"Please, please tell me you don't have a case today."

"You're in luck. Why?"

There was a deep sigh from the other end of the line. "My family is here."

Reid hadn't been expecting that answer. "Your- your family? I thought you hardly ever heard from them."

"I don't," Bianca said. "Which is why I didn't know they were in Virginia until they called last night saying they were stopping in DC. My parents and my brother were visiting my cousins. And now the three of them are on their way to my apartment as we speak. Please don't make me face them alone."

It took only sixteen minutes to get from his apartment to her place. She was standing outside the building, peering at her watch anxiously. The look that crossed her face when she spotted him could only have been described as relief.

"Oh thank goodness," she said, running to hug him. "Thank you so much for doing this. They're getting off the metro now, they should be here any minute. I'm so glad you came."

"Of course I came. You called."

"I love you." She pressed her lips to his cheek. He was leaning in to give her a proper kiss when her expression changed. If her reaction towards him was relief, this could only be described as panic. Her cheeks turned pink, her palm was sweating as she squeezed his hand, and she was biting her lip.

The three figures walking towards them had to be her family. Her father was the tallest, a round-faced man with graying hair and thick glasses. Her mother was the shortest, at most two inches taller than Bianca. She had dark blonde hair that had recently been permed, and carried a heavy purse. Her brother fell between the two, and he was surprised that he looked so similar to Bianca. They both had short brown hair, and similar facial features, though he wore a scowl and it was doubtful that his hair had been washed recently. In fact, none of them were smiling, even at the sight of their daughter.

"Hey," Bianca said timidly. "I'm glad you made it here okay."

"It took us a while to find the building, but here we are," her mother answered. "Who's this?" The woman gestured to Spencer.

"This is Spencer," her daughter answered. "My boyfriend." She said it like a title of honor, and he couldn't help but feel proud. Yes, that was him. He was her boyfriend.

"Hi." He reached out to shake the hands of each family member in turn, trying to make a good impression despite his disdain for physical contact with strangers. "I'm Doctor Spencer Reid." He usually reserved that particular title for introducing himself out on a case, but he wanted them to know exactly who he was, wanted to tell them that he was above them. He was far above them, smart enough to know just how special their daughter was. How could they not see that?

"Don Brown," her father said. "This is my wife, Ann, and our son, Rick. But then, you probably already know that." Reid didn't correct him. "So what do you practice, Doctor?"

"Oh, I'm not that kind of doctor. I have three PhDs though- mathematics, engineering, and chemistry."

"You must be some sort of genius. Are you a chemical engineer?"

"Actually, Mr. Brown, I work for the FBI. I'm a special agent." A special agent who can find your address, credit card purchases, and criminal record with a single phone call.

"Just call me Don." He'd really rather not. He could keep it impersonal that way, distance himself from them like he would with the family of a suspect or a victim. Though to be honest, her father seemed fairly friendly.

"Bianca, you said it wasn't hard to get to the National Mall from her, correct?" Mrs. Brown- Ann, that was- asked. "I want to see the Washington Monument."

"No, it's not. There's a metro stop nearby we can take." If Bianca was suggesting they take the Metro, she must've really wanted to spend as little time with them as possible. Reid maintained his hold on Bianca's hand, walking with her a few feet in front of her family towards the station.

"So why are you the only one with such an old-fashioned name?" he asked, keeping his voice low.

"It was my great-grandmother's name. She died the year I was born, and my grandmother wanted one of her grandkids to keep the name alive. Rick's middle name is Obadiah, like my dad's dad was. But I guess they figured it was a little too old-fashioned."

"That makes sense. How old is he, by the way?"

"We're five years apart. He just turned twenty."

They rode to the National Mall in a crowded train. The Browns sat, while he stood beside Bianca, pressed close to her to let her know he was still there. He could've sworn she started breathing easier when they climbed back out onto the street, like being in such close-quarters with her family again was suffocating. It had been hard for him to be in the same room with his father when they'd reunited back in Vegas, and he figured that claustrophobic feeling was familiar to her as well.

When the reached the monument, Ann refused to go up. "What do you mean you don't want to?" her husband complained. "You're the one who wanted to come here!"

"I want to see the Monument. I don't want to climb it. I hate heights."

