Chapter Text
The music playing from the various speakers situated around Rossi’s mansion is loud; loud enough that hearing what Aaron is saying is more difficult than it should be, given the other man’s close proximity.
“What?” Spencer shouts, tilting his head to the side and down slightly, trying to line his ear up with where Aaron’s lips are moving.
“I said, are you enjoying yourself?” Aaron repeats, raising his voice to a truly unnecessary level as he essentially yells his sentence into Spencer’s ear.
Spencer seems utterly unphased by the increase in volume, nodding enthusiastically as he turns back to the dancefloor behind them, gesturing with the hand holding his half-drunk cocktail to where Penelope and Emily are falling over each other while apparently each acting as the support for the other, equally wasted person.
“Almost as much as they are,” he giggles, turning back to face Aaron with a grin so wide it looks at risk of splitting his face in two.
He looks beautiful like this, Aaron thinks.
Not that he doesn’t always, but there’s something extra special about seeing the younger man so carefree, so happy. He’s more than a little buzzed, and Aaron knows the alcohol in his system is contributing to his enthusiasm right now, but even without the drink, when they’d first arrived at Dave’s annual Christmas party, Spencer had been joyous and light-hearted; every bit the bright young thing he’d fallen for so quickly when Spencer had first walked into the BAU headquarters almost ten years ago.
“I don’t think any of you will manage to find the same level of enjoyment tomorrow morning,” Aaron mutters, amusement clear in his tone of voice.
Spencer just stares at him, grinning lopsidedly.
“Wha’ was tha’?” he mumbles, trying to get the straw of his drink into his mouth, and Aaron can’t help the shake of his head.
“Nothing,” Aaron replies, deciding it’s very much not worth trying to repeat what he’d said, especially when it was mostly for his own amusement, to the man who’s only just succeeded in lining up the straw of his cocktail with his lips.
At least it had only taken four attempts; Aaron supposes that could be considered a record for someone as drunk as Spencer is.
The younger man doesn’t look convinced, so Aaron leans in closer, finding Spencer’s neck with his own lips and smiling against the soft, warm skin there as he feels his partner squirm under his gentle kisses.
“Aaron,” he whines, although for all his wriggling he does nothing to actually move out of the reach of the man in question. If anything, Aaron would say he’s practically bearing his neck for better access and the placement of more of the kisses he’s apparently so displeased by.
“Yes, my darling?” Aaron replies, pulling away from Spencer’s neck before he can get carried away and unintentionally mark the pale skin. Spencer squirms again, though this time Aaron knows it has far more to do with his words than the kisses he’d been administering a moment ago.
Spencer doesn’t speak again, although he looks like he’s considering it, the words there in his head but not yet formed on his tongue, when the hand of Emily Prentiss appears in front of both of them, startling Spencer back into silence.
“Spencerrr,” she sings, grabbing him by the front of his tux and pulling him to his feet with surprising strength, and surprising success, given how utterly wasted she is. Aaron watches as Spencer staggers slightly once he’s upright, the contents of his glass sloshing dangerously close to the rim as he struggles to stay upright.
“Yes, Em?” he responds eventually, his speech adorably slurred as he squints at her, as though closing his eyes will somehow provide him with a clearer view of the somewhat spinning world around him.
“Come and dance with meeee,” Emily says, pulling on his jacket sleeve without actually making a move to head back to the dance floor.
“I thought Pen was your dance partner for tonight,” Spencer says, trying for a moment to get the straw of his drink between his lips before giving up, seemingly deciding the hassle isn’t worth it, and drinking straight from the glass. Aaron winces, dreading to think how much faster the already ridiculously strong mix of alcohol will hit now that it’s being drunk in one go.
Why Dave always gives in and lets Penelope make the cocktail mix, year after year, Aaron will never know.
“She was, but she’s gone to get more drinks, which we both know means she’s just gone looking for Derek.”
Emily’s pouting at him, and Spencer, having finished necking the remaining half of his drink, finally nods at her.
“Alright then,” he concedes, his head wobbling up and down with far more exaggeration than a normal nod consists of, and Aaron spends a second being impressed that it doesn’t fall off his neck entirely, before his attention returns to the fact that Spencer, who’s struggling to stand on his own two feet, is apparently about to throw himself onto the dance floor with an only slightly more stable Emily Prentiss.
He turns back to Aaron, grinning giddily as he holds out his now empty glass, which Aaron dutifully takes from him, allowing him to get a better hold on Emily’s shoulder with his hand.
Aaron finds himself being more impressed than he thinks he should be that Spencer at least had the wherewithal to realise that he wasn’t steady on his feet enough not to need some additional support.
Even if the person he’s chosen to provide that support is almost as unsteady as he is.
