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There was a slip, a twist, a crash. For just a moment the world tumbled away and he had no control to stop it. A sharp pain, a flash of black, and swirling green followed.
The first thing he was aware of, other than the pain, was the smell of soil, rich and dark. It was damp beneath him though not quite mud, saturated from near constant rain. It clung to him, sticking to his hands and his cheeks, soaking into the folds of his clothes. The next thing he realized was that the swirling green was the boughs of trees, though the swaying was only in part because of the wind through the canopies—his vision was spinning slightly from the impact. He was in a forest, lush and deep. The final thing he noticed was the sound of heavy footfalls crashing through the woods behind him. He felt a flash of fear before realizing that he wasn’t being chased. The face of his friend and colleague, Derek Morgan, appeared in his field of vision, just as unstable as the leaves above him, though still distinctly recognizable.
“Are you alright, Pretty Boy? You took quite the tumble there.” Morgan’s tone was light but the worry was clear on his face.
Spencer felt like he could cry from embarrassment. His own body had betrayed him, his lack of coordination causing him to slip down a hill and smack his head in the process, likely resulting in at least a minor concussion. To make things worse, he had tripped over nothing. Not a stick, or a tree root, just some damp leaves over smooth soil.
He hadn’t even been chasing anybody, just looking for any evidence possibly left over at an old dump site that may have been missed in the initial search. It was his and Morgan’s job to search for clues that might have been overlooked, or at the very least bring a new perspective to the scene.
Something wet began to trickle down the side of his face, a slow embrace with gravity, and he thought for a moment that he actually was crying. But the warm liquid wasn’t spilling from his eyes, it was coming from the side of his forehead, matting in his hair and pooling in the soil still stuck to his cheek. Blood.
He was rushed to the hospital as quickly as possible, which was actually quite a long journey given the distance to the hospital from the middle of the woods. Spencer was forced to wallow in his misery the whole drive there. When he was cleaned up and tests were completed, it was discovered that he had, infact, given himself a minor concussion.
Hotch ordered that he be taken off the case completely. Spencer did everything he could to fight the decision, but orders are orders and the doctor said he shouldn’t be in the field. It was too soon for him to fly home with the concussion, the risk of causing further injury too high after the recent impact. He was stuck in some podunk town in the forests of Oregon, unable to help his team in any way that mattered.
—♡—
The roads out here are winding, a sea of green and brown flashing outside the windows as you make the seemingly never ending drive from the local precinct out to the home of a couple you’re supposed to interview. Prentiss sits behind the wheel while you idly flip through stations on the radio. Nothing but static and country songs greet you with each change of the dial.
A smattering of small droplets dust the windshield as you drive. Prentiss reaches to switch on the windshield wipers, an attempt to regain clarity, before changing her mind and pulling her hand back to the wheel. The rain is enough to be an annoyance but not enough to blur your vision.
“Do you think we’ll actually learn anything here?” you ask, finally settling on a station.
“They’re our best lead so far,” Prentiss states. Her response doesn’t really answer your question but you don’t call her out on it. Instead you stare out at the blur of trees beside you, droplets on the glass distorting the view even further. You’ve been driving for a while now. Everything seems so slow here in spite of the fast pace of your work.
The hours on the road—almost no other cars in sight—always seem at odds with the rest of your life. Especially when you have a case far away from a city, so many miles driven guided by the faded median of a run down highway. No, the cases in the city are never quite like this.
The GPS guides you down a long dirt driveway before the trees open up to a house. It’s cabin-like, with dark wood and gaping windows facing out from the large front porch. It’s still early in the day, the hour is still considered morning, but the lingering cloud coverage has made the world darker than it should be, the evidence of the dark found mostly in the warm light spilling out from inside of the home.
“Well,” Prentiss says, “I guess this is the place.”
The two of you step out of the SUV, walking briskly to the door in order to get out of the light drizzle that seems to be a constant in this part of the country. A woman answers the door, middle aged, the hints of smile lines etched into her skin. Prentiss introduces the two of you before the woman lets you in.
