Something that popped into my head while I was up watching Criminal Minds last night. I've suffered from insomnia since I was in middle school and it still plagues me to this day. In short, it sucks. A lot.
"She" is nameless and description-less, because, eh, why not? Make up your own OC, or put yourself in "her" shoes. That kinda thing.
May continue this if more inspiration strikes. I'll keep it labeled unfinished until I decide.
Disclaimer: I do not own Criminal Minds, or...anything, really.
She rolls over once, twice, three times before checking the clock again. 1:27. Only ten minutes have passed since she last stared the blaringly red digital numbers in the face. To her, sleep-deprived, worried, and just unable to stop, it feels like it's been an eternity. It doesn't help that she's in a foreign bed – some hotel in an unfamiliar town in some pocket of the country she didn't even know existed four days prior. Maybe she doesn't know how to stop because her life never stops, so her consciousness just mirrors what it recognizes around her. The ever-changing scenery and the non-stop work are driving her into the ground and, subsequently, back into her insomnia.
Her doctor told her about a year ago that, if her sleeping habits started to straighten out, she could wean herself off the medicine and let her body take over from there. And since her new full-time job as an SSA in the BAU often times tired her to the point of exhaustion, she began sleeping so regularly that she gave up her meds cold turkey without many problems. She stopped taking Rozerem and consequently stopped carrying it around in her purse and her go-bag. Therefore, when reminiscences of past cases and worry over those yet to come suddenly cropped up, she was unprepared.
Finally giving up on sleep for the night, she sits up in bed, reaching for the remote and turning on the TV. She flicks through the channels for a good two minutes, but finds that she's so drained she can't even pay attention. The glow of the television wraps the sheets in a ghostly blue, highlighting the lumps of clothes at the foot of the bed and reminding her that she still hasn't thrown away that Chinese takeout from three nights ago. That's when her insomnia started up again; maybe she just had some bad tofu.
God, but she's so tired she could cry. She's been waiting so long for the clutches of sleep to rise up and pull her under out of her body's pure necessity, but her brain's forced her awake much longer than three days in the past. She remembers the weeks in high school she spent barely sleeping, too worried about grades, the future, and all the unfinished work piling on her desk. Or in college working on her linguistics degree when nothing mattered more than getting this paper exactly right. And that horrendous month finishing up her dissertation where she slept maybe a handful of hours for a full thirty days.
Those were some of the worst cases, sure, but right now, in this moment, she feels the most horrible. Every memory that pops up, every thought that tumbles through her weary mind makes her stomach roil and her mouth taste sour and she so, so badly wants to sleep. Even if her dreams were plagued with nightmares, she'd rather suffer through them than spend another minute contemplating the inner turmoil she's currently experiencing.
Tears well up in her eyes and she pats them away before they can skitter down her cheeks. Having an episode in the middle of a case won't help anyone. Just as she decides to phone down to the front desk to ask if they have any heavy sedatives, a knock comes from the door joining her room to the neighboring one. She undergoes a mini-heart attack before she realizes that the room belongs to one of her teammates, although she can't remember for the life of her whom.
Feeling guilty for having woken them with her TV, she slides out of bed and makes sure she looks somewhat less disorderly before unlocking and pulling open her side of the door. Dr. Spencer Reid stands there, clad in a pair of plaid pajama pants and a Doctor Who t-shirt – an ensemble that's just so Reid that she can't help but smile wanly. Thankfully, he doesn't appear as though she's woken him from deep slumber. In fact, the lit bedside lamp and stack of books and files splayed across his bed spell a much different story, though one much similar to her own. As such, she sighs, leaning against the doorframe and peering up at him.
"Couldn't sleep?" she asks.
"No," he answers quickly, habitually running his hands down his legs to stuff them into pockets that aren't there. "I was actually up reviewing some things for the case, hoping I'd find some sort of breakthrough."
"And you heard my TV come on and figured you'd corral me in to help?" She knows that's the least likely of his reasons for knocking on her door at nearly four in the morning; Spencer Reid has never been one to ask for help, especially not with academic undertakings. However, she wants to keep the mood light for as long as possible, even if she knows his analysis of her current behavior has led to his discovery of her condition. "You know I'm not much for book-learnin,'" she drawls, ironic coming from a linguist.
Reid laughs a bit at her joke, but she cannot deter him so easily. "Actually, the sound of your TV just confirmed my hypothesis. How long have you had insomnia?"
"As long as I've had shit to worry about," she admits with a rushing sigh. "How'd you figure it out?"
Though she could reanalyze her behavior over the past few days and ascertain the events up to his conclusion for herself, she doesn't feel much up to the task. Moreover, it distracts him while she invites herself into his room, making sure to prop open the door to her room before wandering over to peer at one of the open books on his bed.
