#(And yes I did spend an extra few minutes making that gif solely for this goofy 20 second clip)

[royalarchivist]

When Phil is away, the crows (and Ian) will play.

[sierraraeck]

How to Make Friends (Pt.2)

Spencer x OC Aundreya

Masterlist | Series Masterlist

Summary: Spencer’s had a problem with Aundreya since the start. How is she going to earn his respect? Story four.

Category: Some angst, some fluff.

Warnings: Cussing. Quick mention of normal CM stuff and the quick retelling of two rough childhoods. Mentions of bullying.

Word Count: 3.0k

I slept until noon the next day. That wasn’t typical behavior for me, because I always enjoyed being up around seven in the morning so I could feel like I was doing something more productive than sleeping. However, I didn’t get back to my apartment until around three am and figured that I was going to need more that four hours of sleep if I was going to make it through an entire dinner with Doctor Grumpy.

The government finally trusted me enough to have a work phone after four weeks, especially because a case of ours almost ended in a dead ten year old because I didn’t have a phone to call the team on when I had new information. I’d already gotten myself a personal phone that the government didn’t know about, and neither did Dalton. It’s not like I actually used it for anything, except for personal texts from the team and occasional calls, but as you can imagine those didn’t happen frequently. Aaron turned a blind eye as long as I gave Garcia full monitoring permissions. Not like she actually needed my permission to hack into my phone and get my records or anything. He did make me agree not to have anyone ‘firewall’ it and I made the convincing case that it has a GPS, so as Dalton was slowly removed from his duties, the team would always have a way of tracking me. Plus, he didn’t think it was a terrible idea to have a secondary contact for me in case something happened.

However, today was one of those days that I used it.

It’s Reid. How’s Fabi’s?

He’d sent the text at 5:30 in the morning. Why was he up?

Good. How’s 6?

I quickly replied and put my phone down. I didn’t bother eating because I didn’t care enough. I threw on some workout stuff and went down to the clubhouse gym. I worked out practically every day. When I was younger, I always wanted to play college volleyball. I had just started training when my life went awry, and one of the things that kept me sane, that kept me connected to my humanity, was continuing that training. I did high intensity workouts everyday on the streets. I was then roped in to a mixed martial arts gym that I would visit regularly, which is where I met Sydney for the first time. It’s how I got involved with the Cloaks. Once I was thrown in prison, working out was one of the only things we could do. We had limited reading material, limited social time, limited gym time. But the nice thing about working out is that you don’t necessarily need a gym.

I was about to start my final set of squats when Dalton blasted into the gym.

“Have you been here this whole time!” His face had a slight pink color to it, like he’d been holding his breath for far too long.

“Yes.”

“Jesus Christ! Did you forget that today was a check in day?”

Yes. “No. I just thought that I’d be finished by two and was counting on you being late.”

“When have I ever been late?” he asked me, dumbfounded. It was a valid question considering it only happened once and it was only by about five minutes. I didn’t call him on it then, but I figured I would now.

“Uh, let’s see. How about that one time that you were late to the airport picking me up because you were having a good time with your lady friend.” I wiggled my eyebrows at him.

He sighed. “Dammit. When you didn’t say anything I thought that you were too tired to notice and hopefully too tired to remember. I should have known better.”

“Yes you should have.”

“Wait, how’d you know I was with someone? I’ve never even told you anything about me.” He didn’t sound irritated, which I figured he might be, but all I heard was curiosity.

“Come on. I’m working as a profiler for the BAU and before that my life depended on my ability to pick up on the slightest details,” I reminded him. He nodded. Then just for fun, I added, “Plus, I’m also a really good spy and private investigator.”

“What’re you saying?”

“I’m not saying anything.”

“Have you been watching me?”

“I didn’t say that.”

“But you implied it.”

“No I didn’t.”

“Yes, you did.” I always found a bit of extra pleasure from messing with my trusty watch-dog. “Have you actually been following me?”

“Definitely not. That would be weird and completely inappropriate,” I said with a wink. I walked past him, deciding to cut myself one set short.

“Seriously?”

“Bye, Dalton,” I said in a sultry tone, halfway out the door.

“Don’t forget, I’ll be back Sunday!” he called after me.

“I’m counting on it. Tell Renee hi for me!” I said, letting the door slowly close behind me.