It’s always felt so strange to you, just walking into the homes of these people you’ve never met before. You see the photographs, the knick knacks, evidence of lives that have come and gone, the people that linger, the people that build a family in these spaces. You often wonder if the rest of the team feels the same way, or if it’s just another part of the job to them. How often do they enter through the front door of someone else’s home and realize just how much of a stranger they really are?
Spencer would understand, you think. If only because he tends to overthink things quite often. You wish you could ask him, you wish he wasn’t stuck in the motel while you all work, you wish that you had more time to check on him.
You wish for a lot of things when it comes to Spencer.
“Is your husband home?” you ask the woman, needing something to do before your mind wanders even further from the task at hand.
“He’s out back working in the shed.” She guides you to the back door and you go off to speak with her husband on your own.
The grass is wet beneath your feet, soaking into your shoes slightly, not enough to drench your socks but enough to be uncomfortable as you walk. It makes the world feel colder than it really is, somehow. The shed stands a distance away from the house and is about the size of a one car garage. It’s made out of the same dark wood as the house, likely stained even darker from the rain. The door is open so you walk right up to it, announcing your presence as you do.
“Hello,” you shout before introducing yourself. There’s a man standing in the doorway now. You hold up your badge, proof that you are who you say you are, but before you can even pull your arm down, you’re crumpling to the ground. Pain blossoms from your side, pulling tears from your eyes and a shrill scream from your throat.
It hurts to breathe.
You’re aware of Prentiss hovering over you, speaking words to you but you can’t focus on them. It takes a moment for you to finally understand exactly what is happening. There's a small trickle of blood soaking into the thin layer of your blouse. Beside you rests a shovel, the one he’d swung at you—the edge must have nicked your side during the impact with your ribs. One of your wrists aches where you’d fallen on it, but it doesn’t feel broken.
“I’m okay,” you finally tell Prentiss. “I’m okay.”
The lie tastes bitter on your tongue.
Somehow she gets you back into the SUV. She rushes to the hospital as fast as she can, which isn’t as fast as she’d like given the winding road, slick with rain. It’s somehow even darker now.
Deep, shifting storm clouds cover the sky like bruises, the grey masses tinged with blues and purples where they’re thickest. You imagine the rolling clouds reflect the dark stains that are, without a doubt, blooming beneath your skin. Thunder rumbles overhead, rolling through the swirling clouds. The sound draws your attention out the passenger window once more.
You almost expect to see some creature that’s not quite human keeping pace beside you—sharp teeth and wild eyes, a hunger for all that is living. All that meets your eyes is the blur of brown and green, feeling like a thick blanket pulled too high over your head, smothering more than comforting. Part of you wants the sky to crack, to pour rain down so hard and fast that it floods the world. Maybe it could wash the pain away too––a mountain baptism perfect for lost girls.
You wish you were brave.
The whole drive to the hospital your hands don’t stop shaking. You keep them tucked between your legs like a scared dog, afraid that Prentiss will notice the mixture of terror and adrenaline that has yet to leave your system despite the distance you drive away from the scene. At one point you pass the rest of the team on the road, blue and red lights refracting through the raindrops on the windshield only for a second before you’re alone with Prentiss once more.
You wish it was Spencer beside you in the car. He knows how to be brave—how to be kind. The monsters roaring beyond the mountain crests could never reach you if he were here.
—♡—
He’s in his motel room when he gets the call. Of course he is, he hasn’t left in days.
You had an unexpected run in with the UNSUB, Prentiss tells him, you’d injured your wrist, not quite spraining it, and your side is bandaged and bruised. The doctors were surprised that nothing but skin was broken from the impact.
He can’t settle after he hears the news, knowing that you’re mostly fine but needing to see the evidence for himself. You’re out there somewhere and he’s stuck in a small room, unable to help you. He’s never been more tempted to break one of Hotch’s orders, though for once he stays put. He feels like some wild thing contained only by the lock on his door, but he’s only a man. He’s never had sharp claws and gnashing teeth—just soft cardigans, his heart stitched into the sleeves of each one.
