2. Separations

3 years later

Derek Morgan considered himself a very patient man. He was waiting and waiting, not pushing anything yet making sure that he looked at hime encouragingly often enough to make him understand he was more than welcome to talk to him anytime. But maybe, just maybe seeing Reid so miserable he'd never seen him before, not even after Hankel broke Morgan's heart so badly that he wasn't sure if he could wait any longer before he grabbed him and pulled him into a bone-crushing hug, so he finally persuaded himself that whatever it was, he'd get it out of him because he clearly needed somebody's help.

But deep down, Derek knew it was not just that. The truth was, seeing the person he was in love with suffering made him suffer too, and he wanted that feeling gone. His subconscious also knew that interrogating him would probably do more harm than good, but he couldn't help it. His own pain made him decide this way.

One would say he was selfish; and that is no mistake. But selfisness is the deepest human nature. Selflessness is something we force on ourselves. In reality, we do everything out of selfishness but most of us wouldn't admit it for the life of us. We say we do things to help our friends when we want to inquire acknowledgement or just be able to tell our conscience 'I did my best to help them'. That's what Derek Morgan did when he got up from his table and followed Reid into the restroom. The boy was standing in front of the mirror, head bent down, fingers grasping the sink so hard his knuckles were white.

"Reid?" Morgan tried to say his name as gently as he could but Reid gave a start anyway. He didn't look up, still grasping the sink as hard if not harder. Morgan took a step closer to him.

"C'mon kid. Talk to me."

Reid was still being quiet, and it didn't take a profiler to tell that the last thing he wanted to do was talking to Morgan.

"You've been like this the whole week. It's terrible to see you like this. You're my friend and I care about you."

He paused because Reid seemed to stiffen a bit and then he finally raised his head. He looked straight at Morgan, and there was so much hurt and anguish and exhaustion in his eyes that for a very long moment, Derek felt all these feelings flood over him. That was when he realized that Spencer hadn't looked him in the eye for the past week, and now that he was, Morgan could tell that whatever was consuming his friend, it was something he needed help with.

If I don't help him, Morgan thought, he might start taking Dilaudid again. His stomach clenched at the thought, and he mentally pulled himself together to speak again.

"You've been walking around like a living corpse. Everyone can see you're not well. We all care about you and want to help you, pretty boy."

"No, you don't!"

Reid snapped so suddenly that Morgan almost jumped.

"None of you cares about me."

His voice was tired and broken.

"You're just curious. That's how people are. You're pretending to be sympathetic when all you want is to hear every little detail of your life. To hear horrible things. That's what keeps people alive. I can't trust anyone. Everyone's selfish. They will all leave me in the end."

The end of Reid's outburst was a whisper, and now he was covering his face with his palm.

Morgan should have known better than getting hurt about what Reid said, but he couldn't help a jolt of pain flush over him. The pain in his chest caused by Reid's miserableness was stronger though, so he tried his best to remain calm.

"That is not true, kid. It may be in some cases, but we're not like that. We're your friends. Your true friends. I don't know what's happened to you now, but I am aware of your past injuries and none of us would ever betray you. But you also know that, and I refuse to get hurt by what you just said. I want to hear your problem because I want to help you. We all do. You can't handle this alone."

Reid looked at him with an apoligetic expression, and his eyes still shone with vagueness, but Morgan's words seemed to encourage him enough to finally talk to him. He cleared his throat and his face suddenly changed. All feelings vanished from his face, and the look of pride appeared on his face. Like he was about to say something that he wanted to say with confidence, like it deserved no feelings.

"Janine left."

"What?"

Morgan was taken aback. He had thought about everything-his mother's condition got worse, he forgot how to capture books with his mind-but not this.

"Why?"

"I don't know."

His voice was trembling, and that was when Morgan couldn't keep himself from closing the space between them and pulling him into the tightest embrace. Reid didn't even stiffen. He had gotten used to people being close to him, that definitely makes it easier to help, Morgan thought. He didn't cry, but Morgan could tell he was devastated. Saying out loud what he probably hadn't even said to himself definitely upset him. They were standing like that for what seemed like a very long time for Morgan when Reid's breathing finally seemed to calm down.

"So, are you ready to tell me what exactly happened?" Derek asked as he slowly let go of his friend and took a step back to look him in the eye.

Spencer sighed and started to talk.

"She's been cheating on me. For more than six months. That if she wasn't lying, it could be more, I don't know. She lost love for me long ago, you know. We haven't been arguing for a very long time, and that just confirms it even more. I don't think I ever had more heated conversations than in the first year of my relationship with Janine, but I was never happier. There's no happiness without tears, they complement each other. But feelings slowly passed away, and she became nonchalant. Only Leon and Rosa kept us together. But it seems like even they weren't that important for her, considering that she chose a fifty-year-old childless businessman over them."

"Woah, woah, wait a minute. You mean Janine left the twins too?" Morgan had a hard time processing all the information.

"Yeah."

"When exactly did she leave?"

"Saturday morning."

"Have you heard anything from her since then?"

-No. She said she'd call as soon as she'd settled things, but appearantly it hasn't happened yet. However I have a suspicion that she won't be in a hurry. She was never a good mother, you know, I was always the one to look after the children. She didn't even want children...I was the one forcing it. And that's when we started to drift apart. And now she's gone...It's crazy, Morgan. Even though I know she is not good for the children I still want her back. Even though I know she doesn't love me, I still love her. How is this possible? Why am I the one to suffer and why doesn't she? It doesn't make sense."

Reid's voice faltered. Morgan decided that he had learned enough. He couldn't answer his friend's question but he knew that by any means necessary, he would help him through this. After all, Spencer was important to him for more than ore reason: he was his best friend and Derek also happened to be in love with him.

Important, please read this: First I'd like to thank everyone who read this. You make me happy! I'd be SUPER thankful for reviews! This is my first fanfiction ever, and English is not my first language. Writing in English is hell of a lot harder than I thought, damn. Also, I might have spelling errors, grammatical mistakes, syntactic errors, etc. So if you see any, please let me know! Oh, and this is supposed to be more humorous than dramatic, despite the fact that the beggining may seem a bit depressing. Also, I'm sorry for the philosophical stuff about human nature...it just popped into my mind while writing and then I put half of it into Reid's speech so it'd fit more into the story. It might happen in the future so tell me if you don't want me to do it haha. I'll upload the next chapter as soon as I can. That's about it. Please review!

Lora