"Well we're going up," Don declared. And then, as marched towards the towering white structure, "Can you believe her?" The older man shook his head. The four rode the elevator up to the top, where the father and son took turns peering out the small window.

"That's it?" Rick was unimpressed. "That's lame. What's the point of this thing?"

They rode down the way they'd come up- slowly and in silence. Reid pointed out the various museums around the Mall from memory, but the family couldn't agree on where they wanted to go.

Her father didn't want to go anywhere with steep admission prices ("I don't want to pay twenty bucks just to go inside a museum. That's ridiculous.") and her mother didn't want to go through one of the Smithsonians ("Because Don, it takes you five hours to walk through so you can read every little placard." "That's the whole point! You're supposed to learn something.") and her brother had little interest in the remaining options.

"I don't want to go to the Holocaust Museum," he was saying. "I spent enough time learning about that in high school. What about the Crime Museum? It's close to here."

Oh, perfect. Spencer exchanged a concerned glance with Bianca, trying to think fast. "Actually, the entrance fee is pretty expensive, and walking through the exhibits requires extensive reading. In very small type. But the National Art Gallery is free, and right on the Mall."

And so it was decided. They split up once inside, each wandering in search of various artists. He and Bianca spent their time hunting for Van Gogh's paintings, at her request. "Someday," she told him. "We'll go to the Van Gogh Museum, in Amsterdam."

"Amsterdam?"

"Amsterdam! I studied abroad in Europe. As much as I love French, Amsterdam actually turned out to be my favorite city."

"I never studied abroad. Too risky, letting a minor travel through a foreign country."

"Even if said minor was a genius?" she asked, laughing. He wanted to kiss her mid-laugh, right there in the middle of that gallery, surrounded by so many beautiful colors and paintings, but just as he drew a hand to her cheek-

"Bianca, there you are!" Ann Brown came around the corner, and the two of them nearly jumped apart. "We were looking for you. Your dad's ready for lunch."

They settled on an Italian place off of Pennsylvania Avenue, the five of them sitting at a round table near a window. "You can see the White House from here," Reid noted. "We could stop over there after lunch."

"The only time I'm going near that place is when they finally run Obama out," Don remarked. To his left, Reid could see Bianca's cheeks flushing. "The only reason he was elected was because he's black."

"President Obama isn't that bad," Bianca replied. "He's had a positive impact domestically and internationally. I don't see why the color of his skin should matter so much."

"You just like to be contrary," Don fired back. "Always disagreeing with me."

Spencer could've sworn he heard Bianca mutter don't flatter yourself under her breath. Ann looked hard at her husband. "Leave it alone."

An uncomfortable quiet fell over them, until the waiter returned to take orders. "What's the chicken marsala like?" Mr. Brown asked. "I'm trying to watch what I eat you know. I'm on a diet." Bianca's jaw tightened at the word, and he worried that she'd balk and order something like vegetable soup. But to his relief, she asked for gnocchi with pesto. Reid cringed when her father spoke up again. "Really? All those carbs? You know, they say carbs are one of the worst things you can eat. When you were in high school, you wouldn't even touch pasta."

It took a great deal of restraint to keep his mouth from dropping open. Didn't he know not to say things like that to her? What kind of parent lectured a daughter with a history of anorexia about carbs? Oh, right. Her kind of parents. Her kind of family. He could hear the hushed tones of Bianca's mother and brother from across the table, both voices sounding angry. Rick was glaring between her and Don between words, but Mr. Brown seemed to either be unaware of the fact or choosing to ignore it.

"So, Spencer," Bianca's father began. Reid hated the way the man said his name. As though they were friends. When he first heard Bianca say it, it had sent a shiver down his spine, one of excitement, a reaction he hadn't been able to control. This was more like a shudder. "What exactly do you do with the FBI?"

"I'm with the Behavioral Analysis Unit." He considered adding sir, but decided that word was meant for someone you could respect. With every minute any admiration he could've had for Bianca's father was diminishing.

"So analyze my behavior, then." If Reid had a nickel for every time someone said that, he could buy the BAU a second jet.

