SOME PROTECTOR ⋆˚꩜｡ spencer reid x ex!reader
summary: it’s been 313 days. spencer still remembers the last thing you said to him. you still mean it. he’s been holding on from a distance ever since.
genre: angst (some smut & fluff in flashback scenes, but it’s mostly angst & hurt no comfort lol) | w/c: 7k
tags/warnings: inspired by the song “some protector” by role model, fem!reader, no use of y/n, yearner-in-chief spencer reid, yearninggg, like SO much yearning, minor alcohol consumption, relationship/breakup flashbacks, mutual pining, no happy ending (unresolved tho maybe?), panic attack in a flashback, sex scene in a flashback (making out, p in v, riding), 18+ MDNI
a/n: had a moment while editing where I almost gave up on this fic and deleted it but I’m pushing thru to post it anyways bc I worked rlly hard on it 🥲 recently been obsessed with this song and couldn’t stop picturing spencer when listening, so obviously I had to write 7k words to get it out of my system. obviously. also had “the way I loved you” in mind from reader’s side of things! if anyone is interested in a part 2 lmk because I’m already kind of itching over it 😶 (p.s. first pic is not indicative of reader’s appearance, just had the right dress!)
It’s been 313 days since the breakup. Spencer knows because he’d counted at first. Then stopped. Then started again.
He wouldn’t be here if not for the occasion — an engagement party for friends. One of those events where absence says more than presence ever could, so he showed up.
Now, he lingers at the edge of the room, half-shadowed by a bookshelf, pretending to care about the drink in his hand. He’d arrived a little late on purpose — a strategic delay. Fewer how’ve-you-beens, fewer questions about whether he’s seeing anyone new or if he’s talked to you. His plan was simple: blend into the perimeter, nod through a toast, and leave early without making a scene.
He hadn’t planned for you.
You walk in fifteen minutes after he does, wearing a dress he’s never seen before and a smile that almost passes for real. Your new boyfriend is beside you.
The thought had crossed his mind, he’ll admit. He met and became friends with the newly engaged couple through you, so there was always a decently high chance you’d be here tonight. But he hadn’t let himself linger on the thought long enough to plan for it, and he especially hadn’t allowed himself to consider the possibility you’d bring a date with you to a party you knew he’d be at. But nothing could’ve prepared him for it anyways. No amount of mental prep would’ve soothed the ache of watching another man’s hand find yours.
At first, Spencer can’t bring himself to look at you directly. But he tracks you in pieces — the tilt of your chin, the curve of your smile, the hand at your waist. The neckline of your dress, dipping just low enough to undo something in him.
You haven’t seen him yet. He’s not ready for when you do.
The room hums — clinking glasses, laughter pitched too loud, someone making a joke about wedding hashtags like it’s the cleverest thing in the world. But none of it reaches him. It all sounds submerged, warped by memory.
One hand tightens around his glass, the other buried in his pocket, fingers curled tight. He’s trying to ground himself, or maybe just keep himself from doing something stupid. Like walking up to you. Like saying your name. Like asking if it’s still his to say.
Spencer knows who your boyfriend is. He’s heard his name dropped casually by mutual friends. He’s done the requisite, ill-advised Google stalk with Garcia’s help. He’s memorized the basics: Ian Lockhart. Works in marketing. Graduated top of his class from UPenn. Youngest of three. Allergic to shellfish.
But that doesn’t stop the question from forming:
Does he truly know you?
Does he know you hate mint in desserts and prefer dark chocolate over the overly-sweetened milk variety? That you dog-ear the pages of whatever you’re reading instead of using bookmarks, even though you own at least fifteen of them? That you sleep with one hand curled under your chin like a child, hum under your breath when you feel safe, get hiccups when you’re anxious, and apologize for things that aren’t your fault?
Does he know the way you sound when you say Spencer’s name?
He hopes not. He hopes so. He doesn’t actually really know what he hopes for.
You’re smiling up at Ian like the weight of the room hasn’t doubled. Like this is just another party, not a place where Spencer’s body remembers every single version of you it ever loved.
And then — you spot him.
Over someone’s shoulder, through the blur of motion and candlelight, your eyes meet Spencer’s.
Something shifts in your face — a memory breaking the surface too fast to hide from. A flicker of something that looks a little like wanting, followed by restraint. You don’t look at him like a stranger. You look at him like before.
