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one
Derek calls on a Thursday night.
“Hey, pretty boy, can I ask you a favor?”
“Sure,” Spencer says. “What’s up?”
“The heater broke at my house, and it won’t be fixed for several days. I wondered if I could stay with you, since the temperatures are really getting down there at night. If not, no big deal, I have a few other people I can try…”
“No, that’s fine,” Spencer says quickly. “Not a problem. I have a spare room, so as long as you don’t mind sharing a bathroom, we’re good.”
“Sounds good to me.”
Derek shows up a couple of hours later with some bags, and Spencer shows him to the guest room, which has been freshly fitted with clean sheets and a patchwork quilt. At the foot of the bed is a stack of clean towels.
“I know it’s not much,” Spencer says awkwardly. “But—”
“It’s perfect,” Derek interrupts. “Thank you again for letting me stay here, Reid. I really appreciate it.”
“You’re welcome to stay as long as you’d like,” Spencer tells him. “You know where the bathroom and the kitchen are. Is there anything else you need?”
“Nah,” says Derek. “I’m gonna start getting ready for bed. It’s been a long day.”
“Goodnight,” says Spencer, and he leaves the room, closing the door behind him.
Derek takes his time putting on sweats and a t-shirt and laying out tomorrow’s clothes on the small dresser across from the bed. Then he takes his toiletry bag and makes his way to the bathroom. He brushes his teeth and goes to wash his face, only then realizing he’s left his face wash at home. Without really thinking about it, he opens the mirrored cabinet to see if Spencer has some he can borrow, and is met with what looks like a pharmacy’s worth of orange prescription bottles.
He knows he shouldn’t look at them—knows it’s an invasion of Reid’s privacy—but there’s a part of him that can’t help himself. A part of him that wants to know that Reid is okay. That he’s safe. That none of those bottles are narcotics.
So he starts reading the labels.
He can barely pronounce half the names— cariprizine, sertraline, gabapentin, propranolol, doxepin, omeprazole, liothyronine, cyproheptadine… There are dozens of bottles, all with Reid’s name on them, all containing different colors and shapes of pills.
He starts to feel bad for invading Reid’s privacy and goes to close the door of the medicine cabinet, but he hits it wrong and a bunch of the bottles fall into the sink with a loud crash. A moment later, there’s a knock on the bathroom door.
“Is everything okay in there?” Reid calls. “I heard a noise.”
“Everything’s fine,” Derek calls back. “It’s nothing.”
There’s a pause. “It didn’t sound like nothing.”
“It’s fine, Reid.”
“What happened?”
“Nothing.”
“If you don’t tell me, I’m coming in.”
“The door’s locked,” Derek points out petulantly, but a moment later there’s a click and Spencer opens the door.
“You really don’t think I have a key?” he scoffs, but then he sees the open cabinet and the sink full of bottles and his face goes white. “W-what are you doing?”
“I’m so sorry,” Derek says. “I didn’t mean—”
“Why were you in my medicine cabinet?”
“I was looking for face wash I could borrow.”
“You couldn’t just ask me?”
Derek feels his cheeks heating up. “I guess I didn’t really think of that.”
“So, your first instinct was to invade my privacy?”
“I didn’t—I wasn’t thinking,” Derek admits. “I’m really sorry.”
“Did you, um,” Spencer stammers. “Did you look at the labels?”
Derek wants more than anything to lie, but he knows he can’t do that to his friend. Not now. Not after everything they’ve been through.
“Some of them,” he admits. “I don’t recognize any of the names, though, if that helps at all.”
Spencer shrugs. “I didn’t, um… You weren’t supposed to know…”
“Know what?”
“That I require so many meds in order to function.”
“Pretty boy, I don’t care about that at all.”
“No?” Spencer challenges. “You aren’t the least bit curious about what they are? What they’re for? Why there are so many of them?”
“I—” Derek is at a loss. He wants to say no, but the truth is, he is curious. He does want to know.
“I don’t take all of them,” Spencer says quietly. “Some are old prescriptions that I haven’t gotten around to disposing of yet. Some are only prescribed as-needed. There’s only like 10 that I take every day…”
“Ten?!” Derek squawks without thinking.
Spencer wilts. He leans against the wall and slides down until he’s sitting on the floor, his arms wrapped around his bent knees.