It would've been so easy to rattle off the things he'd noticed about Don Brown. The profile came together in his mind with little effort. I can tell you that you hardly spend time at home. You don't know the most basic things about your family, and you're completely insensitive to the important ones. It's obvious from your beer gut that at some point you were a heavy drinker, though Bianca would've told me if you were an alcoholic. And you don't seem like a drunk, so you're probably the kind of man who has one nearly every day, telling yourself that you deserve it after all the hard work you put in and the things you have to put up with.

Except you really don't work all that hard. You're a corporate lawyer who's firm was only 16.2 miles from your house. You could've brought work home to do, but instead you arrived early and stayed late, which tells me you were just looking for an excuse to avoid going home. You have a nice watch, and a new motorcycle jacket, but one that's been used on a bike before. All those things must've been expensive, but you told your daughter to take out student loans rather than helping her with tuition, which tells me you're cheap and materialistic. And your wife has looked your way five times in the last two minutes, but you can't be bothered with her or your son, who seems to clearly have some pent up rage.

But Reid just forced a smile. "Sorry, but I typically consult on crime scenes. It's hard to profile only a person, especially one you've just met," he lied.

"See, Bianca, you could've done something like that with a psychology degree. Or gone on to med school. But you did charity work instead," Ann lamented, the whispered argument with her son apparently over. Rick was in the corner, eyes narrowed, looking like a sulking teenager.

"Mom, please. We've talked about this before. This is what I want to do."

"At least you didn't major in English. There are no jobs in that field." He doubted she understood the things her daughter could do with words. Bianca tried to steer the conversation back to simple small talk, as Spencer observed their family dynamic. What must it have been like to grow up in that house? On the surface, things didn't seem all that bad. It took close examination to notice the dysfunction. The way her father disregarded everyone but himself, the way her mother gave a quiet disapproval, her brother's barely-concealed anger. The seemed like the kinds of people who would keep up appearances- friendly to strangers, probably volunteered for a few school events, went out on weekends and vacations. But at home, tempers could let loose, feelings could be stepped on, and accusations slung like slingshots.

As though on cue, he watched it happen in front of him. Rick was sucking the bottom of his drink through the straw loudly, when Ann turned to him. "Stop that. There are other people around."

"Shut up," her son snapped.

"Hey. You don't take that tone of voice with your mother!" Don hissed.

"Stop yelling at me!"

"Both of you, stop. We're in public," Mrs. Brown said.

"This isn't yelling! You want me to show you yelling, I'll show you yelling!"

"FINE!" Rick roared, pushing the glass from the table. Every eye in the room turned their way, the waiter poking his head out from the door labeled Employees Only to see what was going on. Bianca rose from her chair hastily, her eyes clouded and her face rigid.

"Don't you get up," her father scolded. "We came here all the way here, you don't get to just run off. Sit down with your family." She sat, staring down at the floor, blinking away tears. Reid couldn't help but glance at Rick occasionally. How could he look so much like Bianca, and be so drastically different? How was it that she was related to any of these people?

The meal was finished quickly, with no more discussion. Mr. Brown paid the bill, and they hurried out the door and back on to the street.

"What have I told you about acting like that in public?" Don asked his son, raising his voice. He grabbed at Rick's arm.

"Shut up and leave me alone!" He swatted away his father's hand.

"You are twenty years old! You need to grow up and start acting like an-"

"I'LL KILL YOU!" The son's voice echoed off the buildings, pedestrians on the sidewalk quickly darting across the street to the other side. Rick made no move, just stood glaring at Don with a challenge in his eyes. Mrs. Brown was watching with her hands on her hips, and Bianca turned away.

"Come on," she said, grabbing Reid's hand.

"Don't you do that Bianca!" her father spat. "You always do that! We came here to see you, and you're acting like you want nothing to do with us! You think you have it so bad? You're lucky! There are kids out there who have parents that beat them and abandon them! I'm sure your boyfriend can you tell about that!"

Reid whirled around, locking eyes with the older man. "Actually, you know what, I can. But I can also tell you about parents who don't know how to be anything other than selfish, the kind that only visit their daughter if it's convenient for them because they were so close to the city it would've been rude not to. And the kind of parents who understand nothing about their children, and who put their reputation before the mental health of their kids. And the parents who are in denial? Those are the parents I talk to, telling them that their son grew up to be a serial killer, and maybe if they'd given a damn they would've noticed the warning signs sooner. "

The older man took a step backwards, but the words just kept coming. "Yeah, there are some horrible parents out there, but you don't have to beat someone to leave scars, and you don't have to abandon them to do irreparable damage. And as for Bianca, I am her boyfriend, and I happen to think very highly of her. I also happen to have an IQ of 187, and work as an FBI profiler, so I'd like to think my judgment is pretty good. Now, if that's all you have to say, I'm going to take your daughter's hand, and we're going to leave. There's a metro stop two blocks on your left." Don said nothing, just stood there fuming. "That's what I thought."