Instead of rushing to the hospital, like his instincts are screaming at him to do, he paces the length of his room, waiting for the sound of the SUV pulling into the lot. There’s no use in leaving. He can’t drive with his concussion, even when it’s almost fully healed, not that there’s actually a car for him to drive. All of the SUVs are needed for the team to travel the expanses of forests and mountains lining the Pacific Northwest. Besides, even if he could drive, you’ll be back before he could ever make the journey to the hospital. So he stays put, impatient.
The waiting is the worst part, he thinks. He already knows you’re safe, just needs to see it for himself. In any other situation he would be embarrassed by the way he’s acting, even with no one around to see it, but there is no one around and he can’t bring himself to care. You’ll be there soon, he reminds himself.
The sound of tires on wet pavement barely reaches his ears before he’s rushing out the door. Spencer isn’t even sure that it’s you, but he can’t stay put any longer. It’s as though the buzz of static in the air, warning of an impending storm, is fueling the thrum of his heart and the rush of his legs. He dashes to the parking lot in a flurry of tangled limbs, hands aching with the need to hold you close.
He waits for you there in the light rain, oblivious to the moisture collecting in his hair and soaking into the fabric of his clothes. He just stands, still as a statue, as you slowly slide from your spot in the passenger side of the SUV. You look tired. He’s rarely seen you look so exhausted.
You must have been so scared, he thinks. He knows he would have been.
All of the nervous energy that had been fueling him before is gone, leaving him empty with nothing there to replace it. He’s not sure how to feel, not when he knows he already feels so much—not when he doesn’t know how you feel about him. In the distance a train whistle blows, slow and deep. Dismal.
You turn to Spencer and grin.
“What a motley pair we make,” you say. “The Bureau is going to have a field day with this.”
—♡—
Prentiss leaves not long after bringing you back to the motel. She has a job to do and the team is now two members down. She doesn’t want to leave, she makes that much clear, but you’d rather she not stay. Spencer is more difficult to find space from.
He wanders close behind you, a shadow stretched in the afternoon hours, only there's no sun here, just soaked earth and dark skies. His height would be intimidating if it weren't for the fact that he’s hovering like a mother hen.
“Does it hurt?” he asks. “Of course it hurts. We should get you some ice to put on your side. The cold will help with the bruising.”
“Spencer, I'm fine,” you try to say, but he’s lost in facts and numbers, trying his best to help the only way he knows how.
“The quicker you ice your bruise the more you can minimize the bruising. This won’t prevent the area from hurting, unfortunately.” He follows you into your room. You try to bend down to take your shoes off but it hurts too much to move your body that way. You try again, this time sitting on the bed to do so, but even that doesn’t work. Spencer seems oblivious to your struggle, lost in his own mind. “I’ll go get you some ice from the ice machine. Oh, you’re already sitting, that’s good. You need to rest.”
He’s gone with the ice bucket before you can tell him that you don’t need it. He shouldn’t be doing this, he’s hurt too, he needs rest just as much, if not more than you. He’s gone before you can tell him that what you really want is to be alone. You don’t know what to make of the fact that him leaving makes you desperate for him to return.
You lay back on the bed, kicking off your shoes without untying them. They fly off in different directions, but that’s a problem for later.
Another train whistles out, likely miles and miles from where you rest. It’s a somber sound, almost a wail. You wish you could howl along with it. But you’re no wild beast, you’re rabbit hearted, through and through. There’s nothing out in those woods for you. Nothing that won’t get you killed.
Maybe you’d hop on board that train and run away, run so far that there’s no chance for the ghosts that haunt you to keep up. You could allow the past to become nothing more than a washed out memory, a healing scar rather than a gaping wound.
The door slams open and you jump, wide eyed and gasping for breath.
“It’s just me,” Spencer says, his whiskey eyes just as wide as yours.
“I’m sorry. I think I’m still a little skittish.” Just as you start to calm a clap of thunder roars out, reverberating through the sky.
“It’s okay,” he says quietly. “You’re okay.”
“I’m not scared of thunder,” you state, but you both know that’s not the problem. He doesn’t respond, just starts wrapping up pieces of ice before handing the bundle to you, waiting for you to press it to your side. You reach your good hand up to his face, thumb brushing against his cheek before running your fingers through his soft hair, still damp from the rain. The motion reveals the line of a cut, scabbed over now but far from healed. It must have bled a lot. He must have been so scared.