“Be careful, you two,” Aaron says, trying his best to sound firm enough to be taken seriously, but not too much like a complete killjoy.
As it turns out, Spencer doesn’t even seem to hear him, and Emily merely throws a mock salute over her shoulder with a flippant, “yes, dad,” before she drags the lanky and unstable Dr Reid onto the middle of the multicolour dance floor with her.
Aaron waits for a few minutes, watching the two of them stumble towards and away from each other in what can’t even vaguely be described as dancing, let alone an any actual footwork, before he too stands from the antique bench and heads for the kitchen, satisfied that no one is in any immediate danger.
He finds Dave, as he’d expected to, standing at the open French doors with a cigar in one hand and a glass of whisky in the other.
“Can I help you?”
It’s not exactly an unexpected question, but it still catches him off guard slightly; especially given that Dave doesn’t even turn to face him, instead continuing to stare out at the grounds of his mansion spreading out into the night beyond.
“What makes you think I need help?” he replies, somewhat cautiously, but when Dave finally looks up to meet his eyes, Aaron sees nothing but good natured care and a slight hint of amusement.
“You’ve been nursing that same beer all night, while your boyfriend’s been through at least six of Garcia’s signature mix.”
Aaron bristles at the term despite himself, despite the fact that he knows it’s ridiculous to be so hung up about a term that, in the grand scheme of things, means nothing more than his love and dedication to a certain Spencer Reid.
“Maybe I’m just not thirsty,” he says, but it’s a poor excuse even for him, and Dave scoffs.
“Yeah, right. I’ve known you how many years now, Aaron? It’s going to take more than that to convince me.”
Aaron huffs, but he goes to stand beside the older man all the same, and though smoking has never been something he’s been tempted by, he can’t deny the smell of the cigar smoke isn’t pleasant.
It’s tradition, for Dave to break open his case of Cohiba Behikes during his Christmas party, and while everyone will be offered one as the evening goes on, the host himself can often be found smoking his third or fourth well into the night.
“They’re on the table if you want one,” Dave says, not taking his eyes off the spread of perfectly landscaped garden in front of him as he draws on the cigar hanging from his lips, savouring the smoky tobacco and hints of coffee and cocoa that the pricey stogie contains.
Aaron doesn’t normally, but he’s not feeling quite himself tonight, so he sets his undrunk beer down on the table and picks up the case of Behikes instead.
“Light’s behind the whisky,” Dave calls, and sure enough, just behind the bottle of forty year old single malt sits a lighter.
The first drag takes him by surprise, the earthy sweetness an unexpected but rather pleasant taste. By the time he’s standing next to Dave at the open French doors, he’s almost used to the sensation of breathing smoke into his lungs.
“So,” Dave says, taking a drag on his own stick and holding the smoke in his mouth for a few seconds before he breathes it out into the clear night. Aaron finds himself feeling surprised that the older man doesn’t blow out a perfect smoke ring.
“So,” he echoes, looking down at the cigar that’s balanced between his pointer and middle finger.
“What’s on your mind?”
It’s a simple enough question, but Aaron can’t find it in himself to answer.
He thinks the worst part is that he’s not even sure what the answer actually is.
“The world’s just moving so damn fast, Dave.”
He doesn’t mean to say it, nor is it anything close to what he was expecting to say if he’d actually tried to answer Dave’s question, but the man beside him nods, lowering his cigar in favour of taking a long, slow sip on his whisky.
“You feel like it’s passing you by.”
It’s not exactly a question, but just when David Rossi got this wise, Aaron doesn’t know. He’s not sure he wants to know, either.
“Something like that.”
He regrets putting his beer down now, wishing he had something to wash the taste of smoke away, but even the thought of moving to pick it up threatens to break the spell that’s fallen over their little corner of the kitchen.
He considers a few other things he wants to say, but none of them feel like things he can say out loud. They might not be at work right now, but he’s still this team’s leader; he’s still the head of this strange little family they’ve created. Expressing his unfounded jealousy of JJ and Will’s relationship would imply that he feels his own relationship is lacking, and that couldn’t be further from the truth.
“You love him, though.”
Again, there’s no question in Dave’s words, but even so Aaron feels a desperate need to reiterate that fact, in case there was any possible doubt,
“More than anything.”
Dave does look across at him then, his glass poised halfway to his mouth.
“Then tell him that. Ask him. What’s the worst that can happen?”
Aaron doesn’t want to think about the worst, because the worst is unthinkable.
Unthinkable, but unlikely.
Even if Spencer doesn’t like the idea of marriage, he’s unlikely to want to break up with Aaron for suggesting it. And if they just remain partners for the rest of their time together – Aaron’s going to have to get Dave to stop using the word boyfriend, no matter what the outcome of this question is – he really will be more than happy with that.
