summary: after your breakup with spencer, you receive some well-intentioned yet questionable advice from none other than penelope garcia.
relationship: spencer reid x fem!reader
genre: (slight) angst
word count: 4.3k
tags: garcia is a Gossip, angsty breakup flashback, spencer is a Liar, spencer has abandonment issues, reader gives spencer the silent treatment, garcia gives questionable relationship advice, morgan is the Best Wingman, hotch is a Known Meddler
author's note: new series!!! i do Not consider myself the best at writing arguments so sorry if this is terrible but i need y'all to break up For The Plot <3
The sound of Penelope’s hot pink nails clacking against the keyboard is therapeutic; it’s almost a sufficient distraction from the disaster that has been the past few days of your life. You and Spencer had been broken up for all of forty-five minutes when you were called into the briefing room and swept into a serial arson case halfway across the country. Your best friend has been waiting—ever so impatiently—to get the scoop, a story which you insisted on waiting to tell her in-person.
You’re not entirely sure what Penelope’s doing on her computer; you’re sitting atop her desk, facing her, but during the last glance you stole at her computer screen, you saw her moving a folder labeled “OTP” toward the trash bin icon. You’ve just managed to grind out the basics of your last conversation with Spencer, but hearing yourself explain the situation aloud is jarring, to say the least.
“I’m glad you’re not crying,” she says, accentuating her statement with a few clicks of her mouse. She looks up at you, as if worried that she’s jinxed you and that the tears will now start to flow.
“Why the hell would I be crying?” you scoff, brow furrowing. “He’s a goddamn idiot—it’s his loss.”
“You know what? You’re right,” Pen agrees, nodding emphatically. She points a finger at you, one glittery pink nail shimmering under the fluorescent lights. “Tears spilled over men are tears wasted, my love. More power to you.”
“Exactly,” you affirm. Garcia’s confident expression dissolves into one of incredulity as she blinks up at you.
“He really broke up with you over a… key?” she asks.
“No,” you deny. Before she can question your response, you clarify, “I broke up with him over a key.”
“I’m gonna need more details,” Pen declares. “As many as you can spare. I need to know exactly how icy of a cold shoulder to give the Good Doctor for hurting you.” Brow knitting, she pensively notes, “Well, I guess he’s more like the Bad Doctor now…”
If she wasn’t referring to your boyfriend—ex-boyfriend, you remind yourself—you’d almost find her remark funny. You appreciate her unwavering support, but you can’t find it in yourself to laugh or even crack a weak smile at her commentary. Still, you steel yourself to relive the events of Tuesday night.
You’re in Spencer’s apartment. He’s gone to the kitchen to grab some snacks for your movie night, so you figure that now is the perfect time to kick your plan into high gear. You tiptoe across the living room, approaching his entryway table. You reach for his keys, blood thumping so loudly in your ears that you don’t even hear him enter the room.
“What are you doing?” he calls from the opposite corner. You jump and whirl around to face him, his keyring still clutched in one hand.
“Well, I was trying to be sneaky, but I’m not the one who knows all the sleight of hand tricks,” you joke self-deprecatingly.
Spencer’s gaze falls to your other hand; the one holding a single, silver key. One that you had made specially for him. It glints from between your fingers, and Spencer doesn’t need to see it up close to realize what you’re holding.
“Is that…” he trails off, swallowing thickly.
“Well… yeah,” you shrug casually. If you’ve noticed his stiff posture or the waves of tension radiating off of him, his distress hasn’t fully registered in your mind. You excitedly continue, “I thought, ya know, we’ve been dating for a while, so I wanted to give you a key to my place. Ya know, take the next step or whatever. I thought it might be cute to put it on your keyring when you weren’t looking, so then you’d see it later and it could be some like, unspoken romantic gesture of my trust and everything, but obviously now it’s… spoken.” You loudly clear your throat, a bit sheepish now that you’ve finished your ramble.
Spencer opens his mouth, then closes it. Once. Twice. He inhales deeply, and then, before he can psych himself out a third time, the words come tumbling from his mouth. “You don’t think it’s… maybe too soon for that?”