You tilt your head — a trace of kindness tugging at your mouth. But it only lasts a second before you turn away.
Spencer can’t breathe.
He’s still stuck in that second. He feels it like a match struck behind his ribs.
—
By the time the first toast of the night is over, you’ve disappeared down the hallway towards the kitchen. Spencer lets his gaze follow you just long enough to punish himself for it.
You still tuck your hair behind your ear the same way you used to, he notices. That quiet, automatic gesture like you’re not even thinking about it. You’ve always done it that way, like muscle memory.
And now he’s thinking about September, nearly three and a half years ago. Your first fall together.
It had been raining that day — that steady kind of rain that makes everything feel like it’s underwater. You’d been sitting on his couch with your legs tucked under you, a book splayed open in your lap, your thumb idly tracing the edge of the page. Spencer was talking too much, as usual. A fact spiral he hadn’t meant to fall into, born out of habit and the way you made the room feel safer somehow just by being in it.
“And there’s this theory,” he’d said, glasses pushed up too high on his nose, hands fidgeting with the frayed edge of the blanket between you, “that we can smell the weather changing — like, literally smell the oils and sugars released by leaves breaking down. That’s why autumn feels so…”
He trailed off, embarrassed, suddenly sprung back into hyper-awareness of how long he’d been speaking. But you just looked at him and smiled, that full-faced kind of smile you didn’t hand out easily. “So you’re saying you can smell fall coming?”
He nodded, sheepish. “Sort of. Yes. And I like it — the smell, I mean. It kind of reminds me of being a kid. Like old books and new pencils and being a person who still thought the seasons changing was like magic. Not that the seasons changed much in Vegas, but… still.”
You laughed. Not a sharp laugh, not mocking, but a delighted one. The kind of laugh that only shows up when someone says something completely true and completely weird and you’re so completely glad they said it.
Spencer looked at you like he didn’t quite know how to process how beautiful you were in that moment. Not just physically (though yes, that too), but emotionally. You didn’t flinch away from his oddities — you leaned toward them. Like maybe you were made of the same quiet strangeness he was.
You closed the book in your lap after folding down the corner of the page and laid it gently on the coffee table. “Tell me more things that remind you you’re a person.”
He blinked. “What?”
“That’s what you meant, right? That the smell of fall makes you feel human. Tell me more things like that.”
He hadn’t realized it, but that’s exactly what he meant. And so he did. All night.
Little things. Soft things. Things no one else ever asked him about. The sound of his mom reading him Chaucer and Kempe when he was still too young to really process what the stories meant. The hot sting of seatbelt buckles in the desert sun. The click of a lamp turning on in a dark room. The way library cards used to be made of paper and crinkle at the corners. The feeling of your hand in his.
You listened like every one of them mattered. And every one of them did, to you at least.
He didn’t remember falling asleep. One minute you were curled beside him on the couch, both your heads tipped toward each other like magnets. The next, the sky outside had gone black and your fingers tangled loosely in the drawstring of his hoodie like you’d nodded off while trying to keep him from drifting too far away.
He never told you this, but when he woke up — before you stirred, before the world returned — he’d studied you. Every tiny detail. The part in your hair. The sleep-creased edge of your cheek. The way your mouth twitched when you dreamed. He counted every last freckle splayed across your cheeks. Drew constellations between them in his mind.
That was the night he knew he’d fallen hopelessly in love with you.
He blinks, and all of the sudden he’s back in the present, back at the party. You’re walking towards your date, two glasses of wine in your hands. The one you hand Ian is red. The one you sip from is white — you’d always preferred a colder, crisper Sauvignon Blanc over a full-bodied Chianti or Merlot.
You glance towards Spencer, and in that look, he swears he can see it. The ghost of that night. The version of you who laughed at the way he thought autumn smelled like #2 pencils and old books. The one that fell asleep easily with your body pressed to his side because you trusted him not to move.
He doesn’t look away.
Not yet.
Someone calls his name across the room and he answers with a vague nod. His body is here, but his mind is hovering somewhere else. Caught in the gravity of your glance, still trying to make sense of the soft exhale it pulled from his lungs.
—
You find him before he can decide to leave.
There’s a stretch of seconds as you weave through the room when Spencer wonders if he’s imagining it. If he’s hallucinating your trajectory out of want.
