Chapter Text
“Play that again”
The words were familiar. Oswald, Spencer’s piano teacher, was a stickler for perfection. But it wasn’t Oswald who spoke. It was Spencer, and he was staring at my fingers on the keys.
“Play that again, please” he repeated.
I obliged, my fingers gliding over the piano. I couldn’t really interact with it from their point of view, but on my side of things I was playing Mozart.
“Reid, are you going to stare at the keys all day or are you going to play something?” Oswald sounded grumpy. That wasn’t unusual for him.
“You know what, Mr Fairfax, I think I’m done for today, thank you for the lesson, I’ll see you next week?” Spencer spoke quickly, ushering Oswald to the door of his apartment as he did so. Within thirty seconds he had shut the old man out in the corridor and turned back to the piano. And me. I held my breath. Or I would have, if breathing was something I still did.
“Can you see me?” I asked.
“That was Mozart, wasn’t it? His fourth symphony. So either I’m going crazy and I’m imagining this, or there is someone I can’t see playing Mozart on my piano,” Spencer said.
“Yes, I was! I am here! Please, please see me!”
“Hang on a second, I want to try something.” Spencer disappeared into the bedroom for a moment and came back with a notebook and two pens. He put the notebook down on the coffee table and set one of the pens next to it. With the other he wrote something on the first page. I walked over and read it over his shoulder.
“Hi - SR”
I laughed a little. Then I sat down on the sofa next to him and concentrated on picking up the other pen. It took me a few tries but I eventually had a solid grasp on it. Or at least, as solid as I got these days.
“Hi back - LB”
“Okay so I can see the words, but the pen hasn’t moved, from my point of view at least. Interesting. Also, I know you can hear me out loud but I think it’s better to record both sides of this conversation, for posterity.” Spencer wrote as he spoke. He signed the words SR.
“That seems sensible - LB”
“What does LB stand for? I mean, what’s your name? - SR”
“Leliana Barrow. Most people call... called me Lana though. - LB”
“It’s nice to meet you, Lana,” Spencer said. He didn’t write it down. He was looking next to him, right at me if he had been able to see me. The way he said my name nearly knocked me over. I hadn’t heard anyone say my name in months, and it rolled off his tongue like it was something precious. Every letter considered.
“Hi, Spencer,” I whispered.
“Why were you playing my piano? - SR” he wrote. I turned my attention back to the notebook.
“At first it was to try and get your attention, but after a couple of weeks I gave up on that. I just like playing. - LB”
“Weeks? How long have you been here? - SR”
I thought about it for a moment. “3 months, 1 week, and 4 days - LB”
Spencer whistled through his teeth. “Why are you here? - SR”
This was difficult. I thought I knew the actual answer, I’d spent a lot of time thinking about it, but if I told him my theory he might freak out and stop talking to me. So I told him some of the truth.
“I died. And there was a white light. And I sort of blinked? And then I was here. In your apartment. On the piano stool, actually. - LB”
“You, died?” Spencer stopped writing. I nodded, and then remembered he couldn’t see me. It was easy to forget, his eyes felt like they were making holes in me.
“Yes, I died. I was murdered, actually. But I don’t like to talk about it. - LB”
“I’m sorry.” His voice cracked a little. “It might help, for me to know. I don’t want to make you talk about it, but is it okay if I ask someone to look it up?” He looked so apologetic, like a kicked puppy.
“Go for it. Call Garcia? - LB”
Spencer’s eyes went wide.
“You know about Garcia? - SR”
“I know all about the BAU, Spence. I’ve been following you around for 3 months. - LB”
“Good point,” he muttered. I grinned. “Spence. Huh.” He spoke so softly I almost didn’t hear him. His fingers traced the word I had written. I didn’t mean to use the nickname, it just slipped out. Then, as if snapping out of a trance, he shook his head and pulled out his phone.
“Garcia? Yeah, I know. Can you look up a murder for me? Leliana Barrow. Yeah. Um, hang on,” he held the phone away from his ear, and spoke to me. “She wants to know if I have any more details?”
“Tell her it was in England. And the girl was 23 when she died. - LB” I wrote.
Spencer related the information. “Okay. Yeah that sounds like- oh. Wow. Yeah, thanks. That’s it yeah. Bye.” Spencer was staring at the notepad as he hung up.
“It’s okay - LB”
“No, it’s not. It’s not okay? It’s violent and violating and horrific. You made the front page headlines.” Spencer still hadn’t sat down again.
“I know, but it feels, sort of distant from me now? It doesn’t matter anymore. Either way, I’m dead. This is my reality now. Spencer Reid’s Guardian Angel. - LB”
“Guardian Angel? - SR” Spencer sat down and started writing again.
“My self-appointed job, I guess. I figured that if I was stuck following you around, maybe I could help a bit. Turns out I can interact with stuff, but only if I concentrate really hard. And apparently, only in relation to you. - LB”
“In relation to me? What do you mean? - SR”
“Well, I tried helping the others and it didn’t work. That evidence box that fell off the desk and broke Elle’s toe a month ago? I tried to push it back onto the desk before it fell. But I couldn’t. Whereas the day before, I shoved you hard enough to move you out of the way of that shelf that fell down. - LB”
“That was you? I just thought I’d tripped, and got lucky - SR”
“You got me - LB” I stared at the words, panic rising in my stomach. Too close, too true, too much. I shouldn’t have said that.
“So, does everyone have a guardian angel? - SR”
“I don’t know. I’ve not met any other dead people. It’s just me. And technically, I don’t think I am an angel. I’m more of a benevolent haunting. - LB”
“But why are you haunting me? We never met when you were alive, you were from England. Why zap you to my apartment when you went ghost? - SR”
“I don’t know - LB” And there it was. The one and only lie I would ever tell my soulmate.