He turned on his heel, and pulled Bianca along with him, away from the voices now rising again. Spencer walked briskly, trying to put as much distance between himself and the Brown family before he could go back and do something stupid. They'd been walking for a while before he realized Bianca was crying. She was crying- crap. Was he crying because of her family? Or because of him?

"Bianca?"

She wiped her eyes, taking a few slow, shaking breaths in. "I-I'm sorry. This isn't f-fair of me."

"What are you talking about?"

"My family. Today. Everything." Her bottom lip quivered again. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have asked you to come. I thought it would be easier with you there. But… but they couldn't behave for one fucking day." He'd never heard her swear like that before, and it served only to worry him more.

"Hey, hey. It's okay. It's okay, really. I couldn't let you do that alone. Bianca, when you called me this morning, you sounded so scared. You never sound that scared, not even when we were going after Okello in New York."

She put her hands on his chest, balling up his shirt in her fists as she clung to him. "I just don't know what to do with them. They always, always ruin things."

"Well, we're not ruined. You and me. Bianca Brown, you have stared down warlords and congressmen and all kinds of crazy things. You grew up with two men who I'm fairly certain are a narcissist and a sociopath, respectively. And you're still here. They can't see how special you are. You see the best in everyone, and you believe the best of every thing. You're always giving, always thinking of the people around you. I told you about my mother and my addiction, and you never once judged me. Nothing your family can do is going to make me love you less."

She pulled him down, kissing him square on the mouth, hard. It was frantic and fast, his face wet from the tears still trailing down her cheeks. He wrapped his hands around her waist, the feeling of her fingers in his hair making him think he needed something to steady himself. She'd never kissed him so urgently, needed him so much, and when he pulled back he had to catch his breath.

"I've been wanting to do that all day," he told her.

She gave him a tiny smile, rubbing her eyes again. "Yeah?" Bianca was quiet a moment before she said, "Spencer, do you really think he's a sociopath?"

"Your brother? I mean, I'm not a psychiatrist, so I can't make a diagnosis or anything. But I've seen quite a few over the years. Does it matter?" It was like she'd said once before. Defining it wouldn't take away the years of pain, the fear she felt when she walked into her house wondering if she was walking into a war zone that day. It wouldn't change the fact that the people who she'd been born to had been anything but familial, or that she was so broken by the time she reached high school, or that they'd that left their daughter to be raised by teachers and fictional characters and her own compassion.

Bianca shook her head. "You're my family now. That's all that matters."

His heart swelled. Compared to the rest of that day, hearing her say that, believing that, was the easiest thing in the world.

If Bianca had been shocked to hear JJ had been forced to leave the BAU, she was even more surprised to hear that the unit had taken an Academy trainee out on a case with them.

"Her name is Ashley Seaver, though that's not her original surname. She took her mother's maiden name after her father was arrested."

"I can't imagine what it must be like to find out your dad is a serial killer," Bianca said. She was curled up on the coffee table across from Reid's leather couch, where he sat, shaking out a bag of Skittles into his hand.

"I know. But even though he killed all those women, she still can't bring herself to hate him."

Bianca wasn't sure what to think of that. On one hand, that was admirable of Seaver. On the other, it made her feel worse about her own family.

"Is something wrong?" he asked, sensing her discomfort.

"I was just thinking about my own family. I mean, what does that say about me?"

Spencer looked up from the pile of colored candy in his hand, confused. "What does what say about you?"

"I mean, my parents aren't psychopaths. It's not that they couldn't love me… they just… didn't, I guess. And I still haven't been able to forgive them. If Seaver still loves her dad, and he killed people, shouldn't I be able to at least forgive mine?" She wrung her hands together, feeling guilty and unable to meet his eyes. It wasn't fair, if she talked about compassion and kindness but couldn't practice either.

