Partial Thickness

"Hey, Spence."

JJ shifted Michael on her hip, as she stood at the end of the hallway. As often as she'd told Reid he could just let himself in, he always insisted on using the doorbell.

"Hi." Trying not to look like he was looking her over. But he was, and they both knew it.

"Did you want to come in?"

"Huh? Oh, well, yes, if it's all right. I just wanted to come by to see how you were. Hotch said you were taking a week off."

He did, did he? Did he happen to mention it was on his order?

Aloud, she replied. "I have a week, yes. But it's not like it was my idea."

Reid knew her well enough to have anticipated that, and he had a ready reply….which was actually the reason for his visit. Even without having been told, he was sure Hotch had been forced to issue a command. And Reid was in complete agreement with his unit chief.

"He's right, JJ."

"The EMT said it was only a second degree burn. If I keep it bandaged, it will be fine."

The burn wasn't the reason she'd been benched, and they were both fully aware of that. But if Reid knew JJ, she knew him just as well, and she knew he wouldn't be able to resist expounding. She could only hope it would prove to be an effective deflection.

On cue, the expounding began.

"A partial thickness burn is serious, JJ. It involves the whole epidermis, and goes into the hypodermis as well. And it can progress, even after the thermal contact ends. Not to mention it's on your hand, which is nearly impossible to keep clean and dry, and, if it's deep enough, it could cause a contraction, and…"

"Stop! Enough. Here, hold your godson." Handing Michael over. "Henry's at school."

"I figured. What time does he get home?"

JJ smiled, hearing the eager anticipation in Reid's voice. "Around three. Right after this guy…" tousling Michael's head, "gets up from his nap. Which he just did. I was about to change him when you rang the bell."

Reid's hand took an estimated weight measure of Michael's diaper. "Yep, I think it's time."

She reached for her son. "Here, let me…"

Reid rotated away from her. "Nothing doing. Weren't we just talking about how you need to keep your dressing clean?"

"Well, technically, 'we' weren't talking about it. But, all right, he's all yours. Are you planning on coming over for every diaper change?"

"Touche. But I've got this one."

He headed off to Michael's room, chattering away at his godson, who babbled back at him in return, leaving JJ torn between smiling at the scene, and trying to adjust her armor. Spencer Reid had a way of finding the chinks in it, sometimes even better than Will did.

A few minutes later, godfather and godson returned, Reid sporting a huge grin.

"He just said 'Pes'! I think he means me!"

Or that candy.

The urge to smile triumphed, and JJ gave in to it. "He's got a bunch of words, now. Don't you, Mikey?"

"Ma-ma," reaching once again for his mother, who took him from Reid. Then he reached back for Reid, saying, once again,"Pes!"

Both adults grinned widely, as Reid reclaimed him from JJ.

"See? You're right, Spence. He knows your name! But," putting her nose up to Michael's, "we are not playing this back-and-forth game with you, little man. Not if you want your snack."

Apparently Michael's receptive language was pretty developed as well. At the word 'snack', he motioned his godfather over to the highchair. Once ensconced, he happily pounced on some finger food provided by his mother.

Reid took advantage of the moment to get back to JJ's injury.

"I'd feel better if you'd let a doctor see your burn. Just to be sure. Just to make sure the wound is healthy and that it's not too deep. A partial thickness burn is deceiving. You think it's not too bad, and that you can manage it. But, when you lose the healthy outer tissue like that, it's easy for infection to set in. Until it starts to heal, it opens you up to all sorts of deeper wounds. It's raw."

"It's fine, Spence."

"Maybe you think it looks fine now. But what if it heals poorly? What if, because you didn't attend to it, it causes a contraction? You don't want to be scarred for life just because you didn't attend to something, right?"

He paused just long enough to attract her gaze. When he was sure he had her eyes, he added, "It's never a good idea to underestimate how badly you've been hurt."

There. The chink. He'd found it. She was so good at covering up in so many places, in so many ways. But never her eyes.

And he knows that, damn it.

It would do no good to pretend she hadn't heard him, and known exactly what he meant. She could tell he'd already seen it in her eyes. Much better to declare him wrong.

Right?

"I'm fine."

He just continued to look at her, and as badly as she wanted to break her gaze away from his, she couldn't. His grip was that strong. The truth was that strong.

"I will be fine. It was just…Spence, I went through all this with Will, last night. I'm exhausted from it."

That was enough to penetrate his stare. Reid was immediately apologetic.

"Of course you did. I'm sorry. I shouldn't push you. I just.."

