Chapter 10: A Hard Line

Reid's eyes fluttered open as noises from the kitchen pulled him from his sleep. In one swift motion, he sat upright on the couch, suffering the nervous charge that vibrated through his body until his eyes saw Morgan. Exhaling in relief, he rubbed at his tired eyes and rested his heavy head in his hands for a second. He was still so fatigued. He felt like he'd never be able to catch up on his sleep. Yawning wide, he glanced at his watch. It was 6 o'clock in the evening. He had only been asleep for forty-five minutes.

"How did you get in?" Reid asked. His voice sounded raw and scratchy.

"You didn't lock your door, genius… much less answer it," Morgan told him, grinning. "Got you a sandwich."

Morgan tossed Reid his sandwich, still inside the paper bag. He barely caught it, not having awesome coordination just coming out of a dead sleep. "You don't have to keep feeding me," he told Morgan, frowning. He pulled the sandwich from the bag and slowly began to unwrap it, not sure he was even hungry.

"Grump," Morgan called out from the kitchen with a mouth full of his own sandwich. "You always in a bad mood when you first wake up?"

"No." Reid's tone said otherwise.

"Don't sugar coat it, man." Morgan filled up a glass of water. "You thirsty?"

"Maybe…" Reid stalled until he smelled the meat on the sandwich. "Yeah," he decided.

As Morgan was bringing him a glass of water, Reid remembered how Morgan had spent his day. "How, uhh… How did your retaining wall project go?"

Morgan sat down with Reid and got comfortable. "So far, so good."

Reid nodded. Morgan's short and vague answer was… short and vague. Did he not want to talk about it?

Morgan was fixing to take another bite, but before he could, his cell phone rang and he cursed at it. "Better not be Hotch," he said as he removed it from its holster. Reid immediately averted his eyes when he saw the female's name on the Caller ID. Morgan silenced the call and put the phone back in the holster without saying anything about it. Reid knew that Morgan had been seeing her. Nothing serious, but they had definitely been on quite a few dates.

And there it was. The awkward silence.

Morgan cleared his throat, took a drink of water, cleared his throat again and took a huge bite of his sandwich. Reid's eyebrows rose, having already figured his friend out. He could tell Morgan was gonna avoid this subject at all costs. Morgan had always been a very private man.

Reid looked back down to his sandwich and then scratched at his head.

Morgan's chewing slowed as he watched Reid use his long fingers to wrap the sandwich back up, nice and neat as if he had never touched it. "What?" he asked.

Reid placed the wrapped sandwich back into the bag and set it down on the coffee table. "I'm… I'm just not that hungry."

When Reid pulled his hand back from the coffee table, Morgan saw that it was shaking. "You alright?" Morgan saw a dismissive, 'don't worry about me' smile brush across Reid's lips. Then he could see the sweat on the kid's face. "Reid, look at me." Reid slowly turned his head to face Morgan, but he would only look downward. "Look – at – me," he repeated to Reid. When Reid looked up, Morgan was taken aback. Reid's eyes were bloodshot and glossy, on the verge of watering.

"I'm fine, Morgan." His Adam's apple took a large dip down his throat.

Morgan wasn't sure if Reid was going through any sort of withdrawal, if he was under the weather, or what, but he thought it was as good a time as any to bring it up. "You need to call your sponsor, Reid."

"No, no… No, I don't," Reid seemed irritated at the very suggestion that he wasn't handling his addiction. "I'm fine. I'm… fine. I'll be fine." He messed up once, but that was going to be it.

"Reid—"

"No—" Reid cut him off. Morgan's head dropped in frustration. Reid noticed that and decided to say something that would suffice. "I mean, yes. Y-yes, but…"

"But what?" Morgan prompted him. "But what? Tell me how a 'but' is even possible in your situation. Tell me you're not jonesin' for another hit right now. Tell me how you get by because I want to know."

Reid licked his lips and then laughed uneasily. "When you're here…" he started." When you're here, I can face it. All of it. Everything."