“You should get some rest,” you say. “You’re still healing too.”
He opens his mouth to protest but you don’t give him the chance, pressing your hand firmly into the center of his chest until he lies back on the bed. Then you prop his legs up in your lap, removing his shoes so he can rest comfortably. It’s easier to take his shoes off than it had been to remove your own.
“I’m almost completely healed,” he tries to argue. “The only reason I’m not back on the case already is because of Hotch’s orders.”
“Please rest.” He doesn’t try to fight you this time, just tugs you gently towards him until you're tucked in by his side, closing his eyes. It doesn’t take long for his breathing to slow, the only confirmation you need to know that he hasn’t been getting enough sleep despite his own injuries.
You want to bury him beneath your ribs and tuck him in next to everything else that is so important to you. You would keep him right next to your heart if you could, and he’d be the warmest part of you. It hurts to see him like this, to know that there’s nothing you could have done to help him. But he’s safe now, and so are you.
You lie awake beside him, tired but unable to sleep. You rest though, relaxing to the sound of slow rain and soft breaths. Rest, while not sleeping, still holds its own value. When you’re certain that Spencer is in deep enough of a sleep that moving won’t wake him, you wander over to the window to watch the world move on without you.
Everything beyond the glass is in motion. Rain falls steadily, though it’s not quite a downpour, and collects in puddles on all of the flat surfaces it touches. The boughs of evergreens sway in the wind just beyond the slick pavement of the small parking lot. You can imagine the hiss of the air as it passes the world by, can imagine the sound of tires on the wet roads. If you opened the windows, would you be swept back up into the current of time? Right now, surrounded by the soft sound of Spencer’s breathing and the light thunk of heavy droplets falling from the roof and onto the walkway just beyond the glass, you feel no need to find out.
It no longer feels like you’re being hunted, not when Spencer is able to rest so easily behind you. Thunder doesn’t mean that strong jaws are closing in around you, that some great thing will tear you apart. That doesn’t mean you won’t do the job yourself.
You accidentally wake Spencer when you try to change out of your clothes to take a shower. There’s nothing quiet about your shuffling and cursing in the bathroom, especially not when you accidentally knock your travel shower bag to the floor. Prentiss had lent you a clean shirt after yours had been ruined, but it’s not easy to get out of in your current state. There’s too many buttons and the neck hole is too small, all of it requires you to lift your arms in ways that tug on the bruises spreading across your side.
He knocks on the door so quietly you don’t hear it the first time. When you do finally register the sound you freeze, as though stopping and holding your breath could make the situation go away.
“Let me help,” Spencer says through the door, voice groggy from sleep. The door is unlocked, but he gives you space. He lets you decide if you want his help. You open the door slowly, eyes cast downward as you step back, giving him space to enter the small bathroom.
His eyes don’t burn as he helps you strip down, leaving you in nothing but your undergarments. You’d been desperate to claw off your bra earlier, the pressure of it against your ribs causing even more discomfort than usual, but now you’re grateful for its thin protection. Spencer’s gaze doesn’t linger in all of the places you're afraid it might. Still, he can’t keep the red from rising to his cheeks and glowing on the tips of his ears. Neither of you mention it.
You’d never thought you’d be standing before him in this situation, incapable of fending for yourself. In your fleeting fantasies you’d never felt so weak, and he’d never been cracked open the way that you know his flesh is beneath the mess of his hair. In your fantasies you’d always looked forward to this, to the hunger of being seen, of being held impossibly close.
But being so exposed to him now, it’s embarrassing. Scars mark your body in various places, reminders that you’re still here, that you’re still alive. Knowing that their proof of your strength doesn’t make you feel any better about having them on display. It makes you feel like an open book when they should be like the words in a journal, unseen by anyone’s eyes but yours.
He runs his fingers slowly over a thin scar from a particularly nasty run in with an UNSUB. He remembers how you’d slumped slightly but hadn’t collapsed. He thinks it must have hurt more than you let on. Then he brushes his fingers over another, wider but shallower mark. He didn’t know how you got that one, wasn’t there when you’d scraped against the rough bark of a tree as you tried to climb it as a child, but he would be proud if he knew that you made it to the top all the same.