But no, it’s real. You’re coming toward him — slowly, carefully. Like you don’t trust what might happen when you finally get close.
“Spencer.”
His name falling from your lips still sounds just as gentle as it always had. He straightens. Not because he needs to — he’s never felt like he needs to perform for you — but because his body can’t help but brace when you look at him like that.
“Hi,” he manages, his voice quiet, like too much sound might make the moment collapse. “You look…”
Beautiful isn’t neutral. Radiant is worse.
So he lands on a very lame, very simple, “You look well.”
Your smile tilts, crooked and familiar. “Have you been avoiding me tonight?”
Spencer hesitates. He doesn’t look away, but something in his expression shifts — like he’s been caught doing something he didn’t realize was visible.
“I wasn’t trying to,” he says carefully. “Not intentionally. I just… I thought it was better to keep my distance. I didn’t want to intrude on you and...”
You nod once, like you expected that. You look across the room towards where you’d left Ian.
“He’s getting another drink,” you say, mostly to fill the space.
Spencer only nods. He doesn’t ask about him. He’s already heard enough from others. And what would you say, anyway?
He studies the curve of your wrist as you lift your glass. He used to press his mouth there — absentmindedly, in greeting, in gratitude. He blinks the memory away.
You glance down at your feet, then up again. There’s something almost sheepish about it. “You cut your hair.”
His hand grazes the back of his neck. “Yeah. A while ago.”
“I like it,” you say softly.
There’s no teasing in it. No flirtation. Just something honest. Small and steady, like the thrum of your voice used to be in the mornings, not yet fully awake, legs tangled beneath the covers.
“Thanks,” he says.
Another silence. Not awkward, not exactly. Just… weighted. Like you’re the only two people in it who remember something that’s no longer allowed to exist.
You wet your bottom lip, the way you always do when you’re thinking too hard. Spencer looks away. It feels dangerous to look for too long.
“I saw you on the news last month,” you offer. “That case in Pittsburgh.”
His gaze flicks back to you. “Yeah. That was…” He lets out a sigh. “Long week.”
“You looked tired,” you murmur. “More than usual.”
It’s not an accusation. It’s not even concern, not exactly. Just observation. You always did that — noticed things he didn’t say out loud.
He shifts his weight. “We’ve had worse.”
You nod, but you’re still watching him, seeing right through him. He used to hate that. He used to love it, too.
There’s a long pause. Then, voice soft: “You still forget to eat when you’re anxious?”
Spencer huffs a breath — almost a laugh. “I still forget almost everything when I’m anxious.”
You smile, but it’s a sad thing.
“Your mom still calls me sometimes,” you say so quietly he almost misses it. “Thinks we’re still together.”
His breath catches. “She forgets. I’m sorry. I’ve told her a bunch of times.”
You shake your head, silently telling him the apology isn’t necessary. “She always asks if you’re eating. And if I’m making sure you sleep.”
Spencer nods and swallows, hard. He can’t bring himself to answer right away.
“I never correct her. She’s always so happy when I say yes.”
That lands somewhere deep — deeper than it should. Maybe it’s easier this way. To pretend, in some small corner of the world, you’re still his.
The silence creeps in again, fuller this time. You step an inch closer, not on purpose, not consciously. He doesn’t step back. The space between your arms hums with memory.
There’s a ring on your right pointer finger, the same one you always wore — a vintage, gold band from your grandmother’s jewelry box. Spencer used to twist it mindlessly while you read.
He wonders if you let Ian do that now. He wonders if he even notices it.
“I like the dress,” he says with a nod towards your outfit before he can stop himself. “The color.”
You tilt your head. “You always liked lavender.”
“I still do.”
Internally, you start to wonder: Did you wear it because you knew he’d be here tonight? Subconsciously, did you pick this dress out of your closet with Spencer in mind?
You look down again. Then up. You meet his gaze a second too long, and for a moment, it’s like everything falls away — the party, the boyfriend, the reasons you shouldn’t still care.
Then Ian calls your name from somewhere behind you.
The sound breaks whatever thread had been holding you there. You blink, eyes clearing, and step back half an inch — enough to remind yourselves what year it is. Where you are. What this isn’t anymore.
You glance over your shoulder, then back at Spencer.
“I should—”
“Yeah,” he cuts in gently. “Of course.”
You hesitate. Just for a breath. And then: “It’s really good to see you, Spence.”