Ever the ray of sunshine, you continue to hold out hope that perhaps you’ve just caught him off-guard. Maybe he’s more excited about this development than he’s letting on. “I mean, I wondered if it was, but I did some digging—aka, I spent an ungodly amount of time browsing relationship subreddits—and it seems like the best time to do it is subjective.” You drop the key on the table and take a step closer to him, suddenly despising the distance between the two of you. “I’ve never been in a super serious relationship before, but it feels right to me,” you murmur, cracking a small smile. You had hoped that a smile might ease his nerves, that he might smile back at you, but he doesn’t. Suddenly, a heavy weight begins to press on your chest. The weight of realizing that… “You don’t… you don’t want it?”
Spencer sinks onto his couch, anxiously scratching at the back of his neck. Your feet carry you across the room, your body instinctively positioning itself beside him on the cushions. Even in disagreement, you’ve always yearned to be close to him.
“I, um… I just feel like it’s a big… commitment?” he stammers. The words are less of a sharp sting and more of a watery, cold dread settling in your veins. The smile you had been fighting to keep on your face starts to contort, molding into a tight-lipped frown.
“I guess, maybe, but I thought it was a more sensible step than just asking you to move in,” you say, an edge of defensiveness in your tone. You don’t think you’re being unreasonable; you love Spencer, and you want him to have this small token of your affection. Why is he reacting like you’re demanding something unfathomable of him?
“You’ve thought about that?” Spencer blurts. His eyes meet yours, and the usual warmth in his gaze has been replaced by something chilling—uncertainty. He’s always looked at you like you were the one sure thing in his life, but now he just seems uncomfortably taken aback.
The fact that he even thought to ask that question has you stunned.
“We’ve been dating for almost a year—of course I have,” you answer, thinking that he should’ve expected this reply from you. Yet, he appears surprised. You blanch, whispering, “You… haven’t?”
“Well… no.”
You swear you can hear your heart crack.
“He seriously said ‘well, no’?” Pen interrupts, looking appropriately offended on your behalf. “What an asshole—no wonder you’re pissed!” She schools her expression into a calmer look and gestures to you with an open hand. “Sorry for interrupting. You may proceed.”
Seeing the obvious heartbreak on your face, Spencer attempts to remedy the situation by saying, “Look, it’s not that I can’t picture a future with you, it’s…”
A pause.
“You don’t want to?” you offer.
“I do, I just…” Spencer fervently shakes his head in response to how you opt to finish his sentence. For a man notorious for rambling, he’s at a jarring loss for words—and at the worst time. “I don’t know.”
Spencer has always been the type to offer endless words of affirmation. Unprompted, he’ll remind you that you’re gorgeous, and that he’s the luckiest man on Earth to have you by his side. He has always seemed so deeply in love with you, which makes his sudden disinterest even more confusing.
It would be so easy to tear up at the crushing realization that he doesn’t love you as much as you love him, but you’re not too keen on getting emotional at a time when it appears that Spencer will do little to comfort you. So instead, you get angry.
“Jesus Christ, were you planning on telling me this at any point?” you snap.
“I love you, I do, I just think… um…” Spencer wrings his hands, and the anxiety rolling off his body nauseates you. He might as well have said, “I love you, but—.” He could’ve chosen to give this relationship a quick, dignified end; instead, he’s being torturously vague, prolonging what now feels like the inevitable.
“Think what?” you prompt, tempted to grab his hands and force him to stop fidgeting. You’re quickly growing agitated, exasperatedly scoffing, “What? That I’m not good enough for you?”
Spencer’s head snaps in your direction.
“I didn’t say that,” he retorts, brow furrowed.
“You’re not saying much, actually,” you counter frustratedly. Something that was meant to inspire a tender moment is quickly devolving into an uncontrollable argument. Perhaps tensions have been roiling just beneath the surface for a while now, and you haven’t realized. “‘I don’t know’, ‘um…’, well? What is it?”
“I’m trying to think of the best way to say it,” Spencer replies defensively. You suppose whatever he must be thinking is pretty hurtful if even he is at a loss for words to deliver the message. The air in his apartment feels thick—unspoken sentiments threatening to suffocate you.
“Say what? That you’re just not that into me?” you supply. “My God, Spencer, it’s just a key.”
“It’s not just a key, and you know that,” Spencer rationalizes. His words are logical, but his tone is edged with some sort of annoyance. He adds, “You even just admitted to wanting more than that.”
How could this have gone so poorly? You had really thought he would be excited to take this next step with you, but now you just feel like a humiliated fool, beaten down by reality.
“You say that like it’s a bad thing!” you exclaim, voice wavering with emotion. “Why shouldn’t I want more than that?”
“You should!” Spencer answers, voice rising to meet your climbing volume.
