warning: graphic case description, blood
I slipped out of bed early the next morning to get ready for work. I gave Spencer a gentle goodbye kiss on his forehead, trying my best not to wake him from the slumber he so desperately needed.
His eyes fluttered open and he groaned, "do you have to leave yet?"
"Yeah, I have to get to work," I sighed.
"Please stay, just 5 more minutes," he pleaded, rubbing the sleep from his eyes with the back of his hands.
He didn't ask for, nor did he want my pity. He just wanted to exist in the same space as me. "Alright, fine. But only 5 minutes or else I'll be late," I conceded with barely any convincing.
We both smiled as he grabbed my arm and pulled me on top of him, kissing me intensely as if that one kiss would make me throw off my responsibilities and stay in bed with him all day. I really wished I could. I wanted to be able to experience that domestic fantasy I had scarcely let myself explore previously.
But we had another case and I had already taken off too much time without being the one who was actually sick, so I had to leave. Spencer could swing another couple of days, or at least until we got back from wherever we were traveling this time.
"I gotta go, Spence," I mumbled as he trailed kisses down my neck, leaving little purple bruises in his wake. His lips disconnected from my neck, and I placed a small kiss on his lips, jumping off of the bed before he had another chance to pull me back in. I don't know if I'd be able to resist, that time.
I parked in my usual spot in the parking garage and checked appearance in the mirror. Thankfully, my makeup was barely affected, and the hickies on my neck so small that my hair would hide them. Content with how I looked, I walked upstairs.
I arrived through the glass doors of the BAU to an assault of questions.
"How's the kid, y/l/n?" Morgan got to me first.
"He's doing better. They have him on all sorts of antibiotics, and they finally seem to be working, which is good." I was in a room full of profilers, but I still hoped they wouldn't pick up on my lie.
"I feel bad, we would've come to see him, but we just got back from a case last night," JJ apologized.
"Yeah, no worries. He knows you guys would've been there if you could've." I gave JJ my most reassuring smile.
Eager to avoid any other questions, I went and settled at my desk. Noticing me alone, Emily walked over and asked, "is that where you went Saturday?"
I hesitated, "uh- yeah, actually. He couldn't leave his place and needed a couple things from the drug store." Another half lie. Damn, I was getting good at that.
"Conference room, now," Hotch ordered from the balcony before walking into the room. "Reid won't be joining us, he's still out sick. Garcia?" He motioned to her to start presenting the case as we all entered and took our usual seats.
"Well, hello my fabulous furry friends! I wish I had happier news for you this morning, but alas, that is not in our job description." She took a brief pause to set up the graphics on the monitor behind her. "Two families have been killed in the suburbs of Chicago over the last week. Both parents and the kids all had their throats slashed. The second family was just killed last night." She clicked through the gruesome crime scene photos. "There were no signs of forced entry to the house."
"Was there a connection between the families?" Morgan asked.
"I've found bubkis, but I'll keep looking just for you, hot stuff," she winked at him in her bubbly, flirtatious manner.
Hotch raised his eyebrows and announced, "alright everyone, you know the drill. Wheels up in 30."
On the jet, my mind drifted to Spencer. I hoped he was alright. I felt guilty for having to leave him this soon. I had always wished that there was someone there for me when I was at my lowest point, and I just wanted to be that person for him.
"Y/l/n?" Hotch raised his voice to snap me out of my thoughts and grab my attention.
"Mhm?" I slowly came back to reality to find everyone's eyes on me.
"You and Prentiss go to the crime scene and find out what you can before they move the bodies. Rossi, Morgan, JJ and I will go to the local PD and set up," he ordered in his ever-stoic manner. I haven't known him for that long – hell I barely know him now – but I do know that he almost never smiles.
With the end of the conversation, I returned to my worrying about Spencer. I knew I couldn't do anything to help him right now except finishing this case as fast as possible, but that didn't lessen any of the guilt I felt about leaving.
Prentiss and I arrived at the scene of the most recent murders about an hour later. The downstairs level of the house was completely undisturbed. Not a single pillow left unfluffed or book not placed in its correct spot on the shelf.
"Well, it doesn't look like the unsub took anything. The M.O. must be personal, not monetary." I pondered.
We both made our way upstairs to where the bodies were. I walked into the master bedroom and saw both parents laying on the bed, throats slashed from ear to ear, bathing in pools of their own blood. There was a vase of still fresh roses next to the bed. I cautiously approached the roses and saw a note: "Happy Anniversary, dear. I love you." From the husband, to his wife, both laying completely void of life to my left.