Spence. He nods, slow and careful. “You too.”
You walk away. Spencer stays where he is, heart knocking unevenly in his chest, eyes fixed on the place you’d just stood like maybe you’ll return if he waits long enough.
You don’t. But you do turn around, just once, halfway through the room. Your gaze finds his again.
It’s brief, that look. Barely a second. But it says enough:
You remember everything.
—
Somewhere across the room, you laugh.
It’s not at him — Spencer doesn’t know what was said or why it was funny — but it’s the sound that stands out to him. That specific cadence. The one that always tumbled out of you just after midnight when you were tipsy and barefoot and glowing with affection you never tried to ration.
Your hand lands on Ian’s arm, light and familiar, fingers curling just slightly.
And that—
That’s what undoes him.
Because you used to do that to him. You used to touch him like he belonged to you.
Images swirl in his mind — your palm against his skin. That sweater. That night. That look on your face when you pushed him down onto the couch like you didn’t need words to tell him you wanted him. The memory ambushes him, full and bright and dizzying, like it’s been waiting all evening for the right moment to strike.
—
One month into dating, you wore a loose red sweater on a date with Spencer — one that hung off your shoulder and drove him to the edge of restraint. He’d never say it aloud, but that sweater still haunts him. The curve of your collarbone. The bare sliver of skin at your hip when you lifted your arms. The softness of it. Of you.
You hadn’t slept together yet. Spencer had been so careful about it — cautious in that way he always was when something really mattered to him. He wanted to be sure this thing between you was real first (it was). Wanted to be sure you were ready (god, you were). Wanted to be sure he was ready, too.
You’d come back to his apartment after dinner, your thigh pressed against his in the cab, your voice syrupy and laced with secrets, low in his ear: “You gonna keep being shy, or are you gonna do something about it?”
He kissed you the second the front door closed behind you. Harder than he meant to — sloppier, too. But you moaned softly into it and fisted your hands in his jacket like you didn’t want to waste anymore time being polite about this.
It was a little frantic at first. Your back hit the wall. His belt clattered to the floor. You laughed into his mouth, breathless and giddy, hands everywhere — threading through his hair, yanking at his shirt, skimming down the front of his pants like you already knew exactly how he liked to be touched.
He walked you back into the couch, then you took the reigns and pushed him down onto it. You climbed onto his lap, straddling him, grinding down in a slow, devastating rhythm that made his vision blur.
Within minutes, you were undressed from the waist down, the sweater still on. That somehow made it even more intense — or maybe it would’ve been that way regardless, he couldn’t really say for sure. All he knew was the skin of your thighs, the heat of you moving against him, the breathy way you said his name when his hands cupped your ass and pulled you tighter into his lap.
“Spencer,” you gasped, mouth against his jaw. “Please.”
He remembers the exact moment you said it — the way your breath caught, the stutter in your hips, the way your fingers curled at the back of his neck.
You leaned in, pressed your forehead to his, so close he could feel every shake of your inhale. And then, barely above a whisper:
“I’m yours, Spence. Okay? Don’t be gentle.”
And that was it. Spencer Reid — always careful, always afraid of taking too much — finally let go.
That night, he told you he loved you with every part of his body. He didn’t say it out loud, but he knew you heard it anyway.
He fucked you slow and deep from below, gripping your hips as you rode him and matched his rhythm with every grind of your body against his. Not tender, but not rough either — just real. Like every motion was a word he couldn’t bring himself to say out loud. You clung to him, nails pressing into his shoulders, moaning softly as his lips found every part of you he could reach — your throat, your collarbone, the delicate skin just below it. He mouthed at the place your pulse fluttered hardest and stayed there until you broke.
And when you did — when you came around him with his name caught in your throat like something sacred — he followed, buried deep inside you, your name spilling from his lips like a prayer only he knew how to recite.
After, you collapsed on his chest, the red sweater twisted around your ribs, your legs still tangled with his. You were quiet in that way that only happened when you were fully content. One hand traced over the back of his — slow, barely there — like you couldn’t stand to not be touching him, even in sleep.
Meanwhile, he didn’t sleep at all.
Just lay there memorizing you: the shape of your mouth, the curve of your waist, the warmth of your bare skin under the blanket, the rise and fall of your breath.
Spencer had been with others in the past. But he’d never touched someone quite like that before. Never been touched like that either — not with that kind of need or care or want.
