A Voice Cries Out

Chapter 27

He approached the door slowly, and with some trepidation. But the man he saw through the window looked anything but menacing. He looked pale, frail, thin…small.

Reid knocked softly on the doorjamb as he entered.

"Hi, Dad."

William seemed to hunch more closely upon himself in the bed, not quite certain what to expect from Spencer. His eyes searched his son's face for some sign of what was to come. Now that he'd remembered their alienation, William was entirely unsure of how or why Spencer was even speaking to him, let alone seeing to his care.

His voice belied his apprehension. "Hello, Spencer."

Reid took a few steps into the room, but stopped well short of the bedside.

"The nurses said you had a good night. And your labs are showing improvement."

Not, 'how are you', or 'do you feel better'. More of a clinical imparting of information. Detached. Impersonal.

"Oh…well, that's good." I guess.

"They said you might be ready to go home as early as tomorrow."

That drew a reaction from William. His numbers might have been improving, but he still felt extremely weak.

"Tomorrow?"

Reid tried to interpret without asking. To ask would imply more concern than he was willing to admit he felt. But it seemed as though his father was frightened at the thought of being home alone.

"JJ says they can get you an aide…someone who can help you at home."

"Oh." A slight look of relief.

There ensued a moment of silence that seemed interminable, even if it lasted less than a minute. William broke it with an observation.

"She's even more beautiful in person."

Reid had been studying the scene out the window, but his eyes now shot back to William's.

"How did you know what she looked like? Were you googling her, too?"

Reid's reaction caught both of them by surprise. Immediately after the words were out, each of them winced. Reid, because he'd not been quick enough to stop his mouth once he'd realized what it was about to emit, and William, because of the venom behind the words, and the knowledge that he was so deserving of it.

In mirror fashion, each looked, startled, at the other. And then both Reid men spoke simultaneously, and with the very same words. "I'm sorry."

William lifted a weak arm partly into the air, dismissing his son's apology. "You don't need to apologize, Spencer. I understand why you're cynical, and I can't say I blame you."

Reid agreed with his father, but nothing about it made him happy. He was entitled to be cynical, and yet…. despite having matured greatly in the past few years, it had taken only a few seconds for him to feel like he'd regressed to adolescence.

Before he could respond, William went on. "It's true, I substituted the internet for a real relationship with you. I let myself be satisfied with knowing about you, rather than knowing you. That's a sorry excuse for a father, by anyone's definition."

He had Reid's attention now. When they'd had that last conversation, years ago, William had issued a perfunctory apology and what Reid considered to be a lame excuse for abandoning his family. Afterwards, there had been no further attempt at reconciliation between the two. But just now, it seemed like the father was acknowledging his faults in a way the son had only hoped he would.

"Why?" The plaintive eleven year old had spoken.

William shook his head. "There will never be a good enough reason, Spencer. I did it, that's all."

"But…why? Why couldn't you stay with us? Try harder? Was it so terrible being a family?"

"Of course not. But….."

"But, what?"

"But….it wasn't about that. I wasn't about you, nor even your mother. Not directly, anyway."

Reid was confused. "I thought you said it was because of the killing. Of how she knew about Riley's father avenging him."

William's eyes sought the window. "It was convenient, given the circumstance."

Reid's eyes narrowed. "Convenient?"

Reluctantly, William turned back to his son. "It was the topic of our conversation at the time, wasn't it? I'd been grilled about Riley's death, and then about killing his killer…..and then your mother came forward to tell the truth." There was a trace of resentment in his voice as he recounted the events, and Reid reacted to it.

"Well, it made sense, didn't it? I remembered you burning bloody clothes. It was a natural conclusion that you were involved."

William's eyes bored into Reid's. "Did you really believe I could kill someone, Spencer?"

Holding his breath, awaiting his son's reply. They had been family, once upon a time. William remembered it. But he needed to know that his son did, as well.

After one too many beats of hesitation, Reid responded. "No…I don't…I don't know." A moment more, during which William uttered more silent prayer than he'd done in decades, then, "No."

The one word had a profound effect on William. Reid watched as his father tried to regain his composure, then the younger man spoke into the open space between them.

"But…if it wasn't that….What? Why?"

