A/N: I got the idea for this one from a headcanon that I posted on my Tumblr page a while back, having realised just how much I love the friendship between these two. I was aiming to do all of it in a one-shot, but having given it some more thought, it's probably going to turn into a three-shot.
"Getting to the top is optional. Getting down is mandatory." – Ed Viesturs.
The decision to leave the Bureau was one of the hardest ones that he's ever made. It's been his life for years: cases, his team, guest lecturing at the Academy.. But he just can't do any of it anymore. He'd begun to hate the sight of the bright, hopeful young things taking in his every word because he knew that they too would eventually have to see some of the worst sights in world, all for the brief satisfaction that came after finding and locking up the monsters only to have to keep moving on to the next one, and he could almost feel the team's anger and confusion at him for getting up and abandoning them like this. He's going to miss them all, of course he is, but his heart tells him that they're easily going to be able to pick themselves up and carry on with the job at hand, that they're so much better off without him there anyway.
He also knows without a shadow of a doubt that Spencer would be the one to go to his cabin to check up on him, which is why he can barely see the harm in heading there for one night while he gets his things in order. This, however, proves to be a lot more difficult than he expects. It was supposed to be the place where he can distance himself from the world, the thought that he'd planned to bring Sarah here with him sometime hits him whilst he's packing all the essentials up into boxes to put in the car and he has to stop, close his eyes and just try to breathe for a minute.
After the last box has been sealed up, he then sits himself down at the table with a pen, paper and an envelope and writes until his hand aches and he's out of words. There's no question who he's going to leave this letter to, partly because he believes that Spencer deserves at the very least some kind of explanation as to why he needs to do this. It gives him closure on everything too that comes when he's put the pen down, tucked the letter inside the envelope that has Spencer's name hastily scribbled on it and sealed it up.
For the first time in a long while, he feels the smallest weight lift off of his shoulders. It doesn't last that long though, as after two weeks of being on the road, none of the pain has gone away. There's still a dull, empty ache in his chest where his heart used to be and he of all people should know that these things take time to fade away in order to feel okay again. Sometimes, he wants to pack it all in and go home, then he's reminded that he doesn't even have one anymore. He can never go back to the apartment that was tainted by what happened there because if he'd spent more than five more minutes there, he wouldn't have been able to live with himself or any of the guilt anymore.
He suspects that the team have probably called him a million times by now and that's part of the reason why he left his cell and the charger right in the bottom of his suitcase. Instead, he had bought a basic disposable one as a temporary measure in case he ever needs to contact anyone. It's a lot easier, because he doesn't know how long it'll take Spencer to go to the cabin and for them to find his stuff packed away neatly in the box inside his office. He knows that if it takes too long from that to happen, the team will get the technical analyst girl (what was her name?Penelope? Something like that..) to track his old cell phone and his card, so he takes enough cash with him to pay for food and hotels and anything else he needs.
For a while, it's enough. He doesn't spend any longer than a week in the same place, and he actually enjoys having the freedom to do what he pleases and go to the places that he's always wanted to be without being there for work purposes and no ties to flying straight back to Quantico to find another stack of paperwork to be filled out waiting for him. Sometimes the thought crosses his mind that quite a lot of people would probably think he's being awfully selfish but all he wants to do is focus on distancing himself from the dark place that is the inside of his head until he's ready to sit down and deal with it properly. He just needs time to get towards starting to heal again.
However, the last thing he expects is for that to happen so soon.
One particularly rainy Friday morning in Annapolis, he's hurrying down the street towards the coffee shop that he's been frequenting for the past three mornings in a row when he walks straight into a shivering younger woman huddled under her umbrella.
"Sorry! Are you alright?" He asks her, eyes widening in complete surprise when she looks up at him to reveal an all too familiar face.
"Gideon?" She looks as shocked as he feels and he can't help giving her a warm, delighted grin.