasp out, begging to understand him like he’s tried to understand you tonight. “Our worst sin is that we have destroyed and betrayed ourselves for nothing.”

Spencer tries to be brave, tries to bare himself with the kind of honesty that you’ll recognise. If nothing else because you deserve it. But something holds him back, and what you don’t know is that it’s the very same thing that eats at you. The terrifying prospect of being stripped to nothingness, of being vulnerable in front of you and causing you to flinch. 

Perhaps once and for all.

So he keeps staring at the ceiling. Counts the dusty surroundings he fears will collapse beyond logic and reason, in the hopes that you will forgive him for being less brave than you have been tonight.

“Not as much as I do with Tolstoy, no. If we admit that human life can be ruled by reason, the possibility of life is destroyed.”

You quirk your eyebrow at that, genuinely taken aback by his choice of quote. “Well, that’s definitely surprising. I thought you were a man of logic and reason, doctor Reid.”

You do it again, threaten his worldview and his sanity by getting too close for comfort. The worst thing is that you’re right about it, right to think that if anything guided him in his life it was that.

It’s just that…

It’s just that looking at you now, giving in to this strange, palpable intimacy you’ve both been gravitating towards and away from all night, he realises that logic and reason could’ve never prepared him for what he’s feeling. Whether he tries to ignore it or allows it to take a life of its own, he has absolutely no power over. 

It’s frightening. It’s revelatory. It’s like nothing he’s ever known before and nothing like words on paper have ever elicited in him.

“Believe me when I say, so did I.”

Now, it’s you who’s flustered. It’s you who thinks you’re slipping into an abyss you think is far too beautiful, far too impossible for you to witness. You cling to the fact you’re close to submitting to your exhaustion, that gentle haze of sleepiness that’s provoking you far too enticingly. You cling to it, because if you do, then perhaps you can wake up tomorrow and don’t think of it much. Leave it where it’s meant to be left, blame it on this mocking choice of the universe that’s got you closer to Spencer on this Wednesday’s after hours. 

It’s nothing, it doesn’t mean anything, he doesn’t have to know. He will never have to know. I can be good at this.

But Spencer has one more thing to say. 

“But the why doesn’t matter, not as much as the fact it’s happened does.”

And you do, too.

Something as simple and as unapologetically honest as, “I understand.”

Spencer ignores how his breath catches at that very moment. How his pulse thunders across his body — in his chest, in his throat, in his hands. 

He coaxes you into falling asleep, mentioning that it’s getting late as if the very fact is a blessing and a curse at the same time. You’ve already follow his lead, nodding mindlessly where your face is half-buried against the pillows. Still closer to him than you’re meant to be.

Though he turns off his reading light, he doesn’t turn off yours immediately after. He indulges in the way the light dances across your features, how it smoothens your frown, how it lets your complex glow, how it lets his mind capture the sight and collect it — for as long as he lives, he hopes, perks of an eidetic memory — for his selfish, indulgent reasons. 

When he finally snaps out of it, freeing you from the light’s touch and his indulgence, the world tilts on its axis once more because he doesn’t pull his hand away fast enough. 

Your fingers brush against each other’s. 

It’s a shy touch. Unconscious on your part and what should just be a momentary response on his. But your fingertips curl around his, cradle them as fully as possible given their size difference, and Spencer feels as if he’s felt the Sun’s touch for the first time.

He wonders how something so brief can be so intimate, how it can be the answer to what he realised earlier tonight. He’s sure enough now, he’s starting to understand. Understand why you’re so unapologetic about how you guard yourself, understand why you crave the words and the why’s, understand why you cling to what you know in a way that begs no question and offers many answers. No, there’s nothing paradoxical about you. You’re not a mystery. You’re life’s most honest portrait in the brightest, sharpest colours. And what a pleasure it is to marvel at you.

Yes, he’s glad for what has happened. Yes, he is starting to believe you’re right about the why mattering. No, logic and reason cannot adequately answer for the possibility of this, of you happening. 

It’s what both of you have realised tonight, that you have both been entirely unprepared for each other.

It’s hours later when Spencer lets go of your hand. Or you do his, more like. He’s relieved (it feels wrong to like something you’re not consciously aware of doing, although psychology would argue there’s a reason you sought him out) and disappointed at once. Misses your warmth even though he only knows the briefest example of it. You’re closer to him than you’ve ever been before once more tonight, and yet he knows this won’t last, not really. He can’t believe he’s more thankful for the shortage of single rooms available at this hotel in Ohio than he’s been for something else in a long time — be it the newly resurfaced episodes of Doctor Who or the new breakthrough studies theorising on how dark energy regenerates. It’s another selfish thought of his, he understands it well enough, but under this welcoming cloak of darkness, he feels safer than he has in a long time. He wouldn’t mind it lasting longer than it is physically possible.

But the world clearly works in rather funny, mysterious ways.

He realises it even more when he’s given up on sleeping for longer than fifteen minutes at a time every past hour, when you somehow shuffle close enough to him where your beds meet, until your head is practically touching his shoulder.

Spencer doesn’t move when your warm breath hits his neck. Nor does he move when he feels you nuzzling your nose against his shoulder, your sharp inhale following his audible gulp because of your proximity. 

In a moment of bravery, he finds himself looking down at you. The moonlight that casts a shadow on your skin makes you look even more vulnerable than you probably feel, more vulnerable than he has, and probably will ever, see you again.

A stray strand of hair falls in front of your fluttering eyelids while you’re deep in a dreamful slumber.

He debates brushing it away. He really, really, wants to.

But he doesn’t.

He knows that he won’t be able to calm himself down enough to drift off to a proper, restful sleep anytime soon, for fear that his tossing and turning, or even worse, one of his nightmares will disturb you.

And so he lays still. Moments pass like that, with his free hand toying with the covers next to him, his other resting over his stomach as your face ghosts over his shoulder. And that’s enough.

All of this is enough for Spencer.

Until his name slips past your slightly parted lips, and everything stops.

He swears that his mind is playing tricks on him. It would be far from the first time. Especially at such a late hour.

But it comes again, even softer now, and all he can do is move (as much as he can under the circumstances) just the tiniest bit closer to you. 

A silent gesture of reassurance, of comfort — It’s okay. I’m here. You’re okay. 

He doesn’t have enough time to freak out or overthink what’s happened before he somehow does fall sufficiently asleep, and when you’ve both woken up, hours later, it’s too late to restore any semblance of the atmosphere you’d created last night. It was bound to happen, of course. All things honest and beautiful flourish at night, hidden away from the morning’s intervention.

Surprisingly enough, the air lacks any tension as you both move around to respectively get ready. It’s incomprehensible how natural it all feels, you think, and so does Spencer, though neither of you could admit to it. 

Daylight glimmers through the curtains as Spencer peers at you over his folders where they’re spread out on his bed, noticing you grimace at the coffee you tried to make for the both of you.

You curse under your breath, pouring the coffee down the sink’s drain, and Spencer doesn’t shy away from the idea that creeps into his mind then and there. 

Even if he wanted to, he can’t now that he’s already called out your name, prompting you to look at him right as you’re about to start making a second serving.