“I forget that’s not normal,” he whispers.
“Reid, I don’t mean to make you feel bad. I’m sorry if I have. I’m not judging you, I’m not mad at you. I just care about you. I want to know that you’re okay.”
“The meds are the reason I’m okay,” Spencer sighs.
“How long have you been on them?”
“Since I was in college.”
“Kid, I had no idea.”
“Yeah, I don’t really like to broadcast it.”
“Are you, ah, comfortable telling me what they’re for?”
“Not really,” Spencer says. “But I will anyway, if it’ll help you sleep at night.”
Derek just blinks at him and shrugs.
“You’ve got to use words,” Spencer reminds him. “I’m not good with nonverbal communication.”
“I would like for you to tell me, if you’re okay with that.”
Spencer stands up and walks over to the sink. One by one, he pulls bottles out of the sink and puts them back on the shelf in the cabinet, speaking as he does so:
“Atypical antipsychotic, SSRI, SNRI, anticonvulsant, beta blocker, mood stabilizer, TCA, PPI, stimulant, antihistamine…”
“Antipsychotic?”
“It’s not as dramatic as it sounds,” Spencer says with a withering look.
“Reid—”
“I don’t feel comfortable telling you all my diagnoses right now,” Spencer says. “You’re just going to have to live with that.”
“Does the bureau know—”
“They know as much as they need to know. I’m responsible, Morgan. I’m not hiding anything. I’m not putting anyone in danger.”
“Does Hotch know?”
“Hotch knows as much as he needs to know.”
“Meaning…”
“He doesn’t know,” Spencer says quietly, “and I would appreciate it if you didn’t say anything to him or to anybody else about this.”
“I won’t.”
“Promise?”
“I promise, kid.”
“If you, um, absolutely have to talk to someone about my personal private business, you can talk to Penelope. She knows about all of it.”
Derek raises an eyebrow. “And how’s that?”
“She came over to check on me when I was really sick from a new medication, and I ended up telling her everything. Now I let her know when I have med changes and she checks in to make sure I’m okay.”
“I’m glad she can do that for you.”
“Me, too.”
“If you ever want to talk about it with me, you know you can, right?
Spencer gives him a faint smile. “Thank you.”
“I meant it when I said I don’t judge you for this.”
“No, but you look at me differently now, and you always will,” Spencer points out.
“Reid, I—”
“It’s okay,” Spencer says. “It is what it is. There’s nothing we can do about it now.”
“I suppose you’re right.”
“I’m going to go to bed. Goodnight, Morgan. Try not to go through any more of my cabinets, please. There’s face wash on the shelf under the sink.”
“You don’t have to worry,” Derek promises. “Goodnight, kid.”
That night, Derek lays in bed wondering how he could have missed this. How he could not know that there was so much going on with his friend.
In the morning, they don’t talk about it.
two
They’re on the plane, trying to get some sleep on the way to their case, when Derek notices Spencer frantically digging through his bag. At first he’s just pawing through the contents, but soon he starts taking things out, piling them up on the floor of the jet, searching desperately for something.
“Everything okay, pretty boy?” he asks, his voice low so as not to wake the rest of the team, who are all asleep.
“I can’t—I can’t find it,” Spencer says, wringing his hands in the air and then moving his things around once more. “It’s not here.”
“What is it?”
Spencer looks at him with wide, frantic eyes. “My medication.”
“All of it??” Morgan gasps, thinking of all the bottles in Spencer’s cabinet.
“No, just one. I keep them all in a plastic organizer but this one stays separate, and I can’t find the bottle, and I—I don’t—” His breath starts to speed up, and Derek puts a hand on his back.
“Hey, it’s okay,” he says. “Take a deep breath. We’ll figure this out.”
“I need it,” Spencer says desperately, in a way Derek hasn’t heard him speak since he was going through withdrawals from Dilaudid.
Derek frowns. “What’s the medication for, kid?”
“For a- an-” He tries to take a breath. “For anxiety,” he finally manages, and Derek relaxes a little. “I need it,” he repeats, and a tear runs down his cheek.
“Do you think your doctor could call in a new prescription to a pharmacy in Dallas when we land?” Morgan asks.
“M-maybe, but my insurance probably won’t cover it…”
“Shit, kid, I’ll cover the cost if you need me to, just as long as we can get it. Can you call your doctor now?”