“But you don’t?” you seethe, mind reeling with how badly you’ve misjudged his feelings about you. Once the words are thrown out, they reverberate in your ears. You realize how true they are. You had meant them as a question, yet you don’t truly need to hear his response—not when you’ve already received so many clues as to what’s on his mind. The scared little glint in his eyes when he saw the key, the uncomfortable shifting on his feet; even the way he’s currently positioned on the sofa, body taut like a rubber band about to snap.
He doesn’t want what you do.
“I don’t know,” he all but confirms. He says it in a low voice, almost apologetically, like he knows his words have as much of a punch as if he had outright said “no”. His eyes skirt to the floor. Once again, the onslaught of emotions threatens to drown you in sorrow, yet you refuse to appear desperate. Needy. Instead, you allow the torrent of feelings to stoke the fire rising in your chest.
“That’s not good enough,” you say flatly, resisting the urge to yell. “You don’t know? Are you fucking kidding me? When are you gonna figure it out? Another ten months from now? ‘Cause I will happily take things slow, but I will not wait around for someone to figure out if they even want me.”
“I do want—” he starts.
“You are not acting like it,” you interrupt. You’re beyond furious at this point, but your stupid, bleeding heart yearns to remedy the situation. With one final whisper of hope, you ask, “Is it just ‘cause you’re scared to use the damn key or something? You don’t have to, ya know, you can just hold on to it.”
“It’s not just the key.” He shakes his head, the familiar motion as painful as a knife to your abdomen. So, this is really it. How long has he been playing the role of the caring boyfriend without having much interest in the part?
“How can you say you love me when the more you talk, it sounds like you don’t even like me?” A surprisingly vulnerable question, a raw ember among the blazing inferno of undiluted pain in your heart. Spencer tilts his head toward you, and you level him with an angry glare, attempting to throw as much hurt at him as possible through one expression.
He turns his head just so, and the light catches on an unshed tear glistening in his eye. The sight douses some of that fire within you; it’s been your gut instinct for the past ten months—longer than that, even—to drop everything to care for Spencer when he’s upset. Even when he’s hurting you, some part of you longs to care for him.
“I’m sorry,” he whispers, not even denying the words you’ve just spoken. You’re in such shock from the events of the past ten minutes, energy rapidly leaching from you, that you no longer see the point in arguing. You shouldn’t try to fight for something he clearly doesn’t want.
“For what? What are you apologizing for?” you ask instead, shoulders slumped.
“I hate making you unhappy—I just don’t think I’m ready for this,” Spencer confesses quietly, as if afraid his words will instill the wrath of God in you once more. “And to answer your question, I don’t know when I will be ready. And I know it’s unfair to ask you to wait, but—”
“Yeah, it is unfair,” you reply flatly.
“I’m sorry—” he starts, but you promptly cut him off.
“Stop saying that. This is ridiculous,” you declare with a dissatisfied grumble. “It’s not like I’m fucking proposing to you.”
Spencer blinks harshly, paling at your rebuttal. You swear you see him recoil just a fraction of an inch away from you.
“Oh my God, just the mention of that made you look ill,” you laugh sardonically. At this point, you’re feeling pathetic and ready to mope in bed for the next year. Not even sure if you want a response, you vocalize, “Spencer, why would you even ask me to wait if the thought of a future with me is so terrible?”
Spencer gulps.
“You just don’t wanna be alone,” you mutter. When he doesn’t correct you, you continue, “Am I right? It’s not me you’re interested in, it’s the idea of having a relationship. Any relationship. But things get real, and that’s too scary?”
“That’s not…” Spencer fumbles for a solid statement, settling on, “I am interested in you.”
“I don’t really believe you right now,” you admit, huffing bitterly. “I think you’ll say anything to keep me, but the truth is written all over your face.” You’re not sure why you’re still sitting on his couch, entertaining this conversation. Suddenly, you’re overwhelmed by the need to leave. Not just to be in the comfort of your own home, but to be far away from the embarrassment of begging for someone else’s affection. If he can’t string together a coherent reason for you to stay, then you’ll go. Rising from the couch with more confidence than you truly feel, you announce, “You know what? Forget the key. Forget the whole damn thing. I don’t exist just to satisfy your needs.”
“W-what?” Spencer stutters, clambering to his feet.
“You heard me,” you say, simultaneously heavy with the weight of this decision and lighter because of it. “Thanks for stringing me along and making me think that there was a future for us. I get it now. There’s not.”
