The Test
A marker. A measure of genetic susceptibility.
"There is now a reliable genetic marker for certain cases of schizophrenia. Dr. Reid, do we have your permission to test your mother for this marker?"
Like asking him if he wanted to breathe.
"Does it really matter how or why her brain became broken? Will it make her life any different? Will it make mine any different?"
"But Dr. Reid, if she tests positive for the marker, then we can test you. You could have a definitive answer on your risk of also becoming ill. You could know!"
You're making an assumption, Dr. Norman. The real question is: Do I want to know?
Two months ago he'd finally agreed to his mother's testing, having struggled for days with whether to put her through it. He'd even discussed it with her. In her lucid moments, she'd encouraged him. In those less so, she'd railed against "being a lab rat in an experiment". But, ultimately, reason had prevailed, and the test had been done.
Two weeks later, a result. Diana Reid's cells were marked with the "marker of doom" as she later came to call it. Her schizophrenia had been inevitable, given her genetic makeup. And now, Spencer Reid could find out, definitively, whether he was also at risk.
For many sleepless nights, Reid endured the battle between the need to know and the fear of the answer. If he also carried the marker, was his worst fear an inevitability? Would he need to stop his work, isolate himself, for fear of making a fatal mistake? Would he lose all of the knowledge he carried and valued so much? Or would he find out that he was not marked, not "doomed"? What if the answer led to a freedom he'd never allowed himself in his life?
The case had been difficult. JJ always found cases that involved children took so much more out of her-out of all of them, really. The plane rides home were usually quiet after such cases, and this one was no exception. Emily tried to strike up a game of gin, but she had no takers. Even Morgan was pensive, and declined. When they got back to the BAU, Hotch gave the word to finish their preliminaries and then call it a day. He recognized that his team needed rest, and to spend some time away from thinking about the two children who had been lost.
As she gathered her things, readying to leave, JJ noticed that Reid was not in his spot in the bullpen. Instead, she spied him sitting upstairs, in an empty office. Mostly what JJ noticed was that Reid was sitting perfectly still; he hadn't moved for the three minutes she'd been watching him. Her curiosity got the better of her, and she approached the office. Knocking softly, JJ whispered a hello and entered the room. Reid didn't move, didn't turn around. He remained seated, and perfectly still.
"Spence….are you okay?" she asked. It was only then that he turned, just slightly, to look at her.
He shook his head. "I don't know. Maybe."
As she puzzled his answer, JJ noticed the envelope in his hand.
"What's that?" she asked.
He stared at it another moment before responding.
"My future."
Then he really looked at her, his eyes pleading.
"JJ, I'm scared to death to open this. I don't even know if I should open it."
That brought her all the way into the room. She sat down beside him, and encouraged him.
"Tell me."
Staring forward, Reid explained about the testing for the "marker of doom".
"This came three days ago. I've been carrying it around ever since. I think I'm too much of a coward to find out what it says. What if I have the marker? The one thing in my life that I have feared the most has been becoming like my mother. It's why I don't visit her-whenever I have, and she's having a bad day, I see myself and how I might become, and I retreat. It's also the thing she fears-that she's passed it on to me. She's told me that over and over again, whenever she's had a moment of clarity. What if this tells me it's inevitable? "
Reid's whole body was visibly shaking with emotion, as was his voice.
"I feel like I'm standing at the edge of an abyss, and what's in this envelope could push me over. That it could send me on an endless plunge to a bottom that doesn't exist." Finally, he turned to look at her again. "JJ, I'm scared."
Sitting next to him, she took his free hand in hers, but the shaking wouldn't be stilled. Her heart ached for him. And, in a selfish way, it ached for her as well. She'd come to rely on his steadiness, his practicality-but also on his kindness, his compassion, his humor, even the occasional naivete. Truth be told, she realized she'd grown to admire and respect him, willing to trust him with her deepest emotions, the ones she held in check for all others.
She knew he considered her his best friend, and was honored with the designation. Unlike Reid, JJ had many friends and companions-but she only trusted her deepest thoughts to Spence. The thought of his anguish over the test-and for that matter, the anguish of not knowing for all of these years-was overwhelming. She feared that the burden he'd been carrying all this time was about to crush him.
"Spence, I'm here. I'll stay with you when you open it. I don't think you should be alone, just in case….."
"I've lived all of my adult life afraid of this. It's affected every personal decision I've ever made. I've kept myself from even thinking about one day having a family, because I could never knowingly put a child through what I went through. So I've never even tried to have a serious relationship. I've never thought it would be right, nor even possible."
He rattled the envelope in his other hand once again, and continued.
"Opening this could make me lose all of those possibilities, permanently. These past months, watching you with Will and Henry-it's made me realize what my life should have been like. What if I find out it can never happen?"
JJ's heart broke for him, even as her practical side took over.
"Spence, there are too many 'what-ifs' here. You can't live a life like that. I think we both know you have to open that envelope. You have to know. I'll be right here with you. If it's bad news, we'll figure it out together. If it's good news, we'll celebrate!"
She put an arm around him for support.
Reid looked to her briefly, and then back to the envelope. Silent, he tore it open. His trembling was so bad that it took him three attempts. Finally he was able to extract a paper from inside and, ever so slowly, unfold it. He stared at it for a long moment, and then dropped his chin to his chest and began to sob.
Wide-eyed, JJ's face crumpled as she read his body language. Her own tears began in earnest. Her best friend, her hero-genius, her Spence, was facing his own worst nightmare.
"Spence", she managed to get out.
He replied by handing her the test result. She almost didn't accept the paper. She wanted to comfort him, not to read a test result. But something in his manner was insistent, so she looked at it. Her eyes went right to the bottom of the page, looking for the final result, and found it….."Negative".
