Disclaimer: See my profile
A/N: Clearing Storms is a painting by artist Thomas Kinkade
Hi everybody, this is the last chapter except for an epilogue. Thanks so much to everyone who supported this story and reviewed. As always, special thanks to my sounding board, mablereid.
xxxxxxxxxxx
"You okay Reid?" Morgan asked.
"Yeah…" He replied, extricating himself from JJ. "I'm okay."
"Your dad's not…?" Morgan said.
"No," Reid sat on a love seat just to the left of the door. "He's okay. He came to finally and … and I asked him if he remembered what happened and then his eyes filled with terror and he started thrashing about, setting all the alarms and everything off. They… they just kicked me out."
Emily sat beside him and gingerly reached for his hand, grateful when he didn't resist. "I'm sure it's going to be okay."
"I think you could use some coffee," Rossi said, "we all could. Come with me Morgan." Morgan nodded and followed him to the door.
"What are you guys even doing here? Shouldn't you be on your way back to DC?"
"I called Strauss," Rossi said from the doorway. "I told her we'd just finished two nasty cases with kids and we were not on this weekend, period."
Reid rubbed his hand across his face. His head was beginning to pound. "Could you turn that light off please," he indicated the fluorescent light on the ceiling. Hotch flipped the wall switch leaving the room much dimmer with only the light from two small lamps on the end tables for illumination. "Thanks."
JJ sat on the steel blue faux suede couch that was placed at a right angle to the matching love seat Reid and Emily sat in. She clasped her hands together on her lap. "It sounds like it's an improvement. That's something."
"Yeah, if I can only keep my mouth shut. What was I thinking; that he was a victim in one of our cases and I was there to do a cognitive interview or something? Every time I open my mouth lately, I say the wrong thing." His words were followed by some moments of silence. He looked up at the picture that hung on the coppery walls behind the couch. Frothy white waves lapped against a rocky shoreline, while the golden glow of the sun that turned the fading clouds to a coppery orange, served as a backdrop to a lovely red roofed house of a whitish brick that resembled alabaster. Inviting light effused from within and he could only assume its occupants had taken shelter and now that the sun had returned would be out to enjoy the land and the sea. It was entitled Clearing Storms. He thought this was a perfect place for it. Families were sent here to wait until their loved one's medical storm cleared.
His team had faced a storm in Ian Doyle, hadn't they? They'd taken shelter, being protected, not by walls, but by lies. And, like any storm, it had finally passed. Ian Doyle was dead and, as storm survivors do, the team had come out from beneath the cloak of deception that had protected them from the storm's wrath. In the aftermath survivors surveyed the damage and decided what could be fixed and what was irreparably broken. That's what each of them was deciding now, Reid realized. When their decisions were made, they would start rebuilding and what they built would be stronger and more able to withstand the next storm. "I'm sorry," he said at last.
"Spence, you don't need to…"
"Yes, I do, JJ." He stopped her with a raise of his hand. "Do you think I want all this animosity, I don't? I have to get this out and what happens after that… happens." He glanced down at his hands and noticed the one that still held his. "You've been picking your nails again."
"Nasty habit," Emily replied.
"You only do that when you're stressed. I hope it's not because of me. I hope I'm not the one making your life more stressful."
"I've made your life more stressful recently so maybe I deserve it." Emily said.
"No… no, you don't deserve it," Reid replied. "This is all so difficult. I've realized that I tend to vilify those who hurt me and you three, like my father, were no exception." He looked up at his unit chief. "Hotch I respect you more than any man. I realize now that you felt you couldn't tell me because with my… problem, you considered me a liability."
"Reid, that's not true," Hotch interjected. "I never considered you a liability, not then, not now, not ever. The only reason JJ and I never told anyone was totally for their own protection and Emily's. It's not that I thought you'd give Prentiss up if Doyle caught you and tried to get answers through drugs. I'm quite sure you wouldn't. It's the torture you would have been put through in the endeavor that I couldn't fathom. We couldn't chance that one wrong look; one misspoken word might have a hand in sending you to the depths of hell."
Emily squeezed his hand, "I more than anyone knew what Ian Doyle was capable of and I couldn't risk him taking you to a place where we may never have gotten you back."
xxxxxxxxxxx
"Rossi, what are we doing sitting here eating doughnuts," Morgan said as he considered the sugar covered beauty in front of him.
Rossi picked up his nut covered treat. "Those three upstairs need to talk."
"Do you think they will?" Morgan bit into his doughnut.