Morgan shook his head. "This is one of the things I need to talk to you about… For your sake and my own, I cannot be your sole means of support on this."

Reid slightly shook his head in disagreement. "Morgan—"

"No, Reid. I can't be thinkin' that every time I upset you or every time I'm not or can't be there for you, that you're gonna get high… maybe overdose… kill yourself…"

Reid pressed his lips together and swallowed. "I-It's not like that…" he rubbed his hands against his legs. His nerves were winning. He could feel himself beginning to panic. There was so much more he wanted to say, but he couldn't compose his thoughts well enough. He knew he'd scare Morgan with his words.

"It's happened once already," Morgan said, all too quickly reminding Reid of something he hated himself for every moment since it happened. His tone was on its edge, but then he took a deep breath. "Just… please, man… I don't think you know how much pressure it is on me. You have a sponsor for a reason." He looked at Reid and glanced at the floor, just to see what Reid had his eyes locked on, which of course was nothing. Reid just couldn't look at him. "I'm here for ya, but damn… There's gotta be a line."

"…but you said—" Reid's voice cracked.

"A line, Spencer." With sad eyes, Morgan watched Reid as he tried to hold in the tears. "Reid, it's all I ask and I'm gonna make this easy for you."

Reid licked his lips and took a deep breath slowly let it out. As he turned his head to look at Morgan, a single tear fell from the corner of his left eye. He sniffed and wiped the tear away mid-cheek.

"You don't have to worry, Reid. I'm not leavin' you. I'm not gonna abandon you. Just do what you need to do get passed this and get better again. I know you can do it." Their faces were so close that Reid looked down and away, but Morgan paused long enough that Reid looked at him again. "I want you to call your sponsor right now and I want you to talk to him and tell him what happened and how you're doing." Morgan was leaning into Reid, against his shoulder, speaking sternly, but softly.

Reid pulled his cell phone from his pocket and cleared his throat. Morgan watched his hand as he scrolled through his contacts. "John…" Reid said aloud and pressed 'send'. He stood up feeling Morgan's eyes on him and walked around the front of the coffee table, then passed Morgan, slowly heading towards his room. He cleared his throat again, "Yes, hello, John. This is Spencer. Spencer Reid… Yeah… I'm sorry to bug y—… Yeah, okay… I'm, uhh… Well, to tell you the truth, I've been better." His voice trailed off as he closed his bedroom door behind him.

"That went better than I thought it would," Morgan said to himself as he checked his phone again. Two voicemails, three texts. He let out a very heavy sigh. Wait. One text was from Prentiss.

Prentiss: How's Reid? Any better?

Morgan replied: i think he's ok. not out of the woods but ok.

Prentiss: Are you with him now?

Morgan replied: i'm keeping him some company

Prentiss: Will you tell him I said Hi?

Morgan replied: Sure thing

Reid stepped out of his room quietly. It had been almost an hour. Morgan turned around and gave a look to ask how it went. "Thanks for… having me do that," Reid said. He tried to convey that he really had needed to do that, but without actually saying the words. He held Morgan's gaze for quite a while longer than normal hoping Morgan would just know, just see it written all over him. Reid needed him to understand he had in fact been having a hard time and still was.

"Reid," Morgan got up off the couch. "I'm proud o' you, man. Come here." Morgan took Reid's hand and pulled him in for a good old fashioned bro hug, which brought smiles to both of their faces.

They both sat down on the couch again. Some heavy air had been lifted and it felt good, but Reid had a question. "Does everyone at the BAU know?"

Morgan didn't want to be the one to say it, but he didn't want to ever lie to Reid or stretch any truths with him either. "Yeah… but you know we love you and we're all behind you."

Reid became visibly upset. He pulled his hair behind his ears and immediately became flushed with heat. The veins in his forehead were popping out and the tears were wetting his eyes again. "I'm so disappointed in myself, so embarrassed."