Negative?! It's negative? He doesn't have it? Then why is he reacting…..and then she realized that she was seeing tears of relief. Of finding out that God is good, and prayer works, and life can still be full. But she also realized those tears of relief were mixed with tears of sorrow and loss, for the Diana who might have been, and the life she might have lived, had her own result said "negative".
For a few moments, JJ held him, and loved him, and shared both his joy and his sorrow.
When he had quieted, JJ led Reid out to the bullpen floor again. Morgan and Emily could see that their teammates had both been crying, and were immediately alarmed.
"What, did something happen?" asked Emily.
JJ recovered her voice first. "We have something to tell you. But we should call the others first so we'll only have to do this once."
She didn't think Reid had it in him to relive the experience more than that.
A short while later, the team was gathered in the conference room, sharing uneasy glances all around.
Reid cleared his throat and began. "You all know that my mother has schizophrenia-has had it since she was 22 years old. It's affected her whole life, and mine for that matter. You probably also know that schizophrenia is genetically passed. It's something I've been aware of my whole life…..something I've feared my whole life."
As he said these last words, Reid's voice started to fade and he broke eye contact with the team. It was almost as if he'd become entirely introspective, and forgotten they were there. A moment later, he'd collected himself and went on.
"When I began to get these really bad headaches, I was afraid it had started. I saw doctor after doctor and had test after test, but none of them gave me any answers. None of the doctors I saw could help me. They couldn't tell me if I was losing my mind."
Emily and Morgan exchanged a knowing glance. Reid had shared some of this with each of them before, but never this openly. They knew that he felt, as he'd told Morgan, "afraid of my own mind". And while they'd worried about him, neither had known how to help. Now they feared what he was about to tell them.
Reid continued. "A few months ago, a new genetic marker test for schizophrenia became available. My mother's doctors convinced me to have the test done on her. She tested positive for the marker. So then they wanted to test me."
At this, Emily and Garcia both gasped, realizing the implications for Reid in being tested. Morgan studied the man he'd so often thought of as a younger brother, and knew that his life was about to be irrevocably altered. Hotch and Rossi studied the team, concerned for what Reid was about to tell them and the inevitable emotional fallout.
Reid resumed his tale. "I wasn't sure I should do it. I mean, even though I've lived every day with the fear that it might happen to me, I've also lived with the possibility-the hope-that it wouldn't. I was afraid of…..I was afraid….."
His voice had faltered. Shakily, he started up again.
"I did finally have the test done. The results came in the mail a few days ago, but I couldn't bring myself to open the envelope. I carried it all the way to our case in Seattle and back. JJ finally convinced me I had to know."
Five concerned team members, five hearts holding their beats. They waited for Reid to continue, but he'd lost his ability to speak, which frightened his friends more than anything else. Had their youngest been swallowed by his nightmare?
Reid looked pleadingly to JJ, who gave the slightest nod and took up the story.
"Just a few minutes ago, Spence opened the envelope. " She found her own voice faltering, overcome with the emotion of it. "He's okay, he doesn't have the marker. He doesn't carry the gene for schizophrenia!" And again, barely a whisper, maybe to convince herself as much as anyone else, "He's okay."
And a collective breath they didn't realize they'd been holding was released. Garcia leapt up and embraced her "junior G man"; Emily smiled through her tears and followed suit. No one mentioned them aloud, but tears were rolling down Morgan's cheeks as well. Hotch and Rossi smiled their pleasure, Hotch already working on how to get word to Gideon.
Reid was surprised at how strongly his friends were reacting to the news. Despite their years together and the closeness, he'd never quite realized how much they'd shared his apprehension. He accepted their embraces and congratulations with his usual wry half smile.
"Drinks on me!" Emily proclaimed. "And dancing!" added Garcia.
The others went to gather their things, but Reid stayed behind and JJ, noticing, did as well.
"Are you okay?" she asked him.
"I'm not sure. In some ways, I guess I'm great. And in others, I'm sad…..for my mom, for the life she didn't get to lead. It's like she lost a genetic lottery and I won it. There's nothing fair about that at all."
JJ was quiet for a moment. She was thinking about her own reaction to the whole situation, both then, and now.
Had she held herself back from Spence when she thought he might become mentally ill? Had she passed up a relationship with an amazing man for fear of the unknown? Maybe. But she had kept a wonderful friend, godfather to her son, companion in times when she needed solace, and now, finally, freed of the beast that had, for so very long, haunted him.
"I think I understand, Spence. My feelings are all confused right now as well. But mostly"-and here she did exactly as she described-"I just want to smile ear to ear and give my best friend the hug of his life."
And Reid didn't refuse her a thing.
As they broke their embrace, he told JJ, "You all go ahead and celebrate tonight. Do it for me. I don't think I'm up to it myself. I need to spend some time alone with this. And I should probably ask Hotch for some leave. I think I need to go and see my mom."
Two days later, Reid arrived at Bennington. He found Diana outside, writing, beneath a shady oak-her favorite place, her favorite pastime.
"Hi, Mom."
"Spencer! I didn't expect you. What's wrong? Are you ill? They didn't force you to come here, did they? Tell me and I'll make them let you go. They can't keep you here!"
He sighed. He'd been hoping for better. This was definitely not one of her clearest days, but maybe she could still understand.….and he so wanted her to, he so badly wanted to share this with her. She was, after all, the one person in his life who truly comprehended the enormity of the threat, and he wanted to be able to share its abolition.
"No, Mom. Nothing's wrong. I just wanted to visit with you. I have some news…."