Without thinking, Reid moved toward the side of the bed and sank into a chair. He was a solver of puzzles. Here, finally, he hoped he might encounter the missing piece to the puzzle of his life.

William's face reflected a moment of internal debate, followed by a certain resolution. He would answer Spencer's question, to the best of his ability. After all, everything had changed in the past day. His choice, and the reason for it, had been proven false. He felt both foolish and relieved.

"Your mother and I had only been married a year when my parents died. There was a wrong-way driver on the interstate, he hit them head on...and they were both gone, instantly. Danny was just a kid…..only ten years old. Even then, he was…so bright…..he was like you, really."

Confirmation of something Reid had begun to suspect over the past week. He'd always thought his genius had come from his mother's side of the family. After all, Diana, too, had had an unusual brain.

"He was devastated, poor kid. I'd been out of the house for a long time before that, so all he really had was our parents. Anyway, he came to live with us….for a while."

Reid was wrapped up in the story. "I don't remember him being there," he whispered.

"He wasn't. Not full time, anyway. Not after you were born. That was about when he went off to college. But he spent his time off with us."

"I don't understand. What does Uncle Daniel have to do with….."

"He struggled, Spencer. Emotionally. I don't know that the bullying was as bad in his day as it was in yours, but it was there. He was different, and we all knew it, and it cost him. I didn't know how to handle it, or him…..so I listened to the 'experts'." The last word carried an element of resentment. "They told me the best thing was to get him through high school as quickly as possible, and send him away to college. They said the college kids would be more mature about him."

Reid was fascinated. He'd overheard his own school counselors telling his mother something very similar.

"But they weren't?" For Reid, college had been something of an oasis. He felt sorry if it hadn't been the same for his Uncle Daniel.

"Oh, no….they were. It was just…he was such a smart kid, but he wasn't all that emotionally mature. And he'd had this devastating loss, and a complete upheaval in his life. And….."

William broke off, and Reid could see he was debating whether to complete his sentence. The son encouraged the father.

"Go ahead. We're in it now, I may as well know everything."

William nodded. "Your mother. She'd had a few symptoms even before we married, but we only recognized them in retrospect. But it was starting to show itself more and more. Mood swings, nonsense speech. Poor Danny didn't know what to make of it. Neither did we. And it terrified all three of us."

Reid didn't want to divert the conversation, but they'd now entered new territory for him, and he needed to know. It hadn't been in her journals.

"How did she get diagnosed?"

His father's eyes settled on a middle distance in the room, as his mind brought him back over thirty years.

"She had an episode of catatonia. She still had them, sometimes, even years later…."

They both realized he was referencing the fact that he'd kept up with Diana even to the time of her death. But that part of the story would have to wait for a later point in the conversation.

"Anyway…..she hadn't moved, literally, for a full weekend. That's when I called her doctor, and he had me call a psychiatric emergency service. It was the first time she was hospitalized."

"And they diagnosed her?"

"They gave her some meds, and when she'd come out of it, they got the rest of the history. It was a classic case, according to the psychiatrist."

"So you had Danny, and Mom…." Despite his anger and resentment, Reid was beginning to feel some of the burden William must have shouldered at the time. But he squelched the sympathy that wanted to rise.

"Poor Danny. He needed someone who could support him, who could play the parent role and comfort him, and advocate for him. And I couldn't give him the attention he needed."

They were approaching something that had always stymied Reid, even if he was glad for the outcome. "Dad….if she was already sick…..and if you already had someone else to take care of….why….."

His father knew exactly what he was asking. "Why did we have you?"

Reid nodded.

"I don't want to bruise your ego, Spencer, but….you weren't exactly planned. I guess that puts you in good company with more than half the world." He chanced a small smile. "We'd talked about it, but decided we had to wait. Your mother was still trying to find the right combination of drugs to help her. She'd always wanted to have a child, but, when we were first married, she was finishing up her thesis, and then Danny came, and then…well, really, before then, but we hadn't realized….then her illness."

"So…"

William watched a distant memory behind eyes cast at the bedcovers. "Whether she purposely went off her birth control, or became confused about the pills….or even if the psychiatric meds interfered ….whatever it was, we found out she was pregnant."

Reid was almost afraid to ask. "Was she happy?"

His father heard the plaintive note in his son's voice. "She was very happy, Spencer."