“You’re thinking too hard,” he teases. “That’s my job.”
“Is it normal to feel so breakable?”
“Sometimes. But you’re brave too, you know. And I’m here for you, the whole team is here for you.”
“I feel like my body is betraying me.” It’s difficult to look at him, so you look away, arms pulling up around yourself, fingers brushing against your bruised and bandaged side. Spencer lifts your head, forcing you to look at him before he speaks again.
“You act like your ribs are armor but they’re just bones. That’s all they are, there’s no metaphor to them, no grand plan or story of creation. Sometimes they hold strong and sometimes they break and heal again, but there’s nothing more to it.” He presses his palm into your good side, the ribs shifting slightly from the force but it’s not enough to hurt. “They’re just bones.”
You’d always been warned about taking showers during thunderstorms, about the risks doing so poses. Normally you’d be too scared of lightning strikes to be willing to shower during a storm. It’s a fear that’s been deeply ingrained in you since childhood. Right now it’s a risk you’re willing to take, if only to have a little more time away from everything and everyone around you.
When you’re finished with your shower, you change into something much easier to get in and out of. You’re not ready to be exposed again so soon. Another day, if he feels the same for you, and when you’re feeling braver, you’ll let him see the whole of you. But for now, you’ll take comfort in knowing that he’s simply here with you.
Things get easier after that. You’re still rabbit hearted, but maybe that’s okay. Maybe he is too.
—♡—
“I’m hungry,” Spencer says, kicking your thigh lightly from his spot on your bed, a travel game of Trouble set up between you. He’s winning by a landslide.
“I think I have a granola bar in my bag, if you want it you can have it,” you say, still focused on which piece you want to move. He nudges your leg again, this time slightly harder, finally drawing your attention to him.
“Let's go to the diner. you said it’s close by, right?” You look up at him then, resigned to the fact that you’re not finishing this game.
“It was close when I could drive there. It will be a far walk.” Spencer frowns slightly, but moves to grab his shoes. He’s already getting the second one on before you realize that he still plans to go. “Spencer, we can’t—”
“The storm passed a while ago and we could use the fresh air.” Now he’s gathering you up in a thick cardigan, one that you borrowed long ago. You’ll return it one day—once you can get your hands on another. You slide your feet in your shoes and he ties them. You wrap his favorite purple scarf around his neck while he’s bending down.
He waits for you in the doorway while you pick up your keys but you pause before you leave, turning around to grab the raincoat hanging over the arm of a chair. You pull your arms through the sleeves with ease, leaving the front unzipped.
“Just in case,” you state, as if any justification for the action is needed. Then you’re off, setting a slow but steady pace for the two of you. You step off the curb and onto the dark asphalt, shallow puddles splashing up around your feet as you go. You pass through the near empty parking lot and out onto the winding two lane road leading up to the motel. There’s no sidewalk here. You keep to the side of the road, following the path of fallen pine needles, so bright in their decay that they almost appear red.
Moving this slowly you have time to notice the things you had missed while on the case. Everything had always been a blur to you, flashes of greens and greys and browns, no detail beyond what sat right before you.
Now you can see the roughness of the bark, moss hanging down from branches alongside the leaves. Now you can see the fungus growing from the fallen needles and appearing like steps up decaying logs. You can see the weight of the raindrops pulling down leaves before falling heavily onto the earth below. Some of the drops splatter atop your head and streak down your cheeks. You can’t help but laugh as a particularly large drop lands directly on Spencer’s nose.
There’s so much you had missed when you’d been scared.
Despite your slow pace, your side begins to flair up about half way through your journey to the diner. It doesn’t hurt, not really, but breathing is a bit difficult. You try your best to hide it. Your pace is already leisurely, after all. No need to go any slower.
But hiding is an impossibility with Spencer. Even if he wasn’t a profiler, he knows you too well to not notice that something is wrong. He also knows you well enough to understand that you’ll think you’re being an inconvenience, even when you’re not.