He clears his throat. Twice. Then suggests, with all the timidness of a hummingbird that’s flying too close to glass. “We—We, uhm, have quite a bit until we have to be at the precinct. Would you… Would you like to get a coffee? I noticed a nice-looking coffee shop at the end of the street last night. I bet it has better coffee than… that.” He finishes with a grimace.

Strangely enough, Spencer’s braver now than he was last night. Because he doesn’t take his eyes off of you while he waits for a response. It’s not like he’s asking for something indecent, right? Nothing… forward. Nothing that co-workers don’t typically do together.

His agony is short-lived compared to what he feared. You’re smiling at him soon after you put the questionable mugs aside first, then do the same with the coffee pot, clad in ivory-white and midnight-black.

For the first time since he met you, he debates whether daylight is kinder to you than it has ever been on any other person he knows. Perhaps on anyone to ever live. 

“Only if you promise to pitch War and Peace to me better than you did last night.”

The green in his eyes sparkles when the light hits them just right behind his slightly askew glasses. He tugs on the edge of his polka dot-patterned tie where it falls at his lap. 

He stands, the manila folder he was holding falling close. 

There’s no ghostly third presence in the room with you. Not anymore.

It’s just you, him, and the daylight that’s draping around the both of you in the form of halos which causes something to blossom.

“I just didn’t expect this to take so long,” You can practically see the way that he is digging his palms into his eyes frustratedly as he speaks, “It shouldn’t have taken more than a day or two for us to catch him. I mean, besides the cryptographs, the unsub is a classic example of a mission-oriented budding spree killer with psychopathic tendencies. We should’ve been able to track him down already. Even with how undermanned the Philadelphia field office seems to be these days—”

Thunder rumbles from close to your end of the line, reminds him of the nasty storm that hit DC right after he left. It makes him pause momentarily. That’s when he realises he’d been plaguing you with case details instead of focusing on how you’d both been while he was away.

“Sorry, I got carried away. I’m sorry. Is the storm still heavy over there?”

“Don’t apologise, Spencer, please,” You struggle to balance your cellphone on your shoulder while lighting a few candles in the living room in case the power doesn’t come back tonight, before you make your way to the bedroom, “But yeah, it’s the worst it’s been so far today. The power got cut while we were having dinner and it still hasn’t come back. He didn’t want to finish his pasta after that, not even after we’d lit the kitchen candles. You know how he is with the dark.”

A soft, almost sad smile tugged at Spencer’s lips when he heard that. It was no lie your boy shared his aversion towards the dark. It’s why you’d decorated his bedroom ceiling and walls with glow-in-the-dark stars, connected constellations for him to feel safe under, and also why Penelope had gifted him a pair of space-themed pyjamas of the same kind for his birthday. He loved them so much, he wore them to bed almost every night. 

“God, I should be there with you both, I’m sorry.” He blinks, chastising himself mentally into rearranging the cryptographs in front of him in the hopes that he’ll find something that’ll help the team solve the case and let him come back home to you soon.

“Spencer, honey…” You try again, voice lower and warmer now as you went to settle in bed, as close to his side as possible since he’s away. While you’re glad for the shift in his professional life because it’s brought closeness and stability for your family, you’d never wish for him to be hard on himself for doing his job. The BAU has been much too important to him for far too long, something he’s loved with his whole heart for so many years now, and you won’t have him punishing himself for that fact. There’s enough spots for both of you in his heart and in his life, you’re always sure to remind him. “We’re okay, I promise. I’m sure you’ll solve the case soon enough and you’ll be back before you know it.”

“I know, it’s just… I’m not used to missing you guys like this…” 

His voice gets quieter and lighter as he trails off. That, you understand. And so does your little boy, even as young as he is, at just four-years-old, but you choose not to voice that. 

“Is he in bed?”

“Yeah, I’ve just put him down. He was upset we couldn’t properly read his promised pages from the space encyclopaedia, but I made it up to him by telling him more about the North Star. We almost got to finish building the bottle ship you guys started last week, too, earlier. And let me tell you, he corrected me on where the rudder and the keel should go, not the other way around.”

Spencer could feel his heart swell when he heard that. He’d decided to buy him a kit of his own for them to work on together when he’d asked him about the one he kept on his desk. The image of you guys spending time working on it together only worsened his nostalgia for the haven of your home.

His voice carries too much emotion when he then asks, “Please tell him that I’ll be back so that we can finish it all together, will you?” 

You melt at his request. Whisper back softly through the line, “Of course I will, Spencer.” You can hear Emily and Tara call for him in the background, just as the rain starts patting more heavily against the windowsill. You’re shaking your head before he can apologise to you for having to return to the case, “‘s okay, we’ll talk tomorrow. We love you. Take care of yourself, please.” 

You just about make out Spencer repeating the sentiments for the both of you as the line goes dead, your phone having run out of battery without you even realising. 

Oh, fuck.

It’s then you hear the floorboards creak under the weight of soft footsteps as they reach your bedroom door. Soon enough, your little boy, Jasper, comes into view, his space-themed pyjamas glowing brightly enough in the near darkness of the apartment. 

“Mommy?” He calls, knuckles wiping short-lived sleep furiously from his eyes, his apple plush toy, Newton, tucked under his armpit. “Was that daddy?”

“Hey, baby,” You abandon your dead phone on the nightstand and kick the blankets from your legs, sitting up higher on the bed. With his messy curls and his wide brown eyes and his bottom lip between his teeth, he’s the spitting image of his dad, your favourite boy in the entire world. You open your arms for him to jump in as he starts padding closer to you, “It was, angel. He called to ask how we are and wish us goodnight.”

He climbs inside your arms without hesitation and you help him settle against you as he wishes to, hugging him close by the small of his back and the back of his knees, “Can I talk to him?”

“Not right now, baby,” You sigh, mouth pressed against his forehead as you smoothen his pyjamas over his body, “He had to go back to work. But we’ll call him tomorrow, okay? I promise.” 

You notice his lip wobbling as he clutches his plushie tighter to his chest. He eventually nods, albeit reluctantly enough. “Can’t he come home yet?”

“Not yet, angel, no. He still has work to do. But he promised he’ll be back as soon as he can.”

“I miss him.” 

“I know, baby. He misses you, too. That’s what he was telling me over the phone, you know?” You brush a damp, sweaty curl behind his ear, looking down at him with kindness and affection, “I told him you almost finished building your bottle ship earlier and he said he can’t wait to come home so you can set it up together.”

“I didn’t do it on my own,” He frowns, his cheeks puffing up slightly, “You helped, too.”

Oh, your sweet, sweet boy. Nothing gets past him.

“Well, yeah, I told him that, too.” You lean down, poking the tip of his nose with your own, “He said he’s proud of you and misses you so, so, so much.”

“And you?”

You smile, hugging him as close as you could without squeezing him to discomfort, “And me.”

Lightning flashes outside the window, soon followed by a rather loud thundering sound, and causes Jasper to flinch. You pull him closer still, draw half-circles on his shoulder where Saturn’s ring glows around it, “Hey, it’s okay, angel. Remember what daddy told you about lightning and thunder? How the longer it takes between the flash and the sound, the farther away the storm is?” You feel him nod against your neck, squirming to sit better on your lap. “How many seconds did that one take, can you remember?”

