"Sometimes, the best way to help someone is just to be near them." ~ Veronica Roth
The Lover
When I didn't reply to Melanie's email, it was as though she'd understood that that was enough correspondence.
I felt guilt stronger than the whole of the Atlantic washing over me in a tsunami tide. Not only for ignoring her email and therefore no longer speaking with her - even though that's the one and only thing that had helped me over those few days - but for speaking with her while still being with Dylan.
I didn't understand why; Morgan was right, I wasn't doing anything wrong. But Garcia had explained to me everything she'd said to Dylan and that made me feel bad.
Dylan shouldn't be thought of any less just because Melanie and I had been talking.
What Melanie and I had had already intimidated Dylan enough; she'd explained so, so many times and each time I'd felt sick with guilt.
Over the next few weeks, I'd tried to figure out what was the right thing to do.
End my relationship with Dylan in order to stop feeling guilty at every waking thought of Melanie? Or rush things forward; push on in our relationship in an attempt to permanently block-out Melanie.
I was lost in a sea of indecisiveness and I hated it.
"Just your usual honey?" The cashier asked and I nodded, handing over the bill before accepting the cup of coffee and heading out of the coffee-shop.
Instead of taking the metro to Quantico that morning, I decided to walk in order to clear my head. I walked along the busy street, trying to decide how to play these next couple of days.
Dylan and I were supposed to be meeting up that night for dinner, considering what today was, but I felt like I shouldn't be doing that. I felt like I should be at home; curled under my duvet, crying.
That's certainly what I felt like doing.
As if my mind could turn against me even more I imagined what I'd be doing on this day if the events of three years ago hadn't happened.
Well, right now I'd probably be taking our son to play-group, his Melanie-eyes smiling at me as he waved goodbye from the window, laughing with the friends I'd never had at his age.
My breath whooshed out of my mouth in a sudden gulp as I saw Melanie before me; her gorgeous face twisted in laughter as it washed over me like melted butter while she held a beautiful bouncing boy in her arms; balanced on her hip as the pair waved through a window, laughing.
I tried to blink my eyes clear; escape my head and the reverie it was tormenting me with but I couldn't. This image before me was real.
She turned and our eyes met and instantly I felt the life draining from me.
"Spencer." She said in that beautiful tone of hers. But I was frozen, I could barely breathe.
"Ennie let's go!" The small boy cheered and my eyes fell on him tearfully.
Melanie approached me; frozen on the side-walk as people hurried around me on their way to work.
"Spencer," She said again, straightening the boy on her hip as she stopped in front of me. "This is Thomas. Caitlyn's son, remember? It's been a while."
She said, running a hand through the boy's caramel hair that kind-of matched Melanie's dyed highlights.
"Thomas." I told myself.
Remember Spencer?!
"He was just a few months old the last time you saw him. At my going-away party."
"Caitlyn's son." I mumbled. Melanie looked up at me with tearful eyes.
"I-i-if I'd have known I'd have bumped into you this morning I wouldn't have come here," She explained. "I'm sorry Spencer." Her tone was so sincere and apologetic it took my breath away all over again.
"Do you know what today is?" I whispered, my eyes unblinking from the boy again as he innocently looked around at the people walking by and the shops surrounding us.
"Yes. But it's also Thomas' third birthday," She explained, bouncing the boy on her hip. He cheered at her words and she laughed at his excitement. "I'm looking after him so Caitlyn can sort his surprise." She explained and I nodded.
"I-I-I have to get to w-w-work." I stuttered, deciding there and then that I had to tear myself away from the situation as quickly as possible.
"Please," She said, grabbing my hand before I could run away. "Let's just talk a while? Please?" Her tone was so pleading and emotional I knew I couldn't say no.
When I didn't say anything she sighed and smiled.
"Thank you," She mumbled. "I'm taking Thomas to play-group and then we're going for some lunch. If I call my dad will you come with us?" I slowly nodded my head, deciding that I actually really wanted to spend some time with her.
On today of all days... I missed her.
The Daughter
I hadn't expected to see Spencer. On today of all days especially.
