"How's your ankle?"

Briana looked up from her coffee mug- filled with hot chocolate- at the lanky young man standing across the kitchen.

He had requested to come in and she refused. Then he looked at her ankle, swollen and messily wrapped in brown gauze and decided that her blatant disdain for him at the current moment was unimportant. In one swift move, he lifted her into his arms and carried her back to the couch. She tried to protest and demand that he leave her place of residence, but any and all of her arguments fell on deaf ears.

Gently, he guided the inflamed joint to the coffee table and started re-tending to the wound. He was very thorough, she noted, and meticulous. And as she currently looked across the the kitchen bar where she sat, she could practically see the guilt and disgrace radiating around him like a lurid haze of lung throttling smog.

Briana didn't know if the dramatic amount of remorse rose from him breaking his promise or any of the other things that happened tonight and frankly, she didn't care.

She can handle being lied to. Hell, she's lied to people's face without so much a flutter or fluster. But a broken promise- especially in light of a particular event some months prior- is, in her mind, a broken relationship.

40 minutes earlier

Spencer sat in the back of some random cab in deep, demeaning thought.

He abandoned her. He ignored her. And his failures drove her right into the clawing and clenching hands of danger.

The disappointment, distress and rage in her eyes when she had finally looked at him back in the ally, it was...heart shattering. And to make matters worse, she was hurt. Not just emotionally, but physically.

He had indirectly physically injured her. And to think...if they had gotten to her just a few minutes later she would've been...

but she wasn't. So there was a plus. However, add together the desertion, the 'look', the way she ran- check that- limped away from them...he was drowning. And no one was there to help him. He had to fix this himself.

The cab came to a stop and Spencer paid the man before walking into the apartment building. He could've sworn that he saw something deep-red and about five feet off of the ground dash into the stairwell, so he walked to the door to see if Briana was really the stubborn as to try and trudge up three flights of stairs with a twisted ankle.

Quietly opening the door, he peered around inside the well and found...nothing.

Assuming that what ever he saw was just his mind playing tricks on him, Spencer let the door closed and went to the elevator- completely unaware of the young woman laying on the second floor stair balcony fighting back tears of pain and humiliation.

"Listen, I'm not going to set myself up for betrayal and paranoia," Briana declared suddenly, "And after what happened with the blondie at the bar..."

Spencer peered from his coffee mug- this one actually holding coffee- at the girl who had just spoken. She was beaten and battered. Her hair looked like it was bathed in dirt, dried blood covered a scrap that ran the length of the left side of her face and her entire top lip was starting to swell. And in total opposition to the terrifying events of the night, her eyes were still hard and her gaze was ever-so steady. Reasonable deduction told him what was about to happen.

He wasn't well-versed in relationships. He didn't have a PhD in 'Girlfriends' and of his 187 IQ points, about three of them were for basic social understandings.

Yet still, he knew what was coming.

Damnit, she thought as she felt an all too familiar pressure in her eyes and the back of her throat. No, no, I can not cry.

Swallowing her sorrows the best she could, Briana spoke again.

"I need to know this now, Spencer. Are you safe?"

She tried to hide it, but her personal pain was just far too immense to even joke at choking it back. He could see it so plainly, all of the hurt from (he was assuming) whatever happened back at her old job. All of the hurt that he made her remember.

Was he safe? It was obvious that her pain steamed from some kind of abandonment or betrayal. And considering his own current fears about 'the blondie', he knew the answer to her question.

"No."

Briana sighed. "Well alright, then. Thank you for being honest."

Then there was silence. Spencer attempted to take advantage of it.

"Brea, I really like you." He tried to explain. He tried to tell her how sorry he was. He tired, but the words just wouldn't come out. Stubborn little shits.

Briana sighed once more, taking a moment to collect her thoughts before speaking.

"I know about the blondie, okay? I was briefed by like...five different people on the situation before I was even allowed to take the job. I know that I'm replacing her professionally and I'm fine with that. I couldn't care less about being someone's professional replacement. But I will not, will not, be a warm body, Spencer Reid." She asserted. She attempted to control the flood gates, but just a few feelings of repressed resentment leaked through the cracks. She knew it sounded harsh, and she regretted it. But there was nothing she could do about it now.

The look on his face, though. Dear God, he looked like a kicked puppy. With those big, brown eyes and his little pout- did he even know he was doing it?

"You're so much more than a warm body, Briana. And I know- I know that you deserve better, sop much better than I could ever be. But I want to try, I will try to be better. Just, right now, I..."

She waited for him to continue. She wanted to see where he was going with this. Was he going to try and persuade her into a relationship with him? Ha! Fat Chance, buddy.

Finally, he started speaking again.

"I can't be better, right now, Briana. I think of you, dream of you and against my conscious will, I see flashes of her. And when I daydream about you, I start to wander off and think about all of these 'what if's with me and JJ. And I know it'll never happen and I truly don't even want it to happen. I don't know why I have dreams about her, why I think about her, but I want it to stop. I want it to stop but I have no idea how to make it."

By now, he had slid down to her kitchen floor, completely wiped out. She felt bad for him, she did. She knew what it was like. She had suffered through it herself after the whole Ryan incident.

"Here's the plan."

He looked up from his two palms and saw the bar empty, only to notice a deep colored flame in his peripheral vision.

Briana was sitting next to him, her own legs tucked into her chest like his. She wasn't looking at him, but at the oven door in front of them. He looked, too, and almost laughed out loud at the reflection. What a bunch of miserable losers they look like.

