And it's ashes and dust for casual lust…-The Avett Brothers
Spencer kisses Julie goodbye and heads to the M.E. with Prentiss.
"You good, Reid?" Emily asks as they make their way to the car.
He nods. "It's just hard watching her struggle and grieve, and the only thing of real substance that I can do to help is catch the unsub."
JJ would have some sage and comforting advice, but not Prentiss. She simply nods in agreement with him. "Let's get to it then."
-/-/-
"I discovered something while examining the second victim," the medical examiner looked up at her in expectation.
"The ejaculate never left the vas deferens" she continues.
"And that means...?" Prentiss asks for clarification.
"He was killed before the completion of the sexual act."
"So, the sex possibly serves some other purpose besides being a power play or a ritualistic part of the killings," Spencer muses aloud.
"That depends on the first victim," Prentiss replies while dialing up Garcia.
"Penelope, can you look up the M.E. report for Brian Williams and see if there is any evidence he didn't complete the sex act, in his case ?"
"Oooh, interesting... Let me just...…Yes, it seems there was very little evidence of bullets being in the chamber, so to speak. The Tarrant County M.E. put it down to Williams' secret but long-time use of performance-enhancing drugs of the sporty variety. Does that help?"
"Maybe. He was the first victim. Could be something. Or could be the unsub was just trying to perfect their method of killing."
"Sex would be a suitable distraction, so you wouldn't see it coming."
-/-
"The fact that sex isn't central to the killing in a ritualistic sense but is just a sadistic add-on for the unsub leads me to believe that it leaves the erotic stalker or scorned lover out of the equation," Rossi thinks aloud.
"Yep… which leaves us with…" JJ replies.
"Jack shit," Morgan finishes for her.
-/-
Since literally, every person in town overlaps with everyone else in one form or another, it makes isolating a potential unsub that much more difficult for the team.
They don't usually observe the victim's funeral services in hopes the unsub will be unable to stay away and will inevitably tip their hand, Still, they're still coming up short, which calls for a change in tactics. It makes Spencer edgy.
He can't help but feel that Julie is central to the unsubs plan. JJ said he was projecting his past with Maeve onto Julie. Is she right? He certainly hopes she is. Regardless, he sits beside Julie in the church pew, behind Matt's family. He's wearing a button cam, feeding his viewpoint back to Penelope, as are the rest of the team, scattered throughout the church so as to record as much of the space as much as possible.
"Someone has eyes for the lovely Miss Taylor, Penelope," Rossi whispers lowly into his comm device.
"Three pews up, fourth over from the right," Hotch finishes.
"Running her down. Oh, that's Tyra, it's all good. The best friend is concerned, not psychotic. Her alibi checked out both times."
"Still... Run down all the other women who fit the age demographics, mama," Morgan says while smiling at a woman he'd distracted.
-/-
Julie had helped plan the funeral; it had given her purpose, a distraction in this time when she was so confused. She wasn't just perturbed as to why someone would do this; it was also Spencer that was behaving in a way that was confusing. He seemed to be great when providing her comfort, but still, something seems to be wedged between them as if it has a presence of its own. Julie can't figure out what it was that kept him somehow removed.
Surely, he doesn't think she's still in love with Matt. He had to know you can love someone and not be in love with them. He must know that because of Maeve, right?
She's knocked from her reverie by Matt's grandmother gripping her hand. The choir starts an acoustic cover of I surrender all.
Matt didn't like hymns and he wasn't even sure he believed in God. But funerals are for the living and Julie knows Matt would do anything to ease the grief of the people he loved.
Julie's thoughts float between her grief, Spencer's emotional distance, and the fact that her friends and boyfriend are whispering lowly all around her on their comms, trying to decide if a murderer had the gall to sit quietly in this church as if they weren't breathing personification of evil. She closes her eyes and tries to focus on the hymn.
-/-
She makes it through the funeral and the reception before breaking down in her childhood bedroom. Soon, there's a gentle knock on the door.
She clears her throat and wipes her eyes. "Come in."
"You don't have to hide your feelings from us Julie." Tyra stands in the door, with Spencer just behind her. Julie loves Tyra so much in this moment. Julie had once mentioned casually that sometimes Spencer struggles with how and when to support someone.
They come in. Spencer sits beside her on the bed and Tyra folds herself to sit on the floor at Julie's feet.
"I could not have done what you did today, Jules."
"Yes, you could, Ty. If you had too not only could you. You would simply because it has to be done and it's the only feasible way you can help."
"All that aside... We're proud of you." Tyra continued. "Jules…"
"I'm good, Ty, I promise. I just... I need to talk to Spencer. Just us."
Tyra looks at her for a long moment, but nods gets up off the floor. Julie waits until Tyra leaves the room, closing the door softly behind her.
"Okay Spence, you know what makes our relationship work. We're both honest with each other. You are a little more unfiltered than me, sure, but we're honest." She takes a deep breath. "I feel like we're off and I don't know why. I mean... I didn't lead you to believe that I was still in love with Matt, did I? Because even though he'll always have a place in my heart as the first person I loved, you are the only person I love in the here, and now."
"No, Jules, it's not that. I promise."
'Then what?"
"I don't want to scare you."
"And letting me think you're about to break up with me is better how?"
