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ssanovak · 11 months

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Would the Same Pressure Pull You Under?

TRIGGER WARNINGS; Depression, self destructive behaviour, self harm, blood, drug abuse mention, child abuse mention, usual BAU heavy topic cases.

3596 words.

@skievers‘ request; Reid sees readers scars and starts to pester her about it and gets concerned because he sees it’s fresh. She does it because the trauma of what they see at the BAU on cases (especially ones with kids) and she thinks no one cares about her. Spencer soon tells her she does. Ensue fluff 🥹

You took a deep breath as you sat in your car outside the office. You weren’t having a good day, in fact it was one of the worst days you’d had in a long time, but you couldn’t or wouldn’t call in sick to work. You didn’t want anyone to know you were struggling with your mental health. You wouldn’t ever shame anyone else for needing mental health support, your adopted brother was on antidepressants and had a regular therapist ever since you could remember, so shame wasn’t the reason you didn’t want anyone to know.

You didn’t want anyone to know because you didn’t want to bother them.

They all had their own issues going on, and you saw yourself as the official mom friend of the BAU and if anything even appeared to bother you then you knew they would stop coming to you with their issues and you didn’t want to cut off the only outlet most of them had. It took a lot for them to trust anyone to confide in and you didn’t want to shut that trust down again. But it was a lot of pressure on you to keep yourself from being pulled under with the weight of it all. Another tear slipped down your face and you wiped it away furiously. You pulled the sun visor down in front of you and slid open the mirror compartment. You fiddled with your hair, trying to get the shoulder length curls to sit properly and then looked yourself straight in the eye and took another deep breath. Your eyes weren’t bloodshot or red, you just needed to hold it together long enough to walk into work and you knew it would be easier to push your issues back under the rock you felt in your heart when you saw your friends.

You closed the mirror slider once more and pushed the visor back up. Another deep breath later and you took your keys out of the ignition slot, pulled on the door handle and then pushed the door open next to you. You reached over and grabbed your bag from the passenger seat and got out, adjusting your clothes slightly as you checked that your sleeves were pulled down completely. It was a bit warmer out than you’d have liked it to be, and you ran like a broken boiler year round so you knew you didn’t need the cardigan, but you didn’t have a long sleeved shirt and had to keep your arms covered for the foreseeable future. Once the cuts were healed it might be a different story, but for now the wounds on your skin were far too fresh for comfort, and you knew it wouldn’t take a profiler to put two and two together once anyone saw the marks, unfortunately your colleagues were all profilers, so it would take even less time for them to connect the dots.

You swung your backpack around your shoulders and winced as the strap ran over your wrist but quickly forced your face into a neutral posture before locking your car, putting your keys into your pocket and making your way into the building. You walked over to the elevator and pressed the button for your floor and waited as the numbers across the top of the doors indicated the elevator was at the top of the building.

“Doctor Strange, nice choice! Did you know that Doctor Strange was introduced as a Marvel Comics Superhero in…”

“July 1963, as a backup strip in Strange Tales no. 110” You turned beaming to Spencer Reid as he looked at you with awe.

“You read comics too?”

“Of course! I’ll read anything I can get a hold of, especially if it happens to be the source material for one of my favourite Marvel Cinematic Universe characters, who is played by one of my favourite actors!” You found yourself relaxing talking about one of your biggest combination of interests, books, films and actors. You stepped into the elevator and Spencer joined you, smiling as he listened to you. Spencer liked telling people things, statistics and facts mainly, it was one of the times he felt most comfortable, and with anyone else he might be thrown off by the fact that you seemed to know more than him, but he stood listening intently hanging onto your every word.

When the two of you walked through the glass doors that lead to your office you went to go straight to your desk until you were stopped by Emily, “Hey you two, stop flirting and come join us in the conference room!”

“Uh we weren’t… I don’t… We have a case?” You stammered and felt yourself blush crimson.

“I’m teasing you Y/N, no need to be embarrassed!” You looked up and Emily put her hand on your arm, intended to be a kind gesture but it caused the fresh cuts on your skin to burn under the pressure.

You forced yourself to smile through slightly gritted teeth, “I knew that”.

