Speechless | Spencer Reid FanFiction ✔️

Chapter 56: Taking Time

After I left JJ's I immediately went home and packed everything I needed for a week or so at my parents' house. On the way to my apartment I called my mom and explained the situation. She was terrified because I was in shambles when she answered. All of the grief and pain I had pushed down for weeks for the sake of the others came rushing back in waves as soon as I heard my mother's voice say "hey, sweetie!" When I caught my breath I told my mom I was coming home and that I needed her. She had no objections, she just wanted to be sure I was going to make it home safe if I was driving with all of these emotions.
I explained that I would be fine, but I still couldn't wait to get home. I think Ryder was concerned about my erratic behavior when I walked inside, barely stopping to pet him after letting him out of the crate. I quickly packed up my stuff for a week, clothes, toiletries, technology so I could work remotely, etc. I'm not going to be able to do a lot of work remotely but I'm definitely going to try. I feel guilty leaving without saying anything to Spencer, but I can't jeopardize their case or worry him while I leave. JJ knows I'm leaving as well as Alison and Killian and of course my parents know.
I pack up my suitcase and I have a bag of random things for Ryder and myself. I keep a baseball bat in my car in addition to a car emergency kit, a first aid kit, blankets, water bottles, and snacks. Before I leave the apartment I make sure it's clean. The dishes are done, the laundry is folded and put away, the bed is made, pretty much everything is in its place. I decide to write a note for Spencer explaining that I decided to go home for a trip to mourn the loss of Emily and I'll be back soon. Hopefully JJ and the rest of the team can break the news gently before he comes home to an empty and clean apartment. The clean apartment will be a dead giveaway that I'm not there because you can usually tell when it's being lived in, especially when we are both home for at least a few days.
With a deep breath and a heavy heart, Ryder and I leave the dark and empty apartment, locking the door behind us. We carefully make our way through town before hopping on I95 towards Tennessee. Ryder is set up as copilot in his harness and seat belt in his travel bed. He curls up to take a nap, remembering the last time we packed up the car like this and took a drive. I turn on a murder mystery podcast and mentally prepare for the 12 hour drive home. It's 10:30 am, so let's see how long it takes me to get home and into the warm embrace of my parents.