"I'm not doing that, I- … Getting a real life in the flesh girlfriend was hard and scary and I – I'm definitely not breaking with you. I love you. Like a lot, and like I said , finding you was hard and scary. I'd rather keep you and never ever do that again."
"Baby, you're rambling.'
"Right! Sorry! I love you, we're not breaking up."
"Spence, then what has you twisted up like someone gave you bad news about your mama? Because there's something that's making you pull away."
Spencer looks at her, pain etched in his face. "I can't figure this case out. You all overlap like the lines of a mandala and there's not one detail that I can focus on and do my thing with. I can't draw specific commonalities, because the commonalities are everywhere with everything. And I feel like it's centered on you, I really do. JJ keeps telling me I'm projecting Maeve onto you. That because I love you, I think it's about you. And I want it to be that I do... but..."
"Forget JJ and her theory for a second and tell me yours? Because you might be projecting, but what if you're not? When your brain sees a pattern, it is very rarely wrong, babe."
"Thank you."
"No thanks needed. Pen looked up your solve rate for me, both team-wise and solo consulting when you aren't teaching... The only higher rate was Gideon and Dave, and they built the fucking unit." She raises her brows at him until he concedes with a wry expression, then coaxes him on. "So what are your thoughts on this, babe?"
"The unsub fits somewhere between erotomania and revenge stalking, and a family annihilator but minus the rage required."
"Wait, baby, that's it! Hold on…" Julie jumps up, opens the door to call down the hall "Mama! Where are my yearbooks?"
Then she's back in the room, her brain going a mile a minute. "What if… What if she I mean the Unsub sees this four block of students as a family... What if she left some precursor clue in our yearbooks?"
Spencer gestures and she continues. "Annihilators are jealous, right? You told me that the root cause is either jealousy or that they don't want the responsibility of their lives anymore. If there's no responsibility here, jealousy is still a very possible motive."
"Okay… Jules, this is more than you paying attention when I talk."
"I watched a shit ton of dateline before we got together," she admits. "Now not so much because your brain never shuts off and , even when I keep my distance from your office, your office finds its way into communal spaces."
"I'll work on that…"
"Would be greatly appreciated, baby. The file thing, not your brain." She moves from pacing the floor to rifle through her closet, since her mama hasn't heard her She's tosses old clothes and junk behind her carelessly, comment now and again as she sorts through the over-stuffed dstorage space."Ohhh... that's where I left this skirt. Here take this so I don't forget it." A red leather mini skirt hits Reid in the face as he fumbles the catch.
"Is this leather? Baby, are you manic?"
"Please, that's ethically sourced vegan leather, and no... just looking for the yearbooks." There is a pause and a thunk sound. "Found 'em'"
She pushes a Rubbermaid storage box out of the closet. "Hey, Pen! I think I found you something to research into," she shouts down to Penelope, who she thinks is in the kitchen with her mom.
Penelope is standing in Julie's doorway in seconds, wearing a black dress with neon multicolored polka dots on it, in barbie pink heels, and matching glasses. Julie smiles unconsciously; she loves Pen and her confidence almost as she loves Spencer and his smile when he's truly happy.
"You beckoned, Jules?"
"Yup. Spence thinks this person is a cross between a family annihilator and an erotomaniac stalker…"
"Okay?"
"What if the 05' to 08' class block is viewed as a family by the unsub? Matt was a sophomore in 2005, Smash was a junior. The senior they will target has got to be Jason Street. He was paralyzed first game of the season my freshman year. It basically traumatized the whole town and brought the team into a fanatical kind of loyalty. He should probably guarded; he's at his parents' house."
She furrows her brow and continues... "As for the freshman target, I don't know who it is but I'd bet my life on the unsub being in my freshman yearbook. You can run down faces, names, backgrounds context clues, right? These things could maybe give you an in."
"Day-um. We need a girl's day, sweets. You're spending way too much time with professor smarty pants."
"But I like him." She smiles, kissing Spencer quickly. "We're going to Seven Senorita's to pour one out for Matt, then to the lake because Tim wants to do a bonfire. Wanna go with?" she directs at Spencer.
"I'd love to, despite my fear of communal foods like guacamole... but I have something to ask your Dad, then I'm going to run down these leads with Garcia."
She looks at him oddly and shrugs. "Okay, your loss." She takes the skirt from him and slips into the bathroom smirking.
"That's mean, Julie!" he calls to her retreating back,
"Just giving you something other than death to think about, Spence,"
Spencer blushes and Garcia finds it disarmingly cute. "Are you asking Julie' dad what I think you are asking Julie's Dad?"
"No comment."
"Reid come on," she wheedles. "I will help you plan…"
"Shhh."
Julie is changed and out the door with Tyra less than ten minutes later, tossing, "Bye Mama, Daddy, Grace, Pen, and Spence, I love y'all," to them as she goes.
" I love you, too" is parroted back from all over the house.
AN: So some small things to note, I got some of the ages wrong in the initial chapter for my story to work. Smash would have been 30 making Julie 28 and working on her second degree, Only God knows what number degree Reid is working on. Myranda thank you so much for editing my weird little current passion project. I hope you guys are enjoying it. All commentary and critique are welcome as it feeds the muse.