I was only in town for a few hours to celebrate my godson's birthday and then I was back to New York to complete my team's training. I never would have thought I'd bump into Spencer in the middle of the side-walk when he really should've been in work.
He sat in silence in shot-gun while Thomas and I sung along to some nursery rhymes. I tried to catch up with Caitlyn, Ben, Daisy and Thomas whenever I was back in D.C but that didn't always go according to plan and so I missed out on a lot.
But Thomas was my god-son and I knew I wasn't going to miss out on his third birthday. I'd missed his second the year previous and I hadn't forgiven myself.
"Just give me five minutes." I said to Spencer as we pulled up outside the play-group. "I'll take him in and then I'll call my dad." Spencer nodded but said no words.
"You be good Tommy, okay?" He nodded his beautiful mop of curls as I settled him down on his feet by his coat-peg.
He hung up his little cardigan and ran for his group of friends over by the building blocks. I signed my name on the register and thanked his key-worker before heading outside worriedly.
I watched from the doorway as Spencer leaned against the hood of my car, smoking as he stared into space. I wondered how many of those he'd already had that morning.
"Melanie, is everything okay?" My dad answered on the third beat.
"Uh, not entirely..." I mused. "I'm with Spencer," I explained. "And you know what day it is."
"It's Thomas' birthday, but of course I know what day it is," He sighed. "Tell Spencer not to worry about anything. I'll expect him to join us whenever he's ready."
"Thank you dad. I'll pop by and see Beth and Jack before I leave."
"They'd like that. Take care Mel."
"You too." I hung up with a heaved sigh and knew that these next few hours were going to be some of the worst.
The Lover
I stubbed out my cigarette and climbed back in the car as Melanie made her way across the parking lot, looking like a model for a mother's magazine rather than an FBI agent on her day off.
She didn't say anything as she got back in the car and peeled out of the parking lot.
The entire car was silent in fact until she pulled up outside a coffee-shop.
"Is this okay? It's just for a while until I have to pick up Thomas." I nodded my head.
"This is fine." I explained, loosening my seat-belt.
"You know Spence, this is only going to work if you actually talk to me." She said matter-of-factly.
"I don't really know what to say, Mel." I said quietly.
"As long as you promise to listen, and say anything if you feel like it," I nodded my head and she arched a brow. "A wise man once told me that a promise doesn't mean anything if you don't say it out loud."
Remembering troubled Nathan and how I'd said those same words to Melanie years previous, I smiled and cleared my throat.
"I promise."
"Good, let's go. They have a double shot Americano with my name on it." I smirked at her straight-forwardness as we climbed out of the car.
Perhaps this whole ordeal wasn't going to be so bad after all.
The Daughter
We sat down in the quiet corner in the relatively empty back-patio of the coffee-shop where I knew Spencer could light-up a cigarette if he needed to.
Which, regarding the conversation we were going to have to have, I knew he'd probably want to.
At first, there was silence. Just the pair of us thinking our separate thoughts, drinking our separate coffees and living in our separate worlds; something we'd been doing for far too long to suddenly stop.
"I thought I was imagining things when I saw you in the street, before. With Thomas." Spencer said quietly, surprising me by being the first to speak.
I looked over at him to find him already looking at me, his fingers tapping nervously against the sides of his practically-untouched coffee cup.
"Really?" I asked eventually, lost in his eyes. He nodded his head and looked down at his coffee, licking his lips desperately and blinking.
"I-I was thinking about today... And what I'd be doing- well, what we'd be doing, if... if our baby was here." His voice trailed off quieter and quieter but I could still hear him, could still hear the agony and torture in his voice.
"I do that too," I whispered, nodding as I looked at my coffee swirling in my cup. "Sometimes I wonder if I do it too much," I sighed.
"I think of how he'd look, how well he'd get along with Jack and Henry and Thomas..." I shook my head. "But it hurts too much to think that way too often. It helps to grieve, but hurts to believe." He looked over at me and reached across the table, taking my hand in his.
"We've not really helped each other much," He said softly, searching my eyes and expression. "And I'm sorry, that's been my fault. I... I didn't deal with any of this well."
"That's expected Spence," I whispered. "There's no right or wrong way to take a miscarriage," I explained. He shook his head and licked his lips again, looking back down at his cup. "We dealt with it how we thought was best."
