Criminal minds, don't own it, never will, no profit from this, not much from anything else. Fan-fic. Slash. Hotch/Reid. M/M erotica-eventually.

This was initially started in response to a kink meme prompt, about Reid being mute...but, it's not very smutty smut. Originally posted on my dA account gallery/38994730 - the chapter breaks are a little different, and the text and time line are a little clearer in this version. This chapter is new! And there should be one new one after this, or more, I'm enjoying writing this again. A chapterlet, bigger-better-higher-faster chapter to follow.

And thank you for reading, I know it's a little odd, and maybe a touch warped, but hope you enjoy it anyhow! M

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Spencer cleaned up after dinner. He did the dishes by hand—a ritual of childhood revisited. He played classical music on the CD player. He shuffled Jack off to bed with promises of his father's immanent arrival. And he waited for Aaron to come home.

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"Agent Hotchner?" Strauss was surprised by the unscheduled 5 p.m. visit from Aaron Hotchner—she knew how the man and most of his team, that would be all of his team except Dave, felt about her.

"Thank you." He smiled a half smile, the beginnings of a real smile, directed at Erin Strauss. She didn't recall that happening before.

"Does this mean that Agent Reid is recovering?"

Aaron beamed.

Then Strauss smiled.

"We need to talk about him." Aaron was suddenly overly business like.

Strauss gave him a sharp look. For once in her life she had played match maker, at least somewhat, and she was a woman used to getting what she wanted and this would work. She nodded, indicating that Aaron should pull up a chair, and sat down behind her desk.

"What, agent Hotchner, is the problem?" She failed entirely at her usual ferocity. She truly did have a soft spot for Reid, and a happy Hotchner was an effective Hotchner. Ok, she nearly liked Hotchner also, and his rouge team was beginning to grow on her. It was hardly her fault that it took a while for people to gain her trust—well mostly hardly her fault.

"He wants to return to the field."

Erin Strauss looked surprised, and then suspicious. "And you don't want him to?" She wasn't going to let Agent Hotchner pin this on her, well, she probably wasn't going to let Agent Hotchner pin this one on her.

"I was hoping you would see this the same way as I do."

Erin raised her eyebrows, "So, you are asking for my help in dealing with your family?"

"With my team."

"And you believe he serves us better in an advisory capacity?"

Aaron didn't want to sell Spencer short, the last thing that Spencer needed right now was to be limited by Aaron, he was limited by fate as it was. "I believe, know, he is capable of field work, Ma'am; our team communicates effectively in spite of Reid's disability." Aaron still hated saying disability, but at Spencer's insistence, that was the word they used.

"Then explain it to me, Aaron." Erin sounded arch and dismissive.

Aaron looked down at his hands and then back up. "Because I can't lose him."

"And if you were to lose him we would lose you from the BAU?" Erin Strauss may have looked a bit hopeful.

"I can't lose him ma'am." Aaron was still looking at his hands.

Erin's glance was curt, "I don't believe this is my responsibility Aaron, but I don't believe I can do without two agents, so for the interim, restricted field service."

Aaron Hotchner was grateful, genuinely grateful—but this had been the easy part of the conversation.

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Spencer snatched the car keys from Aaron. He forced himself to keep quiet, no use in unintelligible utterances at this point, he clenched his jaw, he looked away, wiped the tears from his eyes with the back of his hand. If he could have would have been yelling something at Aaron about ability and disability—he wasn't sure what—but this, this, exceeded anything conveyed by statistics, or contained by mathematics. Aaron didn't think he could do his job.

Spencer threw the keys on the floor and shook his head; then shoved his hands deep into his pockets. "You can't treat me like this, Aaron."

Aaron paused. He hadn't expected a physical reaction from Reid, but they had nearly come to blows in the kitchen. Then Reid had taken his keys and blocked the door; and now he was whispering something. He couldn't understand a damn word Reid said anymore, more than a year into this, and he still couldn't understand Spencer—and frankly every time the doctors wanted to do something more to Spencer it was a step back ward for Aaron. And he couldn't lose Spencer.

"It was my choice, my decision as the team leader." Aaron looked worried as he raised his eyes to meet Spencer's.

"Please Spencer."

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"Daddy?" both men spun around. It wasn't as though anyone had been shouting, but there had been enough anger between the two of them that little Jack must have woken up.

"Daddy?" Jack looked skeptically at both men.

They really couldn't say "It's going to be ok."

They both stared at Jack.

"Are you angry because Spencer can't talk with his voice?"

That was it, Aaron cried.

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