A/N: Hey guys! This is my first fic for any story. It's Criminal Minds with no slash! Just maybe some J.J. & Reid best friend fluff. It's a bit Reid-centric and Reid could be a little OOC but it's still Criminal Minds.
A/N 2: This fic contains spoilers for Criminal Minds season 6 and 7
A/N 3: Based off of the episode "Proof" (season 7, episode 2). Specifically the scene where J.J. and Reid fight about Prentiss and the fact that "he came to J.J.'s house crying for 10 weeks." and I love a good angsty story so when there was no fics about this I figured I'd write my own.
A/N 4: I don't own Criminal Minds and if I did I would totally being doing something cooler with the characters than just fanfiction.
Dr. Spencer Reid sat on the couch of his dimly-lit apartment.
'How could she just . . .leave?' he thought miserably.
It had been only two months after J.J. said those awful seven words- that one, tragic sentence. "She never made it off the table." He didn't know how many times he'd played that scene in his head. All he knew was that it was way too many.
Whenever he was alone, undistracted, it came. The urge for his drug of choice- the one he had been clean from for year's now- dilaudid. He scratched at the inner crook of his elbow; something he had picked up on since he'd been clean whenever he was craving it. Reid wished that he had the drug- to feel the chill of the liquid flowing through his veins.
He needed a distraction- something, anything- to stop it but anything in his apartment wasn't doing any good so far.
The young man hid his eyes behind his mop of light brown hair and thought about where he could go. He could call Morgan; he was like a brother to the sophisticated but young profiler. He scratched that thought, afraid that Morgan would think less of him. Hotch had a family so he decided against that and Rossi, he had never been close to. He was more of a colleague than a friend.
Finally, of course, Emily Prentiss; his beloved friend and co-worker no longer. He shared a love of Doctor Who among other things with her but she was clearly not an option to begin with since she was the cause of this mess.
All that was left was J.J., the closest friend he had ever had in his seemingly short life. Reid looked at the old clock hanging on the wall adjacent to him that read 8:02 PM and decided to call her, hoping it wasn't too late.
It rang a total of five times before she picked up.
"Spence?" she sounded concerned.
"Yeah, um, hi Jayje. . ." he said meekly.
"What's wrong? Are you okay?"
He responded quietly,
"Oh, yeah. I'm- I'm fine. No, no, yeah, I'm fine. Um, w-would you mind if I- um- came over for a-a 'bit?"
He could hear the sympathy in her voice and he hated it. He hated feeling weak.
"Of course, Spence." She sighed lightly, "I'll put on some coffee."
Spencer released a breath he had no idea he was holding in. "Thank you, J.J." he sighed gratefully. He was getting a distraction and he was eternally grateful.
"Any time," she stated honestly. "I'll leave the front door unlocked."
"Thanks," and with that he hung up his phone, grabbed a jacket and headed out.
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Reid entered J.J.'s home quietly and cautiously, knowing Henry was already asleep. He walked in and shut the door behind him, quietly kicking his shoes off.
"Jayje?" he called out in a voice that was something of a whisper.
"In here." She called, peeking her head through the wooden doorway, then proceeding to make a motion with her hand, signaling him to come forward.
The minute the man fell into J.J.'s arms, he burst into tears; the tears he had been holding in while in public for the last two months. He had cried alone for the past two months and once the walls broke, there was no way of rebuilding them any time soon. So, he let himself cry in front of someone for the first time.
His knees gave out in less than two minutes after he started crying and J.J. struggled to keep them both up so she eventually lowered them both to the floor, leaning her own back against the doorframe and letting Reid out of the hug and placing his head in her lap.
Her husband Will came down the stairs and into the kitchen to figure out that the bang he heard was his wife lowering a crying Reid to the floor but as soon as his eyes met J.J.'s he knew this was too personal a moment for him to be there.
After he was gone, they sat in silence. Neither knew how long nor did they care. The only sound that remained was Spencer's sobs.
She knew the extent of his emotional pain when she pulled him closer to her and he didn't fight or even comment.
J.J. cradled Reid in his arms like she did when Henry was upset, whispering soothing words into the hair she was gently flattening down and rubbing circles on his back.
After a while, once his sobs had died down to only uneven breathing and whimpers, he spoke,
"She just. . . she just left." He stated forlornly. Depressingly, they both knew exactly who he was talking about.
J.J. whispered any comforting thing she could think of. Phrases such as "It'll be okay," and "give it time," did little help, she knew, but she still tried.
He soon spoke once more.
"I remember she was- she was right there one second and the next thing I know- we all know-she's" he sighed. " she's gone. She's dead and she's never coming back."
As he talked, his voice got quieter and quieter until it was barely audible even to J.J. She had to lean in and rest her cheek on his hair to make out what he was saying properly.
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They laid like that for a while, neither of them knowing how long they sat. All J.J. knew was that her butt was starting to hurt from sitting on the hard floor along with the pressure of a full-grown man on her lap.
Soon, J.J. noticed Reids' peaceful manner and the fact that Reids' breathing had evened out.
He was asleep.
She smiled at the rare moment of Reid sleeping peacefully because of the fact that she was one of the very few people who knew how often the young genius was plagued with nightmares.
The blonde looked at him sleeping peacefully, disappointed that the only thing that let her know that he hadn't fallen asleep in that peaceful manner were the tear tracks that made shiny pathways down his too-thin face.
After appreciating how calm he looked for a few moments, she decided she would try to get him to their living room couch.
"Spence," she shook him ever-so-gently.
He groaned something incoherently, indicating that he disliked being awoken and J.J. laughed lightly.
"Hey, do you just want to stay the night?" she shook him lightly, realizing he was falling back asleep on her lap. "We can set you up on the couch?"
He mumbled something that resembled a 'yes' and she took it as so.
He slowly sat up and groaned when he realized how much his back hurt after being on the hard floor for god-only-knows how long.
J.J. stood up behind him and said "Alright, I'll go get some blankets and a pillow from my room and bring them down, okay?
"Oh, alright, and, um, J.J.?"
"Yeah?" the blonde asked curiously.
"Thank you, for- for everything." Reid said as he made the quick decision to hug her once more.
"No problem, Spence." She responded, trying to keep the guilt out of her voice.
'He's thanking me for being kind and helpful and assuming I'm telling the truth while I'm lying to him and- no, this is for the protection of Prentiss and the team. It's not my decision to make.'
She wished she could tell him. She wished he didn't have to go through this- that any of them did but she had no choice and she hated it. She hated seeing that pained look that her team members held in their eyes and not being able to tell them all the truth.
The two friends held the hug they shared for quite some time but let go soon after. By the time the entire ordeal was settled it was 11:37 PM and they were both clearly exhausted.
J.J. decided that they no longer needed coffee; they needed rest so she would either dump the coffee she made or reheat it tomorrow.
She left Spencer to sit on the couch while she went upstairs, grabbed one of her pillows, and managed to find a big enough spare blanket for him.
She went downstairs, hugged Reid and walked halfway up the stairs before she said quietly, yet clearly "We can talk more in the morning if you're up to it."
Reid responded in a tone of voice that was even quieter than hers "Y-yeah, sure, sure. See ya- see you in the morning, J.J."
"G' night, Spence." And with that J.J. walked up the stairs to her room, wondering if the team will ever be the same again.
A/N: So that's it! Please keep in mind that this is my first fanfiction ever and I'm only 14. If I made errors of any sort please feel free to correct me and we all know authors are grateful for likes, follows, and reviews!
A/N 2: Honestly, with all the angsty stories that are out there I figured I would've seen at least one about this- but hey! I made one so y'all can read this.