“Sure you did, you coming?”

“I’ll be there in a second, want to dump my bag first” You nodded towards your colleague and watched as she walked back towards the stairs.

You turned to put your bag down in your chair only to find the space occupied.

“What was that about?”

“What?”

“When Emily touched your arm, you flinched. I don’t think she noticed but I did, now you want to tell me what’s going on?” Spencer had one of your pencils in his hands and you watched mesmerised for a moment as he twirled it between his fingers effortlessly.

“Uh, not really, come on Spence, get out of my chair, we’re gonna be the last two in there at this rate” You mumbled as you caught glimpse of Hotch on his way out of his office.

“Okay, but will you talk to me afterwards?” He bargained, still sat at your desk.

“Okay, okay, just scram will you!” You laughed, hoping it didn’t sound as fake as it felt.

He moved quickly and dumped his own belongings at his desk, other than the bag that he seemed to never be anywhere without. You put your backpack on your chair and pulled out your water bottle taking it and a pen with you up to the conference room.

JJ got on with explaining the case you were about to be jetting off to, but your head was elsewhere. You absent mindedly doodled on a blank piece of paper that you’d found at the back of the folder she had handed you when you walked into the room.

“Y/N, you listening?” Hotch asked after a couple of minutes.

“Huh…? Yeah, of course, sorry doodling helps me think.” You said, and tried to concentrate on the rest of the briefing, but the concern about your impending conversation with Spencer was eating at your insides and you quickly found yourself zoning out again.

When everyone else got up to leave the room you were still drawing and staring off absently, you only moved when the opening of the door made you jump. You stood up abruptly only for a hand on your shoulder to sit you back down again.

As everyone else left Hotch gave a look at the two of you still sat at the table and nodded to Spencer, trusting that he’d be able to get you to talk about whatever it was that was bothering you.

When the door shut again Spencer turned to look at you and said “Spill, what’s upsetting you?”

“Honestly nothing, I’m sorry I’ve been so distracted, please can we just go and get ready to leave?” you said, looking towards the door.

“Not until you tell me what’s going on! You look after everyone else without ever really telling us how you are, and I don’t know why you do that but I want you to know that people care.” He rested a hand on your shoulder and turned you back to look at him, his deep hazel eyes filled with concern.

“Oh shush Spencer, nobody really cares about me, I’m insignificant. If I wasn’t here nobody would bat an eyelid, you’d just replace me with the next person to be suggested for the job and never look back.” You looked down into your lap, feeling tears threatening to burst the dam that your eyelids created.

“Then I must be nobody.”

“What?” you looked up anger rising, you weren’t one to get angry often but you didn’t like how he was speaking about himself.

“You said nobody cares about you, but I do, so I must be nobody.” He explained, his hands talking as much as his mouth.

“That sounds awful, please don’t say that about yourself” Your face creased into a frown and you looked down into your hands, fiddling with a loose thread off the end of your sleeve.

“Then will you do the same?” he pleaded.

“Huh?” you tilted your head to one side but you didn’t look back up this time.

“You want me to speak better of myself, so will you do the same?” he explained gently.

“If you want me to” you answered flatly.

“No, not because I want you to, for yourself.”

“I’m not sure I can do that Spence”, you said looking back up at his face.

“Then can I?”

You nod, pulling a little at your sleeves as he leant closer to you, in barely more than a whisper he spoke, “Y/N, you’re one of the most amazing people I have ever met, you’re kind courteous even when people don’t deserve the respect, considerate of everyone else’s feelings and always want everyone to know that they’re safe to talk to you about whatever they’re going through,” he paused, looking down at his own hands and smiled softly before continuing, “I don’t know what’s going on in your head right now but I do know for a fact that you don’t have to do it alone. Whether you want to talk to me, Penny, JJ, Emily, Derek or Dave, hell even Hotch would be there for you if you needed him to be. You’re wrong, thinking we’d just be able to replace you if you left. If you left there would be a Y/N shaped piece missing from our team, because you have made us all better people by simply existing, and I hope you know that, truly.”

A tear rolled down your cheek, and then another, and another, until you were sobbing wiping your face with your sleeves and you turned away embarrassed about crying so hard at work.