JJ reached a hand across the table, inviting his.

"You just care. I know. And I appreciate it. But, really, Spence, I'm okay."

"I saw you send Luke away on the plane, and then I saw you lose yourself out there, in the clouds. I wanted to talk then, but I thought I should give you some time….."

"You thought right. You know me too well, my friend."

Reid mirrored her earlier gesture, and put his other hand out, reaching for hers. Holding her hands, looking intently at her, he pleaded.

"I know you don't like to talk about these things. Believe me, I know how uncomfortable it is. But we both know that you need to. I'm glad you were able to talk with Will, and I hope you know that you can always talk with me. But you've just been through a major trauma, JJ. And I'm not talking about your hand. All of this happened while you were still trying to recover from...before..., and you need someone who can help you heal."

The meeting of hands and eyes was powerful, and the remainder of her armor dissipated into the ether. She had no artifice left in her. Only raw, reactive emotion.

"I've been through a trauma? Me? Spence, I let a young girl die in that fire! I made the wrong decisions, and she died!"

Initially, Reid had known only that she'd sent Luke after the unsub, insistent that she could free the children herself. It had sounded like a reasonable enough decision….until he'd arrived at the scene, and examined what was left. Then, he'd understood. Before that, he'd been worried about her physical condition. After...

"They were chained, JJ. It wasn't rope holding them down, or leather, or plastic. It wasn't something you could cut through."

How in God's name did you think you were going to get them free?

"I thought I could loosen them, or….or…..I tried to shoot the lock. And then I tried to find something to cut the chain with, and I did, but…it was too hot."

"Is that when you burned your hand?"

"I think so. I don't know." Her head hung forward, and she stared at the table top, back in the inferno once again. "You think I was wrong too, don't you? You think I was stupid to think I could break those chains."

Sadness creased his face as he looked at her dejected figure. I think those weren't the chains you were trying to break.

He knew. He knew, because he lived it, even all these years later. A sound, or a smell, or a body in the woods, and he could still be back there, in an instant. The loss of control, the terror of being at the mercy of the merciless. The fear of dying in the presence of evil. He knew it because he lived it, just as she undoubtedly did, despite her protests. He'd seen the chains that had held her as she'd been tortured. They'd entered his nightmares as well. And he was absolutely certain she'd been triggered, last night.

Reid took the space of a deep breath to sort through his thoughts. It wouldn't do to express all of them aloud.

"I don't think you're stupid. Never."

It caught her up short. She'd expected him to tell her she'd done the right thing, that she couldn't have known, that she couldn't bear the responsibility of what an unsub did, just as Will had.

But that wasn't what he'd said.

He said he doesn't think I'm stupid. But he didn't say it wasn't the wrong decision.

And, because it was Spence, and because he knew her as well as anyone else in the world, she had to ask.

"What do you think, then?"

Reid knew he was on dangerous ground here. He could say something that would damage their friendship.

But I have to be willing to risk that, don't I? isn't she worth it? What's the expression? 'The pearl of great price'?

He knew their friendship would mean nothing if they couldn't be honest with one another. So he told her.

"I think you did something that you wouldn't have done three years ago."

That caught her completely by surprise.

"Three years…you think?…no, Spence. No." She'd left that all firmly in her past. Hadn't she?

He leaned forward, earnest now.

"JJ, I'd never seen you deliberately disobey an order before that. Never. And then, when we had that case…"

She knew exactly which case he was talking about. Because there had been only the one time.

"The kids in the cult…"

"Yes, the kids in the cult. Hotch told you to wait for the rest of us, but it was like you hadn't even heard him. You just went ahead on your own, and…."

"And I saved them. I saved those kids."

Her voice beginning to break now. There was something about what Spence was saying, something about the words, something about the memories, something….that wanted to rise up, as badly as she wanted to push it back down.

"Yes, you saved those kids. At great risk to yourself. You should have waited, that day. But you didn't."

"I needed to save them!"

"You needed to save them?"

She corrected herself. "They needed to be saved."

He looked at her intently. "Yes, they did. But why did it need to be you? And why you, alone?"

And why on the same day that I confronted you about your PTSD? Think, JJ!

"I…. I needed to know that I could. That I could save someone, that….. that I could save someone…"

"Even if you couldn't save yourself. You needed to know that you could control a situation."

Just like that, so matter of fact. The truth. There it was, as it had always been and might always be. The battle for control. The single major battleground of her life.

As Reid well knew.