Reid's eyes closed in relief. He remembered that Diana had gone off her meds during his gestation, and prayed to hear that she hadn't seen the entire thing as a burden of obligation. At least she wanted me. But…..

"What about you?" Did you ever want me?

A tell-tale breakaway of William's gaze, and Reid had his answer. But his father clarified.

"I was afraid, Spencer. Mostly, I was afraid for her. Of what it would do to her, to go untreated for nine months. I'm sorry to say this now, but…..I tried to convince her it wasn't the right thing. That it would be safer to…wait. To try again later."

Reid was more shaken by the admission than he'd expected. It forced him to contemplate the real possibility of never having come into being. Of course, I wouldn't be here to think about it. So I wouldn't really be missing anything, right? But what about the others whose lives he'd impacted? What about Rosie?!

William's eyes narrowed in on his son, who was clearly lost in some distressing thought.

"For the record, Spencer…I'm happy we went ahead. I'm happy we had a son who grew into such a fine man. In the end, I couldn't imagine having made any other choice."

Reid wasn't about to give his father a show of gratitude about it. This entire conversation had flooded him with memories...the words, the slamming of doors, the sight of his father pulling away from the house, the sound of his mother screaming after him. Most viscerally, the fear of the child who'd been rejected, left to fend for himself, left to parent his own mother. All of it assaulted Reid, and he lashed out at his father again.

"Maybe she should have listened to you. That would have made it all easier, wouldn't it? Because, let's face it, Dad, you had wanted to make another choice. And then, one day, you did, didn't you?"

William barely flinched at the barb, considering it well-earned. "I did, you're right. And I will never be able to express to you how sorry I am about it."

"You're right, you won't." Too pent up to remain seated, Reid rose and started pacing. He spat back at his father, "You couldn't possibly say how sorry you are about it, because it couldn't ever be enough!"

It had been so long in coming. Decades of the child's bewilderment grown into the adolescent's resentment and the adult's distain, poured into words. It should have felt cathartic. But, to Reid, watching William curl a little more into himself, it felt like hitting a wounded man. In several ways, that was exactly what it was, and yet Reid couldn't have stopped himself even if he'd wanted to. Which he didn't. He simply couldn't find the desire to stop.

William unfurled himself enough to speak.

"You're right. You're right, Spencer. It couldn't…and yet…now…..it's all different….God, how I wish I'd known…"

"Known what? That I would manage to grow up anyway? That I would be able to make something of myself? If you'd known that, you would have stayed? Is that what you're saying?"

Emotion ramped up Reid's volume with each sentence, until he'd drawn the attention of William's nurse, who'd hurried to the doorway to check on her patient.

"Is everything all right in here?"

"Sorry…"started Reid, but he was overspoken by his father.

"We haven't seen each other in a long time," was William's non-explanation.

The step-down unit had hosted many an impassioned family interaction in the past, and the experienced nurse recognized this as simply another in a long succession. But, though the conflict was theirs, the territory was hers.

"Try to keep it down, all right?" She looked at both of them as she said it, but directed her next words only at the younger Reid. "And try not to upset him, will you? It gets his heart rate up. He's still on the monitor and I can't be running down here all day long."

As she left them, Reid turned to his father and said, "She's right. I should just go."

But William stopped him. "No, Spencer. Not like this. Please."

Reid didn't see the point. "It's all in the past, Dad. Neither of us can change it. Just like we can't change how we feel."

William pleaded with him. "Spencer…..I know I don't deserve your indulgence, but I'm asking for it anyway. What I did was wrong, even if it didn't seem so at the time. That I stayed away after was…unforgivable. I know I'll never be able to forgive myself. Your mother was right about that, you know. She said I was weak….and I believed her. And then I lived up to it."

Reid felt like they were skirting around some issue he still didn't understand. He resumed his seat at the bedside.

"All right. You have something you want to say. Go ahead and say it."

It took William a few moments to organize his words, and then a soft, controlled voice told the story.

