Adult Content Warning

This work could have adult content. If you continue, you have agreed that you are willing to see such content.

• Yes, Continue
• No, Go Back

If you accept cookies from our site and you choose "Yes, Continue", you will not be asked again during this session (that is, until you close your browser). If you log in you can store your preference and never be asked again.

1. holding my gaze like stars in the night (holding my heart like a Prince Rupert's drop's tail) by Anonymous

   Fandoms: Criminal Minds (US TV)  

   • Explicit
   • No Archive Warnings Apply
   • M/M
   • Complete Work

   06 May 2026

   Tags

   • No Archive Warnings Apply
   • Aaron Hotchner/Spencer Reid
   • Aaron Hotchner
   • Spencer Reid
   • I'm not listing everyone in this guys
   • Other(s)
   • Spencer Reid Doesn't Work for the BAU
   • Professor Spencer Reid
   • Romance
   • what's the opposite of slow burn?
   • they fall hard and fast
   • Fluff
   • there's smut in there too
   • Fluff and Smut
   • Smut
   • written by an aromantic asexual so if I've misunderstood the nature of romantic/sexual desire that's why
   • but they're in love your honour
   • OOC
   • but honestly I don't care
   • Sorry Not Sorry
   • I Wrote This Instead of Sleeping
   • I also wrote this to try and manhandle myself out of writer's block - hence the lack of real care about quality
   • no beta we die like haley
   • gay fanficiton typical abuse of 'the other man' 'the older/younger man' to avoid saying people's names 37 times a sentence
   • Rossi ships Hotch/Reid more than I do
   • but here we are
   • five days into making the tags and I've only just now realised that the opposite of slow burn is probably love at first sight
   • decently responsive author (will respond to comments in less than six months/hj)
   • Author Is Sleep Deprived
   • Soft Aaron Hotchner
   • Soft Spencer Reid
   • Assertive Spencer Reid
   • First Dates
   • First Kiss
   • First Time Bottoming
   • Cute Aaron Hotchner
   • This work is very safe sane and consensual
   • Shy Aaron Hotchner
   • If I removed by own commentary these tags would be half the length and this tag is adding to the problem (you can't stop me)
   • Hurt Aaron Hotchner
   • hints of casefic at the end (if I'm understanding the casefic tag correctly)
   • Bottom Aaron Hotchner

   Summary

   After his wife died, Aaron Hotchner didn't consider the possibility of falling in love again.

   Then he saw this lanky, sleep deprived professor at the library, and something inside him clicked. And all of a sudden, he was plunging into the deep end of butterflies and crushes and a nervousness he couldn't help.

    

   Or; Hotch falls head-over-heels for a certain Doctor Reid, and after managing to speak to the man, drags him down with him.

   Series

   • Part 1 of Cassiopeia anon

   Language:

   English

   Words:

   9,410

   Chapters:

   1/1

   Collections:

   1

   Comments:

   10

   Kudos:

   144

   Bookmarks:

   25

   Hits:

   1,703