Disclaimer: Criminal Minds still does not belong to me. I know the season 8 finale is tonight, so everybody go watch that, okay. (4/24/2013) Lorraine belongs to me, and so do her animal friends. Matter of fact, can we just assume anybody who's not specifically in the show belongs to me? You're always welcome to ask me nicely if you can use them.
Author's Note: I KNOW it's not the Christmas season anymore, but I just now figured out a really important point.
Ch. 5 – Jingle All the Way
"I absolutely hate shopping malls, just so you know," an irritated Spencer Reid told a bordering-on-annoyed Derek Morgan. "They're terribly unsafe. Just to start out, sanitation practices are lax at best. People, particularly the ones who bring children, bring every germ they've ever come in contact with. The traces of fecal matter on every surface should be enough to make you…"
Morgan smacked a hand over his face and considered cuffing the younger man about the head – it always came back to fecal matter with him!
"I don't care what the mall is going to make me do!" he grumped back, pinching the bridge of his nose. This Reid-rant had been going on for the entire duration of the Metro ride – a good ten minutes now. "You, on the other hand, are about to make me sick!"
Oh, Garcia owed him big time for this, thought Morgan. At first, it really hadn't seemed like that big a deal. She needed a favor – just drag the boy out of his apartment and keep him out all day. The tech analyst hadn't exactly been specific as to why Reid needed to stay away from his apartment. This had been cause for suspicion at first, but Morgan figured he'd hear about it eventually. That lady could only hold in a secret for so long before it came bubbling up with the rest of her personality. Okay, he could totally handle this. Reid would run out of breath support eventually…
The semi-informational rant continued as did the Metro. Spencer hadn't exactly been paying attention when Morgan mentioned which mall. At this point, he really didn't care. He suspected something going on, had no clue what it might be, and this irritated him. Derek Morgan, for his part, wondered when they were going to put Excedrin back on the shelves. He had the feeling that he would wind up with a genius-induced migraine before they even stopped for lunch. Then, the unexpected happened though: Reid stopped short in the middle of his info-vomit and stared at his friend like a lost puppy.
"It's not often I find myself with very little knowledge, even theoretical knowledge, of a subject," he started, looking guarded. "And you've… called me out… a few times for refusing to admit I don't know something."
Morgan, in part, felt sympathetic towards the younger man, but also found it very hard not to roll his eyes. He had a feeling he would be hearing this verse and chorus in some variation on and off all day. Trying to exercise something resembling patience, he half-smiled at Reid. This only seemed to confuse the genius further.
"Look, ladies can be hard to buy for, even if you're a genius," Morgan informed him, looking more genial and less like he had a burning headache. "Dude, I still have a hard time trying to pick something out for my mother sometimes."
Reid blinked, glancing furtively round the rest of the train car.
"Morgan, one of the issues here is that I'm not attempting to find a gift for my mother, or Garcia, or anyone else who is a blood relative or coworker," he all but whined. "It's not like… well… I've ever had reason to do this before."
"You've never bought a girlfriend anything?" Morgan asked to confirm.
Spencer's cheeks purpled once again.
"I've never had reason to!" he yelped. "Quite frankly, I've never had one long enough for gift-giving to enter into the equation!"
People on the Metro had started to stare. Spencer Reid had a tendency to talk with his hands when he got really into his subject. And with how fired up Morgan had gotten him, he had almost entered full-on flail mode. A tall, skinny guy ranting in big words and flapping his hands about tended to get looked at. For his part, Morgan decided to keep quiet for a minute. He could try to stem the tide once they actually got out into the mall.
The train ride continued.
Lorraine and Garcia had set out from the Espresso Hut in search of as much Christmas decorating apparatus as they could carry. A quick stop had seen Hawkeye back to Lorraine's living room, and then on to Lowe's. The greeter, a burly twenty-something with a scrubby beard, stared openly. Garcia rolled her eyes while Lorraine forcibly held herself back from saying something. The two ladies looked round for the inevitable explosion of Christmas lights. They were normally somewhere up front this time of year.
