✓ | sick of losing soulmates [SPENCER REID]

3.1

"No, she's not," retorts Spencer automatically as he collapses into his seat, a couple of the others pulling out their own chairs to follow suit. "We met once on a case, and then in LA, and that — that's it."

That's it.

Had he really forgotten she'd ditched him? Completely forgotten about him?

Any embarrassment and relief to see her, any excitement to finally speak to her again, drained out of him like spaghetti water through a colander. He practically felt himself go pale as realisation washed over him that Iris didn't want to be his friend — found him annoying, even though she'd pretended she didn't back in LA. Anger surged through him: not hot, uncontrollable fury, but instead a cold and crisp resentment that made an icy void open up in his chest.

"That's not 'it'!" Derek retorts, leaning back in his chair with a grin. He looks at Emily. "He totally had a crush."

Spencer shoots him a glare, which quickly turns on JJ when she laughs, and then Emily when she chuckles out, "That's really cute, Reid."

Interrupting their moment of light-heartedness, which to Spencer are like oxygen considering the grim nature of his job, the door swings open and Garcia enters with a grin, lighting up the room with her extravagant dress-sense, followed by Rossi. They take their seats and, just before the door swings wholly shut and the lock clicks, Hotch enters and Iris follows.

Spencer looks away, staring straight ahead, but hears Hotch introduce her to the team as a whole, and then there's a shuffle as she takes a seat. She's sat at the corner of his vision, and he can see the tanned circle of her face so he can tell she's looking at him, but he doesn't look back; it takes force to resist the urge to do so, but he manages.

Hotch sighs, making him look up as he fiddles with his pen, and then says: "Brian Matloff."

"Who?" Garcia asks.

"AKA the Blue-Ridge Strangler," Spencer answers. He was surprised the others seemed to have remembered the case just from the name of the killer, but clearly Derek had, and of course Spencer would remember. Well, all things considered, it was a memorable case. One of the first he ever worked, back when he had that awful greased hair and still wore those terrible mustard-yellow sweaters.

God, what was he thinking?

"That was, like, four years ago," Garcia says, looking back at Hotch.

"Three female victims in the Blue-Ridge parkway," Emily says.

"Don't you remember?" Spencer asks, looking at JJ. Then, leaping at his chance with a soar of courage, he says coldly, "Although, I'll admit that people seem to forget very easily nowadays."

Undoubtedly, it's cruel of him to single Iris out on her first day — hell, its a cruel thing to do whenever — but he can't help himself. Some part of him deems it morally correct, or at least deserved on her part. The pain he felt when she dropped all contact with him has now turned into anger and resentment, and that's merely fuel for cruelty.

"Allegedly, he was never convicted," he continues nonchalantly, even though all the others have picked up on his cold tone of voice and have sensed it's some kind of insult — including Iris. "He slipped into a coma before he could be tried."