And because he’s Spencer’s son and he already loves solving problems, even if he’s too young to fully understand them, he starts counting using his fingers. He has to add up his left hands’ fingers twice before he can look up at you and respond quietly, with unmistakable precision, “15?”

“That’s right, which means the storm’s about 3 miles away from us right now. That’s not too close, is it?”

He ponders your question for a moment, then shakes his head in denial. “What if it’s closer to where daddy is, though? What if he can’t come home because of the storm?”

Your heart melts at his sweet questions, at how caring and thoughtful he’s already grown to be, heart full of empathy and kindness. Even when he worries the way he does now.

“Oh, angel boy, daddy will always find the way back home to us, I promise. Even if he can’t fly, he’ll drive back, or take the train. But he’ll always find a way, no matter what. He’s good like that.”

“Even if he can’t see Polaris in the sky?”

You nod, smiling warmly down at him. Of course he’d memorise the name of the star you’d been talking about before. He’s Spencer’s son, after all. With a mind just as fascinating and lovely as his father’s. You love him dearly, too much to put into words. “Even so. And you know why? Because like we said, Polaris will always be there. Stars are like that. When it’s storming or raining or snowing or, or, or. Just like we will always be here for daddy, isn’t that right?”

Jasper gives you the toothiest grin he can muster at his semi-sleepy state. Mumbles a tiny (but firm), “O’ course!” before he rests his head against your shoulder once more.

You hold him there for a beat and when you feel him nuzzle further against your skin ask him tenderly, “Want to sleep in the big bed with me tonight, baby?”

“Can I, please?”

“If you promise to give me a cuddle.”

He climbs over to your side of the bed immediately, helps you tuck both him and yourself under the covers, before returning to your embrace. “Can Newton cuddle, too?”

“Both you and Newton get a cuddle, angel.” You tuck Newton between you both ceremoniously enough, careful not to squish him under your weight, “As big a one as you want.”

Jasper doesn’t mind the storm raging for quite a while after that, nor does it take him too long to fall asleep. You slip into a slumber soon after you’ve made sure he’s comfortable and won’t jolt awake again, holding him as close as he’s shown you he wishes you to.

Your promise to him rings true mere hours later, just after midnight, when the front door opens and Spencer returns. Relieved, and not at all bothered by the way his suit jacket now clings to his back from the rain, or especially tired from taking the first flight home after Emily texted him that his deductions had been right and they’d successfully apprehended the unsub. He slips out of his shoes and loosens the knot of his tie, leaving his phone and his satchel on the armchair by his desk, when he notices the white, soft glow coming from the bedroom.

The sight he’s met with when he reaches the doorstep, of you and Jasper clinging to one another, your chests rising and falling in tandem, makes him almost tear up.

He’s kneeling by your (his) side in seconds, brushing hair away from your temple before his lips find your cheek, and then Jasper’s small fist by your arm.

You stir, turning your head around, blinking twice before you register that he’s actually here. 

“Hey, you’re back.” You move your right hand, as careful as you can so as not to wake Jasper up because of it, and cup Spencer’s cheek lovingly.

“Hi, angel, I’m back.” He whispers back quietly, leaning into your hold while he smoothens Jasper’s back lovingly .

“Caught the bad guy alright?”

“We did, yeah. Not long after we got off the phone.”

“Oh, yeah. Sorry about that, phone died. Didn’t get to charge it before the power cut.” You frown when you remember the storm and notice he’s damp with rain. “Oh, Spencer, did you fly in this weather?”

He shrugs, although he doesn’t move from where he’s crouching down by the bed. “Took the first commercial flight back, the team stayed in Philadelphia to wrap the case up, they decided to fly back tomorrow, instead.”

“You could’ve done the same, waited out the storm and all.”

“Not a chance. I missed you both too much already. What’s suffering through some ultimately harmless turbulence in front of that?”

You smile, heart skipping a beat at how much he loves you and how much you love him. Watch as he rises and starts getting ready for bed with uncharacteristic eagerness. He denies your wanting to move around so he can sleep on his side of the bed, doesn’t mind slipping in to your right, wrapping his arm around both you and Jasper. When he kisses the back of Jasper’s head, you notice how heavy the lack of sleep shows itself under his eyes.

“When’s the last time you slept?”

He sighs, pushing the covers further up all of you. Whispers back the way you do, “Well, technically, it’s going to be tonight.”

You don’t get to scoff in response as Jasper stirs inside his father’s embrace and eventually blinks awake, first at you, then at his dad when he realises he’s right there. 

“Daddy! You’re back!” 

“Hello, buddy, hello. I’m back. I’ve missed you so much, my lovely boy.” 

He kisses his temple twice as Jasper hugs him tightly, his tiny arms not even close to linking behind Spencer’s back. Still, he makes a rather dramatic sound as if to say he’s being crushed with affection.

“Mommy said you still had work to do.”

“I did but I finished it quicker than I thought I would. Had to come back home to my favourite people, didn’t I?” You can see Jasper grin at that. He hugs Spencer again and Spencer melts into it. 

“I was worried you might not be able to make it back ‘cause o’ the storm. ‘Cause maybe you couldn’t see Polaris up in the sky.”

“Oh, Jasper. I’ll always make it back home to you and mommy, I promise.” He thumbs at his cheek gently, for good measure. “Polaris will always be there to make sure I will do so, no storm can stop that.”

Jasper shifts to lay on his back when hears that, glancing back at you.

“Mommy said the same thing.”

You shrug when Spencer looks at you, stifling your own smile behind a tiny yawn.

“I’m sure she did, didn’t she? Mommy’s clever like that. She’s always right.”

“I thought that was you, actually.”

Spencer ignores your witty response out of nothing but elaborate playfulness, his attention returning to Jasper when he asks him whether he brought him back anything.

“You know I did. But you have to be a good boy and go to sleep now because it’s late. We can look at what I’ve brought you tomorrow, when the sun’s up and the storm’s passed. And then we can finish up the ship bottle you and your mommy worked on while I was away. Does that sound okay?”

“You won’t go away for work again tomorrow?”

“No, buddy, I won’t. I promise. I’m not going away for work for quite a while now.”

Jasper silently rejoices (it’s unmissable to you and Spencer, anyhow) when he hears that. He has only one demand when he speaks next, “Can I sleep in the big bed with you both tonight?”

Spencer doesn’t have to consider it twice before he agrees, “Absolutely. I’ve missed you too much to say no, baby. You and Newton, both.”

“And mommy.” Jasper reminds him pointedly.

“Of course! Mommy, too. Always.” You’re half-smiling against Spencer’s pillow drowsily, struggling not to fully succumb to your sleepiness and miss the sweet commotion. Luckily for you, Spencer chimes in to your defence, “Looks like mommy’s sleepy, too, Jasper. Are you?” Jasper takes Newton back inside his arms and nods in response, eyes already half-closed. “So am I. Let’s all go to sleep and you’ll tell me what I missed while I was away from you and mommy these past few days. Sounds okay?”