"I've already told you that I felt like I didn't know how to be to Danny everything he needed me to be. He was…you know, Spencer, I'm not exactly unintelligent, but Danny…he was like you. His intelligence far exceeded his maturity, when he was young. He was still a kid, after all. He struggled, especially when the other kids found him too different to play with…..too different to be kind to. And I told you, I followed the advice of the people at his school and sent him off to live away from us when he was still very young. I thought it was the best thing and, at first, it seemed so. He came back to be with us during his vacations, and he seemed pretty happy. So I was shocked….completely rocked off my foundation…..when he died. The police told us it was suicide. And I felt like it was my fault. Like I should have seen something. Like I should have known. If I'd been more observant, maybe I could have stopped it. Maybe I could have gotten him some help."

Reid was once again feeling the connection between himself and his uncle. Their young lives had shared many similarities. But Uncle Daniel was never been granted the rest of his life. It was taken from him.

"Uncle Daniel didn't commit suicide."

William filled up at that. "I know that, now. Thanks to you. Thank you, Spencer."

Feeling uncomfortable with his father's gratitude, Reid moved them along.

"Is that what you wanted to tell me? That you thought he'd killed himself, but you're relieved to find out he was murdered?" It sounded absurd to both of them.

"No! Well, yes, but….. it was the reason why I left. I felt like it was my fault. I thought I'd failed Danny. That maybe I'd actually helped cause his death. And that made me afraid for you, Spencer. You and Danny were so alike, and…..I was afraid it would hurt you. That I would hurt you. Not physically, I could never have done that. But emotionally…mentally…..I felt like I wasn't enough for what all of you needed, and I thought it would hurt you. I was afraid I would lose you, too."

The incongruity of it impacted Reid, pushing him back in his chair. As mighty as his brain was, it struggled to make sense of what William had just told him. Several confused moments later, he paraphrased his father.

"You were afraid you wouldn't be enough for me…..so you made sure of it, by leaving?"

William hurried to correct him. "No! No, I ….I know it sounds ridiculous now, Spencer, but at the time, I believed it. Sincerely, with everything in me. I was convinced that I'd contributed to Danny's death. Not just that I'd failed to prevent it, but somehow, in being inadequate, I'd helped cause it. And I couldn't allow that to happen to you."

The anger in Reid wilted, just a little bit. Either his father was a skilled liar, or he was telling a genuine tale of their shared past. He'd dealt with too many unsubs to confuse the two. Reid chose to believe his father, however misguided he considered the man's thought process. Instinctively, he began to draw upon his unsub-interviewing skills, the irony not at all lost on him. Go with them, to see where they take you. Go with Dad.

Drawing on his soft voice, Reid started in.

"Okay, let's assume that's correct. I can understand how you'd be afraid. But how could you think that leaving me alone with Mom could be a good idea?"

William responded with a challenge. "Are you saying you would have wanted to be separated from her, Spencer? Your mother loved you."

"I know she did. And I loved her. Very much. But I needed a parent."

His father had the grace to look guilty. "I know. And I'm sorry. She wasn't that ill when I left, and I'd hoped the doctors would find the right treatment….."

"Are you saying you didn't know how much she spiraled after that? Come on, Dad. I already know you kept in touch with her…I know about the flowers."

A small, sad smile came to William's face. "She always loved beautiful things."

"Yeah? Well, you should have seen our beautiful house back then, Dad. I certainly couldn't keep it up. I had to go to school, or the social workers would come. And Mom spent full weeks in bed. She sure wasn't doing any housekeeping. There was nothing beautiful about that."

William's smile was replaced with a look of regret. "I called her, at the beginning. I waited for you to be in school. I knew that, if we spoke, you and I, it would only make the separation harder. After a while, I could tell she was struggling more. Then there were a few times she didn't recognize my voice, and it frightened her. So I stopped calling."

Reid was having trouble keeping his calm. The similarity between interviewing an unsub and speaking with his father went only so far. It definitely didn't extend into the memory of those times of extreme turmoil in the lives of the abandoned mother and son. He drew a deep breath to squelch his rising emotion.

"You stopped calling. You knew she was getting sicker, and you knew we were alone, and you decided to stop calling." He'd squelched a little bit of the anger, but none of the sarcasm.

"My calling was making her worse."

"Well, then, why didn't you call social services? Or, better yet, why didn't you come back and take care of us?" Reid hadn't squelched the exasperation, either.

"I did call social services, Spencer. Multiple times. Repeatedly. But it seemed like someone always managed to make it look like the two of you were coping."