I turned to look at the bodies and, in that moment, all of the intrusive thoughts I had so effectively compartmentalized came rushing to the forefront. I looked down at my body, but I wasn't in my suit and sneakers anymore. I was in my pajamas.
Confused by my changed appearance, I raised my arms to get a better look at myself. But, instead of finding the slightly raised, slightly discolored scars that I had grown accustomed to, I saw fresh wounds dripping with blood. I tried to apply pressure to them in hopes to stop the bleeding, but when I pressed down, there were no cuts. It was only blood. A deep crimson to match the flowers, enough puddling around my feet to fill an Olympic sized swimming pool.
I slowly turned my head to look into the dresser mirror across the room. I didn't see myself, instead only the ghost of a girl. Sure, she sort of resembled me, but the girl who stared back at me had different eyes. They were still green and sort of blue, but softer and more innocent, like she hadn't seen the horrible things I had.
In stark contrast with her gentle, almost angelic eyes, her mouth was tugged up into a devilish grin like she knew something I didn't. Something I would never figure out.
The next thing I knew, I was lying on my back, hearing Prentiss' worried voice and trembling hands shaking me awake. "Hey y/n, are you okay?"
"What happened?" I sat up and rubbed my eyes.
"You fainted. Here, can you stand?" She gave me her hand to grab as she helped me stand. "C'mon, you should go back to the hotel for the day and rest. I'll take you."
"No, I'm fine, really. Let's just go to the station," I insisted.
----
I didn't get back to my hotel room until a bit after 12am. Garcia had figured out that the mother of each family had attended the same spin class a month ago. We weren't quite sure what that meant yet but decided to break for the night anyways.
I did my bare minimum nightly routine and climbed into bed. 12:43am. I was exhausted from the emotional turmoil of the day, but I still couldn't fall asleep. I actually don't know if I ever did. It felt like I was just lying there awake the entire night.
I rolled out of bed at 7am feeling worse than when I got in. Sitting on the edge of the bed, trying to prolong standing for as long as possible, I checked my phone and saw a text from Spencer.
SPENCER
How's the case?
ME
It's alright, don't have any leads yet. How're you??
I was fully ready to set my phone down and not hear from him for a couple hours at least, but he responded immediately.
SPENCER
I'm okay. I went to a meeting last night. I think I'll be able to come back to work soon.
ME
That's good! I'm so proud of you. Everyone here misses you a lot, you know
I actually set my phone down this time and got ready for work, putting on my usual outfit of slacks and a button down with some sneakers. I didn't want to tell him about the whole fainting thing, because one, it wasn't a big deal, and two, he already had enough on his plate without worrying about me too. I knew Emily wouldn't say anything, either.
I kept my head down and worked the rest of the case. I knew if I focused too much on anything other than the unsub, I'd break. Worse than just hallucinations.
We narrowed down the list of suspects from the spin class to one woman. Her husband and teenaged children had all died in a car accident, but she miraculously survived. The one-year anniversary of their deaths was the stressor that led her to kill families similar to how hers once was. Rossi and Prentiss successfully arrested her without her harming herself or anyone else in the process.
I sat across from Emily on the jet ride back to Virginia. "Are you okay?" She whispered to me quietly enough so no one else would hear her.
"Yeah, I will be. Just tired, I think," I smiled.
"Well, if you ever want to talk about what's actually bugging you, I'm always around. Even if you just want to hang out and not talk, I'm here," she reassured me.
Thank god for Emily Prentiss. I still wasn't ready to tell anyone on the team why this case had affected me especially hard, but it was nice to know I could. I knew she was telling me the truth; I could go to her for help at any time – day or night – and she'd be there to listen.
I got home to my empty apartment and it felt lonelier than usual. I always thought that I would be alone forever, and I was content with that. It was the safe option. No one could hurt me if I never let them get close to me, right? But standing here now, in the wake of a case that caused me to hallucinate again for the first time in years, that future didn't have the same appeal it used to.
Instead of reaching out to Spencer or Emily for the help I knew I needed, I chose my usual tactic and rubbed salt in the emotional wound.
I plopped down on the couch, not even bothering to change into pajamas first. I flicked on the TV and started watching Twilight. Most of the time, that movie made me happy and reminded me of all the good memories growing up: my dad taking my brother and I for drives in his old pickup truck down dirt country roads, and the annual family baseball game that never failed to devolve into fits of laughter.
But I was not in that headspace tonight. Tonight, it only reminded me of the bad memories, not the good ones I craved. The thoughts that I would never drive among the corn fields and cows with my dad or watch my extremely uncoordinated mom strike out while batting rushed around my head at a dizzying rate.
