Learning To Let Go

All previous disclaimers apply.


Author’s Note: Sorry this took so long to get up. Please remember that this was started before season three, so anything that has happened so far in season three does not apply. Thank you to everyone who continues to read this.

Some days forgetting was easy. Some days it was almost the easiest thing he could do. Those were the days he spent with Lance in a park on a weekend, sitting against Lance’s chest as they watched the sun set over a small pond. Lance would whisper everything and nothing in his ear and they wouldn’t notice anything but each other.
On those days when Lance was working and he was not, he might spend an afternoon with Hotch, Haley, and Jack just enjoying the family atmosphere. It seemed that Hotch had decided to take him on as a younger brother and did everything he could to make him feel like he was family. He was growing closer to Haley as well and appreciated the motherly way she would ask after his appetite and his headaches, then run her hand over his hair and drop a kiss to the crown of his head without thinking about it. He had the great pleasure of being able to watch as Haley grew with a second child and see her and Hotch’s joy in it. Some evenings he went over to Morgan and Garcia’s apartment and had a dinner with a little too much wine, giving him an excuse to lose all inhibitions once Lance took him home. They were the ones who made him laugh until he couldn’t breathe and tears were running down his face. JJ and Emily dragged him shopping as often as he could stand it, which wasn’t often, but it was always more fun than he let on. They ate horribly greasy food at some mall while JJ and Emily ranked the men who passed them. Reid refused to give into the game most of the time, telling them that he was in a stable, wonderful relationship and that he didn’t need to check anyone else out. They asked him what the point was in having a gay guy for a friend if he wouldn’t check out guys with them. He told them that he would tell them honestly if those pants did indeed make them look fat. That conversation ended with them pelting him with French fries until he begged for mercy. He never mentioned fat and JJ or Emily in the same sentence again. It had only been a joke, but still, better safe than sorry.

Despite everyone being as wonderful as they were, it was Gideon who made it easiest for him to forget for a little while. He was treating him differently than he used to. They all were. How could they not? But, the way that Gideon treated him gave him something he’d never really had in his life. Gideon became his father. They did things a normal father and grown son would do. They went fishing at Gideon’s cabin. They went to sporting events that Gideon had to explain to him most of the time, drank warm beer, and ate processed meat on a bun. He could never seem to call it a hot dog. It just brought too many images to mind associated with the term. Sometimes it was a pain to have read as much as he had. Gideon helped him learn to be comfortable in silence and stillness when he never really had before. It was learning this that finally brought him the peace he had been pretending to feel. They would sit in a little boat only big enough for two of them, fishing rods in the water, not really trying to catch anything, and usually say nothing.

“This is called the gloaming,” Gideon told him once just as the sun was getting ready to go down, “This hour right at sunset.” Reid had been tempted to say that he knew the definition of the word, but he wanted to hear what Gideon had to say first, so instead he just made a noise from the back of his throat in acknowledgement.

“Just sit still for long enough,” Gideon continued, his voice low and gentle, “You can almost hear the world waiting . . . just waiting . . . for that exact moment when the sun slips below the horizon. In that moment it’s like the world holds her breath. Time stops. Nothing makes a sound. It’s magic . . . or as close as things can come to magic nowadays.”

“I think . . .” He responded after thinking about what Gideon had said for a few moments, “That if I could choose . . . this is the time of day that I would want to die.”

Gideon had simply nodded, not trying to deny what the man he had taken as his second son was saying.

“When I do go, Gideon . . . I don’t want to be in a hospital. I’ve done my research and it’s probably going to get pretty bad before I do finally go. From where my tumor is located it’s . . . it’s very likely that I’ll be . . . blind, probably in constant pain, and I won’t be able to discern the difference between temperatures. I might not be able to move. I . . .”

“Reid,” Gideon had reached over and squeezed his shoulder, “I’ll take care of it. You’ll be comfortable. We won’t leave you in a hospital.”