"I don't think that's necessarily true. I mean, it's like you said. Your parents were capable of empathy and love. But they didn't show it. When I was in Las Vegas, and I saw my dad again, it was the same way. I was so angry at him, and even after I found out he'd cared enough to keep tabs on me all those years, it didn't change the fact that he never cared enough to write or to call or to visit me. He left an eight year old alone with a wife he knew wasn't well. And when I had to send her away, he wasn't there. Even though my mom couldn't always remember who I was, and some days she didn't get out of bed, and she thought that the government was spying on us sometimes… she was there, you know? He wasn't. At the end of the day, that was all that mattered."

She considered that. At the end of the day, that was all that mattered. A kid didn't care about who looked for articles about them, or who paid the bills. They noticed who was there for them, and who wasn't. They had both been let down by adults who had forced them to grow up too fast, and parents who didn't understand the meaning of the word. Just two broken people, trying to build a home.

Bianca hopped off the coffee table, and sat down next to him. "Can I meet your mom sometime?" She'd been meaning to ask permission for a while. There was an innate curiosity, a desire to see the person who had raised him, had made the man sitting beside her.

Spencer swallowed hard. "I don't know if that's a good idea. Are you sure you want to? I mean, you know how sick she is…" His voice spoke in the language of apprehension, and she thought she understood the translation. Are you sure you want to meet someone who sees things that aren't there? You don't have to do this. I want to protect her, and I want to protect you.

She leaned into him, pulling her feet up onto the couch. "Even though she was sick, she loved you. And you love her. That much is obvious. Spencer, you met my family. There's no possible way she can be worse than that. My brother has threatened to kill people since he was nine. My mother thinks that mental illness is a fancy way of saying attention-seeking. And my dad, well, you two had quite the heart-to-heart."

"Does he hate me now?"

Her father handed out hate with ease, finding new things to dislike every week: Democrats, feminists, Black History Month, the neighbor's kids, soccer teams. In her lifetime there were only a handful of things she had done that Mr. Brown had ever approved of.

"I don't know. They haven't called since, but my guess is that if you asked his permission to marry me he wouldn't agree. But if a guy thought I needed my dad's blessing for anything, then it would be pretty clear he doesn't know me," she laughed, trying to make light of it. Saying it made her wonder what would happen, if someday he wanted to marry her. It was too soon to think about anything like that, she reminded herself. And yet, it was easy to think about. She would be more than happy to spend her whole life by his side. Bianca only hoped that she hadn't just given him the impression that she someday expected that.

To her relief, he chuckled. "I guess you're right. You know, maybe the next time I get some time off, we could fly to Vegas together, and you could meet my mom. I might be a bit biased, but she's pretty amazing. She's funny, and she loves books, and she always worries about me too much. Her name is Diana."

Diana Reid. "I would be an honor to meet her."

"How do you feel about UNICEF?"

"I'm glad they exist, and I think they deserved that Nobel Prize in 1965. I'm also grateful that their trick-or-treat for UNICEF initiative guarantees me another excuse to continue participating in the annual festivities of Halloween."

"Well, my job is one of several non-profits participating in a fundraising gala for UNICEF on Saturday night. If you're free, I've got two tickets?"

"You're asking me to go with you?"

Bianca laughed into the phone. "Well, my love, it's either you or Ivy, the girl who takes my coffee order at Swing's. But I'd much rather dance with you."

"Oh. There's dancing involved?" Spencer asked.

"We don't have to, if you don't want to. But it is formal. And I do really, really want to go with you. I don't have a dress to match Ivy's pink hair."

As far as he knew, there wasn't a case that weekend, so plans were made to meet at 7 on Saturday night. It was exciting, the thought of going somewhere formal with him. Every time they were together, she discovered new things about him, chapters yet to be read. She wanted to see how he looked dressed up, how he danced, how it would feel to sway in his arms. Sometimes she wondered if she would ever feel she knew enough about him. True to his word, he picked her up at 6:58, insisting on driving if they were going to be out so late at night.

Spencer stepped out from the old car, and she took in the sight of him in a suit. It reminded her of a James Bond movie, a sleek black jacket and bow tie. "Wow. I didn't even know you owned a bow tie," Bianca found herself saying. "You look great."