Spencer nods and pulls his phone out of his pocket with shaking hands. He holds it out to Derek.
“Can you dial?” he asks. “It’s under ‘Dr. Corin.’”
Derek finds the number and hits call, then hands the phone back to Spencer. He works on folding Spencer’s clothes back up and putting them in his bag while Spencer talks, and after a few minutes, Spencer hangs up and sits down on the floor to help Morgan.
“I calculated the pharmacy closest to the precinct,” Spencer says, “and she’s calling the prescription in there. We can pick it up when we land.”
“I’ll go with you to pick it up,” Derek says. “See, everything’s going to be just fine.”
Derek tells Hotch they have a quick errand to run before they head to the precinct, and Hotch, seeing the look on Derek’s face, doesn’t question or argue. The prescription is ready by the time they get there, and Spencer gratefully dry-swallows a pill as they make their way outside and back to the SUV. He’s been shaky and tense since the plane, and it’s a relief for Derek to see him start to relax as they drive to the precinct. By the time they get inside, he’s still pale and trembling, but his breathing has begun to return to normal.
“You good?” Derek whispers as they sit down in the conference room.
Spencer gives him a quick nod, and they get to work on the case.
three
Spencer has been out of work for four days, and Derek is starting to get really worried. This kid never misses a day if he can help it, never takes sick or vacation time. Even worse, he hasn’t been answering Derek’s calls or texts. Penelope assures him that Spencer is fine, that they’ve talked and he's just dealing with a medication adjustment, but Derek can’t shake the nagging feeling that something’s really wrong.
On his way home from the office, he stops at Spencer’s apartment building, takes the steps up two at a time, and pounds on Spencer’s front door. He hears noises inside—it’s obvious someone’s in there—but there’s no answer at the door.
“Spencer,” he calls. “Open the door, please.”
There’s still no response, so Derek sighs and finds the spare key that Spencer gave him a few years ago, to use for emergencies. He unlocks the door and steps inside.
The apartment is mostly spotless, except for a bunched up blanket on the couch, and when he gets to Spencer’s room he finds that the bed is empty, but the sheets are twisted and damp with sweat. Spencer is nowhere to be found. A moment later, though, he hears a sound from the bathroom, which is where he finds Spencer, dressed only in boxers, hunched over the toilet.
“Kid, are you okay?” he asks, and Spencer briefly makes eye contact with him before doubling over and throwing up.
Guess that answers that, Derek thinks. He goes to the kitchen and grabs a glass of water, bringing it to Spencer and setting it down on the floor next to him. After a few moments, Spencer finally flushes the toilet and sits back, wiping his mouth with his hand. Derek points to the water, and Spencer frowns and takes a sip. He rinses his mouth out, then drinks a little.
“The fuck are you doing here?” he croaks. His hair is plastered to his forehead with sweat, and his skin is ashy and gray. Dark circles—even darker than normal—decorate the thin skin below his eyes, which are glassy and unfocused. He's shaking violently and looks half-dead.
“I came to check on you,” Derek says. “You haven’t been to work in four days.”
“I know. 's fine though…”
“I wanted to know you’re okay. And you’re clearly not, so…how can I help?”
“Nothing you can do,” mutters Spencer. “Nothing you can do, nothing anyone can do. Gonna die right here on this floor,” he adds dramatically.
“No, you’re not.” Derek narrows his eyes. “Don’t say shit like that. What is this, a stomach bug?”
Spencer shakes his head slowly. “New meds. Bad.”
Derek frowns. Spencer’s speech is slurred and abrupt and abnormal. Derek has never heard him like this before.
“Have you called your doctor?” he asks.
“Thought, um. Y’know. Stick it out a few more days. See if it gets better.”
“Reid, this could be something serious. I don’t think you’re supposed to react to medications like this. Please call your doctor.”
Spencer grumbles and pouts for a few moments, but he finally holds out his hand and says, “Phone?”
Derek goes to find it in the bedroom, and when he gets back, Spencer is throwing up again.
“How is there even anything left in you to throw up?” he asks incredulously.
“There’s not,” Spencer says, heaving again. “Haven’t eaten in like… three days.”