“Aundreya!” I turned and waved to him through the glass doors, a big grin spreading across my face.

When I returned to my apartment, I checked my phone for a response from Reid.

Good.

That was all I got. At least we were keeping it simple.

# # # # # # # # # # # # #

I got to the restaurant about five minutes early, refusing to be late to my own dinner. I walked in and looked around to see if Spencer was there yet. He wasn’t. I thought about waiting for him, but instead I just got us a table. I slicked my dress down under my legs as I sat. I’d picked out a cute, black, pencil dress with an arrowhead necklace and combat boots. Someone kill me if I ever voluntarily wear heels for longer than a few minutes. I had never gotten my ears pierced, so I didn’t have any other jewelry. I also didn’t want to look like I was trying too hard.

He came in wearing a dress shirt and a tie, but no jacket. He looked nice. He spotted me quickly and came to sit down.

“Hey,” I said.

“Hi.” We sat there in awkward silence while the waitress came and put water glasses down in front of us. We both immediately took a sip.

He decided to break the silence first. “I just want to apologize for-”

“Don’t even worry about it,” I cut him off. I had a good idea as to where that sentence was going and it was unnecessary.

“No, I am going to worry about it. I want to apologize for how I’ve treated you. I immediately judged you for your label without actually getting to know you. That was wrong of me and I’m hoping we can start over.” His voice was steady and his eyes were calm. I gave him a small smile and a nod.

“I can definitely work with that. What do you want to know first?”

“You just want me to ask you questions?”

“Yeah. I’ve found that that works the best. I want to start where you’re the most interested.”

“Um, okay,” he swallowed. “You said you ended up on the streets when you were fourteen?”

“Yep.”

“So tell me what happened before that.” I smiled at him. It was a great starting point.

“Okay. I grew up with divorced parents. They got divorced when I was six. My father was abusive, mostly verbally-”

“Mostly?” he asked.

“Yeah. Mostly,” I replied. I wasn’t ready yet to talk about what happened on the other end of the ‘mostly’. He saw it too. “I stopped living with him when I was nine or ten. My sister decided to stay in contact with him over the phone and occasionally in person after that, but I completely cut him out. I haven’t seen or talked to him since, except for the times that he showed up at my school or sporting events unannounced and unwanted.”

Spencer was shaking his head in disbelief. “I’m sorry.”

“I appreciate that. From ten to fourteen, I lived happily. I was solely with my mom and I was going to school, planning my future. At the start of the year, I walked into the right place at the wrong time. I witnessed one of the biggest serial slaughters ever committed, by one of the FBI’s most wanted.”

“The Storefront Slaughterer,” Reid said.

I nodded. “I don’t know how, but he didn’t realize he left a survivor. Somehow my face got leaked to the press so my family and I had to go into witness protection. Long story short, by the end of that year, he’d found us before the FBI found him. He burned our house down and I was the only one who got out.”

“So then you decided to live on the streets?” his voice was soft, not a hint of judgement like I’d imagined in my head before having this conversation.

“Yeah. My options were to go back and live with my father or fend for myself on the streets. I was willing to take my chances and I wanted to help catch the man that took everything from me.”

“That was very brave of you.”

“Thanks.”

“Didn’t the FBI catch him the following year with the help of an-”

“Anonymous tipper? Yeah, they did.”

“That was you?” his eyes got bigger as realization set in.

“Sure was. I’d spend my first year on the streets making connections and setting a trap for the Storefront Slaughterer. Everyday I got up and I did more digging. That’s how I got good at private investigating and spying. Once the final pieces of my plan came together, I tipped off the FBI and they were able to catch him.”

“Once they caught him, didn’t that mean you could get off the streets and go back to normal?”

I smiled at how intrigued he seemed to be. “Not really. Nothing was normal for me anymore. I’d spent a year in witness protection and another on the streets trying to catch this guy. Plus, I still would have had to go back and live with my father, and at that point, I had just gotten comfortable out on the streets. People babied me at first because of my age. I realized that, but I also realized I looked older than I was, so I started lying to people about my age and I earned massive respect for my talents and catching the Slaughterer. I made the decision that things might end up better for me on the streets then going back to how things were. The streets became my new normal.”

“Wow, that’s…” he trailed off.

“Crazy?” I offered.

