nemesism // spencer reid angst

don't go

"Of course I do, pretty boy. You may have grown up with people who didn't care about your feelings, but that's not how it is anymore. You can always come to me with what you are thinking or experiencing, and I promise I will never be angry with you or impose any sort of punishment." Derek rubbed Spencer's back slowly and softly as Spencer continued crying.

Spencer hated crying, but he couldn't stop. Everything was hitting him all at once. The fact that he had been treated so horribly as a child, that he never even had a childhood, the drug addiction stemming from his abduction, that his life had been full of tragedy and trauma, that he couldn't let anyone in, and - arguably most important - that he was addicted to cutting himself. How had he let it get so far?

"I'm- I've ruined myself." Spencer wept. The realizations were all too much. "I'm ruined."

"Oh, Spence, you aren't ruined. You've had hardship, but you're the strongest person I know. You can beat this, I know it." Derek murmured soothingly.

"What if I can't? Because, to be honest, I don't think I can. It's just easier to let it eat away at me instead of trying to destroy it."

"Wouldn't it be easier in the long run to use the energy you have left to destroy it now and save yourself from later suffering?"

"I don't know. Sometimes," Spencer chokes out a sob, "Sometimes I think I'm too far gone. That I can't be saved."

"Nobody is ever too far gone, pretty boy."

"You're wrong. There's too much darkness inside of me; no amount of light is going to make it all go away. It's too expansive, too consuming." Spencer sniffled and used the back of his hand to wipe the moisture covering his cheeks. "Emotional abuse, physical abuse, sexual abuse, drug addiction, self-harm addiction, abducted and held captive, drugged against my will... should I keep going?" Spencer's breathing began to hasten as he spoke. Just saying all of it aloud made him sick to the stomach.

"No, Spencer. Stop. You're working yourself up again." Derek rubbed his back soothingly as he murmured. "I can't imagine how you feel or what you've been through. I won't sit here and tell you that it's fine, that you're okay. You've had so, so much trauma that just builds and builds. Of course you're going to feel like you're unable to heal." Derek shifted so Spencer's head was leaned up, their eyes meeting. "But that doesn't mean it's true. It'll be hard. So damn hard. But if anyone can do it, it's you. You deserve a better life than this, Spencer."

"That's what Hotch said." Spencer laughed wetly and turned himself so he could bury his face into Derek's chest. He wrapped his arms around his friend so that they were fully entwined.

"Hotch is a smart man." The smile was evident in Derek's words.

"Yeah. He really is." Spencer affirmed. "Speaking of Hotch... this isn't really what I meant to talk about. Not all of it, at least." "What else did you want to talk about, pretty boy?" Derek asked. Spencer pulled back and out of the hug so they were sitting across from each other before he began speaking.

 "You know just as well as I do that severely abused children grow up to be closed-off adults. We've seen it plenty of times. And, well, I'm that adult. The one who shuts himself off from everyone and everything." Spencer took a deep breath in and steadied himself for the next part of his speech. "I learned how to turn it all off. That includes emotions. Really all I do is work, sleep, eat, or self-destruct. I'm not normal, I don't know how to be a person like you. It doesn't help when you add Autism to the mix." Spencer laughed wryly.