We All Fall Down - A Criminal Minds AU

Thirty Two

In the end you didn't call Diana. Whilst you had decided that Spencer did need to know about his father in order to hopefully grow as a person, you still needed time it figure it all out. To decide if you really could be the one to do this to him. You knew that if anyone else knew what you were debating they would think it silly. How can you not do this to him after everything he's done to you, they'd say. But ultimately, what had Spencer really done to you? Yes, to many it would appear that he manipulated you into marrying him and staying with him, and when you drilled right down to it, that was the truth. But you had also allowed it to happen. He had used you and you had used him, the offer of a new life and protection for you and your unborn child seeming better than finding your way alone. Sure, your marriage had been stale and stagnant, a pool full of resentment and inane indifference but you had both allowed it to become that way. You could have at least tried to make it a happy relationship but you didn't. Instead you fell right back into the arms of the person who had broken your heart and allowed them to do it again. Your self revelation that you couldn't walk away because you couldn't be the one to leave had made you realise that your own issues were perhaps a lot more deep seated than what you realised and that maybe, you and Spencer were both as bad as each other. So whilst to some people, dropping the bombshell onto Spencer that his father was just simply awful would be repayment for him chucking you out of the house, to you it wasn't.

As it turned out, you didn't need Diana's help. You'd set your alarm earlier than usual, lying in bed and listening for Spencer to leave and once you heard the door lock behind him, you hauled yourself out of bed, shoved your feet into some sneakers, and located the door to the attic. The homes you lived in previously had simply had a hatch to the roof space, one you needed to access via a ladder. This house being much larger than those places meant that you were blessed with having actually stairs and an actual light. There was a slight damp yet musty smell that came with all attics, and that unsettling feeling that grew worse with every creak of a floorboard or every cobweb that brushed your arm. You learnt to ignore that feeling though, focused on finding what you were looking for and after hunting through boxes for around thirty minutes, you were rewarded. If you could really call it that.

When you saw the box hidden away at the bottom of a pile, you knew it had to be that. There was simply no way that it couldn't be. Knowing what you now knew about William Reid it seemed just the type of box he would use to store details of his sordid little life in. An old fashioned wooden chest, rather akin to the sort of treasure chest you'd seen in adventure movies as a child. To him it would be exactly the right place to store his records, his treasures, his cheap but cherished mementos of his past. After a quick hunt around for something to break the lock with, you were in, crouched on the dusty floor and leafing through journal after journal.

They made you feel sick to your stomach. You had only met William a few times but you could not reconcile the man you had known with the same man that had written the words contained within these books. You didn't read much, you couldn't bring yourself to, but what you did read made you truly realise that Spencer hadn't stood chance at all with this man as a role model. The chest didn't contain just words either, polaroids fell out of the pages, all depicting him with women who were different but the same in physical type. It was then that you had to wonder if you yourself would have become a target for your father in law had you lived closer. It also made you wonder if Spencer had ever seen an image of the woman who's letters he'd read. It seemed all too coincidental that you and the women in the images all bore a resemblance to one another.

Checking your watch you realised that you had been up here for longer than you realised. Delving into a sordid past apparently took time and you had to be at work soon and you needed to shower first. You contemplated what to do with the journals for now, hurriedly shoving them back into the wooden box. After a second of thought you grabbed one, taking it downstairs with you and shoving it into your hand bag. Perhaps you would actually read it at some point, maybe in an attempt to gain some insight into the rather crooked William Reid.