“Don’t turn away, would you like a hug?” Spencer turned you back towards him and held his arms out for you. You nodded and he pulled you towards him awkwardly as the arms of the chair got in the way, but if he was uncomfortable he didn’t say anything as he held you and let you cry onto his shoulder.

When you felt like you’d cried as much as you would ever cry again you lifted your head. You went to wipe your face with your sleeves when Spencer stopped you and handed you a tissue from the box on the centre of the table.

“Now, would you like to talk about why you, the woman who boils hotter than the sun at the equator, is wearing a cardigan inside in the summer?”

“Not really”

“Y/N, there is no judgement coming from me, please explain to me what’s going on.”

You sighed and went to remove your cardigan, your right arm first and were a lot more tentative when it came to your left. You tried to pull it off only to feel the fabric was stuck to your wounds and you winced. As you pulled it slowly away from your arm and took your hand out of the sleeve you looked away as you put the clothing down on the table.

“Why?”

“Why did I do it? Honestly a few different reasons…”

“No, why didn’t you clean them up, dress the wounds, why aren’t you taking care of yourself?”

“I.. Uh, what?”

“I’ve known for a while that this is one of your vices, we can talk about the reasons why if you want to, but can we at least get them cleaned up first?”

“Wait, so you’re not going to give me the lecture about how ‘this isn’t a good way to deal with your feelings’ and try and talk me through a million different scenarios and possibilities like elastic bands and red pen?” You asked, incredulously.

“Would that help?” He looked up from where he’d been examining the cuts with care.

“Not really, it’s just what people usually do. I think you’re the only person not to freak out.”

“When you get to this point, when it all gets too overbearing and you feel like there’s nothing else you can possibly do to quiet whatever’s going on in your head, or you feel like you deserve it, whether it’s punishment or just to feel something because everything inside of you feels numb does it feel like you have a choice?” his voice was barely audible above the chatter outside and you wondered whether this was something he’s researched or whether this was more personal.

“No”

“Me neither. I mean, different vices but they’re an addiction at the end of the day, right? Only my addiction was something I was injecting into my own veins, and yours is something about the blade, or the blood or the pain, the tangible feeling of having something you can do to avoid or punish whatever is going on in your head.”

You grabbed one of Spencer’s hands and held it in yours, squeezing it quickly before letting go, a stray tear leaving your eyes once more. He reached up with his other hand and wiped your cheek, before wiping his own tear away and clearing his throat.

“Are you okay if I leave to get the first aid kit or should I ask Emily to bring it in? And before you freak out, Emily is the one I went to when I was at my worst, she listens and won’t ever judge or talk about it if you don’t want her to.”

“Ask Emily.” You mumbled in response.

“Okay, I’ll call her quickly.” Spencer got his phone out of his pocket and dialed the number waiting for Emily to pick up before asking her to bring the first aid kid and then briefly explaining that you both were okay.

When she opened the door to the conference room Emily was greeted by a scene she wasn’t sure she knew what to do with, until she saw your arm. She came in and shut the door behind her, kneeling down in front of you opening the first aid kit and resting her hands on her legs.

“You want to hold Spencer’s hand whilst I clean it up, or you want Spencer to clean it up whilst I hold your hand? No I won’t be offended if you pick his hand” She added, with a wink.

You laughed, a true laugh this time, “Uh, Spencer’s hand, if that’s okay with you Spence?”

“Of course” he replied, moving to the right hand side of you and taking your hand in his as Emily held your left wrist up to get a better look at the cuts.

“Okay, this will sting,” she said, getting out a bottle of saline after she put some blue gloves on. She grabbed some gauze and soaked it with saline and slowly wiped over your arm, checking your face for a reaction. When you didn’t flinch she focused on the cut highest up your arm and you grit your teeth as she cleaned it out more thoroughly. You gripped Spencer’s hand tightly and he put his other hand on your back and rubbed soothing circles. Once Emily had finished cleaning your wounds and had wrapped a bandage around your arm she looked up to you and said, “What’s your favourite colour?”

“Sorry?” you asked tilting your head to one side with confusion.

