November was a very busy month for the BAU, especially for Spencer. The team went early in the month to Las Vegas to help with a child abduction case. The team was successful in returning the young boy to his parents, but the case and the trip to Spencer's hometown triggered some buried memories from his past. He had even accused his estranged father of murder.

They had found the real killer of the cold case and Spencer had to apologize to his father for his accusation. This had been the first time he had seen his dad in 17 years, since William Reid had walked out on his mother and him. The trip had started to heal some old wounds. He still did not forgive his father for leaving, but he understood that it wasn't his own fault and some of the anger had melted away. He had no plans to start a relationship with him again, but he had been pleased at how kind he had been to his mom during the investigation. It was comforting to see that there must have been some love between them when they were married and when Spencer was born.

On Sunday, Spencer had gone to the Virginia Rifle Club with Bob and a few of his friends for brunch. Bob had been a member of the private club since he moved to DC. He had invited Spencer a few times, but he had either declined or had been out of town on a case. He had just returned from Las Vegas on Friday and decided that he wanted to see Bob to talk about his father and decided that a brunch with his friends sounded nice. He and Bob stayed after the others had left and went to the bar area to talk. Their seats overlooked the underground firing range. You could not see who was shooting or hear any sounds from the range. The bar had a huge thick glass wall and you could just see the paper targets.

Once the waitress had delivered their coffee, Spencer told Bob the entire story about his father. Bob had been pleased how Spencer had handled the situation and was very happy to hear that he had no urge to use during either case. Bob would never have asked Spencer to contact his father, but he did feel the encounter was another step towards staying clean for life.

After Spencer had finished the story, Bob started to talk about his granddaughter, Chelsea. Spencer had seen many photos of her at Bob's place and Bob talked about her mostly when recounting his own addiction and the death of his son. This time he was telling Spencer that she was now 26, living alone and single. He really wanted her to find a nice guy. Spencer was shocked at Bob's next comment. He told Spencer that he thought that they would have a lot in common and that Spencer should ask Chelsea out. Spencer was adamant about his answer. He really wasn't interested in dating anyone right now, he was managing to stay clean, but he didn't want to bring anyone new into his live. He couldn't understand why Bob would think they had anything in common. Bob had dropped the subject and they finished their coffee watching the paper targets get hit and then move underneath them and fresh targets appear several minutes later.

The next day, Rossi and Spencer had been giving a lecture at Georgetown University when a man claiming to be a professor baited both Rossi and Reid to find 5 missing people and dared them to prove he had killed 7 others.

Then less than a week after sending the professor to prison and saving the 5 people, which had turned out to be one teacher and 4 young children, they were called to Atlanta on another case.

Morgan had insisted he go to a nightclub with him to pass out the "Wanted" photos of their current unsub. Morgan had also given him some tips on picking up a girl. Spencer really did not want to go to the bar or to try to pick up on a girl, but he kept remembering Bob's words to step outside his comfort zone and to start to live a little. He actually had been successful in using a magic trick to start a conversation with a very cute bartender.

When he told Bob about it, he had been very impressed. "Are you planning to go and see her again?"

"No, absolutely not!" Spencer told him. "She called me at work to let me know how she was doing, but we have NOTHING in common and she lives in Atlanta. It isn't practical."

Bob then surprised Spencer again. "I really think you and Chelsea have a lot in common and you should give her a call and ask her out. She lives right here in Virginia. You know I hate that she lives alone and works all of the time."

Spencer did not want to date anyone and couldn't understand why Bob had brought up Chelsea again. "You know most people in the BAU are single because dating is very difficult due to the hours and stress of our jobs. Almost everyone that I know that did marry, ended in divorced. Sometimes divorced several times." He then reminded Bob that he often rattles of facts that scare many people. He couldn't understand why Bob would want his only granddaughter to date a recovering addict, he felt like damaged merchandise. He was happy when Bob changed the subject.

In between all of the November cases, his firearm's re-certification was due and he passed with the best score he ever had. After the day with John, Spencer had gone down to the FBI range and tried to relax and think about the outdoor range. The test results did not escape Hotch's notice. He knew something was different about Spencer recently, but the changes seemed for the better so he kept it to himself.

Spencer was slowly growing more comfortable with himself and was interacting more with the people they worked with on cases. Hotch was especially proud of how he had handled himself in Colorado with the head of the fringe religious sect. He had been instrumental in getting out most of the group alive, including himself and Prentis. He was also pleased at how he had dealt with the mind games that Professor Rothchild had tried to use on him and Rossi. He had not let that distract him from helping them find the identities of the seven women that he had murdered and figure out the Professor's obsession with the Fibonacci sequence.

December had been mostly uneventful. The team had traveled a few times on cases, but mostly worked on profiles for police agencies around the country to help them on their difficult cases. This year their team had been on call for both Christmas and New Year's, but they were not called out on a case until New Year's Day.

Spencer had seen Bob a couple of times in December, and every time Bob had talked about Chelsea. He told Spencer that he had mentioned him to her and she said she would be happy to go out to dinner with him sometime. As Spencer was traveling back home to Virginia, he was now regretting his last attempt to dissuade her. He had told Bob to tell her the truth of what he did for a living, his IQ and eidetic memory and why he and Bob knew each other. He was sure that would dissuade her from saying yes to a blind date. Who would want to go out with a recovering addicted genius that works 24/7 in a dangerous occupation?

He looked again at his message from Bob. It was almost 11:00 pm on January 1st. He knew he had no choice but to call her. If he didn't call, he would look extremely rude both to Bob and to Chelsea. It was too late to do anything about it tonight, but tomorrow was Friday, he decided to call first thing in the morning and see if she was available that night or on Saturday. He might as well get this out of the way. He was sure it would not go well.