Behind Every Corner

Chapter 2

I do not own Criminal Minds


SPRING


She directed him towards the hospital doors and two of them entered together. Although the large amount Natalie had drank that night she wasn't swaying as much as she should have been. Spencer however had to awkwardly smile at workers walking around the hospital as he escorted a drunk woman through the lobby. He did receive some speculative glances but he tried his best to not let them get to him. They walked through the hallways and she pulled him towards an on call room that she didn't think would have anyone in it and when they got there she was right. No one was there.

"Thanks." she said opening the door to the on call room.

"Happy to help." he responded. Without a thought she started to take off her pants and then her shirt. And there she stood in front of him in nothing but her underwear and her bra. She bent down and pulled scrubs out of her purse and started to put it on. He wondered why he was watching this or why he was still there. He should have just left.

"Sorry." she said realizing he was still standing in the door way. "I didn't even think…" she was pulling up her scrub pants. Spencer's face was all red and he adverted his eyes away from her and down to the ground instead.

"It's fine. I-I-I should have just left…" he stammered and then began to walk out the door, he turned back around to say something else but then just raised his hand to wave. "I'll… Goodbye." he said

"Sure." she responded pulling on her top.

Spencer couldn't get the picture of her in her bra and underwear out of his mind. It might as well been an imprint in his brain. The black underwear and black lace bra made her look so sexy...No! He subconsciously told himself. He needed to get the picture out of his mind. His face was probably still incredibly red as he walked out of the hospital. He couldn't help but wonder how he was going to get through not thinking about how she just undressed in front of him.

He got back in his car and let out a huge breath. Natalie was different from what he was used to. In fact she was much different. Sarcastic. Joked a lot. Drank herself until she was wasted and she almost got in a bar fight. And this was all in one night. She was... a lot. But he admitted that she was... entertaining? Unpredictable? And very... go with the flow... Everything he was not. An exact opposite. Reid drove himself home spent the rest of the night rerunning the events in his head. It was odd at how many things he thought he should have done or wish he had done differently with her. And he didn't do much talking to her in the first place. Rolling to his side he wondered if she would even remember the night that just happened. He hoped she did. Because otherwise he would feel like an idiot for never forgetting about it.

Spencer woke up the next morning to the sound of his alarm. He rolled over quickly and turned it off not wanting to hear such an annoying beeping sound in the morning. He laid in bed for a minute and let out a sigh when the first thought that came into his head was about Natalie rather than, well, anything else. He got up from bed and made his usual morning tea and selected a book to take with him to work. He didn't feel like taking the effort and reading something today that he hadn't read in a while so he settled on one of his favorites. War and Peace.

He shoved it in his brown leather bag on top of the Sherlock Holmes book he always had in there. He normally never read it. It was more like a security blanket. Thinking about it for a bit he wondered if it would be considered odd that he carried around his dead girlfriend's gift to him. But then he shook his head away from the thought deciding that it was none of their business anyway. Whoever the hypothetical "they" was. But who was he kidding, he thought that maybe Natalie would think it would be weird. Natalie was the "they".

He shrugged his shoulders. After all he would probably never see her again anyway. Well you could ask her out. The evil thought popped into his head while he was downing the rest of his tea. He wondered if he had the guts or the confidence to do that. Years ago it wouldn't even be a thought but now... but now it was like a battle with himself. She could be a corner. Was the next thought that popped in when he thought back to yesterday. When he thought he had been walking in a straight line rather than a zig zag path. Or whatever the path was supposed to be.


After changing Natalie completely forgot all about the fact that Dr. Reid had seen her... pretty much naked. She shrugged her shoulders while setting an alarm for the morning. She groaned thinking about how much of an idiot she was for drinking so much tonight. Scratching her head she sat down on the bed and tried to get the spinning of the room to subside. However, Dr. Reid... Spencer still lingered in her mind. He was painfully awkward. But at the same time she couldn't help but find it adorable.

Natalie laid down on the bed rubbing her temples and then realized that she should probably eat something. After getting up and purchasing a bag of potato chips from the vending machine she ate the quickly wanting to get to bed. She was already thinking about the amount of coffee she was going to have to consume tomorrow. Natalie rolled to her side and then pulled the cheap blue blankets over her and closed her eyes to go to sleep. Spencer was still unfortunately on her mind but she forced him out and quickly fell asleep.