“And then I left,” you conclude. “So.”
Penelope’s staring up at you with wide eyes and an even wider mouth, her jaw having been halfway to the floor for the past five minutes. She presses her lips into a thin line, blinking rapidly like she’s having trouble processing your story. Her eyebrows rise and fall in a perplexed—and somewhat impressed—little jump.
“Wow,” she murmurs. “You really kicked his ass to the curb.”
“Yeah,” you nod. You’re exhausted from reliving the details of the other night, and you’re half-tempted to fake an illness so you can go home and watch a comfort movie—or three.
“Have you… talked at all? Since then?” Garcia hesitantly inquires.
“Would you talk to him after that?” you ask, hackles rising. You sigh deeply, shooting Pen an apologetic glance. You may be on edge because of the breakup, but it’s nothing you need to take out on her. You amend, “No. He’s been texting me, but—”
Like clockwork, your phone buzzes.
“I’m ignoring him.”
“That’s not gonna work forever,” Penelope says pointedly. “Hotch is a meddler. He’ll probably assign you two the same job to force you to talk.” She looks up at the corner, as if deep in thought. She muses, “I can just picture him scheming, sending you both to the M.E. and careening towards an exceptionally dramatic argument in a morgue.”
“Ugh,” you groan at the thought. “Yeah, I know, but until that happens, I need space.”
“Sounds like you could use a distraction,” Pen concludes, perking up slightly.
“To say the least,” you huff, tilting back your head to slump against the wall.
“Well, you know what they say,” Garcia lilts. “‘The best way to get over a man is to get under another.’” A glimmer of mischief sparkles in her eyes. “Another man, that is. Oo, or woman! You know, Emily’s single.” She wiggles her fingers, clicking her nails together in a thrilled little gesture.
“One, I know,” you reply, looking down at her with an unimpressed face. “Two, I’m swearing off dating BAU members. Clearly having a clinical understanding of psychology does nothing to foster emotional maturity in profilers.” You raise three fingers. “Three, JJ’s been giving her googly eyes for years. I wouldn’t dare interfere with the inevitable duo there.”
“Four, I doubt that a hookup is gonna be a very productive distraction,” you reason. Feeling restless, you hop off her desk, smoothing your skirt before beginning to pace the room. “Short-term, sure, but long-term, how does that help me find someone who’s interested in a serious relationship?”
You look over your shoulder expectantly. Of course, your best friend already has a pitch prepared.
“You just spent ten months with Reid,” she says emphatically, spinning in her chair to face you. “I personally see no harm in having some fun before you jump into another commitment.” Her nose scrunches. Revealing her true intentions, she adds, “And hey, maybe seeing you with someone else will open his eyes to the reality that you are a super hot catch and that he made a grave mistake getting squirrely?”
“Oh no, I’m not playing the ‘make him jealous’ game,” you deny, crossing your arms in a definitive gesture. “I need to move on, for real.”
“Alright, alright,” she concedes, nodding her approval. Meeting your eyes, she earnestly promises, “I support it, obvi.”
“Good,” you respond insistently, “because I’m gonna get over his dumb ass.”
“She just read it. She’s leaving it on read. Again,” Spencer says, slumping into his desk chair. While you and Garcia have been unpacking the breakup in her lair, Spencer and his best friend have commandeered the bullpen. The rest of the agents are effectively tuning them out; well, besides Prentiss, who offers the occasional dramatic sigh to let them know they’re being too distracting.
“Pretty Boy, she’s literally in the next room,” Derek reminds him. He clicks his pen with a flourish, crumpling a Post-It note and chucking it at Spencer’s head as he suggests, “Just go talk to her.”
For the past thirty-two minutes and seventeen—now eighteen—seconds, Spencer’s been relaying his version of events. Of course, his memory of the breakup consists of verbatim insults and eerily minute details about your physiological response to his stupidity, but it’s essentially the same download Penelope’s getting in the other room.
While Morgan’s trying to be a good friend, he has the attention span of a house fly, and has resigned himself to doodling pictures of the not-so-happy and not-so-coupley couple. Spencer flattens out the most recent paper ball and narrows his eyes at the poorly-drawn stick figures; as rudimentary as Derek’s artistry may be, he’s clearly depicting you and Spencer kissing, a sensation of which Spencer does not need to be reminded right now.