"There's a first time for everything," he replied. "Speaking of which…" His cheeks turned pink, as he walked around the car to where she stood. There was another answer she had - how he would react to seeing her in that dress. It was a pale blue, with lace cap sleeves and a tulle skirt that brushed the pavement. She twirled around on the sidewalk, letting him see the way it spun and how the high lace collar fell away to a low back. "You- you look amazing," he stammered. "You're beautiful."

She laughed. "You can thank Mrs. Ngyuen in apartment 317. This dress looked very different when I found it at the thrift store." She tried to not think about the garishly puffy sleeves the seamstress had replaced. Instead she glanced at Spencer's feet. "Are those your Converse?"

"Should I have worn something else?"

"No, actually, I was kind of counting on that. Otherwise this would've looked a little odd." Bianca lifted the hem of her dress, revealing a pair of white high tops. He flashed her a grin, and held open the door of the car for her. Everything about him gave her butterflies still, and every smile of his made her think her chest might burst, the medical report confirming cause of death to be an abundance of happiness.

They walked arm in arm through the parking lot and into the building, a large event center that had been decorated in strands of shimmering lights, blue balloons, and white paper stars. A semicircle of cloth covered tables wrapped around a dance floor, each one dotted with placards announcing table numbers and names. They took their seats once he found the card labeled Miss Bianca Brown and Dr. Spencer Reid, wedged between Mr. and Mrs. Jacob Arruzo and Professor Muna al-Abdallah.

The professor was an older woman, who taught Arabic at Georgetown and advocated for Syrian refugees, the Arruzos were an Italian couple; he worked at an HIV/AIDS clinic and she was a kindergarten teacher. They made polite conversation through dinner, and Bianca introduced him to her boss, a burly middle-aged man who had only nine fingers.

Mr. Janowski, she explained to him, never told the same story twice, and nobody could say for sure how what really happened to his right ring finger. He'd lost it in the war, it had been bit off by a snapping turtle in his childhood, he'd been born without one, he traded it for his freedom in a prison camp. Bianca tried to keep a straight as Spencer asked the man progressively prying questions in an effort to determine the truth, falling just short of an interrogation. For his part, Janowski gave progressively evasive answers, and she'd never seen Spencer so determined to get information from someone.

At some point, a black-clad band had made their way up to the stage in the front of the room, and couples were slowly making their way from the tables to the floor. "I don't suppose they take requests for Mozart?" Reid asked, sounding disappointed.

"I don't think we'll be hearing any piano solos tonight," she conceded. "But they'll probably play a few slow songs. I don't think I've been to a dance yet where they haven't played the The Time of My Life." She glanced over at the band, playing the 70's classic Oh What a Night, and shook her head. "I feel like I'm in high school again. This was the first song they played at our senior prom. Wait, did you go to prom?"

"It went past my bedtime," he said plainly.

"Oh, then you have to dance just one song," she begged. Spencer tried to protest, claiming he had no idea how to dance. Somewhere like this, she explained, it was merely a matter of jumping up and down or stepping in a slow circle. Neither skill nor experience necessary.

"I don't know. I mean, we've gone out to a few bars and nightclubs as a unit. And while everyone else dances and gets drinks, I'm usually the one who watches the coats in the corner and hopes for someone to ask me about Star Trek trivia."

"I know what that's like. When I was in in grad school, my friends used to drag me out to clubs with them. I can still remember them asking, 'Bianca, how do you expect to meet a guy if you don't go to bars?' And I always told them I wasn't looking to meet any guy who spent all his nights hanging out in a bar. If I wanted to meet someone, I'd start at a library or something."

"With enough luck, we would've run into each other eventually. There's an estimated 119, 478 libraries in the United States, which puts the odds of us being in the same one far better than being in the same bar at the same time." Yes, that was the man she loved, who would sooner rattle off statistical probabilities than go bar-hopping. She had started to reach for him when a well-manicured hand landed on his shoulder. She watched as he turned to a blonde woman in a fitted red dress. The stranger had curves in all the places Bianca didn't, and stood easily several inches taller than her.

"Hi. I saw you sitting over here. I came here without a date. Are you too busy to join me for just one song?" she asked, leaning towards him to be heard over the music, her curled hair falling over her shoulder.