In the morning Natalie woke up and rolled out the bed with a striking headache. The alarm that had woke her up was still going off and she groaned reaching for her phone. She turned the alarm off cursing at the brightness that her phone gave off.

She got up holding her head and closing her eyes tight. The light from everything was driving her nuts. Natalie walked into the adjoining bathroom and fixed her hair, washed her face, and took a shot of mouthwash that was left in the bathroom deciding that she could care less about who had used it last. Natalie took her purse and walked out of the room and then walked through the hallways until she made it to the locker room for the surgeons.

Opening hers she pulled out fresh scrubs she left, put them on the bench, and then she shoved in her purse. She changed into the fresh scrubs, put on deodorant, sprayed herself with vanilla fragrance, and then put on a thin layer of foundation making her face no look so "hungover". She was here to save people from death rather than looking like death herself.

Walking out of the locker room she made her way to the cafeteria to get coffee in her veins. Thankfully her favorite coffee guy was there and he gave her a large without charging her extra. "Dr. Grierson." she heard from behind her. She turned around and saw one of the interns she was training and frowned wondering what she was going to be doing next. "You're needed for a consult…"

"Alright." she took a huge gulp of coffee and then waited for the intern to move so she could follow and yet he didn't. "I don't know where we're going Steve you need to take me there."

"Oh. Right." he responded. He nervously turned around and brought her to the emergency room.

Four hours later she was sitting in the cafeteria. Siping on her second coffee and filling out a piece of paperwork she didn't trust an intern with. She yawned and then took another sip of coffee. To her surprise someone pulled out a chair put a large chocolate chip muffin in front of her and sat down with her. Natalie looked up to see her closest friend at the hospital. "Thought you had that huge surgery today…" she said shoving the paperwork into the file. "Colectomy?" she asked trying to remember what he had told her yesterday.

"It got moved to this afternoon. I'll be working well into the night." Dr. Patrick Thomas responded.

"Why did they move it?" she asked unwrapping her muffin.

"They had to move surgeries around. Someone's heart needs immediate surgery. It's going down now." he answered. "I was pissed before but jokes on the hospital because since they moved it they'll be paying me overtime. I was supposed to be off when you get off. I'm only here today for the surgery."

"At least you have a surgery today. I have done nothing but consults, teaching in the lab, and paperwork."

"I would kill for that." he said taking a swig of his bottle of Pepsi. "Shouldn't you be like at home or something that guy you were talking with died. Maybe that's why you have no surgeries."

"I'll be sad later when I get off." she responded. "And don't act like I was seeing the guy or something he was like fifteen years older than me."

"I remember a certain someone being pretty excited getting to talk to him."

"About coming to do a surgery. Not jump his bones."

"Keep denying it."

"Alright so what's happening with your love life then? Since you're so eager to make up mine." she said leaning into the table with a smile. Patrick shut his mouth and shook his head already knowing that she was never going to let it go.

"Well. That nurse." he stated. "She was pretty hot."

Natalie rolled her eyes thinking back to yesterday when he told her about some nurse from the sixth floor that he slept with in the on-call room. "What was her name?"

"Uh." Patrick thought about if for longer than he should have. "I'm pretty sure Olivia."

"You told me yesterday it was Bridget." Natalie said sitting back in her chair and crossing her arms with a grin. Patrick scratched the back of his head nervously.

"Well." he said. "Oh well." Natalie really hated how he treated women sometimes. There were times when he was extremely nice and romantic and then he would just go on some downward spiral and sleep with women he barely knew. He didn't talk about relationships much. But Natalie knew he was lonely considering all the times he had invited her over to watch movies and eat dinner. When they met he asked her out but she refused when he started talking to her with "I think you're suffering from a lack of vitamin me." She vowed to this day that she threw up in her mouth. And they were best friends ever since.

"Tom said you had a pretty rough night. Did you and that guy do it?"

"When did you see Tom?" she asked furrowing her brow. "And no... he drove me to the hospital and then left."

"He called me this morning and told me to make sure you were okay considering the amount of alcohol you ingested." Patrick said sipping his coffee. "Tell me? Are you sure your liver isn't failing?"

Natalie rolled her eyes "Of course he did." she said shoving another piece of muffin in her mouth. Natalie's pager started to go off and when she pulled it out she saw that it calling her to the ICU. She got up from the table eating another piece of her muffin. "I'll finish it later. I have to go."