“I bought some colourful plasters, no more of the boring ‘skin tone’ ones that don’t match anyone’s actual skin tone” She explained using her hands to indicate quotation marks around ‘skin tone’, “So what’s your favourite?”

Before you could answer Spencer spoke up from beside you, “It’s purple.”

You looked at him and smiled, you were starting to believe that maybe people did really care about you.

“Purple coming right up!” Emily beamed and stuck the end of the bandage down with a deep purple plaster. “Okay, I’ll leave you two now, if you need anything else let me know, I’ll let the team know that you just need some time but you’ll be ready by 9am, it’s currently 8:45, you think that’ll be enough time?”

You nodded and said “Thank you, so much.”

“No need to thank me silly, I’m here for my friends, whatever they need” Emily smiled and stood up, taking the first aid kit with her and leaving.

Only once she was gone did you realise you were still holding onto Spencer’s hand. You let go quickly and felt your cheeks blush bright red again, “Sorry.”

“For what?” Spencer turned his head to look at you and it was his turn to be confused.

“Never mind” You said, smiling at him.

“You want to talk about anything else?”

“I have a question, but it might be too personal, and I don’t want to upset you”

“Fire away” he said and you turned your chair towards him.

“When you were listing all the reasons that someone might use one of their vices, which one fit you?” you looked down at your lap and picked at one of your fingernails where the nail polish was chipping slightly.

“Multiple reasons, mainly to forget, to get out of my own head, and then when we had difficult cases it became a release of tension. If you want to, you can tell me which of them fit you.” He added after his answer.

“Punishment, and when things got too much.”

“What were you punishing yourself for?” he asked quietly.

“Jesse.”

“La Plata, Colorado?”

“That’s the one” you nod and clasp your hands together, twisting a ring around your middle finger.

“That wasn’t your fault, that wasn’t anyone’s fault but Benjamin Cyrus’ who brainwashed her into believing he truly loved her. Nothing anyone could have said would have stopped her from pressing that button once she got hold of the switch” Spencer explained, quickly.

“I should’ve at least tried to talk her down,” you felt tears prickling your eyes again as you thought of the young girl’s situation.

“In staying behind you would’ve put yourself in imminent danger.”

“If I could have changed her mind, there wouldn’t have been any danger, we could’ve both walked out of there alive.

“Or you could have died.” Spencer’s voice gave away little hint of the despair he felt at the way you seemed to wish to throw your life away so flippantly.

“At least I would’ve tried.”

“I wish there was something I could say to reassure you that we did everything we could in going to that ranch in the first place. From the minute Emily and I spoke to her she was so wrapped up in her perceived love for him that I doubt anything you could’ve said would’ve changed her mind.”

“Really?”

“Y/N, if I’d thought there was a chance to change her mind I wouldn’t have shouted for you and Morgan to run. But I do wish it could have been different.” He said, looking down at his hands.

“You do?” you ask, barely audibly.

“Every time we lose an innocent life it takes it’s toll. We just have to believe that we do everything within our power to help or the ‘what if’s’ would eat us alive.”

“Thank you Spence.”

“For what?” he asked, looking back up at you.

“For being honest with me, for telling me that these things affect you too, for letting me know that I’m not alone with these feelings.”

“Thank you for staying here to listen, you could’ve easily stood up and walked out, I wouldn’t have tried to stop you, to me you staying here and being vulnerable with me was the biggest show of strength and willingness to let others in, and you should be proud of yourself for being open to knowing you’re not alone”.

“You’re one of a kind Spencer Reid, you always know just what to say.”

“Oh not always, but fortunately, when it matters.”

You smiled at him as the both of you stood up. You went to throw your cardigan back on when you realised it wasn’t clean any more.

“You have a spare in your go bag?” Spencer asked, nodding to the clothing in your hands.

You nodded and he signalled for you to wait there and he ran to your desk where you kept your go bag in the bottom drawer. He came back a minute later and handed you the spare cardigan and you thanked him with a kiss on the cheek. Now it was his turn to blush and he ran his hand through his hair and down the back of his neck laughing. The pair of you walked out of the conference room together and Rossi and Prentiss shared a knowing look as you wrapped your arm in Spencer’s as you all headed to the plane.

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