Jasper offers him a quiet, sleepy mumble. “Okay.”

“That’s my boy. Goodnight, my lovely. Sleep tight. I love you.”

“I love you, too, dadda. You and mommy.”

You clear your throat and mutter back at both of your boys, “I love you, three.”

Spencer leaves a kiss on both yours and Jasper’s forehead as he snuggles closer to you both, pulling you as close as possible inside his embrace. 

All that he can think about right before he falls asleep after the both of you is just how right you’d been about what you’d told Jasper about Polaris. How it’s always there, no matter what, a constant beacon of hope and comfort. How it’s been that for eons upon eons and how it’ll continue to be so. How it’ll always guide people home, visible or not. Much like you and Jasper and his love for you both will keep doing the same. Even if some kind of storm happens to take him away again for a short while (though he hopes not soon), he will always return to this. To you. To both of you. His shelter from the storm, his beacon. Always, without fail. 

he knew by heart the walking distance from the parking spot to the staircase, the amount of steps he would have to take until he reached the third floor, and how to hurry past mrs. stevenson's door to avoid the neighbourly small talk he dreaded so much.

although the elder woman was kind, she seemed excessively eager to talk to him since you had offered to watch her cats, and always made a point to corner you both when you were in a rush.

tonight, he was.

when he sucessfully made it to the pink doormat, the door opened before his key could connect to the lock. he wondered if the gates of heaven were opening to him, finally alleviating him from a lifetime of pain endured.

"hi, honey"

you greeted him in a voice sweeter than any nectar, welcoming him inside with a motion of the arm as you studied his face attentively.

a look was enough for you to read him. spencer's shoulder instinctively slumped when you close the door and helped him out of his coat, catching hold of his messenger bag, heavy with case files and unwanted emotions.

"long day..." you affirmed, not bothering to ask.

he simply nodded, tired pools of amber looking at you in a silent plea. one that meant let's not talk about it.

no explanations needed. no need to ramble and fill the silence with statistics and trivia his brain memorized by heart to avoid feeling crushed by heavy silence.

he didn't have to pretend here. he just had to be.

while waiting for him just like you did everynight after your shift, you'd prepared the bathroom to allow him to take a much needed shower, while a warm dish was simmering on the stove, the smell of garlic and herbs emanating from the kitchen.

your schedules, precisely balanced to fit like the pieces of a puzzle, formed a choreographed dance you two knew by heart now.

a ballad, really. he only allowed himself to stay under the hot spray of water for a couple of minutes, before his stomach decided to remind him that he was hungry for food, and his his heart hungry for you.

dinner was usually quiet, or filled with fun facts about your day you couldn't hold in. something about a new coffee shop opening next to the office, and what a shame it was that the matcha "wasn't ceremonial grade".

it's only later that comes his favorite part.

when the dishwasher is loaded, the laundry is folded, and the couch calls for both your names like the sighting of a miraculous oasis after days of walking in the desert.

"spence," you call, making yourself comfortable with your legs tucked under yourself. the blanket covers your lower half, and the only thing missing is him by your side.

"you know we dont have to talk about work if you don't want to... but we could."

his voice almost cracks from the lack of talking when he answers, taking a seat so close to you that your shoulders are touching. through the shirt he'd changed in, a warmth you recognize as his renders the blanket useless.

"i know. i'd just... rather not." he answers, shrugging pensively.

the confirmation he gives you doesn't come off as dissmissive, like it would've to anyone else who could be blinded by the flat tone of his voice. it only makes you tilt your head in worry, afraid to cross the line.

before doubts get you, he assures half jokingly.

"it's not bad, really. just nothing i want to bother you with, i have psych evals for that."

amidst his torments, spencer always made a point not to hit you with the harsh reality of the job. knowing what being a profiler involved was enough, he wasn't going to pull you into the dark selfishly.

"fine," you sigh, knowing better than to press the subject. by the slight purse of his pouty lips and the rythm of his fingers tapping against the cushions, he wasn't going to change his mind.

still, you attempt a smile.

"let me at least be there for you, tell me what we could do. wanna play chess ? we could watch the end of that documentary you started last week-"

earnest was your gaze, capturing his undivided attention in a way that he did not feel deserving of. shifting to face you fully from where he was sitting, he cut you off with a much better suggestion.

"a hug ?" he asked shyly - like he wasn't your boyfriend and you weren't wearing his sweater, and the rent of this very apartment wasn't to be split up equally every month.

immediately, he looked away.

"i don't know, i just... i think i could use some cuddles."

the squeal you let out was almost comical.

"cuddles, cuddles, cuddles !" you repeated at the word that always got a pavlovian response out of you, to which he could only obey with a small chuckle.

"i swear, you were just waiting for this."

you pulled him in so that his head could find the crook of your neck, settling back against the cushions while he nuzzled the fabric of your sweager - his sweater.

no use telling him that you were, in fact, waiting for this since the minute he came in wearing that adorable pout on his tired face.

"you know," he says in a slighlty muffled voice.

"when a hug lasts at least twenty seconds, it’s long enough to stimulate the release of oxytocin, often called the “cuddle hormone.”

nodding although he can't see it, your hand quietly finds its way to his hair, and you don't point out the humming sound he lets out that has your heart flutter.

"oxytocin..." the words die out from your decision to lightly scratch the top of his head, right where the slightest touch can be deliciously toe curling.

"... is produced by the hypothalamus and released by the pituitary gland when we're physically affectionate, it helps lower cortisol and creates a bond between the-"

""-spencer." your hand stills, fingers hovering over his precious chesnut curls. "just let me cuddle you. i've got you."

what started as a warning really just ended up sounding like a soft whisper, a quiet promise just between the two of you.

he doesn't move an inch, preferring to play dead right there on the couch, long limbs stretched all the way to the corner of the sofa while your figure is stuck between his torso and the cushions.

the deliberate motion of your fingers signals the only proof of life in the room, contrasting from the stillness caused by the hum of the dishwasher and nothing else. with you, silence was so light and appreciable, it made his brain unusually quiet.

until something urges him to confess, so low it's almost inaudible.

"i've gotten so used to this, to you - coming home to you after work, having someone to talk to... or stay silent with.”

he pauses as you cup the back of his neck, a silent attempt at coaxing the answer out of him.

“i don't even know how i did it by myself for so long."

it makes you blink twice. too bad he can't see your face, buried too deep in your chest as if to inhale every molecule of the vanilla scent you carried.

that realisation - the how was life before her ? - had dawned upon him pretty much the first time he slept at your place, when he stayed frozen at your kitchen island for about half an hour too long.

eyes focused on the oatmeal you’d made for him, he had tried to calculate the chance his peaceful and uninterrupted night of sleep - the first one he had in… forever, really - was correlated to the fact he spent it with you.

“wanna know what i hate the most about you ?”

slowly, spencer stirs. out of all the outcomes he’d thought of in the previous two seconds, the possible ways this conversation could go his mind had to overthink and plan, this sentence hadn’t even possibly crossed it.

“honey…” he paused, searching for the truth in your eyes, or the slightest hint of your lips curving upwards.

he was met with a genuine expression, and huff and shook his head, bewildered. “what ?”

