Disclaimer: Criminal Minds is owned by CBS. I own nothing but my imagination.
~This story was written in response to Ilovetvalot and Tonnie2001969's June Fanfic Challenge
Coping Mechanisms
Spencer Reid pushed open the door to the bar, stepped in and waited for his eyes to adjust to the dark and smoky atmosphere. After a minute, he looked around and found her, she sitting at a table by herself with a bottle of Patron and a glass. He pushed his way through the Friday night crowd and slipped into the other side of the booth. She was so lost in her thoughts that it took her a moment to realize she was no longer alone.
"Reid!" She said in surprise, "What are you doing here?"
That was a valid question; what was he doing there? As he had been leaving the BAU bullpen an hour ago, Rossi had stopped him.
"Got any big plans for the night, Dr. Reid?" He asked.
The genius shook his head, "No, I thought I would edit a journal article I'm working on and then curl up with a couple of books in front of the fireplace. You?" He asked politely.
Rossi grinned, "I may have a few things planned for tonight, but I think you're too young to hear about them."
Reid turned red thinking about the activities the older profiler had planned for the night and Dave laughed. "The reason I'm asking you is because you're the only one of us without plans for the night and I need a favor from you; I think this last case bothered Jordan more than she let on and rumor has it she's planning on going to the Ivory Bar to drown her sorrows…and she's planning on going by herself."
"Okay," Reid said, still wondering what the older man wanted from him.
"Since your evening is free, I'm hoping you'll go to the bar and at least sit with her so she doesn't overdo it."
"Sir-" Reid started, but Rossi interrupted him.
"Look Reid, you and I both know it's not safe for a woman to drink herself into oblivion alone, too many bad things can happen to them. Plus, you know better than anyone that losing yourself to a substance is not the best coping mechanism-" Reid interrupted Dave this time.
"Yeah, but sir…" He practically whined.
"She needs someone to talk to Reid, she's new to this, she hasn't seen what we have and it gets under her skin more." Rossi said quietly. He could see that the younger man was close to giving in to his request, so he decided to sweeten the deal. "Look Reid, if you do this for me, I'll owe you one."
Spencer considered his options; the idea of having someone as powerful as Rossi owing him one was nice, plus anyone who wanted to have a lasting career at the FBI didn't usually say no when David Rossi asked them for a favor. Finally, like it or not, Jordan was a member of his team and if she needed help then she was going to get it.
"Fine, I'll go sit with her, sir." Reid said, still somewhat reluctant.
Rossi clapped him on the shoulder, "You're a good man, Reid."
"Reid, why are you here?" Jordan repeated.
Spencer shook himself out of his reverie. "I heard you were coming here tonight, and I didn't want you to drink alone."
In spite of the shitty day she'd had, Jordan found herself smiling. "Well have a seat Doctor," she said, signaling for the waitress to bring them another glass. When she arrived, Reid waved the glass away, "I'll just have an ice water please," he told her.
Once the waitress was gone, Jordan poured herself a healthy shot of tequila and threw it back. "I thought you said you didn't want me to drink alone."
"What I meant was, I didn't want you to be alone while you drink. Someone has to remain sober, if only to drive," he explained as the waitress set his ice water down in front of him.
"Oh," she said, pouring herself another shot. "Suit yourself," she said as she gulped the alcohol.
Five minutes later, after she had taken another three shots, she asked, "What are you really doing here Reid? I always got the impression that you never really liked me."
Spencer felt bad about that. It was somewhat true, but he never wanted his dislike for her to be obvious. "It's not that I don't like you, it's just that JJ and I are really close, and seeing you doing her job makes me miss her," he said diplomatically.
Jordan, who had been pouring tequila into her glass, slammed the bottle down on the table. "Ah yes, the great and all knowing JJ. JJ, the woman who can pick cases without regret. JJ, the one who can manage the team, the local LEO's and the press, all without showing a line of stress on her face. JJ, the woman who can report on the deaths of children without a waver in her voice. JJ, who will be able to juggle her demanding career and a family, while I can barely remember to feed my cat!" She threw the shot back and quickly poured another. "I can't tell you how sick I am of being compared to JJ!"
"To my knowledge, no one has compared you to her," Reid said calmly. While he normally wouldn't let anyone rip into JJ like that, he understood that Jordan was drunk and he also realized that the last case had deeply affected her.
"Not out loud, but you all do it in your heads, I can tell," she said, almost in tears.
"Jordan-" He started, but she didn't let him finish.
"No Reid, don't try to placate me, not here and not now…just let me drink."
For an hour, he did just that; they both sat in silence while she drank shot after shot of the potent liquor. Finally after about an hour, when the bottle stood half-full, Reid took the bottle and moved it out of her reach.
"What are you doing Reid?" She slurred.
"You're good and drunk now Jordan, but I'm sure as hell not going to let you drink yourself into a coma. It's time to go home."
She shook her head, "I can still remember the case from today, so I'm not done drinking yet!" She tried to grab the bottle, but Spencer moved it out of her reach.
"Look Jordan, I know better than anyone that losing yourself to something like this is a temporary fix; it's not going to help you in the long run, in fact it will do more harm than good, so I'm cutting you off before it gets to that point. Let's go," he said, standing up.
She wanted to argue with him, but she could tell by the look in his eyes that it was a fight she wouldn't win. "All right," she said as she stumbled to her feet. Reid grabbed her arm to support her and then led her to the parking lot.