He takes the phone and calls his doctor, waiting on hold for the medical assistant and then haltingly describing the situation and his symptoms. His eyes grow wide as he listens to the medical assistant speak, and when he hangs up, he holds the phone out for Derek to take. His hands are still trembling.
“Help me get dressed?” Spencer asks. “Then…d-drive me to the emergency room?”
“What the fuck?” Derek exclaims. “Yes, I will drive you to the emergency room, but what the hell did the doctor’s office say?”
“Tos- Tox- Toxicity. Go to the hospital immediately,” Spencer says, trying to stand up. Derek offers an elbow, but Spencer can’t manage to get his feet under him, and finally Derek picks him up and carries him to his bedroom. “Guess it ‘splains why I’m so dizzy, too,” he adds, twisting away and stumbling into the nightstand as Derek sets him down.
“I mean, you clearly aren’t thinking straight, or you would have researched these symptoms and figured out what was going on,” Derek points out.
“Fair point,” mutters Spencer.
Derek hands him some sweats and a t-shirt, which he manages to put on without too much help, and then Derek picks him up again and starts to carry him out the door.
“Wait—” calls Spencer. “Water bottle? They said… water will help flush it out.”
“On it,” says Derek warily, “but I’m also grabbing a bowl for when it comes back up again in the car.”
Between the two of them, they manage to grab the bottle and the bowl, and then Derek drives like a maniac in order to get them to the hospital as quickly as possible. He can’t help it—every time he glances over at Spencer, he looks worse than he did before, barely managing to stay upright in his seat. He guns it for the last half mile and then peels into the parking lot.
“Gonna kill us both,” Spencer groans. “Gonna make me puke again.”
“That’s what the bowl’s for. Anyway, we’re here.”
Derek carries Spencer through the front doors and right up to the triage desk, letting Spencer describe his symptoms and the instructions from his doctor. The nurse quickly finds him a wheelchair and then pushes him back behind a pair of heavy doors while another nurse guides Derek to the waiting area.
And then Derek waits.
And waits.
And waits.
It takes almost three hours before someone comes to talk to him, explaining that Spencer has been treated and is now being hydrated and monitored, that he’s going to be just fine. There was no permanent organ damage because they brought him in in time, and Derek is welcome to go sit with him.
When Derek enters the room, Spencer looks like he’s asleep, but as soon as the nurse closes the door, he opens his mouth to speak.
“Sorry,” he says weakly, his voice so low that Derek barely hears him.
“You’ve got nothing to be sorry for, kid. I’m just glad you’re okay.”
“Should’ve said something sooner. Should’ve…asked for help.” His speech is still unsteady, but at least he's stopped shaking.
“Yeah, you should’ve,” Derek agrees. “But we can’t change the past, right? Just call me next time.”
“Okay.”
They stay at the hospital for several hours, until the doctors are sure Spencer is safe to go home, and then Derek drives them both back to his apartment. He washes Spencer’s bedding and puts fresh sheets on the bed, and then he makes dinner for the two of them.
“Thanks for all this,” Spencer whispers. “I appreciate it.”
“Anytime,” Derek tells him. “I mean it.”
four
Derek’s phone rings at 3:30 in the morning, and he assumes it’s work. He doesn’t even look at the screen before answering.
“What’s up, JJ?” he mumbles.
There’s a sob on the other end, and suddenly Derek is wide awake. He pulls the phone away from his ear to look at the caller ID.
“Reid? What’s wrong?”
“I can’t do this,” Spencer whispers. “Please help me.”
“I’m on my way, kid,” Derek promises, already jumping out of bed and into some clothes, grabbing his wallet and keys, and running to the garage. “Don’t hang up, okay? I’m setting my phone down while I drive, but I want you to stay on the line.”
“Okay.”
Derek drives even faster than that time he had to drive Spencer to the hospital, turning quick corners and ignoring speed limits, doing everything he can to get there as quickly as humanly possible. He makes the 20 minute drive in only 12 minutes, then flies out of the car and up the stairs to Spencer’s apartment, not even bothering to knock before he uses his spare key to get inside.
“Spencer?” he calls, running to the bedroom. He finds Spencer there under the covers, curled up in a little ball, trembling. “Hey,” he says gently, sitting down next to him. “What’s going on?”
“I can’t— I can’t— It’s too much,” Spencer mumbles. “It’s too loud… too heavy… it’s too much.”