"What am I supposed to do with it?!" he shouted as she started to run. She didn't answer so all he did was stare at the muffin on the table.

Natalie made it to the ICU and rushed to where she was being called. "What the hell?!" she shouted coming into the room. "What did you do!?" Natalie rushed into a room crowded with people including her interns. Everyone was crowded around the patient. Natalie had seen the floor when she ran in. The blood spilled all over the floor. She didn't receive and answer from her interns. Natalie watched one of the nurses hook up blood for the patient. "C'mon… Where's the crystalloid?" she mumbled. After the second she saw someone hooking up the IV bags she was looking for and the bleeding started to slow down. Natalie let out a sigh and the nurse across from her pulled up the gauze slowly.

"The stitches are ripped." she said to her and then took a breath before saying. "He's on blood thinners." Natalie nodded her head in understanding.

"Someone look for internal bleeding." she commanded. "There's way to much blood for such simple rip." Natalie pulled out a suture kit from the drawer behind her while a nurse began looking for the internal bleeding.

"It should clot on it's own." he stated he turned the screen to her to view. "Especially since we hooked up the saline."

Natalie agreed with the nurse once she looked at the monitor. She began redoing the stitches on the abdomen and once everything was under control she turned to the interns.

"What happened?" she asked them getting annoyed.

"We were doing our check like usual, redressing, and then the stitches ripped..." one of the interns responded.

"I think we pulled the dressing off to fast and the stitches had stuck onto the gauze."

"Listen to me." she said. "You're lucky I made it here fast enough! And you're lucky the nurses were watching! Next time you won't be so lucky! You're doctor's." Natalie walked away from the ICU telling the head nurse to give those interns the paperwork. She felt like she could punch a hole in the wall and a few times she thought she was going to. But she restrained herself and went back downstairs to get her stupid muffin.

Natalie sat down at the table and started chomping on her muffin once more. "Geez what happened to you." Patrick said folding up his newspaper and setting it on the table. Looking up and down at her. It was then that she noticed that there was blood all over the top of her shoes and some on her shirt and pants.

"I don't want to talk about it." Natalie finished her muffin and then her coffee, which had become cold, which irritated her even more. "Three more hours…" she muttered.

"Thanks for reminding me how much more longer I'm going to be here." he said frowning.

She looked to the newspaper and then back to Patrick. "Since when do you pay attention to the news?"

"Crosswords are news too right?" he joked.

"Sure." Natalie said with a laugh. "Well." she said getting up from her seat again. "I have an ER shift so I'll be there."

"I have paperwork I could be doing…" Patrick responded thinking about the pile of paperwork he had to do.

"I'll see you tomorrow." Natalie said waving and walking out of the cafeteria before buying another cup of coffee from the vender. She then walked to the ER through the hallways and down the stairs. Taking a place at the counter she pulled three charts and let out a breath and started work.

After everything in the ER, including being bled on, peed on, and popping a shoulder back into place, which was one of her least favorite things to do, she found herself back in the locker room pulling out her purse and realizing that she was without a car. It was back at the bar. She momentarily placed her head on the locker realizing that she in fact could not leave the hospital yet.


All day Spencer sat at his desk mindlessly doing paperwork. Morgan, even though he had an office came over to sit and do his own paperwork. Reid concluded that he just needed to be around people rather than stuffed in an office alone all day. For most of the day, well actually the whole day, he thought about that woman. Natalie. Why he was thinking about her so much was crazy. She probably didn't even remember him from last night. He bit his inner cheek and tapped his pencil on the desk thinking about how embarrassing it was when she started to undress in front of him and he stood there like some idiot. He would get uncomfortable sharing a room with Morgan let alone getting changed with someone around him... and this was a girl, not Morgan.

Morgan didn't care much about personal space. Morgan and Natalie were probably very similar. Where as Spencer was on the opposite end of the spectrum. He couldn't get the images of her out of his head and it was driving him crazy. He tried to do everything to get her off his mind. Including trying to read. Sure he got through a book today during lunch but it took him his whole lunch hour. Which was something that rarely happened. "Hey, kid." he heard Morgan call. He looked up to Morgan staring at him with look of annoyance. "Kid, I've been trying to get your attention now for like five minutes."