And now?
Now you’re across the room with someone else’s arm around your waist, yet he still can’t stop thinking about that night. About your mouth. Your hands. Your voice when you begged him not to hold back.
You catch him looking with a twitch of your lips like you’ve caught a secret.
For a second, he thinks you know what he’s remembering. Maybe you’re remembering it too.
And then, just like that, the moment passes. You look away and turn slightly toward Ian, laughing again — softer this time. But something about it’s off — you smile too quickly, blink too long, seem too practiced.
And god, Spencer feels it now — an ache that starts behind his ribs and spreads. He knows that look. The forced composure. Your tight little nod. The way your shoulders curl inward, just enough to seem invisible.
You’re tired.
Not just from the party or the heels. Not even from the fact that Spencer is here. No, you’re tired in a quiet, cell-deep way. The kind of tired that creeps in when you’ve been holding everything too tightly for too long. He used to see it in your posture before you ever spoke. In the way you’d knead at the back of your neck. In the sound of your keys hitting the kitchen counter just a little too hard.
His whole body aches with the memory of it.
Because he can’t touch your elbow now, can’t draw you into a hallway and press his hand to your spine and ask, Is it bad today? in a voice soft enough to disappear into your skin. He can’t guide you to the couch and take your shoes off for you and rub slow circles into the arch of your foot. He can’t be that version of himself for you anymore.
But he remembers. He remembers it all.
—
You’d had a rough shift.
Spencer knew before you said a word. He heard it in the way your bag hit the floor when you’d walked into his apartment — not thrown exactly, but dropped with too much force. Watched it in the way you kicked off your shoes in the hallway like they’d betrayed you. You didn’t kiss him hello. Didn’t even meet his eyes.
You just paced the kitchen in your scrubs, hands trembling slightly. Your voice cracked when it finally came. “She was just a kid, Spence. She died right in front of me.”
He didn’t answer at first. Just crossed the room, took your phone gently from your hand, and set it down on the counter.
You looked at him like you weren’t sure if he’d understand. Like some part of you expected him to step back.
But then, you broke.
It happened all at once, because panic doesn’t slow down or ask permission. One moment you were upright, breathing, trying — and the next, you were not. Your breath hitched. Your eyes went wide. Your hands clawed at your chest like you needed to open it, like the air in your lungs wasn’t enough.
“I can’t— I can’t—”
“I know, baby,” he said, already reaching.
He slid to the floor with you, back against the cabinets, his body folding around yours to hold you steady. His hands were firm but gentle — one at your shoulder, one at the base of your spine.
“I’ve got you,” he whispered. “You’re okay. You’re right here.”
You let out a single, ragged sob and collapsed against him, clutching his shirt like it was the only thing keeping you from falling through the floor. He didn’t flinch — just tightened his arms around you, voice soft and measured in your ear.
“Five things you can see,” he murmured. “Just try for me.”
You shook your head, breath shallow, shoulders tight. “Can’t.”
“Okay. Okay. Just look, then.” His hand moved slowly along your back. “The floor tile. The fridge magnets. The photo of us in Vegas framed on the wall. That stupid spiky plant you named Steve. Me. I’m right here.”
You gasped — air, finally — and he held you through it.
“You’re not alone,” he said, steady as a heartbeat. “You’re safe. I’ve got you.”
It took seven minutes for your breathing to settle. Even longer for your hands to stop shaking. But he didn’t let go.
Later, when you were curled against his side in bed — voice scratchy, eyes raw — you said it like a confession:
“I’m sorry, Spence. I…I don’t want to be too much.”
He turned toward you and answered without hesitation as he pulled you closer into him.
“There’s no such thing as too much. Not with you.” He pressed a soft kiss to your temple before adding, “You’re just enough, all the time.”
—
The memory lingers long after it fades.
Spencer exhales, slow and shaky, chest tight with the ghost of it — your voice in his ear, your fingers curled into his shirt, the unbearable tenderness of that night on the kitchen floor. He can still feel the imprint of you, sharp as breath in cold air.
When he blinks, the present returns in pieces: music pulsing, voices laughing, people moving all around him. But it’s your absence that hits harder: You’re gone. You’re not near Ian, not near the party hosts, not near anyone. You’ve slipped out of the crowd, vanished discreetly like you always could when your shoulders got too heavy to hold up.