"I'm sorry Melanie," He mumbled, pulling his hand out of mine in order to rub at his forehead gruffly.
"I should've been there for you. I was too selfish. I didn't think of you, I only thought of me losing our child and not us losing our baby." I didn't know what to say to him, didn't know how to make any of this better.
He sighed and reached into his inside pocket, pulling out his pack of cigarettes.
He opened his mouth, looking at me questioningly but I smiled and shook my head,
"On you go." I nodded, wrapping my hands around my cup and lifting it to my lips as he lit up.
He sighed and tilted his head back.
"I know this is bad," He said, nodding to the cigarette in his hands. "But it helps."
"Nothing that helps could ever be bad." I replied and he nodded his head, shrugging.
"I never thought we'd get like this, you know. Living miles apart, so different to each other that we're practically strangers, having to force ourselves to go for coffee just so we can talk about our miscarriage." I lowered my head, trying to push the lump out of my throat.
"You and I both." I whispered, unable to raise my voice any louder.
"I just wanted it so much." He said in a broken voice, and when I looked back up he had both hands covering his face and his cigarette balanced on the ash-tray in front of him on the table.
I opened and closed my mouth a few times, fast, gaping like a fish without a clue of what to say in order to lessen his pain any.
Instead, I leaned forward and grabbed him in my arms, pulling him against me and pushing his head down onto my shoulder, deciding that sometimes, actions were far better than any amount of words.
He wrapped his arms around me in return and we hugged for what felt like a lifetime.
"Well isn't this cosy..." A sharp voice pierced the silence and I pulled back from Spencer, turning around to find the short brunette eccentric girl from a while ago stood in front of the table, glaring at Spencer with her arms folded.
"Dylan?" Spencer choked, and after a delayed moment he leapt to his feet in surprise.
"What the Hell Spencer?! Why aren't you at work?!"
"Why aren't you at work? What're you doing here?"
"I asked you first," There was a pause. "What's that?!" She demanded, looking at the cigarette.
I looked from it to Spencer's shocked expression and I looked back at Dylan as I stubbed the cigarette out in the ash-tray.
"Sorry, that's mine. It's a bad habit, don't tell my dad," I smirked before clearing my throat. "Listen, I'm sorry, this is my fault. I was upset and I bumped into Spencer on his way to work and I asked if he'd come for a coffee with me. I'm sorry."
"You're sorry?!" She demanded, her anger rolling off of her in waves.
"Ironic how it's taken you two and a half years to establish you're sorry. He's moved on, Miss England, he's not interested." I was surprised by her coldness and abruptness, this little eccentric girl who seemed like butter wouldn't melt.
I dropped my head to hide my surprised expression, and to hide the fact I was smirking.
"Dylan," Spencer choked. "That's hardly fair."
"Well, how she's treated you is hardly fair, Spencer. I'm sick of tiptoeing around the fact that everyone thinks she's an angel. She left you, and now she thinks she can click her fingers and you'll comfort her?"
"Actually it was-"
I stood up, getting in-between them.
"Listen, this hardly merits an argument between you both," I said, turning from Dylan to glance at Spencer now behind me as I turned to face his new girlfriend.
"This is my fault, and I'm so sorry. I didn't mean to cause any hurt or anger. I'm only in town to see my god-son and I should never have suggested we come for a coffee, Spencer. I just hope that you're okay now."
"Oh, you hope that now?! Really? Where the Hell were you when he wasn't okay months after you abandoned him you cold-hearted bitch."
"Dylan that's enough! You don't know what we're going through."
"You're not going through anything! You," She frantically gestured between Spencer and I. "Ended years ago!"
"You have no idea what we went through and what we're still going through," I said in a serious tone without even blinking.
Immediately her entire demeanour changed and I felt Spencer stiffen behind me. That tone I recognised and had adopted from my father; and whenever it was used, it was an automatic reaction to shut the hell up and listen.
"Despite the fact that mine and Spencer's relationship ended years ago, it doesn't change what happened, and that every year that passes is another reminder of what we could have, but what we will never have," I turned to my chair and picked my bag from the arm.