“what i hate the most about you.” you repeated, sighing. “is how long it took us to meet.”

how many days, how many years you appreciated the beauty of life around you, admired love in all its forms without yourself receiving any of it. you used to tell yourself it would be your turn one day, and it was no bother hopelessly wish for someone that would appear at the right time.

now fully sat up, your teeth pressed a bit too hard on your bottom lip. “think about it, i moved to DC what, eight years ago ? how come we only met three years later ?”

“hon,” spencer shook his head. he was amused by the turn this was taking. “there are over eight million people living in the state. do you even know how incredibly unbelievable it is that we met ?”

you could only agree, taking his words into account. “huh, i guess. but i thought you didn’t believe in fate.”

out of you two, you’re the hopeless romantic. the one who sees the bright side of every situation, who lets things happen as a result of your everlasting interest in destiny.

spencer reid, in all his six foot one charisma and intellect, was a man of science. he couldn’t bear trusting something blindly without a proof or explanation to rely on.

“you’re right, i don’t - really. i don’t really believe in fate.” he admits.

you’re listening attentively now, a soft smile on your face brightening the dim lighted living room.

“but with you ? i never had to question it… i just knew”

“which is why-“ holding a finger pointed towards him, he doesn’t exactly feel threatened by your cuteness nor by the pretend serious tone you’re using.

“i’m never letting you go now. cause i don’t care what brought us together, i just know that i’m thankful for it.”

slowly, he breathes out. you seem to have gotten him to laugh, and it makes the giggle leaving your throat match his. “even when i come home looking like i haven’t slept in days and refuse to talk ?”

“yeah,” you nod, kissing his temple so softly that he can feel your laugh vibrating against his skin. “i’m here for you, dummy, even when you don’t want me to be - which can be a problem, but hey. deal with it.”

that only makes him laugh harder. you did it again, make his entire day better by showing up and staying. by giving him all your love. he didn't need more, never had.

"i don't want my job to affect you," he blurts out once the giggles die down. his nose scrunches slightly, and you know it's from the thoughts forming in his head he'd never speak out loud.

those where it's not just a bad case, but one threatening to burst the happy bubble he cherishes so much. you try to lighten up the situation by saying "i don't want your job to affect you either, but it does."

"it's different. i signed up for this, i made the decision. you never asked for any of it and i'm just forcing my lifestyle out on you."

screw him and his ability to make a point.

"i did," leaves your lips sincerly, causing his eyes to widen and somehow enhance the astonishing ressemblance to a puppy he had going on. "and i've already told you a hundred time i don't care as long as you don't shut me out."

the conversation feels scripted at this point. the keys of a piano damaged from being played years on end. a desired path forming against all odds where people seem to have chosen to walk out of convenience.

you don't know how many times you two talked about this, yet the topic always seems to come back, seeping through the cracks of your balaced romantic life.

"i don't" he swears, hair bouncing as he shakes his head vividly. "i don't wanna shut you out either, i just don't feel like it's fair to you to rely on you to make it better. especially when none of it is your fault."

you scoff, stretching your numb leg after supporting his weight for slightly too long. another thing you won't complain about. "oh, please. i don't try to fix you, spence. i just love you... and i love cuddling because it's nice, not because i feel like i have to."

"you're sure ?"

"yup. always."

spencer simply sighs, perhaps from the umptieth confirmation that despite what he may think, he's not a burden.

he could thank you, tell you how he doesn't know what he did to derserve you or that he wouldn't be anywhere else in the whole wide world if he was given the chance. he could apologize for being too much or not opening up, which wouldn't solve anything because the rebuke he'd get out of you would be a waste of the soothing silence you'd offered.

instead, he lays back down where his head can find it's rightful spot against your chest and lets the beat of your heart quieten the thoughts.

this is where he wants to be - where it's sweet and heavenly.

You've been trying to figure him out from afar, as subtle as you can. You're not a creep, after all, but he cuts such a lonely figure that you couldn't help but wonder if he needed some company. A part of you wonders if he's noticed you as well. This store is your late afternoon treat, after all. You come here every Friday, without fail, even when you know the inventory is unreplenished, simply to bask in the presence of books.

And then he started coming in regularly, and you had another reason to come.

You never approached him. Something about simply knowing he's there, while remaining a stranger, is thrilling. You can romanticize him if he's a stranger, project all the wholesome fantasies and book boyfriends you have upon him with no sense of accountability.

It also means you avoid the disappointment if he turns out to be another condescending know it all, eager to put you and your reading habits down because oh your tastes are so girly.

No, this was better. You're a flaneur, you tell yourself, you're here to be part of the space and observe from within, even though you doubt this is what Baudelaire had in mind when he wrote that essay and defined the term.

Still.

You smile to yourself, crouching down to check the books on the lower shelf, and also to catch a glimpse of his legs. He'd been on the other side of this shelf for the past five minutes, and you've gotten a soft chuckle when you saw his mismatched socks.

However, his lean form is nowhere to be seen. He seems to have moved to another aisle. With a small frown, you move to stand up, only to feel a tug.

“Shit,” a quick glance down reveals that a familiar looking shoe has accidentally stepped on your long skirt. You hadn't realized it billowed out around you when you knelt down.

“Oh, I'm so sorry!”

You look up and realize why the shoe looks familiar. It's him. You couldn't see him in the other aisle because he'd moved to your side, so silently you hadn't even heard him.

“Sorry, oh gosh, I didn’t notice.” He steps off quickly, and you watch as his cheeks bloom bright pink. A pink that quickly travels down his neck.

You stifle a laugh at how easily he blushed. “It's fine.” Your attempt to stand is more successful without his foot pinning the fabric of your skirt to the ground.

“I've messed up your skirt though.” He says, looking at the brown smudge left behind on the skirt.

“It's no big deal, it’ll come out.” You shrug, getting a good look at him this time. He's taller than you thought, with a sharp bone structure that's softened by large, hazel eyes and pouty lips. His hair is slicked back, curling at the nape of his neck, the color a soft brown that matches his eyes. Yeah, one of him should really come in every bookstore, you think.

“O-okay, uh, if you're sure…” He says, rubbing his hands on his pants. A nervous energy emanates from him, disrupting your idea that he's calm and tranquil.

Oh well, there goes that fantasy. Still, you wonder if maybe he's nervous because of you.

“I still feel bad though,” He adds, looking around, “Uh, how about I buy you a book for the inconvenience?”

“It's hardly an inconvenience,” You laugh, “But hey, I won't say no to a free book.”

He perks up, “Great. I'm Spencer, by the way.”

“Y/N. It's nice to meet you, Spencer.”

He repeats your name, and you find yourself enjoying the shape his mouth makes as he tests it out, lips and tongue wrapping around the syllables as if he wants to commit the way it feels in his memory.

You mentally kick yourself in the ass, wondering if you've read too many romance novels.

“Likewise,” He smiles, and you have to remind yourself that it's rude to stare at the lips of someone you just met. It's not your fault he has such pretty dimples, and you had the urge to count them. He continues, “So what kind of books do you like, Y/N? Romance?”