He knows where you’ve gone before he even moves. Knows the way you seek out quiet. Knows the exact rhythm of your retreat.
And so he follows.
—
It’s started to snow.
Not hard — just flurries, soft and inconsistent, the kind that hover before deciding whether or not they want to stick. String lights stretch across the balcony railing, catching in the wind.
You’re alone. Or trying to be, at least.
One hand rests on the railing. Your thumb circles the condensation on your wine glass, which you’ve long stopped drinking from — just holding it now, mostly for the sake of keeping your fingers occupied.
Spencer finds you like gravity. Like an orbit he never quite escaped.
You don’t turn when you hear him step outside. You don’t have to — you already knew he’d be the one to track you down.
The door hushes shut behind him. He doesn’t speak, not at first — just stands there for a moment in the doorway, watching your silhouette outlined against the snow-smeared sky.
You exhale through your nose. “Ian talks too much when he’s nervous.”
Spencer steps closer. “You used to say the same thing about me.”
You look over your shoulder. Not smiling, but not not smiling either. “Yeah. But it was different with you.”
He doesn’t respond, but you hear the way his breath catches. He shrugs out of his jacket without thinking — an instinct time hasn’t yet pulled from him. It’s the same instinct that used to make him drape it over your shoulders on late walks home, or leave it folded at the foot of your bed after an argument, still carrying the shape of his body. He eases it around you gently, and you let him. You hold it closed at the collar with one hand, and for a second, Spencer swears you lean into the warmth of it — the him of it.
“Has it always been this cold in January?” you ask with a laugh, eyes on the city skyline.
Spencer’s quiet for a moment. Then: “Yeah. But I think we just didn’t notice it the last few Januaries. Or at least I didn’t.”
You turn your head to look at him, slowly this time. “Why not?”
His eyes don’t leave yours. “Because I had you.”
And just like that, the wind cuts through the silence between you. You both shiver, but neither of you move.
“Some nights I still wake up thinking I heard your voice,” you say quietly.
He blinks.
“I don’t know what it says. It’s not really words — just… the shape of them. I think my brain fills in the rest.”
Spencer swallows, hard. “What does your brain imagine?”
You shake your head. “All kinds of things, I guess. But it definitely misses how you used to say my name.”
He doesn’t answer right away. His hands twitch at his sides. His throat works around something sharp.
“You know,” he says softly, “I still talk to you sometimes. In my head. I still tell you about cases, and books you’d hate, and little things I see that remind me of you.”
You blink quickly, but not quick enough to hide the sheen in your eyes. “Do I ever answer?”
He nods, his voice rough, a sad smile pulling at his lips. “Yeah. Sometimes you do.”
A beat passes. The snow starts to stick in your hair.
You both move at the same time. Just a half-step closer, your bodies angled toward each other like two halves of the same thought.
His hand brushes your wrist on the railing. Yours lingers at the lapel of his jacket, still clutched around you like armor. Your eyes drop to his mouth then flicker back up. You’re not smiling. Neither is he.
The city exhales around you. Somewhere inside, a champagne cork pops. But it feels like you’re the only two people on the planet.
Spencer leans forward — just barely. His forehead nearly touches yours, close enough to feel your breath warm the space between you. His voice, when it comes, is barely a sound:
“I would’ve done anything to keep you.”
You don’t flinch. You don’t cry. You just whisper, “I know.”
And you do. You know. You’ve always known.
A full minute passes like that. Eventually, you pull back and shrug the jacket from your shoulders, hold it out with an unsteady hand. Spencer takes it slowly, without a word, fingers brushing yours for a half-second too long.
You step towards the door and turn slightly, just enough to get a look at him. “Do you remember the last thing I said to you?”
Spencer watches the snow catch in your hair. “Of course.”
You nod once. “I meant it.” You pause, blink back a tear before adding, “I still mean it.”
You look at him then — really look, as if you’re expecting him to say something in response, but he doesn’t. And so, after one more tremble of hesitation, you’re gone.
Spencer doesn’t go inside right away. He watches the snow collect in the grooves of the railing, in the spaces between bricks on the balcony wall. Watches his breath fog in the air like smoke. He can still smell your perfume on his jacket. Still feel the shape of your voice in his chest.
And god, if you’d asked him, if you’d reached, if you’d said come with me, he would have, without question.
But that’s the thing about moments — they pass. And once they do, all that’s left is the before. And the after.