Sure enough, a giant inflatable Winnie-the-Pooh announced the start of the Christmas section. Every inch of five entire aisles sparkled, blinked, glittered, and winked at them. Lorraine gravitated immediately towards a display of Peanuts light-ups and inflatables. Garcia squealed openly over a quartet of penguins in Santa hats, comparing them to the penguin waiters from Mary Poppins. When Lorraine saw this, she immediately popped the box into the cart. She backtracked and added the Snoopy light-up with the dog house. The two women scuttled down the second aisle, snagging garlands and lights. Both let out a yell of joy at the exact same time at the Mickey Mouse in the Santa hat. Mickey joined Snoopy and the penguins. Okay, so this wasn't going to be the most organized Christmas surprise, but it should work!
They had rolls of white lights, multi-colored lights, and one string of purple lights that Lorraine had just absolutely fallen in love with. They'd go in the kitchen if nothing else. Garcia grabbed a wreath in the shape of a Hidden Mickey, covered in white lights and adorned with Disney characters. It would go nicely on a door or wall or something. On the next aisle over, they came to rows upon rows of artificial trees. Lorraine wrinkled her nose and Garcia shook her head – apparently, they had the same thought.
"It just isn't right when they don't smell like Christmas trees," Garcia declared.
"Or leave an unholy mess all over everything," Lorraine agreed.
Garcia whipped out a tablet from seemingly nowhere and started tapping away on it.
"Okay, I probably should have said something about this when we got here," she said, studying the tablet over her glasses. "But I cobbled together a list of what we might want to pick up!"
Lorraine perked up, struggling a little under the weight of a three-foot-tall nutcracker that didn't quite want to settle in the cart.
"Run it by me?" she asked.
Garcia tapped a few things and the tablet made a noise at her – she frowned and cursed at the thing for a second.
"If my stupid tablet would behave for two seconds," she grumped. "Now, okay, what we've got already is good. What we need is… Okay, we've got garlands, lights, light-up creatures that dance and do things, a wreath… That thing…"
She eyed the nutcracker with some nervousness.
"We need," the analyst continued, picking back up. "Ornaments, things for sticking all this stuff on the walls, probably a couple power strips. I really don't want to be responsible for shorting out the entire building – done it before. And let's see… something to put ornaments on. A tree! We need a tree!"
Lorraine perked up again, still wrestling with the nutcracker – finally, she wedged him between Snoopy and the box of penguins.
"Real tree is the only option," she declared by way of further agreement. "Where's the closest tree place from here?"
Garcia tapped away at her tablet again.
"Very!" she chirped. "Let's get this stuff out to the car and I can give you direction from there."
Lorraine turned to head back down the aisle and ran right into someone.
"Oh my God, I am so sorry, sir!" she exclaimed, helping the man pick up the armful of light bulbs – thankfully, nothing broken. "Can I help you with…"
She cut off when she realized Garcia was staring at the man in a combination of a giggle-fit and something that looked like nerves. Standing there in front of them was a rather thin brown-haired man with tired eyes. He continued gathering up his light bulbs, looking both amused and aggravated.
"Hotch, what are you doing here?" Garcia blurted out, quite red in the face and looking as though she had seen something she shouldn't have. "And… what's with all the light bulbs?"
The otherwise-stodgy-looking man sighed, running a hand through hair that looked vaguely electric.
"Jack and I were decorating," he said rather shortly, shifting his collection about in his arms. "He used a plug I didn't think about behind the couch. Blew out every light in the kitchen…"
Lorraine kindly handed him three more bulbs that had slid under a shelving unit and Garcia looked like a child seeing a teacher outside of school. Hotch, still sweating and rather put-out, smiled at the redhead. His "Spidey sense" – Jack had continued the in-joke that his dad was a superhero – started to tingle. There was definitely something he needed to remember about that redhead. However, now was not the time for it – big profiling badass or not, he had a dark kitchen to repair and an upset eight-year-old to buck up.
