Wild Nights, Wild Nights || Spencer Reid x Reader

22. Darkness is about to Pass

And despite the still present guilt and worry regarding Samantha Lark, despite JJ's words and their implications, you couldn't help but smile at the sight of him.

You silently took your shoes off and dropped your purse off by the door before hanging up your coat and walking over to him.

He stirred with a sharp inhale as you perched on the edge of the couch. His eyes fluttered open, and he sleepily murmured, "Hi, you're back."

"I'm back," you whispered back. You couldn't help but run your fingers through his hair, still slightly damp from a shower.

Spencer sighed and leaned into your touch. He swallowed before a smile rose to his lips, lifting a hand to his face to rub his eye. "I finally read that book. I'm trying to be more up to date with contemporary fiction," he said, opening his eyes and pointing to the coffee table.

An amused smile spread across your face. "I noticed. Was it good?"

He laughed and answered, "I can see why Oprah would choose it for her book club, now. I, uh..." He laughed to himself again, finally sitting up. "I read it in less than fifteen minutes, but I didn't expect it to be quite such an emotional experience."

You stole a glance at the nearly 1,000 page book on your coffee table. I Know This Much is True told the story of Dominick Birdsey, a forty-year-old man struggling to find forgiveness and healing while being the sole caretaker for his identical twin brother Thomas, a paranoid schizophrenic.

You could see why it might have struck something with Spencer.

"What'd you think?" you asked.

Spencer thought for a moment. "I expected it to be more of a drama given the opening incident, but I wasn't disappointed with where it ended up. I don't really... love contemporary literature that delves into severe mental illness. I find that contemporary authors often romanticize it for the sake of entertainment, which is always extremely off-putting. But that was..." He trailed off, glancing down at the novel again. "That was incredibly dark, and real, and gripping, and not for the faint of heart. Three and a half out of five stars."

"Why only three and a half?"

Spencer shrugged. "The ending felt a little bit insincere, a little bit too... neat." Then he thought a bit more and added, "But perhaps that was the point. Okay. Four out of five stars, if for nothing else than for the line 'But what are our stories if not the mirror we hold up to our fears.'"

You laughed and answered, "Yeah, Wally Lamb is pretty quotable."

It was true, but as you locked eyes with Spencer, your mind went to a particular quote from Lamb's debut novel, She's Come Undone:

If you risked love, it took you wherever you wanted to go. If you repressed it, you ended up unhappy.

You'd read that novel years ago, fairly soon after you moved to Virginia, but that quote had stuck with you. You didn't really understand it at the time. Frankly, you hadn't wanted to and found the notion of "happiness" relying on "love" laughable. After everything with Alexander, after believing that your ability to "love" another had been stolen from you, you were content to never understand the breadth of that quote as the average unburdened person might.

Now, though, after all this time and despite your best efforts to avoid such a feat, you wondered if you were inadvertently beginning to understand it at last.

But then JJ's words echoed in your mind, and you quickly cast the thought away, clearing your throat and standing up. You held out a hand for Spencer. "Come on. I'm going to get ready for bed."