“Can we rest soon?” he asks. “Just for a minute?”
“Of course.” You look around, finding a patch of ground by the side of the road covered in enough fallen pine needles to not be muddy before throwing your raincoat over the damp leaf litter. You then urge Spencer to sit down and rest. There’s really nowhere else for such things so you do your best to make sure he’s comfortable.
“Your jacket will get wet,” he says, “and dirty.”
“A trivial matter,” you insist. “And nowhere else is dry.”
He huffs slightly but sits down anyway, his long legs bent a bit awkwardly in order to keep the rest of him dry. He tugs at your hand then, pulling you down into him and wrapping his arms loosely around you. The two of you barely fit on the space of water resistant fabric. He grabs onto one of your hands, holding it firmly as he buries his face into the crook of your neck.
“Comfortable?” you ask. You tried your best to sound teasing, though your voice shakes slightly as the single word slips past your lips. You feel rather than see him nod.
It seems like Midas wasn’t the only one with a touch that turned to gold. With his hand pressed firmly into your skin you feel as though you’re gilded, molten metal coating your veins. You wouldn’t want it any other way. You’d stay here forever if you could, wrapped up in the heat of him surrounded by a forest that doesn’t seem so scary when he’s with you.
Somewhere out there the rest of your team is on a hunt, and you’re certain they’ll complete the task they set out to do. But right now, on the side of this empty winding road, you’re exactly where you need to be. You may not change the world, you realize that you’re nothing magnificent, but you’re not insignificant either. Not here, not to the man tucked slightly awkwardly around you. Somewhere in the distance a train whistles. You almost miss it, too distracted by the man surrounding you.
You lean back slightly, forcing Spencer to raise his head from where he’d nuzzled it into you. His eyes are warm as they take you in. His eyes are always warm. There’s so much life in them, blending perfectly into the woods around you. You can almost imagine moss growing into his soft cardigan, a bird making a nest atop his head. It’s a funny thought. You think that he’d be oblivious to it all, eyes only directed towards you.
You can’t help yourself. You lean forward, pressing your lips to his jaw in a quick kiss. When you pull back he’s still looking only at you, eyes shining and mouth hanging open slightly, as if he can’t believe you would do such a thing.
And he can’t. Never once over the past few years that he’s gotten the chance to know you, to grow close with you, had he ever expected you to truly return his feelings. Maybe it’s because he thought it best to settle with friendship, there’s beauty in platonic love as well, after all. Or maybe he just never believed himself worthy of being loved the way he loves you, never thought anyone would find anything worth loving in him. But you had, and he is more than worthy of being loved.
You just hope that he’ll let you be the one to show him just how deserving of affection he is.
He brings his hand up to your cheek, cupping it lightly as though he’s afraid his hand might pass through, as though he’s afraid this is all some sort of dream. He brushes his thumb across your lips and again you can’t help yourself. You kiss that too, smiling lazily as his eyes light up once more.
“Can I?” he asks, not quite finishing his question, but you nod anyway.
He leans in slowly, pausing only for a brief moment before he finally kisses you. His lips are warm, a pleasant contrast to the cool air around you. You kiss him back instantly, falling into a steady rhythm. How easily the world falls away around you, leaving nothing behind but him. Nothing else matters now—not the damp air or the slightly uncomfortable angle of your bodies, not the knowledge that anyone could drive by at any moment. Nothing interrupts you but the slow stretch of Spencer’s grin.
He can’t help it. He’s wanted to kiss you for so long. You’ve both been so scared of change. It’s ridiculous, really, all of it is. And you can’t help but laugh.
“I love you,” he says between giggles and pants, and if he could he would say it with every exhale. “I love you.”
You still can’t speak though, so you just lean in closer to him, impossibly close.
—♡—
The diner is a strange place. Not strange for a diner, perhaps, but generally strange. It seems removed from time, as though it’s been stuck since the day it was built. Maybe people have come and gone, the waitress bustling behind the counter too young to have been around since it was built, but the tiles and the booths seem original, unchanged.