"Would you like a basket, sir?" a young Black man conveniently interrupted the awkward moment to ask.
Hotch took the basket with a thank-you and excused himself from the two ladies, having the feeling this day was far from over. Lorraine and Garcia said their goodbyes as well, steering their overflowing cart towards the registers. Garcia asked if Lorraine would just bring the car round, making things a bit easier with the loading. The redhead nodded affirmatively and scooted out into the cold to do so. Up above, she could see big fluffy clouds that threatened to snow like nobody's business. She started the car and pulled it up in front of the building, where Garcia and a Latino fellow steered the cart out.
Reid and Morgan got off the train with the rest of the Christmastime crush of people, something for which Derek Morgan could not have been gladder. It had started to snow again. Thankfully, it was nowhere near enough to shut down normal activity, but it did somewhat impede the flow. Both BAU agents ducked as they exited the station. A bunch of boys had started a snowball fight, causing several people to yell and jostle about in discomfort. One snowball nailed Spencer square in the back. At the younger man's squawk, Morgan fired off a snowball of his own and a warning for the clowns to make tracks. Since he used his "official voice," the boys cleared off, grumbling.
"I hate shopping," Reid informed his friend again.
Morgan rolled his eyes.
"What are you, twelve?" he groused, digging his hands deeper in his pockets and wedging himself past a lady with a mega-stroller. "I promise you, this is not hard – it's not even that painful."
Spencer felt they had gone back and forth on this subject for quite long enough, so he decided to just keep his mouth shut. Privately, he had the feeling that no matter what he got, it was going to be wrong, and that bothered him. Something in the back of his brain never exactly settled down over the prospect of being wrong – he couldn't stand it! For someone who had been told his whole life how smart he was, this whole process made him feel awfully stupid.
When they actually got to the mall, Spencer found himself more and more wanting to throw his proverbial guns down and run. The stores around him were frankly intimidating. Bright colors screamed at him from window-fronts in combinations he had never imagined on mannequins that seemed to stare. He had never stopped finding those things creepy. Suddenly, the rather traumatic experience of clothes-shopping with his mother screamed back to him. The shops smelled funny and the ladies working looked at him funny. Okay, he felt less bad noticing that seemed to affect Morgan too. Apparently, two grown men poking around in New York and Co. did not look right. A few of the ladies shopping shot the duo appraising looks, but did not approach.
"Morgan, this is giving me a headache already," the genius half-whined – he wanted to sprint for the safety of the GameStop across the way. "She's unconventional, so I'll get her a game or something!"
Morgan caught the genius by the back of his coat and pulled back, causing him to make a gerk sound. He then insisted that, no – unconventional or not, you did not get your girlfriend a video game for your first Christmas together. Spencer wanted to know why not. Next second, he had to give Morgan a very stern look for steering towards Victoria's Secret. Privately, he figured he could live a very happy life never, ever setting foot inside that place. The interior, just from where he could see, consisted of nothing but eye-burning pink. Perhaps the Brookstone over there would have something interesting? He nodded that way and Morgan followed him over.
Well, the Brookstone did have interesting things, but none of them said anything resembling "first Christmas with girlfriend." Most of the little gadgets were probably for people with more money than they knew what to do with. Morgan stepped over to look at the Tempur-Pedic pillows. Those were neat, Spencer guessed, but not something he would get for a girlfriend. He moved over to a table that had three white objects on it. One had a plug-in cord and a big round white head. Curiously, he picked it up and flicked the "on" switch. A second later, he yelped and nearly dropped the thing. It had started to vibrate almost as hard as a Weed Whacker. Morgan laughed uproariously, loudly suggested that as a gift. The older man ended up following a mortified, purple Spencer Reid out of the store, still howling like a hyena.
"I am not getting my… girlfriend… a…. that!" yelled Spencer the second they were out of the store. This drew a glare from a close-by security guard, so he shrank down and hissed, "That is completely inappropriate!"
