Spencer Reid | Oneshots

Porcelain ❤️‍🩹 (G)

Summary: Autistic!Reader has a meltdown in the cafe. Luckily, there is a Dr. Reid nearby.

Rating: G

Content Warning: Autisticmeltdown, self-harm (hitting), sensory overload

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I have become convinced over my decades of existence that there is no place with sounds more varied and chaotic than a cafe. For all intents and purposes, I should despise this place. The pungent, conflicting smells and the tight spaces filled with grumpy people should repel me like two north poles of a magnet.

And the sounds. Again, the sounds. The cashier till ringing and electric machines whirring. The customer chatter and the clatter of glassware. It was nothing but lawless pandemonium. There was no rhyme or reason to what you would hear, and the patterns were jagged and imprecise. I couldn't predict what would happen with any better accuracy than I could guess someone's name. I might get it right occasionally, but would it really be worth the energy to try? My brain would try to focus on everything and succeed at nothing. No matter how much time I spent there, I wasn't be able to identify anything. But that day, all I could hear was the sound of the faulty faucet.

Drip. Drip. Drip.

A particular, predictable pattern repeating a reliable rhythm over and over.

Drip. Drip. Drip.

And all I could see was the woman who seemed to hear it, too. What was left of my faculties was focused on her finger, tapping gently against the table with an identical tempo.

Tap. Tap. Tap.

She did it every time she came. Or at least, every time I'd seen her there. Part of me wanted to alert the staff of how much water they were wasting – over 20 gallons a day – but the rest of me was too scared. Worried that if the noise stopped, she wouldn't find anything worth focusing on in this cafe. That she would disappear with the only sound that I'd grown to love.

There were many sounds to notice in a busy cafe. But that day I heard a sound that overwhelmed all of the others.

I wasn't paying attention, and I would feel guilty about it for a long time. Although realistically I understand that I couldn't have predicted the actions of other people well enough to prevent disaster, I still found myself wishing I could have warned her before she left the counter with her oversized porcelain cup.

I wish I could have warned the others how she only looks at their feet, and that she wouldn't guess that they would've stepped into her way at the last second while they dilly dallied on their phone. I wish I could have warned her before the cup tumbled to the ground and became dozens of ricocheting shards and boiling liquid over the floor.

That sound of glass and gasps would resonate in my head for far too long.

The only good thing it did was alert me to the fact she'd also fallen, and was now soaked in brown liquid, avoiding prying eyes that she felt obligated to meet. It was a mistake. I watched as panic overtook her the second that she saw them. The others would read her eyes as a cry for help, and in many ways, it was, but not the kind they thought.

She was swamped behind a small crowd, torn from my vision when I wanted to reach out to her most. But just like her, my legs were frozen by the hectic scene that followed. To someone else, it might have seemed so leisurely and forgettable. But for her, for us, it was something else.

I could feel it. I could feel the hands reaching and grabbing and sweeping over my skin and the broken glass. The feel of still-warm coffee seeping into the fabric on my skin, the smell becoming one with the threads. My breathing increased and the world went dizzy with everything happening at once.