Title: Pain in the Past
Pairing: Lila/Reid
Author's Notes: Third in Deal Breaker Series. Follows Safely and Coming Home. Safely is rated definitely M for sexual scenes and doesn't have to read to understand the story. Coming Home is more necessary and not rated as high
Summary: Reid comes home to Lila after Nathan Harris.
She knows nothing about the case. He doesn't share about them. He still hasn't told her about what really happened to Elle and how he had something to do with it. She had tried to get him to talk about it, but he had shook it off. Elle was eventually released from the hospital and everything moved on, although Lila did notice the man talk about the other woman a little more for a while until he stopped talking about her completely. She had asked but he always switched the subject, not wanting to talk about it. This night seemed like a perfect example of that. He came home, driven home by Gideon, with blood on his hands. She had freaked, scared that it was his, when he had gone straight to the shower, washing it away. She looks at her watch; he's still in there after 30 minutes. Another thing she's learned about Spencer is that he's not wasteful. She saw that the first time she came to visit him. His apartment was nothing like she expected. She had pictured him living in a library and yet, she had walked in to see only one bookcase, filled with a few books - he had said he didn't keep them because there was no need -, but mostly it was CDs and DVDs. His place had been organized, nothing out of place. It had been a little unnerving at first, if she was being honest, but she had grown into it and he wasn't too particular if she was messy. Although, he did clean up after her at the end of night. She had learned he couldn't sleep if the place wasn't clean. She had called him obsessive and he had shaken his head, explained that every night he had to clean his childhood home to make sure his mother hadn't hidden her pills or something else of importance. He just liked to know where everything was. He needed to know and she didn't argue with it, accepting it as a quirk and let it go.
He walks out of the bathroom, steam billowing up around the open door. She watches as he continues to rub his now-clean hands together, his face scrunched in thought.
"Come here, Spencer."
He looks up, as if realizing for the first time that she's there. His eyes flash with regret before they fall back to his hands, his fingers rubbing at his knuckles. He listens though, sitting on the couch next to her, linking his fingers together before pulling them apart before he clutches at his wrist, his thumb still moving over the ball of his thumb. He can't still, his fingers continue to twitch before he rubs his hands together again, his eyes falling down to them again. When she can't stand it anymore, she grabs his hands.
"Spencer."
He looks up at her, swallows difficulty. "Nathan Harris. He…He came to me, scared."
She nods, glad he's talking. He's pale and fidgeting. It's unnerving and she's worried. His fingers twitch, but she holds his hands still, keeps her eyes locked with him, trying to keep him with her, instead of losing him to his thoughts.
"What was wrong?" She guides.
"Psychopathic tendencies. Murder fantasy. He wanted to kill. He wanted me to help him not succumb."
"And did he kill?"
He shakes his head, back and forth, unstopping. "He… He tried to kill himself."
She bites on her bottom lip. "You saved him?"
"I saved him. He was going to kill and then he turned the knife on himself. The… She called and I saved him."
"Then what's wrong, Spencer? He's okay. You're okay. You're home."
"How many people are going to die because I saved him?"
She looks at him confused. "I-"
"He'll kill. He's compelled to. His mind- He can't control it. He can't control the things he thinks and he'll act on them. He'll have to. He'll kill. But I couldn't let him die. I couldn't let him die because it's not his fault. It's not his fault he's like that."
She watches him and wonders if he's talking about Nathan Harris or his mother. She reaches out to cup his cheek. "I know, baby, I know."
He shakes his head and pulls away from her touch. "I know what it's like. I know what it's like to be afraid of your mind and know that you could someday lose it all. And I've seen what it's like to be that. I've seen what I could become. I've seen it and I don't want to be that. I don't want to be like that. That's why he came to me. He saw that."
"You're not crazy, Spencer. You're-"
He gets up, unable to sit and begins to pace, silently. She watches, helpless, from the couch. They had spoken about his mother a few times, her illness and the hereditary nature. He had mentioned he had been scared that he might get it too sometimes. She's watched him when he's cooking or something, telling himself the instructions. He pauses, realizes he's talking to himself and stops, as if repeating himself while no one else is listening is illegal. She doesn't know what to say to him when he gets like this. She watches as he paces, his hands knotting together, nervously.
"You're not Nathan Harris. Even if you do get schizophrenia, you….you wouldn't kill anyone."
Her words make him pause.
"You don't know that. You don't know what the voices might tell me to do. You don't know what they tell you do."
