It had been a bad day for her and Spencer knew that before he even enter her apartment. In fact it was the main reason he was even going to her apartment, not to see if she was okay because he knew she wasn’t, but he wanted to try to provide a distraction for her, to try to prevent her from doing what he knew she’d want to do.
Y/N had become an intregal part of Spencer Reid's life over the past few years. She’d gone from someone who he’d barely acknowledged at work to someone who was his best friend and was one of the people he cared most about in the world. That day she'd ended up out in the field with the rest of his team and she'd saved his life had changed their relationship completely. And it was a change for the better. She was one of nicest, kindest, smartest people he knew, something he never realised at first. And now he did, he couldn't help but wonder how he'd missed out of her friendship for all the years he had gone without. She was brilliant.
Except she didn’t think that. She thought she was the worst and had thought so for many years, something drilled into her from a young age by an abusive father and a passive mother who didn’t give a shit about her. Her school life had not been much different, Y/N being bullied for years because of intelligence. Even as an adult, having gone through many years of therapy and being one of the most renowned agents her field didn't help change her view of herself. The abuse from her childhood continued to scar her emotionally and she continued to scar herself physically.
Spencer had found out about it quite accidentally. She never intended to tell him, never intended to tell anyone but he had come around earlier than their agreed time once before, using the spare key she had given him months ago. He'd misunderstood the noise she had made when he’d knocked on her bedroom door and had taken it as a welcoming rather than the “oh shit, give me a minute” that it actually was. It was then that he’d seen the scars on her thighs, the fresh blood oozing from the marks she’d carved into her skin with a razor blade. After much coaxing on his behalf she finally caved, breaking down into his arms and telling him of her awful past, how she felt so worthless and so unlike the marvelous woman he knew her to be. And after that he began to notice when she wasn’t being herself, and he resolved himself to do everything he could to help her, or if he couldn’t help her, just at least be there for her so she didn’t feel so alone.
Today, something had happened. There had been a case at a local school. A teenage girl, with a gun, taking out half of the schools football with it before she was stopped. Y/N had convinced the girl to surrender, placing herself between an FBI sniper and the girl as she talked her down, the girl eventually tossing her weapon to the floor and breaking down in tears. The girl had been bullied for years, by both her classmates and at home by her parents. She had no respite from the cruel words that were thrown at her everyday, from the slurs that were scrawled across her locker and that were then barked at her from her junkie parents when she got home. She had had enough. Y/N had been excellent out in the field, but Spencer knew she was triggered. And he also knew what she would do when she was triggered.
The scene he found was as he expected and Y/N didn’t even flinch or try to stop what she was doing when he entered her bedroom. Her thighs were bare, sleep shorts rolled up to expose the marred flesh to her. Her instrument of choice this time was a compass and rather than random lines, she was carving words into her skin. Spencer could make them out as he grew closer, his blood boiling as he recognised some of the words as taunts that today's shooter had experienced. The same taunts that Y/N had long ago told him that had been thrown at her as a teenager.
Whore
Slut
And her own personal add ins; failure. Worthless. Trash.
Spencer didn’t even speak to her, he just moved to the bathroom that joined onto her room, filling a basin with warm water and grabbing a clean wash cloth. She didn’t fight as he pulled the compass from her hands, didn’t argue as he carefully cleaned the blood from her thighs, hoping she hadn’t cut deep enough to scar this time. She sat there emotionless and numb.
“Y/N, why?” He didn’t expect her to answer but she did.
“They all said these things about me. And so did my father. People said them about me so they must be true.”
“But they’re not, they’re just words. Cruel, meaningless words.”
She shrugged. “People said them so they must be true.”
“So you thought you’d etch them onto your skin?”
“If it’s what I am then why not have it written on me?”
Spencer shook his head sadly. She took so much stock in what other people said about her, a trait ingrained into her. He glanced around the room, more out of habit than anything but he spotted something that gave him an idea. Leaving her bed he grabbed her pen pot from her desk, pulling out a sharpie and sitting back down next to her.
“You want the untrue words that others say about you to be written on you so why not have the truthful words that I think about you written onto you as well.”
He took her arm, knowing full well she’d have to wear long sleeves for the next few days but not caring. Uncapping the pen he began to write, his messy scrawl beginning to cover her arms.
Amazing
Beautiful
Brave
Strong
Astounding
Unique
Sunshine
Every positive word he associated with her he inked onto her skin, her not saying anything but just sitting there wide eyed as he marked her. When he finally ran out of words he recapped the pen and tossed it to one side.
“These are just words though Spencer, they’re not who I am.”
“It’s who you are to me. And if words aren’t who you are then the ones on your legs don’t mean a thing either. If you must…. if you must do this to yourself then don’t carve hateful things onto your skin. You are not any of those things. You are…. you are the entire opposite of everything you think you are. Write love on your skin instead of hate.”
Spencer wasn’t always great with words, he fumbled and stumbled when it came to feelings and making someone feel better but he tried. And she knew that. And as she stared down at her arms, at all the lovely things he’d written about her, she wished that one day she would believe that they were all true. For now though, he believed it and he was here.
“Thank you.”