"Which car is yours?" He asked, looking around.
"We're not taking yours?" She asked back, in surprise.
Shaking his head, Spencer responded, "No, I take the train to work so I don't have my car."
"How did you get here?" Even drunk, Jordan knew that this bar wasn't close to any Metro stops.
Reid shrugged, "Took a cab. Now which one is yours?"
Jordan felt a flood of affection for the young genius, she knew a cab ride from Quantico must have been expensive, and he did it for her out of the goodness of his heart. "It's right there," she said, pointing to a Toyota Prius.
He helped her into the car and then got in behind the wheel. "I live on-"
"We're not going your house," Reid told her.
"We're not?" He shook his head. "Where are we going then?" She asked, surprised.
"Back to my place." He saw the questioning look on her face, so he elaborated, "There's no way I'm letting you stay alone in the condition you're in, and since you have your go bag in your car, you can easily stay at my apartment."
Again, Jordan tried to get a grip on her emotions, it was nice having someone else looking out for her.
They passed the drive to Reid's apartment in silence, and once there, he again helped her out of the car and up to the building. They went inside, and while Jordan used the bathroom, Reid changed the sheets on his bed and put a pillow and blanket on the couch.
Jordan came out of the bathroom, clad in her pajamas, and wobbled toward the sofa. "No, you can have my room, I'll take the couch." Reid told her.
"I can't-"
"Yes you can," he said, leading her to his room. He helped her into bed, put an empty trashcan near her head and then left, leaving the bedroom door partially open in case she needed help during the night.
xxxxxxxxxx
At around ten o'clock the next morning, Jordan sheepishly emerged from the bedroom and made her way to the kitchen. Reid, who had been up since eight, poured her a cup of coffee. "Sleep well?" He asked with a small smile on his face.
"Not really," she said taking a drink. "I want to thank you Reid, I really owe you one for last night."
He waved away her gratitude, "You don't owe me one, I was just being a good teammate and friend. As your friend though, I feel I should tell you that drowning each of our cases in tequila is not a good coping mechanism."
She nodded, "I know, yesterday just really got to me."
"It got to all of us Jordan, it was a shitty end to a shitty case." The team had been looking for a child murderer, and by the time they had caught him, he had taken his eighth and final victim.
"The body was still warm," Jordan said softly, "If we had gotten there ten minutes earlier-"
"Stop," Reid commanded, "If you think like that, it will drive you insane. There are about a thousand woulda, shoulda, coulda's you could think about, but none of them will help bring any of those kids back. You need to try to think about all of the kids we saved by catching the bastard."
Jordan was silent for a minute while she drank her coffee and tried to absorb Reid's advice. "You said last night that you know better than anyone that losing yourself to a substance doesn't help anything. What did you mean by that?"
He shook his head, "Someday I'll tell you all about it, but today I'm going to show you my method of coping. Grab a shower and get dressed, we leave in half an hour."
Jordan, who was curious to see how the young doctor dealt with the aftermath of the horrors of his job, followed his order and was ready to go thirty minutes later.
An hour later, she was surprised to find herself in the lobby of a branch of the Washington DC humane society.
"Hey Tony, you think you can hook me and my friend up today?" Reid asked one of the guys behind the desk.
Tony looked around the building, "Sure Spencer, its slow today, so there shouldn't be a problem. Why don't you and your lady friend go on back to the room."
Reid grinned and led Jordan to a small room and they both sat on the floor. A minute later Tony came in with five puppies attached to leashes. Once inside the room, he let the puppies off the leashes and they lunged towards Spencer and Jordan. Tony threw some toys at them and said, "You have an hour Spencer," and then left.
Jordan was confused as a golden retriever puppy began gnawing on the side of her shoe. "What is this Reid?" She asked as she picked up the puppy and cuddled it. The other puppies, seeing the love she was giving to one, all clambered over to her looking for the same attention.
"This is my coping mechanism," he told her, plucking a black lab puppy out of the mix. He began to throw a tennis ball to it and all of the puppies went after it. "When I first started at the BAU, Hotch talked about 'The Reid Effect.' Kids and dogs pretty much hated me back then and it seemed like there was nothing I could do about it. Well a year ago I became friends with Tony, who's a veterinarian here, and I mentioned the Reid Effect to him. He let me come in and play with the dogs as a way for me to become comfortable around them. It kind of became a habit that after really bad cases, I would come here to play with the puppies." What he didn't tell Jordan was that he met Tony at a Narcotics Anonymous meeting. "It's a great stress reliever," he said, smiling down at mixed breed puppy that had fallen asleep in his lap.
"It sure is," Jordan agreed, wrestling with a couple of the dogs.
Later, as they walked back to her car, she turned to him. "Thanks Reid, I really needed this today. I usually call my mom or one of my sisters when things get rough, but how do I tell them about some of our cases without letting the horror into their lives?"
"You can't," Reid said honestly, "They would never understand, but we do. Any time you need to talk or vent about a case, come find me or one of the other team members, even Hotch. We've all been where you are, Jordan, and no matter how unfriendly some of us may seem, we care about you and we don't want you to have to go through this stuff alone, okay?"
"Okay," she said softly, finally feeling like she was a member of the team, as temporary as her position may be. "Thanks again Reid."
"Anytime," he told her.
The End