He presses his palms to the cold railing. Breathes deep. And then, the darkest memory comes.
—
You weren’t angry. That was the worst part.
You were quiet. Controlled. A little too still — like someone who’d already cried in the car then reapplied her makeup and practiced how to sound fine. Spencer had been reading when you showed up, a case file open beside him, a mug of tea cooling untouched on the coffee table.
He hadn’t been expecting you.
But the second he looked up and saw you in the doorway — your jacket still zipped, your eyes dim, your shoulders pulled back like a wall — he knew. Even before you spoke, he knew.
You sat on the edge of the couch without a word. You didn’t take off your shoes. Didn’t reach for his hand. Just stared at him, quietly. Like you were still deciding whether or not to break your own heart.
“I don’t want to do this,” you said softly once you finally got yourself to speak.
Spencer’s breath hitched. “Then don’t.”
But you shook your head, eyes glassy. “It’s not that simple.”
And he felt it then — that slow, precise tear in the fabric of something he thought he could still fix. The moment peeling open like skin beneath a dull blade.
“I love you,” you said. “That hasn’t changed. I need you to know that.”
His lips parted. He said your name — soft, small — like maybe saying it would anchor you both back to solid ground.
But you went on. “I just don’t know how to be with you when you won’t let me in.”
He blinked, confused. “I let you in.”
“No.” You shook your head again, more tired than anything else. “I know you wanted to. And you thought you did. But… you didn’t. Not really.”
Spencer looked down. He knew you were right.
He’d been quietly withdrawing for months — not in big, obvious ways, but slowly. Case after case. Canceled dates, sleepless nights, long silences between texts. Promises made in touches instead of words, apologies offered in the form of forehead kisses and new books and please don’t ask me to talk about it.
You’d stayed anyway.
You kept showing up — with dinner, with warmth, with hope. And he kept failing to reach back the way you needed him to.
He wanted to believe you knew that he loved you, even if he didn’t always know how to say it when the weight got too heavy. But he never really told you where the weight lived. Never let you see what it cost him just to hold it all together.
“It’s not you,” he said, the words spilling out too fast, like they were trying to outrun the inevitable. “It’s just— I’ve been… I’ve been trying not to make it worse.”
Your brows knit in confusion. “Worse?”
“For you,” he said softly. “I didn’t want to drag you into my darkness. I thought… I thought I was protecting you.”
That was the moment something shifted in your face. Not anger. Not even disappointment. Just that quiet kind of grief that comes from loving someone who keeps pointing you to a door without handing you the key.
“I didn’t need protecting, Spencer,” you said. “I just needed you.”
He reached for you then, without thinking. Not to fix it — he already knew it was too late for that — but to hold on to you one last time.
You almost let him, but then you pulled away. The moment had already passed. The truth had already landed.
“I keep waiting for you to let me all the way in,” you whispered. “Keep hoping. Keep thinking if I just love you a little harder, maybe you’d stop holding back.”
He wanted to tell you he never meant to. That he never meant for the silence to feel like distance, or for his grief to become a barrier. But he couldn’t find the words. Couldn’t even lift his eyes to meet yours.
“I didn’t realize you felt that way,” he choked out.
“I know. That’s the worst part.”
And then — like a wound coming undone at the seam — you stood.
He stood too — reflexive, as if maybe just the movement would change your mind. But you were already reaching for your bag, already curling into yourself, one arm tucked across your ribs like you were barely holding your body together.
“I’m sorry,” you said. “I can’t do this anymore. I need to feel like I can breathe again.”
He nodded. Because what else do you do when the person you love more than anything else in the universe is asking you to let them go?
You turned toward the door and took a few strides before hesitating and looking back.
Spencer was still standing there, frozen in place, eyes red and rimmed with tears, shoulders hunched like he was trying to make himself smaller — like if he could just shrink the hurt, maybe you’d stay.
You reached into your coat pocket and pulled out a key — your key to his place, the one you’d already taken off your keychain as you cried in the car. You set it down on the entry table, and your fingers lingered over the shape of it for a second too long before pulling back and reaching for the door.
You steadied yourself enough to speak, but your voice still broke as you did. The kind of words that echo louder once the silence sets in:
“I’ll love you forever, Spencer. Even if I have to do it from far away.”
Despite your best efforts, you froze once more before you could bring yourself to step outside. “I’ll never stop,” you added in a whisper.