“Could I . . . I mean . . . would you . . .” He didn’t know how to put what he wanted to ask into words. It wasn’t something one asked every day.

“Do you want it to be here, Reid?”

“I . . .” Reid couldn’t figure out what to say when confronted with the exact thought in his head coming from someone else’s mouth. The next statement Gideon made had him breathing in deeply and finally settling something deep in his soul.

“It would be an honor . . . son.”

It was so natural to respond, “Thank you . . . Dad.”

This all happened, of course, in between cases that kept them away from Virginia for far longer than Reid would have preferred, but it was their job. If there was one thing that was able to keep Reid sane it was the fact that he was able to continue working as he had before his world had changed forever. If anything, the fact that he wasn’t going to be around for much longer made Reid sharper. Of course, he had always amazed them, but now he was simply stunning. His mind made connections with lightning speed, he went through possibilities faster than they could think, and, yet, he smiled, laughed, and joked more than he ever had before. In short, Spencer Reid was finally living his life exactly how he had always wanted.

For eight wonderful months everything seemed perfect. He went to Lance’s opening, thought his heart would burst with pride when Lance was nominated for a Tony, and almost broke down when Lance won that Tony. They made their civil union official in a small, intimate ceremony with only their closest friends and couldn’t be happier. They bought a puppy and laughed a lot as they trained it. They called him Tristan, a personal joke for both of them. On vacation time they went to Las Vegas and spent as much time with Reid’s mother as they could. Reid tried to explain to her what was happening. In a lucid moment, she understood and cried with him. The next day she didn’t remember what he’d told her. He made his arrangements for her and spoke on the phone with her every day after that. For eight months, he was content. Of course, his headaches were getting worse, but a higher pain prescription and more sleeping took care of that easily. It was when things were going right that everything fell apart. The beginning of the end took them all by surprise.

Reid was pouring his coffee one morning at work when Morgan snuck up behind him and shouted his good morning. Always a little on edge, (How could any of them not be with their line of work?) Reid jumped, spilling fresh coffee all over the hand that had been holding his mug.

“Jesus, man, I’m sorry! I didn’t expect you’d jump so high!” Morgan tried to apologize, but Reid just kept looking down at his hand, his eyes wide. He dropped the mug and the coffee pot, not noticing as both shattered at his feet and soaked both his and Morgan’s pants, and just looked. Morgan jumped away from the heat, swearing, then went quickly silent as he looked up at Reid, still frozen.

“Reid, man, what’s wrong?” He asked after a moment.

“I . . . I . . . Morgan,” Reid looked up at him, eyes wild and terrified, “Morgan, I can’t feel it. I can’t feel the burn. It doesn’t hurt. I . . .” He began to breathe harshly in panic.

“Wait a minute,” Morgan instructed, going to the refrigerator, “Might just be a fluke. Just wait,” Fighting down his own panic, he opened the freezer and grabbed an ice cube. He walked slowly back to Reid, trying to keep them both calm. Reid held out his hand, knowing what Derek wanted. They both held their breath as Derek gently ran the cube up and down Reid’s arm until his fingers were too numb to hold it.

“Nothing,” Reid whispered when they finally looked up at each other again, “Oh, God.” They just stared at each other for nearly two minutes, unable to say anything at all. Then, Reid’s face went blank for a moment just before his eyes had rolled back in his head, and he simply collapsed. Derek caught him before he could hit the floor.

“Reid? Reid, come on, man. Wake up. Come on, buddy.” But Reid didn’t wake when Derek shook him gently as he knelt on the ground, with the younger agent in his arms. He didn’t wake when Derek patted his face gently and rubbed the ice cube over his brow. It was then that Derek couldn’t breathe. Reid hadn’t just fainted from shock. There was something very wrong.

“Call an ambulance!” He shouted at the next person to walk in. Then, he turned his attention back to Reid and did something he hadn’t done in a very long time. Derek Morgan began to pray.