•••••

~Spencer's POV~

The cases following Emily's death have been very surreal. Everyone on the team has been treating me like a ticking time bomb since we got to the station. Hotch had previously sent me to talk to the sheriff as soon as we got to the station in San Diego and when I came back, everybody avoided eye contact with me. I tried to shrug it off, I knew I had been a bit moody lately, but I didn't think I had earned this cold of a shoulder. I decided to just brush it off and get to work on the geographic profile for the unsub. I heard a lot of whispers behind my back, but just assumed it was regarding something about Emily or me and the team just didn't want to upset me. They always treat me like the baby of the group, especially Morgan, and I absolutely hate it.
         Morgan and I have to go visit the crime scene and he gives me very short responses for the most part, not making conversation. In the SUV on the way back, I ask him "did I do something to upset somebody?" He raises an eyebrow and responds "I don't know, did you?" I roll my eyes and say back "I don't know, that's why I'm asking you! Everybody has been treating me differently lately, but especially on this case." Morgan nods and says "everybody has just been affected by Emily's death more than I think you have considered. I know you're taking it really hard, but so are the rest of us. I miss her, too, but we have to keep going. The world doesn't start and end with Prentiss. You and I both know that." I nod silently, not knowing what to say at the moment. I eventually decide to say "I know I've been a lot to handle lately. I've been trying to do better, especially at home with Annie. She's gotten the worst of it."
         Morgan nods and says "you probably need to try more, kid. She's taking this hard, too, and she's coped by taking care of you and focusing on you. She's basically procrastinating her grief and the longer she does that, the harder she will fall when it finally hits her. Open your eyes, you love her too much to be this self centered. I know you weren't meaning to be, but you've had your time and now you need to help her. You feel me?" I nod, humbled by the honesty of Morgan's words. He's completely right. I've been a selfish dick. I tell him "I should call her and apologize." Morgan shakes his head "nah wait until later, it's the middle of the work day now and you'd probably make her cry if you got all sappy." I chuckle and nod, he's right.
        The next day we go back to the station and get right back to work. I couldn't be grieving or worried about Annie if I wanted to be with how much I'm working to try to figure out this case. The only good thing that has come from Prentiss' death has been that it really put a lot of things into perspective for Seaver. She's been a lot nicer, a lot easier to work with these last few cases. If only she could've behaved this way the whole time? When I've wrapped up the geographic profile and take a momentary break, Seaver walks up to me and she looks like she has something to say.
         I make eye contact with her and wait for her to say what she walked up to say. She finally says "I'm sorry I harassed you my entire time here and insulted your fiancé. You're both really good people and didn't deserve that. I guess I was just scared and decided to begin on the offensive. You know, be mean to people before they can be mean to me first. I anticipated being treated awfully here as the rookie, but I was wildly wrong. I hope you can forgive me." She doesn't wait for me to answer, she walks away before I can. Before I can do anything else in response, the team starts gearing up for the possible take down of the unsub.
The takedown goes well, Seaver is a big help and talks the unsub down, but we still lost the unsub in the end. We wrap everything up in San Diego, leaving to get on the jet after everything is settled at the station. Everybody is quiet, still somber. However, Seaver seems different, like she has peace with herself and with the job. She should, she did well today in the field. I get on the jet with everybody and prepare for the flight to take off. It'll be a long one back to DC from San Diego. I decide I should call Annie and see how she's doing and really check in on her. When I go to call her though, my phone keeps displaying an error message and saying it can't connect to the service provider. I've never had this error message before and don't know what to do.
I look around and ask Morgan if he knows and he shakes his head. He says "after we get in the air see if you can video chat with Garcia and maybe she can help." I nod "good idea." I settle in, preparing for takeoff as the jet taxis on the runway. Once we level off in the air I ask Morgan to video chat with her and he nods, getting it set up. He looks around at everybody else, making eye contact, all of them sharing a look that's making me nervous. Garcia's face appears on the screen and, instead of her perky bubbly self, she seems pretty serious. She gives a serious half smile and asks "calling about service provider issues?" I nod "yes, how did you know?" She gives me a sad smile "because I made it happen. We can't let you call Annie right now, boy wonder."
I look around at the team, very confused about what's happening. I try to read everybody's expressions and figure out what on earth is happening right now. I ask "is Annie okay?" Hotch nods and says "yes, she's fine and she's safe. She's home in Tennessee." I'm utterly confused at his statement "what? Why is she in Tennessee? Are her parents okay?" Rossi speaks up "everybody is fine, nobody is hurt. Annie just needed to grieve and she needed her support system." I give them an incredulous expression "what? I'm her support system?" Morgan sighs and says "this is what I was trying to talk to you about before. She was your support system, but you haven't been hers. She talked to JJ and said she felt guilty asking you to support her in her grieving when you were struggling with it, too."