Your eyes narrow at that. You wonder how to answer. Yes? Would he judge you if you say yes? Is he one of those guys, the ones who only read heavy, intellectual books and look down on people who read fluff? Do you want to try and impress him by saying no, by scoffing and saying something like of course not I’m looking for a copy of Swann's Way by Marcel Proust? (which is the most “impressive” book you can think of at the moment). The idea seems too gross, too I'm not like other girls, and you immediately cross it out.

“And if I do?” you ask instead, surprised by the edge to your voice.

He blinks, then shrugs, looking entirely innocent. “Then we should head to the romance shelf over there.”

Once again, you're surprised. Some part of you had been expecting a smirk, maybe a roll of his eyes, that look you get when you even dare to bring up the romance genre. But, no. He starts walking to a different part of the store and you're forced to follow.

“Why did you think I read romance?” the words escape your lips before you can stop them.

He ducks behind a shelf, his hair falling down and hiding his face but you get a glimpse of the bright red skin of his neck. He's blushing again.

“Well, it's - ah - that is, I've noticed you here before, and you always seemed to hang out here in the romance section.” He says in a rush, his head still angled away from you.

You feel simultaneously called out, and a little giddy. So he's noticed you, just as much as you'd noticed him.

“So you're a stalker.” You can't help but tease.

He lets out a sound, somewhere between an indignant sputter and a scoff. “What? No! I just happen to be very observant, it's a skill I've learned to hone for my job, and you're not very hard to remember-” He cuts himself off, peeking at you with a horrified look on his face.

Laughter tumbles from your lips, and you clamp your teeth down your bottom lip to stop.

“I was teasing you.” You say, trying to fight the giggles.

He seems relieved, but the crease on his brow remains, a sign of his previous embarrassment.

“And you're right. The romance section has the biggest amount of secondhand books that I can read while I'm here.” You explain. This aisle also gives you the best view of the nonfiction section, which he frequents, therefore giving you the perfect spot to observe him over the past few weeks. Though you leave out that part.

“Ah,” He nods, looking around, “See anything you like?”

“No, I'm actually looking for a copy of The Hobbit right now.”

He lights up, “Oh, you're a fan of Tolkien too? I love him, he's such a genius and completely innovated the fantasy genre! So much so that he - wait, if you're looking for The Hobbit, why didn't you tell me sooner?”

“You just started walking.” You reply, smiling at him. He's adorable when he becomes so animated, hands waving around like his body can't contain his excitement and has to find ways to express them physically. “Had to follow you. But anyway, I'm assuming you've read The Hobbit?”

He accepts your explanation easily, then nods his head. You can't help but compare him to a puppy, so eager and nearly frantic in his excitement.

“I've read every Tolkien book.” He says, and you're surprised to find his voice contains no hint of superiority, or cockiness. Just genuine joy. It's refreshing, “Including The Silmarillion."

“Oh wow,” You laugh, aware of the reputation that tome carries, “I've only seen the Lord of The Rings movies.”

“Well that's not sufficient at all! You're missing out on so much history,” He says, crossing his arms over his chest.

“Mhm, well help me find The Hobbit first, before I move on to the trilogy.” You reply, already walking over to where you know the fantasy books are.

He follows you, smiling bashfully, “You know, I have copies of all the books… I can just lend them to you, if you want.”

You pause, glancing over your shoulder in surprise. “You'd let a stranger borrow your books?”

“Only if you promise to take care of them.” He says, sheepishly rubbing the back of his neck.

“I swear on my life, I will not tarry your precious copies of Tolkien's masterpiece.” You make a cross over your heart for emphasis, which makes him laugh. This time, you stare at his lips shamelessly, enjoying the dimples that appeared from the action.

“Okay, maybe we meet up over coffee sometime?” he asks, fiddling with the strap of his bag. “I'll bring the books.”

You fight the urge to squeal. Your body refuses to contain the giddiness, and the sound compromises by coming out as a giggle.

“Yeah, sure.” you watch as he digs into his pocket, handing over a card. “Oh, how very professional.” You say playfully, accepting the slip of paper.

He ducks his head, and you see the beginnings of the blush creeping down his neck. It feels exhilarating, being able to make him blush like this.

“It's just more practical.” He mumbles.

You grab your phone quickly, typing in his number and giving it a call, so that your number goes through his as well. “I'll give you a call. But, you still owe me a book for this.” You motion at your skirt, at the stain of his footprint on the fabric.

He chuckles, “Of course. Can't go back on my promise.” he looks around the store and you're taken by the sight of him, looking like he's part of the space, like he simply belongs here. And this time, with you standing next to him, with him. “Take your pick.”

“I'm pretty indecisive.” You say playfully.

It's an unexpected question, one that sounds stabbing and treacherous as it curls around his tongue. He feels it's a thought he shouldn't be allowed to have—not with the life he's given himself, not with the genetics he has and the great possibility of passing them on. It's a selfish thing to envision.

He's imagined something small, a wooden crib, a stuffed giraffe in the corner, a soft lamp that is easy on the eyes. He's imagined tiny curls and their mother's nose, their mother's everything, really. Chubby fingers and tiny clothes, late nights and hard nights and nights brimming with love. That image in particular makes his chest burn.

He doesn't let you answer—he has more to say, and, honestly, he's a little bit terrified. "Did you know that 80% of parents agree or strongly agree that they are a good parent? Do you believe that? I don't; I think it's ridiculous. And did you know that almost half of parents say that they try to parent as their parents parented them?" He's frustrated, his throat closing and working against him. He shouldn't get so angry, so defeated by thinking about parenthood—but he does, often.

You don't interrupt, letting him string out the last of what he has to say. It's a conversation that hasn't ever come up between you two, children. It's always seemed something quite a bit out of reach, like a concept that was never written in the books for you.

"I'm not surprised by that, I don't think. Most people grow into some version of their parents."

He thinks about your words. He doesn't want to live the way his dad brought him up to, and if Spencer did have a child, he wouldn't want to raise them that way either—by absence. He loves his mother, but he doesn't suppose he would want to raise his child like her, either. He wants to be there, in every way, by choice. What a horribly unattainable thing.

He should leave the conversation at that. He's torturing himself, expanding these ideas that will only work to make an alternate universe further away.

But, he can't.

"I think you would make a wonderful father, Spence."

You say it truly, like you dragged it straight from your heart through your mouth, and, god, he's a child himself, left to weep at the feet of the woman he loves.

"Children who were raised with an absent parent are far more likely to be bad parents themselves. Not to mention schizophrenia running through my family, and my history of substance abuse. Statistically, I would not make a good father."

The words are cruel and bitter, and he detects something he hasn't felt since he started sobriety: unnecessary, unaccounted for vexation with the world.

But in just under a second, it evaporates when you look at him, all understanding and warmth and life. "Have you seen yourself with Henry? He adores you, Spencer. I mean, he dressed up as you for Halloween." You watch as he swallows and looks down, and you think not only would he be a fine parent, but he would be extraordinary. You take his face in your hands, and he's ruined by you, by the life you've given him, by the pleasure he has because of your name forever etched into the four chambers of his heart. "You are so good, and giving, and lovable, Spencer."