Reid was stunned. That 'someone' had been him. More terrified of the unknown than the known, he'd always put his genius to work making it look like his mother was functional.

"You're saying I kept you from getting us help? But all social services would have done would have been to put me in foster care. They might not even have gotten Mom any help at all. Are you saying you'd rather I was in foster care than to take care of me yourself?"

William didn't answer him directly. "Many children thrive in foster care, Spencer. I've worked with quite a few of them over the years."

Reid fell forward in his chair, his hands on either side of his head, as though trying to contain all of the information within. His father had left him to help him. He'd thought Reid would be better off in foster care. He'd worked with kids in foster care. What, was he going to let me go into foster care and then become my 'Big Brother'?

All he could do was to shake his head. "I don't understand."

"That's because you're trying to make sense of it."

Well, of course….. "What do you mean?"

"It doesn't make sense, Spencer. Even I know that. At the time, to me, it did. Mostly because I was acting out of fear...out of panic, really. I knew what had happened to Danny….or thought I did, anyway….and then, as you grew older, I could see the same traits in you. I thought you'd be better off without me. At the time, I thought your mother might get better. Maybe not all the way, but we had hope about her treatments. I thought you'd be better off with her. Then, when I saw her deteriorating…I was still afraid of not being enough for you. I prayed you would find a nice, nurturing home."

"Which I didn't."

"No, you didn't. But you found your way, anyway. I know that doesn't make it right. I can only tell you what I did, and thought, and felt, for right or wrong. And I know it doesn't hold up against what happened. That's why I understand that you can never forgive me."

It was such a simple, matter-of-fact statement, reflecting a long-ago coming to terms. Reid heard the resignation behind it. William wasn't actually unrepentant. He simply thought his own sin was unforgivable.

His father may have been the one in the hospital bed, but Reid felt completely drained of energy. He needed to close this conversation. But he also needed to know one more thing.

"What about Bennington?"

"What about it?"

"Did you go to see her there?"

William shook his head. "Only the one time. But I spoke with Dr. Norman regularly. He thought seeing me would confuse her too much. That she would forget we weren't together. So I sent her flowers, and it turned out that she thought we were courting…in a medieval kind of way, I guess." He gave a small chuckle of reminiscence. "It suited her. No, Spencer, the only time we saw each other was when we met with you."

Reid was silent for a moment, remembering. "Mom was clear then. She knew everything, didn't she?"

"About the status of our relationship? Yes, she remembered. We had a few tears over it, but she understood. At least, in that moment….she understood."

Reid's voice was buried deep under a sea of emotion, and he had trouble bringing it to the surface. "Did you love her, Dad? Did you love Mom?"

William made sure he had his son's eyes. "I loved your mother from the day I met her. I love her today. But I couldn't take care of her. Nor you. I'm sorry you were saddled with me for a father, Spencer. I wanted so much more for you. You deserved so much more."

Reid had come to the hospital today not at all committed to having this conversation with his father. It had simply happened, seemingly of its own volition. And, while it felt unfinished, it needed to end. Both of them were exhausted…physically, emotionally, spiritually. Reid rose and pushed back his chair.

"I should go and let you rest."

William gave a weary nod, but stopped his son just at the threshold. His words brought them back to the beginning of the conversation.

"For the record….no, I didn't google JJ. She sent me a wedding picture, and then she sent a couple of Christmas cards with family photos. You have a beautiful family, Spencer."

"Thanks." His son responded reflexively.

William seemed to hesitate, undecided. Then went for it. "If you could find it in your heart one day…well…..I would be grateful if I could meet them."

She always could sense when he was near. JJ raised her eyes from the case report she'd been pretending to work on and was already watching the doorway when her husband came through it. One glance told her all she needed to know.

"That bad?" She was already out of her seat and approaching him, arms wide.

Instead of accepting her embrace, he took her face in his hands and kissed her. She recognized it as his way of telling her he needed space.

"I need to walk." He might do some of his best intellectual thinking in front of a white board, but he did his best emotional untangling on his feet.

JJ studied him. "You want company?"

He looked at her for a moment. There would never come a time, he thought, when he didn't want her company. But he wasn't sure he was fit company at the moment. And then he realized how much that thought was like his father's explanation. Which decided it for him.

"Only if it's yours."