I look down and shake my head "why didn't she tell me this herself? I can do better, I didn't know she felt this way." Morgan continues "we all know you can, we need to lean on each other more instead of leaning on others to the point of hurting them. You love Annie and we all know you didn't hurt her or neglect her on purpose, this has just been a hard time for everybody." I turn to look between Morgan and Hotch "when did she leave for Tennessee?" They share a silent look and neither wants to answer. I say again more forcefully "how long has Annie been in Tennessee?"
        Hotch tells me in his business tone "she left the morning we left for San Diego." I stand up, enraged that they kept this information from me for this long. I rub my eye harshly as I say "She's been in Tennessee for 4 days without my knowledge?! When were you going to tell me?!" Morgan looks at me and asks "you done?" I shake my head, feeling my nostrils flare and my face turn red. "You all let me work for days across the country when my fiancée was having an emotional crisis bad enough she had to travel 670 miles out of the blue? What kind of team - no - what kind of friends are you all?" Hotch speaks up "we didn't tell you at the request of Annie. She didn't want you to be distracted from the case."
        I continue rubbing my eyes out of anxiety and stress. I sit back down and hold my hands in my head. I look up and say "I need to book a flight. Garcia, please fix my phone so I can book a flight to Nashville." I hear Garcia say quietly through the speaker on the laptop "I can't let you do that. Annie told me that you needed at least a few hours to process the information before following her to Tennessee." I angrily hit my hand on the couch. I look at Morgan and ask "why do I feel like I'm losing her?" Morgan looks at me seriously "you are not losing her. She communicated with you, albeit a bit delayed, and she plans on coming back. Everybody needs a break sometimes, especially breaks to see family. She took care of us for weeks without a care to herself or her own grief. She's earned a reprieve. Don't be mad at her."
       I sigh "I'm not mad at her. I'm mad at myself...and a little mad at you guys for keeping this from me." Hotch nods "we thought you would be. We were okay with that. In the end, we wanted to help you, both of you. Losing Emily has been hard on all of us and sometimes a different perspective is necessary. It's going to be okay. Just give her time and space." I nod. I tell them "if you won't let me buy a plane ticket, then I will drive to Tennessee. I am not going to let her think I will just sit idly by and not be there for her. She may not want me there, but I want to be close by in case that changes. I'll stay in a hotel if I have to, just to make sure she knows I love her and support her. I had no idea she had taken Emily's death so hard."
       Garcia speaks up "Spencer, Emily was going to be a bridesmaid in your wedding. She was close to Emily, maybe not as close as you were, but close considering they'd only known each other for like a year." I sigh and nod "you're right." Garcia says "okay, you've got a little under 5 hours to cool off before you land. If you still want to fly out to see her I will reserve the ticket myself, the fastest one available." Morgan speaks up "and I'll drive you to the airport. We are here for you kid." I smile gratefully and nod once, "thanks you guys. I appreciate it."
        I try to rest on the flight home, but my mind is running wild trying to come up with a plan to help Annie and to make things up to her. I feel like an absolute selfish idiot. How did I not notice what was going on? Did my pushing for sex finally push her over the edge? Is it my fault she had to go home? All of the questions swirling around my brain have me rubbing my eyes aggressively in a constant manner. Morgan gently shakes my shoulder "kid, stop that. You're going to hurt yourself." I pull my shaking hands away from my face, nodding silently.
        I don't know how much time has passed, but I closed my eyes and now I open my eyes to find that we are landing. I guess I finally did fall asleep, for how long? I don't know. Once we have landed I find that my phone is back to normal. I call Garcia and before I can say anything "the flight is booked, I sent the information to your phone." I try to ask her how and why, but before I can she says "I bought the plane ticket as soon as I hung up the video call. I knew you wouldn't change your mind. Should Annie decide she needs her space, there's a reservation waiting for you at the Embassy Suites. You can cancel it for free if things work out." I tell her "thank you, Garcia." I can almost hear her smile as she says "you are welcome, Penny G over and out," and with that she hangs up. Morgan looks at me from his car "you coming?" I give him a half smile and nod, walking over to his car and hopping in the passenger seat.
After a mad dash through airport security and barely making it on the flight Garcia had arranged for me, I am now in the Nashville international airport, making my way towards the car rental place by baggage claim. It wasn't very populated and they had a few options available. They end up giving me a white Nissan Altima which was more than enough. I drive to Annie's hometown, playing and replaying what I should say to her when I get to her parents' house. I am still so angry at myself for letting things get to this point. I can't help but think she wouldn't have had to miss work and go home if I had just been a better partner, a more supportive partner.
The hour drive drags as I drive on I40 with all the semi truck drivers driving their normal routes. Eventually I make it in the city limits and drive into Annie's neighborhood. I'm more nervous this time to go to her parents' house than I was when we came here for Christmas. It's an hour earlier here so it's just hitting 8 pm now. I park the rental car on the street and decide to just leave my bag in the car, not wanting to seem presumptuous. With sweaty hands and a rapidly beating heart I walk up the front steps and knock on the front door. A minute or so passes before the door unlocks and swings open to reveal Annie.