It’s mostly empty, an odd hour after the busiest of the dinner rush, not that many folks would be coming in either way. The town is small and most of the customers are regulars. You’re starting to feel like a regular yourself with how many times you’ve been in this last week. Regular enough, at least, for the waitress to recognize you.
You greet her as you make your way to a booth, Spencer not far behind. The waitress brings you menus before returning to a conversation with a man sitting at the counter. It’s a comfortable atmosphere, and you’re glad you made the decision to leave the motel.
You glance at the menu, mostly sure of what you want after having been here several times already, usually to bring back warm meals to Spencer who was stuck in the motel. It doesn’t take you long to notice that something is wrong.
He’s quiet beside you, a rare occurrence for the man who has too much to talk about and not enough people willing to listen. His eyes are closed, a small crease formed between his brows.
“What’s wrong?” you ask, gently pressing your thumb to the crease until it fades away, his face relaxing once more as he turns to look at you.
“Most of the time I’m fine,” he explains, “but sometimes… The font is too small and there are too many words. It hurts to look at.” You humm in acknowledgment, grabbing his menu from him and folding it back up.
“I just- I feel useless right now. The whole team is out there working on this case and I’ve just been sitting around, unable to help. Maybe if I hadn’t been so clumsy things would have been different. Maybe you wouldn’t have—” but he doesn’t finish.
“Hey, this wasn’t your fault,” you tell him. “None of this was your fault. Sometimes these things just happen.” He’s not convinced, but one day he will be. One day, when his head doesn’t still hurt when he reads and the wound on your side is just another faint scar, he’ll understand.
“Now,” you divert the conversation, “do you want something savory or something sweet?”
“Something sweet.” You smile up at him then.
“Of course. Something sugary for the sweetest man around.”
You list off the different options he might like to order, drifting closer to him as you do. He wraps an arm around you, the sound of your voice soothing, even if it’s only reading off the words on a menu. Things will be okay, one day, he’s sure of it.
—♡—
The walk back to the motel takes longer than the walk to the diner. It’s not because you need to take breaks, though you do need to pause a couple of times, but because neither of you can seem to stay away from the other. You can’t stop grabbing his hand; can’t stop kissing his cheeks, his nose, his lips still sweet with the taste of syrup. There’s no one around to see, after all. The road is just as empty on the way back as it was on the way there. That’s what you tell yourselves, at least.
It should come as no surprise that your sneaking around like lovestruck teenagers would lead to you getting caught. It’s not until you’re pulling away from Spencer, good hand still tangled in his messy hair, careful of the healing cut on his forehead, that you notice the black SUV stopped on the road beside you.
The driver’s side window rolls down slowly, revealing the smirking face of Derek Morgan. Prentiss is sitting in the passenger’s side next to him.
“Having fun?” Morgan asks. You and Spencer both nod without thinking.
The two of you sit in the back of the SUV during the rest of the drive to the motel, hands in your laps as if they hadn’t been touching each other as much as possible for most of the day. There’s really no use in playing innocent, and you can’t help but giggle to yourself.
The case is over now. Morgan Apprehended the UNSUB not long ago. No one else was injured in the process. You’ll all be leaving for D.C. first thing in the morning. When you return to the motel, Morgan and Prentiss rush out ahead of you, looking forward to getting some rest after a long case.
Now, slipping out of your seat and making your way to Spencer’s side, it feels much different than it had in the morning. You’re still rabbit hearted, still scared of what comes next, but for now you’re safe. For now you’re certain that someone has your back.
“Do you want to go back to my room?” You ask, “I never finished beating you at Trouble.”
He smiles, tangling his fingers in yours.
“Keep telling yourself that.” He turns on the light as you lock the door, the room filling to the brim with it’s warm glow. You put the raincoat in a plastic bag to be dealt with another day and strip off the borrowed cardigan. Spencer removes his purple scarf, setting it on top of the small table while you kick off your shoes. They fly off in different directions, and he grins at you. A train whistles somewhere in the distance. It’s a familiar sound, comforting.
“I love you,” you say. “I didn’t say it earlier, but I do.”
“I love you too,” he says, pulling you in close to kiss you once again. It’s slow and sweet, there’s no need to rush.