“She clearly doesn’t want to talk to me,” Spencer pouts. Not that he blames you in the slightest for edging him out. “Plus, the door’s been closed for over half an hour. Garcia would wring my neck if I interrupted their… girl talk.”
Spencer looks longingly down the hall, remembering a time when you would have emerged from Penelope’s office with a delighted expression on your face. You’ve always been soft smiles when your eyes would find him across the room, but he’s ruined any semblance of hope that he’ll see that look directed toward him again.
“She has to come out at some point, though,” Morgan reasons, starting in on another sticky note. Distractedly, he adds, “Baby Girl doesn’t have room for her to move in.”
“What do I even say?” Spencer groans, throwing his hands exasperatedly in the air. “‘Sorry I lied to you about not wanting a future with you because I have a crippling fear of abandonment and am convinced that you would eventually leave me, causing me to push you away and force you to understandably leave me anyway’?”
Derek looks up from his sketch.
“Well, it would be an interesting conversation starter,” he taunts with a cheeky grin. If Spencer had any hand-eye coordination whatsoever, he’d throw something at Morgan in return, but he doesn’t trust himself to not accidentally bean JJ.
“I’m serious, Morgan,” Spencer huffs. At his pitchy exclamation, Emily lets out a long-suffering sigh. Reid lowers his voice, leaning toward Morgan and pondering aloud, “How do I beg the girl of my freaking dreams to take me back when I was such an asshole the other night? She’s not gonna hear me out. I wouldn’t hear me out.” He grimaces. “God, I’m such an idiot. I should’ve just sucked it up and taken the damn key.”
If Derek’s grin had been teasing before, it’s downright shit-eating now. He wiggles his eyebrows suggestively and quips, “Girl of your dreams, huh? Man, I knew you were into her, but I didn’t realize you were in love love.”
Spencer’s not even able to deny it. “Yeah, I am, and I messed it all up for what?” he asks. “I just panicked. I totally floundered.” Spencer buries his head in his hands for a brief moment before looking up with horror in his eyes as he recalls the details of his last conversation with you. “I even told her I haven’t pictured a future with her when that’s literally what I do for approximately ninety percent of my time. What is wrong with me?”
“You don’t want me to answer that,” Derek deadpans. Spencer shoots him a flat look, to which Morgan amends, “Dude, relax. If there’s one thing I’ve learned about relationships, it’s how to perfect my groveling technique.” He nods solemnly, vowing to assist his friend. “I’ll help you get her back.”
“How?” Spencer questions, unable to fathom any possible route resulting in you giving him the time of day.
“Baby steps,” Morgan answers calmly. “Here’s one.” He holds up his notepad, revealing a yellow square that simply says:
TALK TO HER!
Each word is underlined several times.
“How?” Spencer repeats dumbly.
“Easy,” Morgan shrugs. “Get Hotch to put you two on the same task on our next case. He’s a meddler, he’ll do it.”
Spencer considers this for a moment. It’s verifiable that their Unit Chief relies on the team to settle their differences the mature way—open communication. He’d never let something like this fester for too long without intervening.
“That’s… true,” Spencer nods. Then, unsure how to proceed, he questions, “So, I just… ask him?”
Morgan reclines in his chair with a shrug, propping his hands behind his head. “Tell him you’re getting the silent treatment. If there’s one thing he values, it’s efficiency in the workplace. He’ll wanna get her talking.”
“That feels… dirty,” Spencer shudders. “Won’t she be mad that I got him involved?”
He doesn’t really need Derek to answer that question for him, of course. He knows you’ll be livid. Still, it’s something of a comfort to air out his concerns and be met with his friend’s validation. “Of course she’ll be mad, but she’s already pissed at you. It can’t get much worse.”
Spencer’s thoughts exactly, yet he rhythmically taps his fingers on his desk and murmurs, “I’m not sure I really want to test that theory.”
“But you want her back, don’t you?” Derek asks pointedly.
“More than anything,” Spencer answers easily. At the time, it had felt like the right thing to do—to push you away. He couldn’t disagree with anything you said. Well, not most things, anyway. He was scared of a serious relationship; that much was true. The one thing you had really gotten wrong, though, was thinking that he would be happy with just anyone.
No, Spencer wouldn’t be content to be with any man or woman. Now that he had known what it was like to love and be loved by you, he didn’t want to experience anything different. He was determined to make his regret known, and he would do just about anything to make it up to you and earn your forgiveness.
Morgan knows it, too. He offers a smirk and declares, “So rat her ass out.”