"No one is making any judgments, Reid, it's alright." Morgan rubbed his back. "Nobody's perfect. We just gotta make the best of every day."

"I guess," Reid said, wiping his eyes. That really didn't make him feel better at all, but he didn't want to argue with his friend.

"Prentiss says Hi," Morgan told him. "She texted me. Wanted to know how you're doing…"

Reid just smiled. Now, that made him feel better.

A quiet moment passed, allowing Reid to calm down. Morgan suddenly jumped up and grabbed a bag he had left on the counter. He sat back down and handed it to Reid, wanting him to open it and look inside. "Take a look at that."

"What's this?" Reid felt remotely like this was Christmas. He smiled faintly and shook the bag.

"I wanna see the look on your face."

"Morgan," Reid started… then he opened the bag. "Oh…" Reid's face reddened and he smiled out of the side of his mouth. "Magnums, huh? Those must be for you."

Morgan smirked. "There's some 'average white guy' ones in there too." He quietly laughed deep in his throat.

"The Man… The Myth…" Reid teased continuing to look in the bag.

"The Legend," Morgan said in completion.

"And… lubricant," Reid said with another embarrassed grin as he tried hard not to laugh at the fact that he and Morgan were very 'stereotypical'. Morgan was well endowed when fully erect.

"A little starter kit for you know, when we decide. Chances are it'll happen here. Keep it. "

"I can't wait for this to happen, Morgan," Reid blurted.

"What?" Morgan asked.

"I can't wait to have sex with you."

"Really?"

"Don't seem so shocked. I know you know that."

"After everything, hearing you actually say it…" Morgan was very surprised at the effect Reid's words had on him. They caught his body's attention very quickly.

"Ever since the night I told you how I felt, it's been hard to think about much else when I think about you," Reid told him.

"You've never… been with another man, right?"

Reid held back a laugh. "I've never been with anyone, Morgan."

"Oh…" Morgan was almost positive of that, but not 100%. The confirmation brought up some concerns for him.

"I- I hear the tone in your voice." Reid turned to face Morgan, folding his leg against Morgan's right thigh. "Trust me when I say this, but I have never been so sure of anything in my life." He looked left and then right and then back to Morgan. "If I could place a statistical percentage on this, on how badly I want you, on how badly I want to be with you… on how comfortable I would be that you would be my first… it would be an infinite number. I wouldn't be able to do it. It could not be contained within this universe."

Morgan tried to digest that. He couldn't tell if that was blind love or absolute sincerity. Knowing Reid, probably both. "And you know how we would…?" His eyebrows tried to finish that question, along with a slight motion from his hands.

"Oh, absolutely. Before I ever spoke to you, I watched- I mean, I did a lot research, I read a lot..."

Morgan's smile was too strong to hold back. "You watched gay porn."

"I- I did. I didn't limit myself to just…" he swallowed, "…to just men. I studied the behaviors of homosexual women and homosexual men and even those with multiple partners... bi-sexual and otherwise. And I found it interesting, actually. Homosexual partners seem to have this level of understanding that I didn't see in heterosexual partners. Not to say one doesn't exist, but it's- The level of intimacy… The connection was completely dif-"

"Reid."

Reid stopped speaking. Morgan always did that, when he didn't want to listen to him ramble. "There were a lot of documentaries… Science…" Reid's voice trailed off as he became embarrassed all over again.

Morgan was entertained. He smiled at Reid with pure affection.

Reid felt sticky and just wanted to wash the day off of him. He thought it would make him feel a lot better and clear his head. "Uhh, I'm gonna go shower. Do you mind? I can't stop sweating." Reid loosened his tie a bit and pulled his shirt away from his chest a couple times trying to cool off.

"I ain't gonna stop you."

Reid looked at Morgan and blushed. Morgan was sitting against the corner of the couch, his legs were spread open and his left knee was swingin' back and forth. Something about him right now sent Reid's blood racing. He swallowed as he worked up the nerve for what he wanted to ask Morgan. "Do you want to join me?"

REVISED 10/2014