He gulped, and Bianca held her breath as he stared at the woman, stammering out a reply. "Um, I'm kind of here with my girlfriend. So, uh, I'm sorry."

The blonde woman glanced over at Bianca, who was seated next to Mr. Arruzo. She gave a short, self-conscious wave. "My mistake," the woman said, dejected. "I didn't realize you were with someone." She apologized, and made her way across the room to a different table.

"She's pretty," Bianca commented. It wasn't an accusation, merely an observation.

"She is," Spencer agreed. "But she's not you." When he looked at her, it didn't matter that she barely broke five feet, or that her hair was far too short to curl. He looked at her like she was something worth noticing, and never wanted to stop. As for herself, she was disappointed by sonnets that compared a lover to a summer's day, because no metaphor ever seemed to do justice to his expressive eyes or his jawline or that mega-watt smile she never got tired of seeing.

The band switched tempo, a slow cover of a classic ballad, and he held his hand out to her, rising from his chair. "May I have this dance?" He gave her a lovely, uneven smile that tugged at her heart. They strolled to the edge of the floor, where he wrapped one arm around her waist, letting it rest on the small of her back, his fingers warm against her skin. She placed one hand around his neck, the lacing the other through his fingers, as she let her forehead fall against him. He pulled her close, rocking them in a steady, gradual circle to the rhythm of the song.

Bianca lifted her head from his chest at one point, gazing up at him. He'd closed his eyes, and when he opened them again, she pressed her mouth to his, kissing him slowly, as if it were the first and the last time she ever would. When Spencer was concerned, there was never really enough time. All too soon, the music changed, and he pulled away from her, his eyes narrowed in concentration.

She strained to hear the notes coming from the guitar on the stage, quickly mingling with the sounds of the drums and the keyboard as his expression changed to one of recognition.

"I actually know this one!" he exclaimed. Harry Truman, Doris Day, Red China, Johnny Ray, South Pacific, Walter Winchell, Joe DiMaggio…

"And I'm guessing you've memorized all the words as well?" she laughed. He nodded, too caught up in the fast-paced lyrics to verbally reply. Of course he knew that song. Taking her hand, he spun her in circles, never once messing up the words, Billy Joel's history finding the perfect place in present day. They laughed, caught up in something only they understood, a feeling that they alone could lay claim to.

It was nearly midnight when they trekked back to the parking lot, Bianca holding up the hem of her dress to avoid dragging it through the gravel, relieved that she'd chosen to wear Converse instead of heels. She collapsed into the passenger seat, overcome with the sort of exhaustion that accompanies some of the best days, when life has been lived to its fullest extent. She nodded off quickly, her head resting on the cool pane of the window, Spencer glancing over at her from time to time and wishing that there was no need for sleep, wishing that they had just a few more hours in the day. He could hold onto her forever, and it still wouldn't be long enough.

"What I'm not sure about is if our lives have been so different from the lives of the people we save. We all complete. Maybe none of us really understand what we've lived through, or feel we've had enough time." – Kazuo Ishiguro

Author's Note:

Thank you for reading chapter 10! I sort of can't believe I've written so much for this particular chapter. A few people have asked/commented about Bianca's family, and I thought it would be a good time to bring them into the story... despite the fact they're quite uninvolved in Bianca's life. I think there's a sort of understanding between people who have grown up in broken homes, of what family is or isn't, and I think they would both get that. Naturally, Seaver's family made an interesting comparison.

The last ten chapters have been all about bringing Bianca and Spencer together, and I hope you've enjoyed them. Thanks so much for continuing to read this story! Thank you ahowell1993, ripon, and sarahmichellegellarfan1 for taking the time to write such lovely reviews for the last chapter. I'm grateful to You Can Go Your Own Way, hfcmfan2013, Brown-Eyed-Mauraderette (do you solemnly swear you are up to no good?), and Nonitk for favoriting/following this story.

I'm guessing most of you have noticed by this point that the quotes appear sporadically, breaking up the chapters into chunks of time. Rather than use them at the beginning and end of every chapter, and I wanted to use them to tie together different "sections" of the story. For example, they divide up the time the BAU spends in New York on the case from the time period when Spencer and Bianca are just getting to know each other, and another set of quotes separates that time period from the section where the two are becoming more comfortable in their relationship.

I think that's worth mentioning before I post the next chapter.