The Keeping of Words | Spencer Reid

4 |Voice Across Distance

"Kindness is words creates confidence. Kindness in thinking creates profoundness. Kindness in giving creates love." – Lao Tzu

"Reid," said the voice on the other end of the phone, in what Bianca assumed was supposed to be a formal-sounding tone.

"Hi, um Dr. Reid? This is Bianca Brown. From New York?" Already she regretted calling him. He probably didn't even remember her. It was probably silly. Before she could panic and hang up, she heard him respond.

"Bianca, hi! I was actually uh, thinking about calling you. But I guess you beat me to it." He actually sounded happy to hear from her.

She fiddled the sleeve of her sweater, still unable to shake the nervous fluttering feeling in her chest. "Yeah, I... I really enjoyed talking to you when your team was helping out up here."

"How did that turn out by the way?" Reid asked eagerly.

"Pretty great! Kana -um, Judge Mogami and Dr. Baker escorted him to the Netherlands. His trial with the ICC is going to be starting soon, but after apprehending him and his accomplice, the UN has been able to track and arrest several more of his generals. That wouldn't have happened without the BAU."

"I just wish there was more we could do. Knowing that there's still so many groups like that, who get away with forcing children into armies like that so easily..." He trailed off, and Bianca thought that it must be so similar, the work he did. Catching one unsub, and knowing that there were more out there, doing the same thing, cases that were still waiting for the team to solve the next week.

She tried to push the thought away. Smiling to herself, she said, "It made a difference to that one."

"Huh?"

"That story, about the starfish. What you did, it made a difference to the kids that we saved this time. And... it made a difference to me."

There was a short pause on the other line, and Bianca worried she'd said something wrong. Then - "I think I might just need to put that up on my wall too." She couldn't help but laugh. "You know, I read your poems - the whole book," he went on, and it was her turn to fall quiet. "They were really beautiful."

She always felt unprepared when people brought that up. What was she supposed to say? She was always afraid of sounding proud, but that was exactly what she felt when he called her words beautiful. "Oh gosh. Um, thanks. It still feels weird to think that people want to buy my book, and read what I write. But I'm glad you liked it, Dr. Reid."

"Oh, call me Spencer. Please."

"Spencer," she repeated, trying out the sound of it. She liked the way it rolled off lips. She liked it very much.

★---☆---★

He'd never really seen the appeal of phone calls before. Sure, Reid had a cell phone for his job because it was convenient. He needed to be able to communicate with his team, and anyone else who might need to be notified during a case. They spent so much time together in person, it hardly seemed necessary to call when they weren't. The only other human being he communicated that often with was his mother, and he always wrote her letters. So maybe the reason he'd never seen the appeal was because he'd never really had anyone to call before.

He did now.

Phone calls were the fastest, easiest way to talk to Bianca. It was how they got to know each other, exchanging so many of the little things that most people typically did in person.

It was how she knew that he was from Nevada, he went to college at Caltech (where he got all of his degrees), he was close to his mom, and was afraid at the dark.