"You needed to prove to yourself that you could be in control. It was all closing in on you then, I know you remember, because I do. And you needed to prove something to yourself. It was a bad decision, and it was only through the grace of God that it worked out."

"Well, thanks for that, friend. It couldn't have been my skill or anything."

Inserting sarcasm between them like a shield, because he'd come too close.

He read her like a book. "You know I think you're great at everything you do. But you weren't great at making decisions that day. And, yes, I'll agree with you. You didn't make good decisions last night, either. You should have let Luke help you. There's no guarantee that it would have changed the outcome, but it would have been the right thing to do. But, even so, it wasn't your fault that we lost a life."

Purposely inserting the 'we'.

He continued. "How many times have you told me that I can't take the blame for what an unsub does? That I can only do the best I can, with the right intention? Has that been only for my benefit? Do you believe that or not?"

"Of course I do!"

"Only when it's me who's carrying the guilt, though, right? Not when it's you?"

"No…I ….. " She dissolved into a sigh, and her posture told him that he'd gotten her there, at last.

"I'm right."

She saw a hint of triumph on his face, and was irritated.

"You're a know-it-all."

He laughed, and, in spite of herself, she joined him.

"Yes, I am. I'm afraid it's a hazard of the trade for us geniuses. But I'm a lovable know-it-all. Admit it."

She gave him a look. "All right, yes. You're a lovable know-it-all. But you're also scary."

"Me?"

"Yes, you. How do you do that?"

"How do I know my best friend as well as she knows me?"

"No, I know how that works. I just want to know how you make me see it. I'm not fond of looking in the mirror, as you well know."

He smiled. "Well, you should be. If you did, you'd see a beautiful woman looking back. The same one I get to see every day."

The smile she returned was infused with sadness, and resignation. JJ rose, and pulled Reid up with her.

"C'mere, you."

Her arms looped around his neck, and his around her waist, and they embraced.

"If I ever stop listening to you, hit me over the head with something, will you?"

"You're not mad at me?"

"For being a good friend?"

He pushed back so he could see her face.

"Well….I might be about to push the good friend thing a little further."

Wary, now. "What did you do?"

"How about if I volunteer to babysit the boys until Will gets home?"

"Spence, you're always welcome to stay for dinner. You know that. Besides, I don't need to go anywhere."

Red began creeping up his neck, and he had trouble making eye contact. If he hadn't overstepped before, he was about to, now.

He cleared his throat. "Um…I may have checked to see if your counselor had an opening this afternoon."

It took a second to penetrate.

"You…Spencer Reid, you did not make an appointment for me!" Getting a little red in the face herself.

"No! No, I didn't. I just pretended I might want to make one for myself, and they told me they had a cancellation for this afternoon. That's all, I promise."

She released herself and went to get a cloth for Michael's well-decorated face. Reid watched as she scrubbed at her son's cheeks, maybe just the slightest bit harder than was necessary.

"I'm sorry. I overstepped. You don't need to talk to anyone if you don't want to. I just…. I think you need to. And I couldn't stand by and know that without trying to help. I couldn't live with myself that way. If that makes me selfish, then…all right, I'm selfish."

"You're not selfish." Reflexively defending him to himself. "But you know I don't like to be pushed."

"I'm not pushing. I just investigated a possible opportunity, and reported my findings, in case a person who needed to know them wanted to take advantage of said opportunity. Which happens to be at four o'clock. But no pushing."

Palms up in a gesture of innocence.

She flashed him a look, and finished up with Michael, slowly lifting him out of his high chair.

For a long moment, her back was to Reid. Then she turned around, arms extended.

"He's all yours. There's a roast in the fridge all ready to go. Put it in at 4:30. Michael should be set, but Henry will be looking for a snack. Make sure he doesn't eat a full sleeve of cookies."

"Yes, ma'am."

"And try not to look so smug."

He blushed again. "This isn't smug. This is happy. Because my best friend in all the world has decided she wants to take care of her wounds, and the thing I want, more than anything, is for her to get better."

JJ grabbed her purse and landed a quick kiss on the top of Michael's head.

"Be good for your Uncle Spence."

Then she tipped up and bussed Reid's cheek.

"It's a good thing I love you."

She hurried down the hall and turned, just before reaching the door.

"Have Henry help you set the table. Four place settings and Mikey's high chair. Family dinner tonight."

As the door closed behind her, Michael reached a hand in that direction and called, "Ma-ma!"

The genius profiler assured the toddler in his arms.

"Don't worry, little man. Your mama will be back. All the way back. Because I don't intend to stop until she is."