The isolation of my apartment soon became too much for me to handle. Tears pricked my eyes as I dialed the number of the only person I knew would understand my loneliness.
"Hey, y/n! How was the end the of the case?" Spencer and I hadn't talked since our texts a couple days ago.
"Spence... can you uh- can you just come over? Please?" I whimpered into my phone.
"What's wrong? Send me your address, I'll be over soon." I heard him shuffling on the other end of the line.
"I j-just can't be alone right now. T-Thank you." I texted him my address and waited, the tears ebbing and flowing when they so chose. I was hiding my apartment from him for so long, afraid to let him see the unfiltered version of me. Tonight, I just needed him to hold me. It didn't matter where.
Not 20 minutes later, he knocked on my door. I answered it looking like a mess – bloodshot eyes, puffy faced, and still in my full work attire. "Oh no, y/n." I'm thankful that he didn't ask how I was, but instead just wrapped his arms around me in a tight hug. He leaned down and kissed the top of my head, only causing my tears to increase.
----
(Spencer)
The withdrawal symptoms were almost all gone. I had spent most of my days since y/n left just lying in my bed reading, trying to distract from my overwhelming boredom and cravings.
Though the physical signs of my recent relapse were dissipating, the emotional and mental ones stuck around. I knew that this would be a lifelong battle that I would lose a couple times along the way, but that didn't stop the less rational part of myself from feeling ashamed. Ashamed that y/n had had to find me, ashamed that I couldn't seem to do anything on my own anymore, ashamed that I had failed in almost every aspect of my life.
But all that mattered now was that I was sober, and I was alive. The urges were still there – they always would be – but I was managing them by going to meetings whenever they became too much, or when I could muster the energy to leave my apartment.
Interrupting me from my third time trying to read this one page, my phone buzzed on my nightstand. It was y/n. That likely meant she was back home, finally.
I answered it, probably a little too eager for my own good. I heard the cracks in her voice as she mumbled asking me to come over. I jumped up and threw on my shoes before she could even finish her sentence. I grabbed the keys to the car I hadn't driven in months and started driving, hoping it was in the right direction until she could text me her address.
I finally made it there, and ran up the steps outside, taking two at a time. I knocked on her door and she answered a few seconds later. I felt a lump form in my throat. She wasn't crying at the moment, but her cheeks were still red and wet with tears.
"Oh, y/n," I whispered as I wrapped her in my arms, tenderly kissing the top of her head. That only seemed to make her start crying more. "Shhh, y/n it's okay. Here, let's go sit down."
She didn't release her arms from around my back, but nevertheless I shuffled us over to the couch and sat us down. "Are you watching Twilight?" I thought that distracting her might ease the crying so that she'd tell me what's really wrong.
"Yes," she chuckled as she untangled her arms and sat back on the couch. "It's my comfort movie, but uh... it's obviously not really working tonight..." Her hand grabbed mine and interlaced our fingers, keeping her eyes trained down at our hands while she studied the way they looked wrapped up together.
I couldn't take my eyes off of hers, still avoiding mine, as I tried to think of a way to diminish the pain held behind them. It didn't matter what was plaguing her mind; she didn't seem to want to talk about it, so I didn't press.
I wiped the remaining tears from her cheeks with my thumb and brushed a few loose hairs out of her face. "How can I help you?" I would've done anything she asked of me.
"Can you just hold me for a while?" She whispered so quietly I could barely hear her over the sounds of the TV.
"Come here." I reached my arm out and she collapsed onto my chest. I laid us down on the couch and ran my fingers through her hair as I held her.
I had never actually been here before. In the months since we started our arrangement, we had only ever been to my place. I had done everything short of beg on my hands and knees to be able to see where she lived. I wasn't happy about why I was here right now, but I was glad to finally be here.
There wasn't an inch of empty wall space. They were all covered in artwork or bookcases or concert posters to bands that I admittedly had never heard of. I immediately recognized some of the pieces to be by Wassily Kandinsky – I had a book on some of his most famous paintings, and I caught y/n looking at it the first night she saw my apartment. He must be one of her favorites.
The cleanliness of her place rivaled my own, not a speck of dust or semblance of dirt anywhere. But there were also no overly personal things here. No pictures of her family or friends. To be fair, I didn't have any pictures of my family either, but I only really had my mom, and I saw my only friends every day at work. Maybe she was the same.
It wasn't long before I felt her breathing slowto a consistent pace as she fell asleep. If she wanted to tell me why shecalled me sobbing, she would. I squeezed her shoulder as if to say goodnightbefore closing my eyes to the sound of "Clair de Lune" playing in the movie.