Then the door closed behind you.
—
The snow’s falling heavier now. Slow, deliberate flakes, shapeless against the sky.
Spencer stays outside long after the cold has sunk into his hands, long after the balcony door clicks shut behind him. Somewhere behind the glass, people are laughing. A new song is starting. But all of it feels miles away.
You’d asked him — softly, like it might break if you said it too loud:
“Do you remember the last thing I said to you?”
He’d thought it was just nostalgia. A prompt for some shared memory, a fragment you wanted him to hold with you for a final moment before moving on.
But it wasn’t.
You weren’t asking if he remembered — no. You were asking if he still believed you.
I’ll love you forever. I’ll never stop.
I still mean it.
He grips the railing tighter. Because now he understands: you weren’t reaching back into a memory. You were reaching towards him. Tentatively. Hopefully. Asking if it still means anything. If it’s still real.
You’ve moved on, at least that’s what you tell yourself. Maybe Ian — solid, safe Ian — is more than just a placeholder. Maybe it’s still the wrong time for you and Spencer. But maybe some small, stubborn part of you is still tethered to him by a thread neither of you has had the courage to cut.
Maybe that look you gave him tonight wasn’t just nostalgia. Maybe it was permission. Or forgiveness. Or both.
Maybe it’s not too late.
Or maybe it is.
But maybe — just maybe — if he reaches, you’ll reach back.
And for the first time in 313 days, Spencer can’t bring himself to just wonder from afar.
He needs to find out.
—
The warmth of the party hits him too fast once he steps back inside.
It's jarring, like surfacing through ice. Noise and light and heat pressing in on all sides.
He moves before he knows where he’s going. Not calmly. Not with logic. Just instinct — pulled forward like a tide. Past the hallway. Past the bar. Past an acquaintance calling his name.
He’s scanning the crowd now with something closer to desperation than hope. Looking for the lavender of your dress, the curve of your mouth, the shape of a future he once held in both hands.
He thinks he sees your hair by the fireplace, but it isn’t you. Just someone with the same soft tilt of the head. Another not-you in a sea full of not-yous.
He checks the hallway. A guest bedroom. The stairwell. The far end of the kitchen.
You’re not there. You aren’t anywhere.
The edges of the room start to blur. For a moment, he thinks he’s too late. Thinks maybe you’ve already slipped through his fingers for good.
But then — he sees you.
Near the front door, coat draped over your arm, ready to leave. Ian’s standing beside you, saying something low near your ear. You’re nodding, distracted. Your fingers tighten around your purse strap.
Spencer stops moving.
His whole body goes still — like someone hit pause mid-scene. Like the universe has given him one last, final frame to memorize you before you’re gone.
He could go to you. Reach for you and pull you into him, Ian be damned. Say your name. Tell you the truth — that it’s been 313 days since you left and he’s loved you for every single one of them. That when you turned to him on the balcony and said I still mean it, he should’ve said I never stopped, either.
But he doesn’t.
Because the part of him that’s always loved you best — the part that curled around you on the kitchen floor, the part that kept you at a distance thinking it was safest — knows what it means to protect someone.
And sometimes it means letting you walk away, even when it feels like it might kill him.
So he stays where he is. Doesn’t speak. Doesn’t move.
He just watches.
Watches the way you pause at the door like something intangible is tugging at you. Watches the moment your head turns, as if your muscles knew he was there before your heart could catch up.
Your eyes meet Spencer’s across the foyer, and for a second, the rest of the world vanishes.
Neither of you smiles. Neither speaks.
But everything is said.
It’s in the way your mouth parts like you might call his name and then don’t. In the way you look at him like you remember it all. Like you never stopped remembering. Like you never stopped wanting.
He wants to go to you. God, he does. It takes every ounce of strength in him to hold back.
And after one long, fragile heartbeat, you look away and leave with Ian’s hand pressed against your back.
The door closes softly behind you. Spencer doesn’t move.
He watches the snow blur the windows. Watches the space you left behind.
And in the quiet, he holds it all. The ache. The memories. The weight of a love he never stopped carrying. The feeling of caring so deeply for someone from the outside of a life that used to be his.
Because that’s what he is now — an outsider.
Not your partner. Not your future.
Just some protector.
And maybe — for now — that can be enough.
ᝰ.ᐟ
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