“Okay,” Derek says slowly. “Can you tell me what exactly is too much? And are you safe right now?”
“It doesn’t feel right,” Spencer tries to explain, his voice weak and shaky. “Nothing makes sense. It’s so loud inside my head. It’s so heavy and dark. It’s like the air before a rainstorm, all charged and buzzy. But it’s in my head, and it won’t go away, and it won’t stop. I need it to stop.”
“Do you know what’s causing it? Have you changed your medication lately?”
Spencer starts to shake his head, but stops. “Yeah,” he breathes. “Stopped my antipsychotic.”
“Do you think that could be contributing to this?”
Spencer shrugs. “Maybe,” he sighs. “Probably. I don’t know. I just, I don’t like it. I don’t feel real.”
“You don’t feel real?”
“I feel like I’m floating above us,” Spencer says dreamily. “I can hear all my words. They sound wrong. Everything is wrong, and I’m not in my body, and I can’t get back.”
“Pretty boy, why did your doctor stop your antipsychotics?”
“To focus on my anxiety.”
“And how’s your anxiety?”
“Bad.” Spencer frowns. “I don’t think the new medication is helping the way it’s supposed to.”
“Have you talked to your doctor about all of this? About these feelings?”
Spencer shakes his head again. “I don’t see her for three more weeks. And I don’t want her to know.”
“Don’t want her to know what?”
Spencer stares at Derek with wide, sad eyes. “That I want to die,” he says calmly.
“Spencer…I think you need to call and talk to your doctor right now. Otherwise I’m taking you to the hospital.”
“No hospital.”
“Then call your doctor.”
“Not now. It’s too early. They’ll send me to the on-call psychiatrist. I don’t want that.”
“Why not?”
“They don’t know me. They won’t understand. I’ve been seeing Dr. Corin for almost 10 years.”
“Well, why don’t we call in the morning, then, when the practice opens. And until then, I’ll stay with you.”
“I guess,” says Spencer. He’s staring at his lap, and when he looks up, his eyes are full of tears. “Derek, I hate this.”
“I know, kid,” Derek says sympathetically. “How can I help right now?”
“Could you just…give me a hug?”
Derek leans over and wraps his arms around Spencer, holding him close.
“Yeah, kid. I can do that.”
Derek stays with Spencer until he falls asleep, and he’s still there when Spencer wakes up in a terror and can’t stop crying, and he calms Spencer down every time he starts to panic, and he tells him stories to distract him from feeling unreal, to keep him from feeling the heaviness, the noise in his mind. He puts Star Trek on TV while he makes the two of them breakfast, to give Spencer something to focus on that’s not his own thoughts, and then he sits with Spencer while he calls the doctor’s office.
The phone call takes a long time, and when Spencer hangs up, he looks exhausted but a little relieved.
“I’m going to have a couple of prescriptions to pick up at the pharmacy soon,” he says. “And I have an appointment this afternoon. And I have a safety plan.”
“I’m glad,” says Derek, a huge weight falling off his chest. “Can I stay with you until your prescriptions are ready?”
“Please,” says Spencer. “You’re the only thing that keeps the noise at bay.”
They watch more TV, and they talk, and they listen to music, and sometimes Spencer shoves his hands over his ears and doubles over in frustration, and sometimes he gets up and moves his body, shaking out his limbs, reaching down to touch his toes, and sometimes he’s furious about what’s going on inside his head, and sometimes he’s so, so sad, but sometimes Derek is able to calm him enough to just sit still and know that he’s safe, that things are going to be okay. And for those moments, he can relax. And that’s exactly what he needs.
They go to the pharmacy together to get his medications, and when they get home Derek watches him reorganize his pill organizer, and then he takes him to his appointment, and stays in the waiting room the whole time.
Two days later, Spencer is back at work, and it’s like nothing happened at all.
five
Spencer starts taking more time off of work.
First it’s just a day here and there, using the sick time he used to hoard. Then it’s two or three or four days at a time, and Derek calls to check in on him, and Spencer always answers.
It’s a med thing, they’re not working.
It’s a flare-up.
It’s a chronic condition, it won’t go away.
We’re trying something new.
It’s frustrating for Derek. He wants there to be a cure. He wants Spencer to get better. He wants him to find the right meds and have them work the way they’re supposed to, forever.