Morgan attempted to calm his laughter with only mild success.
"You did say she was unconventional…" he prodded the genius with every ounce of suggestiveness he could possibly muster in his tone. "And that would be kinda like getting her a game…"
The prodigy yelled again, looking highly embarrassed as a little girl with a large Mickey Mouse plush doll stared at him. Okay, that actually gave him an idea, or rather, the Disney Store bag on the girl's arm did. He pointed it out to Morgan, who quickly schooled his features and led the way.
Naturally, the Disney store was packed to the gills and every single person in there over the age of eighteen had a child with them. Morgan and Reid both very suddenly found themselves stared at like freaks. For Spencer, this wasn't much new, but Morgan looked quite uncomfortable. The super-genius half-excused, half-tripped his way to the back left corner of the store. Free of princess nightgowns and Power Rangers, it seemed a bit tamer. The shelves held things like coffee mugs and adult-sized T-shirts. Over a few steps, Spencer saw something that might be more Lorraine's style. In the middle of the shelf sat a collection of snow-globes. Stretching his hand out as if playing chess, the profiler let his hand hover over several globes in turn… It stopped, however, at one featuring a night-time scene of the Magic Kingdom. Cinderella's Castle stood proudly in the globe. He picked it up and carefully wound it.
It wasn't something he would admit to terribly many people, but Doctor Spencer Reid had always been incredibly sentimental. When he heard the pretty little melody of "When You Wish Upon A Star" his heart clenched. Taking a deep breath, he set the snow-globe back on the shelf. Gold and iridescent glitter fell upon the castle as the melody slowed down and finally stopped. He had not wound it for very long, after all. For a moment, this seemed like it might have been it, but something in the back of his mind still doubted. Blinking away a mild fog in his mind, Spencer nodded to Morgan and they left the store.
"You know, I think I'm on to something with the snow-globe idea, but I just don't know," he told his friend and coworker. To Morgan's credit, he managed not to look totally disinterested. "I know usually I get told to trust my instincts but… Wait! That's it!"
With Morgan looking quite confused, Spencer sped off in another direction with his cell phone in hand. Morgan stepped away so the boy wonder could make the call in peace. With Spencer still on the phone, Morgan's own cell phone buzzed and he retrieved it from his pocket. Surprisingly unsurprising, it was Garcia, telling him Spencer's idea was too good. The message sang the tune of "Stall for time and I'll get you back later." He trusted the technical analyst would make good with some fresh-baked brownies in the near future. So… stalling for time with the boy genius – oh, this would just be fantastic. Spencer came back, still folding up his phone, and practically sparkled with enthusiasm now. For Morgan, the expression was actually a little disconcerting.
"So what's the idea, Pretty Boy?" he asked the younger man, almost afraid of the answer at this point.
Spencer shoved his phone back in his coat pocket and gestured for Morgan to follow him past the food court. Ah! Morgan grabbed him by the arm and insisted upon a detour over to that Cajun chicken place first. Food – always a good "stall for time" ploy… As they waited in line, though, the Reid effect began to set in again and children once more started to stare.
"You know, I doubt this place bears any resemblance to actual Cajun cooking, given that I don't smell any cayenne pepper" the genius started to observe. He craned his long neck over to look at the contents of the steam bins. "And… I've got an incredibly hard time believing half of this meat is chicken."
Morgan could have cheerfully drowned himself in the fountain by the end of lunch. The food didn't taste that bad – standard mall food court fare with too much sauce to hide probably substandard meat. He killed another slug of fountain-spewed Cherry Coke and tried to shut his ears off from inside. Reid had moved on to the topic of over-cooking and over-seasoning. Both these practices were supposed to hide meat past its expiration date. The older man wished he could just tell the genius to put a sock in it. Garcia, however, had insisted on this whole "stalling" thing, so he would oblige. Damned if he wouldn't get them both back later, once he found out what this was all about!
Grumbling, he followed the prodigy through the jostling crowd