We All Fall Down - A Criminal Minds AU

Twenty Seven

Over the course of the next two weeks you settled back into the house and life with Spencer Reid. Well, settled was not the best word to use as that would imply that you were actually settled and settled implied that you were happy.

Which, you weren’t unhappy as such. You were in fact a million times better than you had been in almost the entirety of your relationship with Spencer Reid. You just, well, you were just waiting. Waiting for your one year to be up. And you knew that however short one year could be to some people, for you right now, it would be long.

In the grand scheme of things though the atmosphere between you and him was improved. Perhaps because you were no longer sat at home, alone, and just waiting for him to return from work. During the first year of your marriage when he returned home to the New York apartment it was often to a newly repainted wall or ceiling, something you put effort and work into, and he was pleased with that effort and so were you. Once you had run out of the things to decorate though, your relationship had wained severely. As your mind was no longer filled with paint patterns and stencils it wandered. It wandered to Lara, to Derek, to your mother and father. And then you had become low and depressed, and Spencer’s evening chit chat about his day was no longer something you could smile and respond to, however boring you may have thought it was, it would actually irritate you. It had quickly become apparent that aside from your love of words, a lost love in your own case, you had very little in common, and even Spencer’s adoration of you couldn’t change that. And so the drinking had started, just a glass or three over the dinners you would share with him, just enough to stop you from rolling your eyes at him,with it gradually escalating to what it had ended up as.

Now though, you were back to being busy, back to having your mind occupied with a job, with having a purpose. Due to your shift times he was often gone when you woke up, making yourself a quick breakfast and doing a few chores around the house before heading off for the day. When you returned in the evenings, he would be slumped over a pile of papers, sometimes in his father’s…. in his study, sometimes at the table in the kitchen, take out containers spewed over the containers. Most evenings you would make your excuses and disappear for a hot bath before falling into bed again but some nights, more nights than you would have even thought possible, you found yourself talking to him. Never for too long, the longest had been for around ninety minutes, him commenting about a lecture he was giving the following day an a book that he had covered when you were his student. The conversation had been pleasant, almost a reminder of the time when you could devour books and create worlds with your pen, a reminder that you had at least had that one thing in common.

Some exchanges between you both were stilted, him not quite knowing how to ask you if you could run into town before work one morning to post something for him, you not quite knowing how to ask him what to do with some more of his father’s files that you had found. But somehow you both managed it, managed to actually communicate with each other without venom in your voices, without him looking at you with the distain and indifference that had been there for so long. This was progress, much needed progress. The only issue was that you were quite sure that Spencer saw this progress as a positive step into renewing your marriage whereas to you it was simply a means to an end.

When the first Sunday after you had returned had rolled around you told Spencer that you would be out for the day, visiting Tara and Emily. He seemed disappointed but you reminded him that this was part of who you were now, you had friends and you weren’t intending on letting those friendships slip. And you did visit with them, for at least an hour before Luke came to collect you for your Sunday hike, not questioning the arrangement until you were out on the trail.

“I can collect you from your house you know,” he tossed a stick for Roxy who bounded off to collect it.

“I know. I’d just…. rather not deal with the questions it would raise.”