He never says these things to Spencer. Knows that Spencer must think them, too, and he doesn’t need to be hearing it from Derek. But he can’t stop thinking them. He can’t stop thinking there must be a way to make things better for him.
And then things get worse.
Spencer takes FMLA leave, uses short-term disability to keep some of his salary. He’s off for what is supposed to be four weeks but ends up being 12. He comes back refreshed, but unable to take any more sick time when he needs it. And he sure does need it.
The following year, he takes his FMLA leave as intermittent time, and he essentially works a part-time schedule for a few months. And then that leave runs out, and he starts showing up at work pale and shaking, struggling to do what he needs to do. His coworkers beg him to take more time off, but he can’t. He’ll lose his job if he does.
Everything crashes down one Saturday morning when Spencer asks Derek to come over for breakfast. They sit down with their oatmeal and Spencer looks at Derek, his face ashen.
“I have to tell you something,” he says.
“Okay.”
“I’ve decided to leave the BAU.”
Derek’s eyes widen. “What??”
“I don’t really have a choice,” Spencer says with a sad smile. “I’ve exhausted my FMLA, and my vacation and sick time, too, and I still can’t keep up. I still have days when I shouldn’t be there—when I can’t be there. I’m no longer an asset to the team, and all I’m doing is hurting myself by trying to do things I can’t do. It’s too much. I can’t do it anymore.”
“Does Hotch know?”
Spencer shakes his head. “I’m handing in my notice on Monday,” he says. “I’ll work two more weeks. And then that’ll be it.”
“It’s not fair.”
Spencer raises an eyebrow. “What’s not fair?”
“All of it. It’s not fair that you can’t keep doing what you love to do. It’s not fair that the office can’t accommodate you. It’s not fair that you only get a set amount of leave time per year. It’s not fair that you’re sick. None of it’s fair.”
“I know,” Spencer says quietly. “I—I’ve had a lot of time to ponder those things. To think about this, about whether I’m doing the right thing. And the conclusion I’ve come to is that this is the right thing, and also, it really, really sucks.”
“So what are you going to do after you leave the BAU?”
“I’m not sure. Search for a job better suited to my limitations, I guess. Do my best for as long as I can. Hope I can find a job that will be a good fit. Maybe look into starting my own business, or doing freelance work—something where I can set the schedule and not have to work on my bad days. Honestly, I’m terrified, and I don’t even know where to start. But hopefully I can figure something out.”
“I’m proud of you, pretty boy.”
“For what?”
“For knowing what’s best for you, and what you need. For taking care of yourself.”
“I don’t really have a choice,” Spencer points out.
“I know,” says Derek. “It’s still not an easy step to take. And I’m proud of you for taking it.”
“I feel like a failure,” Spencer whispers. “I’m terrified to tell Hotch and the rest of the team.”
“You’re not a failure, Spencer.”
“I’m walking away from my dream job. My family. I don’t—I don’t know how to deal with that.”
“First of all, you’re not walking away from your family. We are always going to be here for you, no matter what. So don’t worry about that part one bit. Second, they’re going to understand. I promise. They’ve seen how much you’ve been struggling these last few years. They’re going to be proud of you for taking care of yourself, too. And finally, you’re not walking away from your dream job because you want to. You’re doing it because you have to. There’s no choice in this, pretty boy. Your body is forcing you to walk away, and you have to listen to it.”
“I fucking hate my body.”
“I know.”
“You were right. It’s not fair.”
“I know.”
“It wasn’t supposed to be like this. I love this job more than anything. I was supposed to keep on helping people, and using my brain for good, and working with the best team in the world. This wasn’t supposed to happen.”
Spencer is crying now, his face in his hands, and Derek puts a hand on his shoulder and squeezes.
“It’s okay to grieve,” he says quietly. “It’s probably going to be a long process.”
“I hate this,” Spencer mutters through his sobs. “I hate it!”
“I know.”
“I just want to be okay.”
“I know.”
“I need to lay down. I’m getting lightheaded.”
Derek takes his arm and helps him into bed, pulling the comforter over him and bringing a glass of water.
“Do you want me to stay or go?” he asks when Spencer is settled, eyes closed.
“Would you mind staying?” Spencer asks. “Just for a little while.”
“Kid, I’m not going anywhere,” Derek promises. “No matter what.”