To Die For → Derek Morgan

Six

Josephine

To distract myself from the events of the night, I texted Spencer, asking if he could meet me at the library in the morning. Work started at eight, but I planned for us to spend a couple of hours there before heading in. I needed some one-on-one advice about the job, and Spencer, with his love for learning, felt like the perfect person to turn to. Besides, it was a good way to keep my mind off last night's mistake.

Focusing on work seemed like the only way to stop myself from spiraling.

The next morning, I arrived at the library just after six, the early morning stillness calming my racing thoughts. I spotted Spencer already inside, sitting at a table surrounded by a few open books. He had that familiar, focused look on his face, completely absorbed in whatever he was reading.

"Morning," I greeted softly as I approached, pulling out a chair across from him.

He glanced up, giving me a small, warm smile. "Hey. You're early." I shrugged, setting my bag down. "Couldn't sleep."

He nodded, his eyes curious but not prying. Spencer had always had this way of understanding without needing to ask too many questions. That's partly why I reached out to him—he was a safe space.

"So, what did you need help with?" Spencer asked, gently closing one of the books and turning his full attention to me.

"Work," I replied vaguely, leaving the word open to interpretation. He nodded, his brow furrowing slightly as if calculating the range of possibilities behind my answer.

"Work can be a lot of things," he said thoughtfully. "The average person spends roughly 90,000 hours at their job over a lifetime, but we never consider how much of that is spent on the mental side of it—balancing stress, personal relationships, and doubt." He tilted his head, giving me a knowing look. "What part of 'work' are you really concerned about?"

I smirked, appreciating how quickly he could pinpoint the heart of something, always armed with a statistic or fact to make it all seem more manageable. "Maybe it's not just the job itself but how I'm handling it," I admitted, leaning back in my chair. "It's like... there's this pressure to always be on, always be ten steps ahead. You seem to manage it with ease, and I—"

"Trust me, it's not effortless," he interrupted. "Did you know, when I first joined the team, I had a 187 IQ, an eidetic memory, and three PhDs, but I was completely overwhelmed by the emotional dynamics of the job? Intelligence and knowledge only get you so far; it's the emotional intelligence that takes longer to develop."

I couldn't help but smile at his Reid-like way of admitting something so personal through facts. "I know," I said softly. "I guess I just don't want to feel like I'm falling behind."

Spencer leaned forward, resting his hands on the table. "Josephine, you're not falling behind. You're already thinking critically, asking the right questions, absorbing more than you realize. Statistically speaking, people who question their performance tend to improve more quickly than those who don't. The fact that you're self-aware is actually a good indicator that you're on the right path."

I raised an eyebrow. "Are you citing a study on workplace performance?"

"2017, Harvard Business Review," he answered with a small grin. I laughed softly, shaking my head. "Of course you'd know that."

"But seriously," he continued, his voice softening. "You're doing better than you think. And, for the record, no one expects perfection. We learn by making mistakes."

I nodded, his words sinking in, but the kiss with Derek still loomed in the back of my mind.

"You know," I said, trying to shift the conversation, "I did some research on cognitive patterns in decision-making under stress. There's this theory I found—about how high-functioning individuals like us can make impulsive decisions as a way to alleviate stress temporarily. It's not about intelligence; it's about being human." I glanced up at him. "It's a small comfort to know we're not alone in that."