Dave is giving him a knowing look, and shit, he’s really going to do this, isn’t he?
One last, slightly desperate glance at his old mentor gives him all the answers he needs, and no small amount of courage, and, much like how Spencer had handed him his empty glass, he passes the barely smoked cigar over to its rightful owner.
“Aaron.”
He’s already turned for the door when he hears his name, and looking back he finds Dave standing at the table, pouring a generous measure of the single malt into a glass, which he holds out towards Aaron with a gentle smile.
“One for the road.”
Aaron takes it gratefully, swallowing a mouthful to rid his mouth of the lingering taste of ash and tobacco, before he nods towards the older man.
“See you on the other side.”
He doesn’t turn back as he leaves the kitchen, but he can feel Dave’s kind eyes on him until long after he’s rounded the corner that will eventually lead him to the secondary living room that’s been converted into a dance floor for the night.
- - -
He finds Spencer on the dance floor with the girls, swaying precariously whilst attempting to spin JJ round in a pirouette, trying to be a pillar of balance for the blonde despite not being at all stable on his own two feet to begin with.
JJ’s drunk, but no where near as severely so as Emily and Penelope are; the other two women seemingly trying to copy the dance movements of her and Spencer, albeit in a somewhat more abstract interpretation than even the drunken version being portrayed to them is.
Aaron stands for a moment, content to just watch the scene unfolding in front of him, certain for what feels like the first in a long time that none of his team members are in serious risk of getting injured. A drunken fall would be painful, though perhaps not until the morning, given everyone’s current state of inebriation, but nothing dangerous. Nothing he needs to intervene in.
Having successfully spun JJ round in one full circle, albeit with more than one wobble in the process, the pair nearest to Aaron’s side of the room seem to decide to switch places, with JJ extending her arm to take Spencer’s hand and hold it above his head.
It’s not going to work, and Aaron’s somewhat surprised that neither of them have realised that the height difference is going to be insurmountable, but he relaxes back against the wall behind to watch as JJ nonetheless tries her best to swivel her dance partner. Spencer’s back is bent almost in half, his neck twisted at what must be an uncomfortable angle as he tries to complete the twirl while still remaining underneath JJ’s raised arm.
He gets halfway through his spin when his eyes land on the new occupant of the room, and a delighted, lopsided grin spreads across his face as he points with his other hand in the wavering direction of where Aaron himself is stood.
“Aaron!”
Seemingly sensing that she’s about to lose her dance partner mid performance, JJ releases her grasp on Spencer’s hand just as he’s completing his circle, and for a brief moment Aaron thinks he’s about to witness his lover land fully on his arse in the middle of the dancefloor.
Somehow though – miraculously as far as Aaron is concerned – Spencer manages to save himself at the last minute, course correcting to walk in Aaron’s direction with wobbly legs and the brightest smile that Aaron has seen in a long time.
Yes, Aaron thinks, this is the person that I want to marry.
Spencer is warm and soft when he presses his face into the side of Aaron’s neck, although whether the action was an intentional way of greeting or a miscalculated attempt at leaning in for a kiss, Aaron can’t decide. Either way, the hot breath that fans against his neck, laced with the distinct smell of alcohol, is comforting, as is the heaviness of the body that’s pressed up against his chest.
“Having fun?” Aaron asks quietly, and the weight against his chest nods enthusiastically.
“Very much so,” comes the mumbled reply, that Aaron suspects wouldn’t be much clearer even if the words hadn’t been spoken against the skin of his neck.
“Do I want to know how much you’ve had to drink?” he asks, somewhat warily, although it melts away when Spencer’s groggy gaze finds his as the younger man pulls back just far enough to meet his eyes.
“Depends,” Spencer says, raising a finger as if he’s about to launch into one of his usual spiels, only to falter with it halfway in the air. Aaron waits patiently, just in case this actually is going somewhere, and Spencer’s merely forgotten his train of thought, but a moment later the finger pokes him none too gentle in the chest as Spencer asks; “do you want to know or not?”
Aaron grins, shaking his head just slightly, and Spencer’s practically beaming at him.
“Oi! Lover boys!”
Spencer spins on his heels far too fast for his drink-addled reflexes to keep up with, and would have landed on his ass if not for Aaron’s arms that wrap quickly around his waist, holding him safely in place where he stands unsteadily.
“Yes, Prentiss?” he says on instinct, fingers splaying out across Spencer’s hips of their own accord, the action coming automatically from memory from when he holds Spencer in this way during far more intimate moments.
He sees Emily rolling her eyes from all the way across the room.