His words scare her and she sits further back on the couch, looking at him. She wonders if he has been hearing voices and they've been telling him to do things, but as she notices the look is more pained, than angry or violent. She leans forward, reaching out to touch his hand. "What did they tell your mother to do, Spence?" She says, softly.
He shakes his head. "I don't want to talk about this. I don't want to think about this." He moves away from her, towards his office, but she steps in front of him, placing her hands on his chest.
"Spence, stop."
"I don't want to talk about this, Lila. I…" He pauses, eyes locked with hers for a second before he sighs. "You don't need to know."
She steps closer, wrapping her arms around his neck, pulling him closer. "I want to know everything about you, Spencer."
He stares at her, as if searching for an answer. She runs her hands down his chest before wrapping his arms around his waist, resting her head on his chest. His heart is racing along with his mind, she knows.
"You don't have to tell me, Spence, but you can… if you want."
His arms move around her slow, puling her close as he rests his head on her shoulder. She massages circles into the small of his back, glad he seems to be calming down.
"She stopped her medications when she was pregnant for me and got on them after breastfeeding, but the medications never worked the same as before. They couldn't find the right dosage or the side effects were too much. She was never really right again, but she tried. She wanted to work. She loved to read and teach, but they couldn't help her."
His voice waivers and she squeezes him slightly.
"Sometimes they'd work for a while, but then stop and until they could find something else that worked, she'd be unbearable. That's why my dad left. He couldn't handle it…and after he left, getting her to the doctor was so much harder. Eventually, she just stopped going and… then, everything was bad.. Everything was so bad."
She leaves kisses over his neck, trying to comfort him. "It's okay, baby."
"Her delusions were usually based that someone was trying to get her, to take her away, to use her for her intelligence. The government was going to take her away. Most of the time, she just spent her days, reading and writing everything down so if they did take her she'd have evidence of everything. She'd hide things, so they couldn't get them. We'd play loud music so they couldn't hear us talking or make fake journals so… if they came in, they would find them instead of the ones she had hidden. An I could hand that. I could do that. But sometimes it got…. It got where she didn't even know I was her son or that I was her son but the government had gotten to me at school and… were using me against her. And she'd.." He shakes her head, still not looking up.
Lila doesn't say anything. He'd never been this open about his mother. She knew she was schizophrenic and had googled it. He had spoken about it being hereditary, his fears, but never his past.
"She'd…. make me strip, to see if there were any wires on me or… if she didn't know who I was, she…she could get violent."
She wants to pull back, to say something, do something. She wants to call Garcia and find his father and kick his ass for leaving his son with someone so sick. She wanted to be mad at his mother, but she knew she was ill and that Spencer would never blame the woman for anything she did to him. He pulls away, feeling her tense most likely. He looks at her, looking kind of scared.
"She didn't mean it. It wasn't her fault. She'd realize it was me and get so upset, Lila. She'd lock herself in her room for days." His words are rushed and she smiles, weakly, her hand moving to his cheek.
"I know, baby, I know."
"She loved me. She loved me as much as she could."
She nods, caressing her cheek. "Of course."
He breathes out what sounds almost like a sigh of relief as he rests his head back on her shoulder. She wraps her arms around his waist. He doesn't speak again about his mother or anything for a while. They stand there for what feels like hours before Lila pulls back and tries to look into his eyes. "Hey, boyfriend." She says, lightly.
He smiles slightly, looking embarrassed. "I'm sorry, I've… I've never told anyone any of that. I didn't mean to-"
"Shh, it's okay. You needed to let it out."
"But you didn't-"
"I told you I wanted to know."
He studies her for a second. "I could be like that, you know. I could get to a point where I don't know if you're going to kill me or…"
"You're not."
"I cou-"
"But you're not right now. That's all that matters for the moment."
He opens his mouth to argue, but stops. He looks exhausted and she tugs him closer, her arms around his neck. "How about we go to bed, okay? And tomorrow, you can take me to a museum or something and tell me everything about everything."
He smiles a little. "You want to go to a museum with me?"
"I sure do. We've already been to a gallery, so it's your turn to go somewhere you'd like."
He leans in and kisses her, staying close, brushing her cheek with his nose. "Thank you." he breathes, against her skin. Her fingers scratch against his scalp as she leaves soft kisses on his skin she can reach without moving.
"You don't have to thank me, Spence. Now, c'mon." She tugs at his hair before stepping back, her hands moving over his shoulder before tugging at his tie, pulling him with her. "Let's get to bed."