His eyes appeared completely embedded into his skull, his face look unnaturally long and thin and his hair was a mess form running his hands through it. That was one of the reasons he cut it, actually. He just got so annoyed one day when he caught a knot that he took hold of a knife and just sliiiiiiiiiiice. Glancing at Briana's reflection, he noticed that her hair knots would be quite the problem. He winced just thinking about the next time she would try to brush the rat's nest. Her makeup was smeared off and her eye was already starting to swell shut just slightly. And despite the temporary dis-figuration, he could easily see just how tired she was.

"You are going to go about your business and live life like we never tried to start dating. When the images and fantasies about Blondie are done, then we can try again.

Spencer looked at her in total disbelief. Why was she being so understanding about this? To say that her's wasn't the reaction he was expecting would be a complete belittlement of his current shocked state.

"Bri-Briana, I don't understand."

"What?"

"Why are you giving me another chance?" He inquired as his brows naturally knitted together.

She sighed slightly and gave him a small smile.

"Because we can' control our subconscious, Spencer. And I'm not one to punish people for something that they can't control."

He smiled back at her a for a moment- just one, quick moment- it was only them. No 'Blondie', no bar, no pasts. Just the two of them.

Before a damned oven alarm ruined the moment.

Spencer's head shot to the appliance in shock and Briana giggled before trying to scoot her way up the cabinet door she was sitting in front of.

Spencer took note of this and quickly help her up and over to the alarm.

"Bed time." She told him as she turned it off. "I wake up pretty consistently, so to be able to function in daily society, I also have to go to bed at a semi-consistent time."

He nodded in understanding and released his light hold on her waist. It was only when she started hopping on her good foot did he re-establish his hold around her midriff.

She shot him a minute, embarrassed smile as they trudged towards her bedroom. Once there, she directed him towards her bed, where she had a pair of gray and pink stripped bikini panties and an old, gray t-shirt laying out. She grabbed the items and quickly but cautiously hobbled to the conjoined bathroom.

While she changed, Spencer walked back out to the kitchen and opened her freezer. Much to his relief, he found a generic brand, flexible ice pack on one of the shelves.

Finding the slipcover for the pack in a cabinet drawer next to the refrigerator, Spencer slide the pack into the gray, fleece pouch and stepped into the living room. The roll of gauze, box of clips and the scissors were still on the table. He snatched the supplies up and went back into the bedroom. He noticed that the bathroom was now open and as he peeked inside, he saw what he was dreading.

Briana was trying to brush her hair.

And frankly, the horrific crunching sound of the brush ripping through the knots made his stomach churn.

He waited until she was done with what had to be some kind of Chinese torture to her scalp and beckoned her to the bedroom. There, he led her to the edge of the queen sized mattress and commanded her to sit while he got the supplies ready.

After opening the box of clasps and starting the gauze roll, he gently guided her twisted ankle to his eye level and started undoing his previous wrappings.

Over the next few minutes he re-wrapped the ankle and guided her under covers of her bed. He watched her reach over to her electronic clock and turned on something that sounded like a cross between to ocean and and SUV going 80 mph on a gravel road.

"I'm going to call Hotch tomorrow morning and tell him I'm taking you to get x-rays." He told her as he stood in the bedroom doorway.

"Alright." She mumbled back, only about 1/4 conscious.

Spencer quietly laughed to himself and switched the light off, leaving the bedroom door slightly ajar before exiting the apartment entirely. He walked down the hallway and to the elevator, pressing button '5' and waiting to get his own self tucked into bed.

A/N: So I had this all typed last week. Guess what happened.

I went to click 'Save' and BAM! It took me to the Login screen. I screamed, threw my laptop at the wall, cried for an hour and then screamed again. To say I was lightyears beyond pissed would do SHAME to my true emotions. People, it was like I was heading torwards Psychotic Break at comfortable pace and then someone just sent into fucking Wrap 9.

Oh, and yesterday I started walking to Quad area of my campus before my first class (I like having about an hour or so before classes to just do whatever I want) and let me tell you something. Seventeen people told me "We got Osama!"

Yeah, sweeties, I know. Don't get me wrong, I'm enthralled and beyond proud but...really people? Because I didn't hear on seven different news stations while just trying to find the weather forecast, I didn't wake up to ten text messages and I see it all over the internet.

I understand that they're exited and so am I but I gotta be honest, by the third person I was just thinking "NO FUCKIN' WAY, DUDE! YOU'RE SHITTIN' ME! I HAD .IDEA!"

...I'm not in a good mood.

But on the plus side, I get an extension on two of my finals because of the whole 'mental breakdown' thing! So there ya go!

And a quick note: I really don't give a shit if you think we were wrong in killing Osama Bin Laden. He was a pure evil man who indirectly killed 3,000 people in a matter of hours. An eye for three thousand fucking eyes, bitches.

And if you bring up how we didn't kill Sadam, I have a quick fact for you. Sadam surrendered. Osama fought. You fight, you better be prepared to suffer the consequences. You shoot at us, we shoot at you. If you so happen to get shot and die, well, you shouldn't have shot at us in the first place, idiot! If 'Paradise' does exists then you know what, good for you, Osama! If 'Hell' exists, then good for the rest of the fucking planet!

Okay, okay, I'm better. For now.

Oh, and I know IQ points don't work the way in real life how they do in my comparison, but you get the point.