“It’s Emily, we’re not at work, Hotchner!” she shoots back, but it’s clearly more slurred than she’d expected it to be, because even she looks surprised at the jumble of words that leaves her lips.
“Emily, what?!”
Aaron chuckles, tightening his grasp on Spencer just slightly as his partner’s patience wears thin enough for him to shout across to the woman across from them, and wonders whether Spencer is just ignoring or, more likely, completely oblivious to the fact that yelling back and forth across the dance floor is not the easiest way their trio could be communicating.
Despite his drunken state, Spencer leans willingly back against Aaron’s chest, allowing the other man to rock him slightly as he waits for Emily to think what she wants to say and then actually say it out loud.
“Photobooth! In the hall. You two are the last not to have pictures taken!”
Aaron suspects that’s not entirely true, especially given that he’s been with at least one person from his team at all times, but Spencer’s weight as he leans gently against Aaron’s hands is nice, and if having photos taken in the booth means he gets the full weight of his partner pressed against him, not to mention his undivided attention – however briefly – Aaron knows he would be an idiot not to take that chance when it is being offered to him.
“Come on then,” he mutters, but there’s no hiding the affection in his voice as he slides his hands up from Spencer’s hips to more firmly grasp one side of his waist, the other hand picking up his deserted glass of whisky from a nearby chair.
He hadn’t actually checked before putting it down, but now he’s left hoping that it wasn’t an antique handed down by previous generations of Rossi’s family.
It would be just his luck that it would be.
Then again, it was Dave’s fault he was feeling nervous enough to need the stiffer drink; he should be able to hold the older man responsible for any and all situations that arise from the moment he placed the glass into Aaron’s hand henceforth.
Walking to the photo booth is slightly more challenging than Aaron had anticipated it being. Not least because, now that his hands were around Spencer’s waist, the younger man seemed perfectly happy to let Aaron not only support all of his weight, but also steer him in the correct direction, but also because of the many breakables that Rossi seems to be obsessed with keeping precariously balanced on various high up surfaces.
By the time they reach the main area of the hallway, where the booth is located, Aaron’s more out of breath than he was when he ran his last 10k.
He thinks, whilst half guiding and half hauling all of Spencer’s lanky limbs behind the low hanging velvet curtain; a deep purple that goes surprisingly well with the marble bust of Abraham Lincoln that sits directly opposite to where the booth has been set up, that he must be getting old. He’s not so out of shape that half carrying Spencer – who’s hardly the heaviest person Aaron has ever had to bodily manoeuvrer – should have him feeling this unfit, and age is, unfortunately, the only other thing that makes sense.
Well.
That, and the half a measure of Scotch that Dave had all but forced upon him.
Getting both Spencer and himself situated inside the booth is surprisingly easy in comparison to the journey they’d just undergone, and by the time he’s leaning forwards to press the on-screen prompt to begin taking the pictures, the man beside him is practically curled up against his side.
He looks so peaceful, and so undeniably handsome; the flush of alcohol sitting high on his cheekbones, the reddish pink contrasting starkly yet so beautifully with the paleness of his skin, eyes that Aaron finds himself getting lost in all too often hidden behind delicately fluttering eyelashes as the younger man blinks owlishly up at him from his reclined position on the bench.
And, whilst popping the question here was most definitely not what Aaron had planned at all, it suddenly feels almost too right to ignore.
Because he hasn’t planned anything; didn’t even know he was going to consider asking Spencer to marry him before his conversation with Dave not even an hour prior, and whilst he’d never admit to needing alcohol to bolster his nerve, the liquid courage has already been consumed, running through his bloodstream to his head and his heart, taking over his inhibitions and allowing him to be reckless with his love for once in his life.
He hears the camera shutter begin to click somewhere in the back of his mind just as he turns to face his partner, and although he knows he’s speaking, although he can feel his lips moving around the words that his brain is coming up with, he can’t hear anything in his ears besides a static buzzing.
Before him, Spencer’s face changes rapidly; going first from soft inebriation to shock and surprise, a hint of confusion morphing into questioning, perplexion, and, finally, the most blatant look of utter delight that Aaron thinks he’s ever seen on any human being ever.
He might not be able to hear anything, but he can see, and Spencer’s lips moving as he repeatedly says the word Aaron’s been dying without knowing it to be told is everything he needs to know.
Yes.
Yes, I will marry you.
Yes.
His hearing comes back just in time for the camera shutter to go off again, but it doesn’t matter, because Spencer’s arms are around his neck and his lips are against his own, and the world outside the photo booth could be imploding for all he cares in this moment, because Spencer said yes.
Spencer Reid is going to marry him.
Now all he has to do is plan a wedding.