"Sorry." he said. "I didn't get much sleep." Spencer lied. Anything was better than telling Morgan that he was constantly thinking about some girl. "What is it?"

"Didn't get much sleep?" Morgan repeated back. "What? You hit off with that girl you wanted to talk to? Did you do the walk of shame this morning?" Spencer realized the flaw in his lie. He really needed to think more before he spoke.

"What? No." he said defensively. "I had to drive a friend home." he lied again thinking that what he said was better but it wasn't. "But that's not why I'm tired. I had trouble sleeping that's all." Reid said quickly. He really was digging his own grave wasn't he?

"A friend?" Morgan asked.

Reid nodded hoping he would drop the subject and go back to doing paperwork but he knew that wouldn't happen. "Yepp." Reid said popping the p.

"Lying is gonna get you nowhere." Morgan said giving him a grin. Reid sat back in his chair debating himself whether or not to mention Natalie.

"It's true." he responded. "I drove her home and I went home and that was it." It was partly true. He actually drove her to the hospital.

"So you sweet on her?" Morgan asked directly continuing to watch Reid squirm at his desk.

"I don't know." he said. He wasn't sure what to really say concerning Natalie. If sweet on her meant that he couldn't get her out of his head then yes. But he met her once. Well twice. But basically once considering the second time she was drunker than a frat guy at a football game. He let it escape, a small smile came to his lips, when he thought about how she almost got in the fight with those men at the bar.

"Oh. Look." Morgan said in a high pitched voice. "You are sweet on her." Morgan sat back in his chair and eyed Reid up. "So are you going to ask her out?" he questioned.

"I mean… I don't know." he told him honestly. "I'm not exactly great at asking out girls… Besides. She probably wouldn't want to go out with me."

"Well why not?"

"Because she's blonde, beautiful, and perfect." he muttered under his breath. Where was he even getting the perfect from? He met her once! He kept reminding himself this fact. "I only met her once."

"So what?" Morgan asked. "Reid. How many times are you exactly supposed to meet someone and then ask her out?"

"No. It's just… I don't know much about her." he told Morgan. "Just that she went to Yale, she has a PhD in chemistry, she was a medic in Afghanistan and she's a surgeon. While teaching some lectures on the side."

"Sounds impressive." he said nodding his head.

"Exactly." Reid frowned. "What if she says no?"

"So what? Then you never see her again and move on."

"I don't know."

"Reid."

"Morgan."

"I haven't seen you pine over a girl this much… since Maeve. And you're not going to do anything about it?" It was true Spencer couldn't remember the last time he actually had thought this much about someone.

"I just… What if she laughs?" Reid asked. "She was probably something like prom queen… and I never really had much luck with being around people like that."

"She's not going to laugh Reid." Morgan said sternly. "If she laughs then you can come and blame me for this whole thing. But if she says yes. You owe me. Big time."

"Oh. Like what am I going to owe you?" he asked.

"I don't know. Paperwork."

"Morgan I'm not doing your paperwork."

"You say that now. But you wait and see. On your wedding day with this girl instead of a gift I'm going to be handing you paperwork."

For the rest of the day Reid finished up his paperwork and thought more about Natalie. Which wasn't shocking. Spencer got up from his seat and took his things to go before realizing something. He drove her to work last night. She didn't have a car. He pulled out his phone after looking up the phone number to the hospital. He put it into his phone and thought for a second. What the hell was wrong with him? He stared down at the number. Was he really going to call the hospital. His hand shook and he hit the call button. He put it up to his ear and the quickly hung up. He was pretty sure there was something wrong with him. He breathed out a sigh of relief when he ended the call quickly.

But she still didn't have a car. He hit redial and mustered up all of the confidence he could and managed to stay on the line until there was no turning back.


This is much shorter than I thought it was... but to combine this chapter and the next chapter is just crazy and then that would be really long... the updates will actually be more than just once a week probably since I have all of the early chapters basically done... they just need some tweaking. Where as when we can past 10 or 20 they need more than some tweaking...

I tried to make the scene with her in the ICU as close to something as possible. Sorry if there's some mistake with it all. Crystalloid is sodium chloride solution or saline solution used to replenish the blood that is lost. I did my best.

It's cool to see that I have reviews already! Thanks so much! And I'm glad you like it so much!

Review, favorite, or follow if you like it!

Amelia.