You don't expect the bite you feel, the poignant sting that arises under your ribcage and behind your eyes. He senses it, because of course he does, because he is so lovely in every way. "Don't cry, why are you crying?"

You laugh, and it's not sunshine—it's fragmented and worn at the edges. "I'm not crying." You are, but it's okay. He won't correct you. "Do you hear me when I say that that child, your child, will be the luckiest kid on the planet?"

He's slightly stunned, and it's not an abnormal thing to happen to him. Did you mean to say "will"? Was that on purpose? Every word you say, every movement of your mind you present to him, affects him twice as hard as anything else.

"I—I don't—"

"Do you hear me, Spencer?"

"Yes. I hear you." Your voice rings in his ears when you're miles away. He always hears you.

It's quiet for a long time. You know you have to let it sink into him—the affection—or else it will bounce right off. The inability to accept kindness is something that stays with him even throughout adulthood, and maybe that's why he believes he fits so well into a team that's glued together by disaster. It's difficult to get rid of rot when it's already settled in, stated its claim on a vulnerable host.

Maybe there is something rotten inside of him. He's seen blood more times than he can count, and he can list off the anatomical structure of a human being without a second thought; but he's always quietly suspected that his insides are green and dirty, that instead of veins there are vines, and if you were to go too far down his throat, you'd run into thorn bushes that regularly leave him inable to speak conherently and prick people who get close enough. They aren't healthy thoughts to have—that's definite—but he's always been a bit self-destructive, hasn't he?

"Do you want to be a father? Is that why you're asking?"

Yes. No. Yes, in the way it's primal for a human to want to reproduce. Yes, in the way he wants to have another chair in the dining room occupied, so it doesn't constantly collect dust. Yes, in the way he wants to fill the world with more of you. Yes, in the way he wants to be a role model like his mother was for him, and be a steady, loving figure like his father wasn't. Yes, in the way he wants to give more of his heart. Yes. Yes, he wants to be a father.

"I don't know. Maybe? I haven't really been able to think about it. I think it might be nice with you. To share that with you. Not now, of course. Not for a while." He takes a breath, and he can't look at you, but he can feel you. "Would you—Would you ever want to be a mother?"

The question spins something into knots. You have always been avoidant in that way. "That's a really tough question, Spence."

"I'm sorry. I don't expect anything from you."

The truth is that you really can't answer that right now. You would like nothing more than to tell him yes, yes, you want to be a parent with him, you want to create something out of love with him. And you do, but it is so much more than that.

"I know you don't expect anything, it's okay. All I know is that I want to be with you. I don't really know what I'll want when the time comes."

He nods, and that's enough, that's more than enough. "I understand."

You stop, and you think. You can't help it: you see a toddler, all legs, all brains, running throughout the kitchen with big, beautiful brown eyes and a hunger for some part of the world. You aren't ready now, and you might never be. It's a sweet daydream to have. You hope you will be ready one day. "Do you think—if we were to have a child—they'd be a baby genius? Take from their dad?"

It's such a shift, such a wonderful, bright thought, he can't help but laugh. He will never get over the weightlessness. "Maybe?"

"I think the chances are pretty good, don't you?"

"50-80%. I wouldn't care if they were a genius or not, though. As long as they can appreciate Nietzsche and be able to read War and Peace in the original Russian by five."

You slap his arm, and he's oh so smitten, and thank whatever divine power brought you to him and gave him enough brain cells to make you laugh. "I'm kidding. It would be unfortunate, though, if he had an interest in sports. I would not be able to help him with that."

"'Him'?"

"Or her. I don't care about that, either. But, really, I don't know how to play baseball. Or football, or basketball, or soccer, or hockey—"

"Spencer, that's what Morgan is for."

He hums, and you're smiling, and he's happy thinking about this, about you with him, about the possibility of a family. And even if you don't want that in the future, that would be okay.

In this very moment, you're all that he wants, you're all that he wants in his space and heart and mind, and maybe one morning he'll wake up knowing he has more of himself to give—but that morning is not now. It's everything to him that he doesn't know what lies in the future. He's always thought he knew how he would end: forgotten, drifting through abandoned, unreachable rivers of knowledge that would be more than useless at that point.

He'll live as someone who loves to the very death of himself, who loves, despite improbability or impossibility.

Now, why does this do nothing to actually ease my worries?

Because you’re much too skeptical, baby. You’d risen to your tiptoes after draping your jacket over your shoulders, an oversized blazer that Spencer had gifted you a few months back, one of those you loved to wear when you wanted to feel smarty as you called it, and left a sweet kiss on his slightly pursed lips. Must come alongside that wonderful big brain of yours.

Or maybe I know what your being on your best behaviour can look like. He’d hummed, leaning into the soft pressing of your mouth against his, regardless of how brief it’d been. Especially when you’re out with Penelope.

You have such little faith in me, it almost hurts. You’d teased, though Spencer knew well enough how much his attentiveness meant to you. His (more often than not overly) protective nature stemmed not from a need to possess and control you. That wasn’t his nature. He trusted you far too much to stoop that low, imprison you in a relationship full of toxicity and paranoia, and falsely refer to it as love. And oh, did he love you, so very much, which only meant that he cared for you deeply. More than he had done for anyone (other than his mother and his co-workers but that was much different) else in his life. It always felt nice to know he was looking out for you. You’d never been cared for before, not that way. It’s why you’d returned to his arms after putting on your heels, your outfit now complete, your hands wrapping around his shoulders. How about this, I promise to be all nice and careful, if you promise not to stay up until three a.m. overthinking your choice of bibliography and course structure regarding forensic linguistics as an established criminal science tool for the third time this week.

Heat had risen from his neck to his cheeks as he’d tried (but failed) to bite back a smile, and it had to do both with you regarding him with as potent care as he had you and with the feeling of your fingers playing with the curls on the nape of his neck. He’d been more than willing to agree with your terms, nodding lazily as his forehead came to rest against yours, his mouth seeking your mouth, as he’d whispered, Mhm, you’ve got yourself a deal, honey.

And so you’d made good on your promise. Drank no more than two cocktails, low on alcohol but high on sugar, which is how you’d found yourself to the dance floor alongside Penelope (an event rare in and of itself, so much that she’d squealed when you’d followed her without bemoaning about it) a handful of times throughout the night. You’d only returned to your table, sitting back down with Emily and Tara, when a handsome man had seemed more eager than you to dance with her. Judging from Penelope’s immediate flirty response, you’d been more than glad to vanish quietly into the relative quietness of your booth, chitchatting with Emily and Tara about everything and nothing in particular. 

However much you enjoyed their company, though, you couldn’t help but take out your phone to quickly type a short text to Spencer. A reminder of your promise, it read: Not only am I not drunk, I’m barely even tipsy. That’s how much I love you, doc. Miss you, leave the light on for me (and for those beautiful hazel eyes of yours, you’ve probably once again hurt them enough for tonight), will you?

Not even a minute later, your phone buzzed, and the warmth radiating across your body had nothing to do with the alcohol, the atmosphere, or your previous exertion, but it had everything to do with Spencer’s message lighting up your screen: That’s my lovely girl, I’m glad to hear that, baby. And you know I will, just like I’ll do with the hot water for the shower I’ll have ready for you. Miss you more, the apartment’s too quiet without you. Give my regards to the girls, yeah?