"Please don't make today any harder than what it has to be for him." I added quietly to Dylan before hurrying away from the pair and upstairs out of the coffee shop; my heart thudding in my chest as I swallowed the lump in my throat and blinked the tears from my eyes.
The Lover
Dylan blinked at me in shock as Melanie left.
"I can't believe you just said that, Dylan." I said, shaking my head as I lowered myself back into my chair.
"And I can't believe everyone worships the ground that woman walks on despite the fact she's destroyed your life."
"No!" I yelled, making her skinny frame jump in surprise. "Melanie has not destroyed my life!" I said firmly.
"Melanie made my life! It was a depressed woman who couldn't get over the death of her child that ruined my life! That woman destroyed my life, not Melanie. You will not speak to Melanie like that again, do you understand?!"
"Don't you dare speak to me like I'm a child, Spencer. I understand more than what you do. You don't see it the way I see it. I'm an outsider Spencer, on every single occasion because you never let me close. You always shut me down and shove me away before I can ever help you. I had to track your cell-phone just so I could make sure you were still alive!" I frowned.
"You did what?" She blinked at me in surprise, as if she'd just revealed her most secret, secret. "You tracked my cell-phone? What the hell? Have you never heard of just calling me? Or asking my boss?"
"Aaron Hotchner?" She scoffed in a quiet voice. "The man who just-so-happens to be your ex-fiance's father? I'd rather walk over broken glass all the way to England than ask that man for anything."
"Well, maybe you should do that."
"What?"
"Maybe you should walk all the way to England and not bother coming back."
"Spencer?!"
"Today," I sighed, pinching the bridge of my nose. "Is the three-year anniversary of the death of my child," My voice cracked and for a moment I thought I was going to lose it.
"And the fact you've come here, after tracking me - illegally - only to throw around ridiculous and insulting accusations and diminishing insults at not only me, but the only other person in the entire world who knows what I'm going through... That's only made my day one million times harder than it could ever have been."
There was a short silence as Dylan realised for the first time what I was trying to tell her. We'd never spoken about the miscarriage. I wasn't even sure if she knew that Melanie and I had lost a child.
"Spencer I-I didn't realise... If... If somebody would have told me-"
"I've tried," I mumbled. "I've tried a hundred times before. But today, you saw red - or green for jealousy - and you didn't even bother to just think before you came here to insult me.
"So no, you will never speak to Melanie like that again, and you will never do anything like this to me again either."
"Spencer just let me... let me comfort you."
"Comfort?" I snapped, pulling away from her touch.
"I'm not the one who needs comforting!" I gushed as I leapt to my feet.
"I was the one being comforted before you came along and smashed the only confidence and comfort Melanie had built for herself. So no. I will not let you comfort me because you didn't let me comfort Melanie."
So maybe that wasn't the best thing to say to your girlfriend in regards to your ex. But I didn't care.
Dylan had to hear how I felt because really, she was the only one who hadn't heard how I'd been feeling.
The Daughter
I'd made it all the way to the play-group before my phone began ringing.
I glanced at the caller ID and sighed as I recognised Spencer's number.
"Hello?"
"Melanie I'm so sorry. She had no right to say all those things."
"Spencer it's-"
"It's not okay. Without... Without seeing you today, I don't think I would've been able to deal with how I was feeling. You... You really helped me Melanie and it's not fair that she said all of those things."
"Spencer she's your girlfriend. If our roles were reversed I'd feel the exact same if I'd have tracked you all the way to a coffee-shop basement where you were sat holding your ex-fiance."
"But it's not about who you are to me, Mel, it's about what the day is to me," I didn't quite know what to say to this.
"Anyway, I'm sorry about what she said. And... thank you for helping me today. Without seeing you I don't know how I would've dealt with today,"
I pinched the bridge of my nose. Please stop, Spencer.
"And in all of the fuss, I never got to ask you how you were coping. I want you to know that just because I'm with Dylan now, it doesn't mean that I don't want to help you too."
Please, please stop Spencer.
"Thank you... I... I don't know what to say."
"You don't have to say anything. But I'm just really sorry."
"Me too Spence."