"Um hmm," Rossi said as he chewed. "It's like two sets of warring gangsters and Reid was the innocent bystander that got caught in the middle, collateral damage."
"We've all been affected by what happened Rossi, not just Reid."
"I know that but we're older and our different experiences have made us more capable of handling it I think."
"Do you think Reid'll come out of it okay?"
"I think he'll find a way to make sense of it."
xxxxxxxxxxx
"I forgave my dad," Reid blurted out suddenly.
"That's great Reid," Hotch said feeling the first twinges of hope. "How did you come to that decision?"
"I was thinking about all of you and that Emily's fear for us was because Doyle was going after families and, for her, that was us. I was thinking about some of the times we've had together. And I realized that although family members hurt each other from time to time, in the end, they're still family and families forgive. I just jumped up and forgave him."
"You all forgave me after the Dilaudid." He turned so he faced Emily, then shifted his glance to include Hotch and JJ, "And I want to forgive you," he said. "Logically, of course, I understand the reasoning behind why you did what you did. I can even relate it to what I felt I had to do with my mother. She felt betrayed by me in the beginning, and still does now and then, and I still feel the guilt I felt that day although I know what I did was right. I've been told I would have done the exact same thing had the decision been mine. I don't know if that's true. I don't know if I could have watched one of you suffer the way I did and not do what I knew would help. I almost want to think I couldn't, that I couldn't be that cold and callous."
He looked up at his unit chief. "Hotch you know what this feels like. You lost Haley to an unsub. We all saw the pain you went through after that and I can't imagine you wanting to unleash that on people you supposedly care about. How would you feel if, after all you and Jack had gone through, Haley suddenly popped up and said, "Surprise?" I know you'd be grateful she was still alive. I'm grateful that Emily's alive too, believe me. But I think you couldn't help but feel some anger at whoever had played this sick joke on you, not to mention parading us all through that grief assessment. What was that, to evaluate how well your plan was working?" He didn't wait for Hotch to respond before going on.
"Emily's so called death changed me. I was consumed with an anger I'd never felt before. I started going to the firing range all the time. I had to get rid of all that anger and the range seemed like a good place." He gave a disdainful laugh, "I think I finally got it right Hotch, front sight, trigger press, follow through. I must have killed Ian Doyle a thousand times and I've got the paper targets to prove it. Ian Doyle seemed like a fitting target; he'd taken Emily's life. Only he hadn't. And now it seems I've directed all this anger for over seven months at the wrong target. It wasn't Ian Doyle that had taken Emily from us, it was you." He looked at Hotch and JJ. "I know you had your reasons for the pretense that Emily was dead, and I understand the legitimacy of them, I really do, but it doesn't make me feel any less like I've been played for a fool by people I trusted."
"I know you went out on a limb and trusted me with this case Hotch, bringing the team out here and having me organize the raid. I really appreciate the vote of confidence. I'm sorry I've been so difficult and I'll try to be less of an ass. I said I want to forgive you and I do. And I'm sure I will, in time. When I found out that Emily was alive and I'd been lied to all this time, it hit me to my core. I've never really felt I belonged anywhere in my life until I came to the BAU and now I feel like a fool for believing that might actually be true. Like I always do when something like this happens, I retreat into myself. I don't want anyone else to be able to get at me so I avoid interacting with people as much as I can. I decided I was best on my own, not letting anyone in. If I couldn't trust the people I was closest to then I couldn't trust anyone. No one could hurt me then. So, for right now, my heart is closed. I hope it won't be for long."
Emily squeezed his hand, "We'll take it one day at a time and we'll be here when you're ready."
"Can anyone join this party?" Rossi asked. He and Morgan each held a tray containing three cups of coffee.
"Here kid, this should sweeten you up," Morgan handed him a cup from his tray as he and Rossi distributed the coffee amongst the team.
"Hi there," Shannon interrupted from the doorway. "You can come back in and see your dad now if you'd like Dr. Reid."
"Is he okay?" Reid asked.
"He's fine. Patients in his position when they find they can't talk and their hands are tied down get frustrated, that's all. It happens all the time. We told him that he can be unrestrained if someone's with him and we gave him some paper and a pen so he can write. He won't be quite so frustrated that way."
"Okay, I guess I'll see you guys later." He turned his head back when he was in the doorway and saw Emily give him a nail bitten thumbs up and behind her the painting on the wall. He left his friends and headed for the ICU once again as a thought that circled around in his head made him grin… clearing storms.