Just as your lips were about to fall into a small pout reading his message, the corners of them immediately twitched when another notification came. One that read: P.S. I love you much, much, much more. (No, I didn’t forget to type it, the keyboard buttons just betrayed me. You might be right about me needing to get a new phone. I hope you forgive me and my affinity for outdated technology.)

You had been glad the night wrapped relatively quickly after you got that message. Not because you minded Emily’s playful comments about Spencer being able to distract you even when he’s miles away, or Tara’s light-hearted guesses on what he might have said to get you all flustered. But because you just really, really, really missed Spencer. It didn’t matter that it’d only been a few hours away from him or that the BAU girls had been more than great company, still, you’d craved Spencer’s presence as much as your lungs craved the reprieve of the fresh oxygen as you escaped the dusty, crowded bar and made your way to the cab Emily had hailed for all of you.

Unsurprisingly enough, Spencer was still at his desk scribbling down notes and filing copies of the reading material for his lectures when you walked through the door.

“Now, who is it that didn’t keep their promise?” 

He sat back against his chair as you pointed at him with your keys, lips curling into that signature grin of his. Fond. Soft. Sweet. Home, home, home.

“I say we should examine the evidence before we answer that question,” He beckons you to his lap with a flick of his hand, pushing his chair backwards, making room for you as you made your way around his desk. The creaking sound it makes is a much more welcome sound than whatever music you’d been unwillingly listening to at the club had been. You’d have to apologise to Penelope for refusing to check out the artist she’d mentioned.

You stumble over your feet once before kicking your heels off with a low groan, picking them up in your hand as you settled on his lap. Actually, plopped would be more accurate a description. 

With one arm wrapping around your waist, steadying you against him, he looks over at his watch on his other hand. Smiling triumphantly, he glances down at you where your face is resting next to his neck, “Only half-past midnight. I’d say I’m off the hook for tonight.”

“Mhm, maybe you need to fix your watch as well as your phone.” You attempt to ignore the fact he is, indeed, off the hook as far as the schedule you’d put him in goes by humouring him. It’s pointless but it offers you the opportunity to take advantage of the fact he’s discarded his suit jacket and unbuttoned the top buttons of his shirt, and thus, lavish his neck with tiny, particular kisses, instead.

He lets you do so for a beat, unperturbed as he laughs through a heavy, content exhale, and goes back to checking the papers before him. 

“Did you settle on the course structure?” You ask, leaning back slightly to peer at his desk.

“I think I have. I decided to start with two introductory lectures on the history and the context in which forensic linguistics developed as a science, then add separate lectures for each possible investigative stage the science can be used for as a tool before looking at individual cases. I figure it’ll help students accumulate the knowledge easier than if I included it all in one or two lectures. Of course, I’ll include some primary examples from notorious cases in passing during the two introductory lectures, but I’ll leave the specific details for further along the course, as well as most of the required readings. What do you think?”

You are almost surprised that you manage to catch every word that leaves his mouth, following his train of thought without any difficulty. It’s not that you usually have trouble doing so, only occasionally, but it feels nice to know your brain is attuned to his, even after the debauchery of a night out. Maybe it’s because his cadence is soft and lively as he explains it all to you, hands reaching for the carefully curated outline and the compulsory reading material for each lecture as he goes. Maybe it’s because of the way he keeps you close and turns to look at you as he shows you his work, wanting you to know as much about it as possible, because he knows you’re always eager to listen and learn. Or maybe it’s just because you’re inside his arms, and his hand is caressing your back lightly under your blazer and blouse, and the green and orange of the living room along with the faint scent of chamomile tea and old paper and his lavender shampoo (so, that’s why his curls are a little damp where you’re twisting them around your fingertips) and the characteristic timbre of Ella Fitzgerald’s voice fills the apartment from his vinyl player (jazz has always helped him concentrate) and you’re so glad to be home that you’re eager to drown in all that he has to say. In everything that he has to say. Whatever it is. Forever. Here, where you’re no longer listless and engulfed in inescapable ennui. Here, where you’re both warm and safe and loved in ways you’ve never known before.

You shake your head the tiniest bit. Mumble quietly, “I think you’re brilliant.” You nuzzle your nose against his cheek, heels dangling over his shoulder as you hug him closer, tighter. “And I think your students are lucky to have such a wonderful professor as you.” 

He blushes. Tries to hide it by kissing your knuckles all kindly. It’ll never get old to have someone support him as fiercely as you do. He feels as if there’s nothing to worry about as long as he has you there, listening to his every thought, because you care, because you always intend to know what he wants to share with you. Spencer had never thought that love could be like this — intentional, on purpose. It’s beyond anything that he could ever wish for, and so, he always muses his gratitude, sometimes out loud, other times silently, for he knows better than to have the universe or yourself think he is anything but worshipfully beholden to you and your love.

“You think so?” His free hand reaches to tuck a stray hair behind your ear. It lingers at the back of your neck, scratching gently at the skin just the way you like as you nod, before he tilts your head down to kiss your forehead. “That’s very sweet of you to say, honey. Thank you so much.” Finally, he leans further down to kiss you, tasting the cherry-like sweetness that resides on your lips and examining the evidence of your promise. “Looks like you’ve fulfilled your end of the deal as well. Almost no alcohol.”

“Told you I’d be on my best behaviour.” You preen, the words coming out almost through a yawn as you stretch like a cat perched on his lap, “I can’t believe you didn’t trust me. I’m your girlfriend, you know. That’s almost rude.”

“It is, isn’t it?” Your eyes have fallen shut when he speaks next, and you can both hear and feel his smile where his lips skim your temple, “I apologise, honey. You know I always trust you. I just get a little overprotective is all. Will you forgive me?”

“Depends.”

“On what?”

“If you didn’t use all of the hot water when you showered.”

“You know I didn’t. I couldn’t. I promised you, didn’t I?” You can feel him taking your heels from your hand before he reaches down to leave them by his desk, still holding you to his side. “Don’t I always keep my promises?”

“I suppose you do.” You nod, opening your eyes and rising slowly from his lap at his beckoning. “It’s one of the reasons why I love you so much.”

“I love you so much, too, sweet girl.” Spencer’s not sure you can’t feel the fuzziness he melts into whenever you tell him that, however you end up confessing it. It settles within him, burning him up from the inside out, and he loves embracing that feeling as much as he loves you. “Come on, let’s go get ready for bed, yeah? Or do you need me to carry you to the bathroom myself?”

“Nice try, doc. I’m not tipsy, remember?”

Still, Spencer follows behind you, arms wrapped around your waist, as you make your way to your bedroom and he watches you slip inside the bathroom. When you come out, he’s already undressed and settled under the covers, and he’s now smiling at the sight of you reaching for your pyjamas where he’s left them by the edge of the bed. Once you finally cuddle up to him, smelling of vanilla, with your skin feeling like silk under his touch, he’s left burning at your asking him to recite the part of his lecture about ambiguity which he’d shared with you earlier that day.