"Well, despite the obvious increase in irritability –" she shoots him a look that does more to confirm his statement than reprimand him for it "– you've mentioned to both Hotch and Garcia that you haven't been sleeping well lately. You've also been getting up earlier than everyone else has, when you're usually the last to wake up, and there are very prominent dark circles under your eyes."
"Good job," she genuinely praises, slumping down onto the edge of the mattress. "Anything else?"
Reid hesitates for a second, as if debating on whether or not to speak, and then continues. "You have a very specific expression you wear when you focus – uh, your eyebrow creases, your lips purse, and your eyes fix onto something in front of you. But, lately you've been very…inattentive and dazed."
While the fact that he takes a good portion of his time around her memorizing her facial expressions is rather flattering, she's sure half of her team has done the same by this point, merely out of habit than anything else. Hell, she could say the same about him; when he gets so caught up in some piece of trivia he's sharing with the group, his hands will either slip into his pockets, or fiddle with a pen, his eyes light up, and the tiniest of smiles will turn the corners of his lips. Or, if he's preoccupied with something at the moment, he'll squint as he divides his attention between the task at hand and the fact he's relaying, able to successfully multitask between the two with no problems whatsoever. Meanwhile, she can barely focus on writing one report.
Although, saying it in her head now, she's not sure she would admit that aloud to him. He was very brave, however, and spilled his secret monitoring of her countenance, so she gives him a smile in return.
"It's sweet of you to notice," she says honestly. He shrugs it off and crosses his arms, a small tinge of pink rising to his cheeks. She continues on, if only to save him some embarrassment. "To be honest, I'm actually surprised no one else has noticed. I haven't exactly been my usual, fun-loving self."
Reid chuckles. "Yeah, you haven't made a jab at Morgan's masculinity since we got here."
"Insomnia is truly a curse to us all."
Silence falls between them and Reid, apparently just realizing her presence in his room, clears his throat. He moves to the small mini-bar in his room, digging through the little packets of tea and instant coffee. "Uh, do you want coffee – actually, no, coffee wouldn't help at all."
"Might as well just have some," she admits. "It's obvious I won't be getting any sleep tonight."
"You should at least try."
Reid straightens, showing her the packet of chamomile tea he managed to conjure. She smiles and gets to her feet to help him prepare the tea. She grabs a clean mug while he tears open the pack. She fills the mug with water and sticks it into the microwave, setting the time for two minutes. "Well, I've been trying for the last three hours and all I've done is get a migraine."
"I have ibuprofen."
"Dr. Reid, you're a lifesaver." She leans against the counter as he moves to rummage through his bag. "You wouldn't happen to have Rozerem in there? Or something that will knock me out."
"Unfortunately, I'm not currently cornering the market in narcotics, no."
"Lame," she sighs. He returns a few seconds later with a bottle of Advil and she takes it gratefully. The microwave beeps just as she shakes a few pills into the palm of her hand and she removes the mug, tentatively sipping the hot beverage to wash them down. When she finishes, Reid's replaced himself on the bed, studiously flipping through the many texts surrounding him. She shifts uncomfortably for a second, cupping her drink carefully with both hands. "Um, Spencer…."
His gaze break almost immediately from the page he's own to focus his attention on her. She never calls him by his first name; it's always Dr. Reid, or Doc, or some other similar moniker that she comes up with on the spot. Mostly because first names are very personal to her for some reason and just the thought of using his first name makes her heart beat faster. Her eyes cut to the floor before he can meet them.
"I was just wondering if…I could stay here? For a bit." The green and brown carpet between her toes is suddenly very interesting. "If I'm alone I'll just think myself in circles all night and never have even the slightest hope of sleeping. I mean, I understand if you don't want me to, I just didn't want…."
Where is she even going with this?
"It's – it's fine," he says, interrupting before she can continue rambling.
She breathes a sigh of relief, almost positive that he was going to reject her and she was going to have to live the rest of her days in shame. Carefully, she sits cross-legged at the foot of the bed, pulling over one of the books he either hasn't read or already looked at. She tucks her mug into the popliteal space behind her knee while flipping idly through the book, not exactly sure for what she's looking.
When she voices this aloud, Reid wastes no time diving straight into a long-winded explanation of his theories. She listens as intently as she can, watching his hands shift from book to book, indicating various sentences or blocks of text. At one point, he opens the case file to show her something pertaining to the positioning of the bodies, but she's not sure what he's talking about anymore. But his voice is nice and helps her to relax. Before she knows it, she has stretched out over the bed on her side, clutching the now-empty mug to her chest while she watches him speak.
Her heavy eyelids droop, slowly… slowly…closing….
...
Reid has a hard time explaining away her presence in his bed when Morgan barges in that morning.