“No. Well, kind of. But I was going to say incredible. I mean, you were already one of the smartest and most skilled informants on the streets at the age of fourteen.”

I laughed. “Well I hear you weren't doing too bad yourself at age fourteen.”

“That’s true,” he smiled, “but I wasn’t having to learn street survival skills.”

“No, you were doing something much harder.” There was that sweet sound of laughter again. He told me all about his childhood, which honestly seemed non-existent, and I realized how much we actually had in common. His dad left him when he was young, his mother has schizophrenia, he practically raised himself, was constantly bullied, and despite all that he was still able to be successful. It amazed me and I told him that.

“Thank you. That means a lot,” he said, humbly. I could tell he didn’t fully believe the words himself, which made me sad.

“You know I mean that, right?”

“Yes.”

“So why don’t you believe it?”

He looked up at me. “No one’s asked me that before.”

“If you don’t want to answer me that’s fine. I’m just wondering because despite being one of the coolest people I’ve met, and I’ve met a lot of people, you still don’t seem to resonate with my praises.”

He let out a huge sigh. “My dad had told me many times that I was smart and important and deserving of a good life. But he then turned around and told me that I was too hard to care for and he left. Ever since then, it’s hard for me to believe anyone when they compliment me because I never know if they mean it. On top of that, being constantly bullied didn’t help my self-confidence,” he met my eyes, his own glistening. It hurt me to think that someone who overcame so much and is probably one of the smartest people on the planet didn’t think he was all that. I had already respected him, but that feeling continued to grow the more I got to know him.

“Let me tell you something. If you get nothing else out of this dinner, get this. You and I were in very similar situations when we were younger. You were strong enough to overcome all of the obstacles put in your way and came out the other side as a caring genius who saves lives. Someone else in your situation, someone like myself, wasn’t as mentally strong as you and chose the wrong path. Sure, I’m here now, but you stayed the course and made it here yourself. No one had to come and save you, you saved yourself. And I’d say that’s something to be pretty damn proud of.” I was dead serious and I needed him to know that. An unfamiliar feeling surged through me that I wasn’t able to immediately put my finger on.

Admiration. I admired him. He was who I wanted to be before my life got flipped upside down and I was forced to change my ideals.

I barely heard him when he whispered, “Thank you.”

I nodded and our waitress came over to place the bill on the table. Spencer started to reach for it before I quickly put my hand down on it, sliding it my way. “Nuh, uh. I’m taking you to dinner, remember?”

“But you’ve paid for everyone else-”

“Don’t worry about it,” I said with a wink.

“Oh you two make such a nice couple,” the waitress said. She was a woman in her late fifties and appeared to be swooning over what she thought was young love.

I gave a single nervous laugh, slipping my dollar bills in the fold, before replying, “No, ma’am, we’re not a couple.”

“Sure you’re not. Just keep telling yourselves that,” she said, taking the bill and cash from me, strutting away. Spencer and I made confused eye contact and we both started laughing.

“That was bold,” he said.

“You’re telling me. I think we should inform her that we’re the profilers here,” I said, and we both laughed again.

“Hey, I have one more question for you,” he said, attitude quickly shifting back to serious.

“Shoot.”

“Why’d you step in the other day?”

I was confused for a moment before remembering what he was most likely referencing. “Oh you mean with Kristy? It wasn’t a big deal, she seemed like a bitch anyways.”

“Anyway,” he corrected with a smirk.

“Okay. Fine. You got me on that one, Doctor Genius,” I said, playfully rolling my eyes.

“But seriously, why did you? And how could you tell before everyone else that I was uncomfortable?”

“I guess I’ve been able to pick up on a tell that no one else has learned to pay attention to. And I stepped in because I saw you were uncomfortable and figured you had enough of that going on with me around,” I replied. I made a small joke out of it, hoping he wouldn’t press me farther, because I honestly didn’t know why I stepped in. Sure, I was curious as to who she was, why she was making him uneasy, and it was a means of extending an olive branch, but there was something else. I respected him, and I wanted him to respect me (I don’t know why it actually mattered that much to me) but I didn’t think that was it either. Plus, I would have done that for any of the team members.

Probably.

I sighed, not willing to dig further into my psyche, at least not today and definitely not now.

The waitress returned with my change, giving Spencer and I a longing look. I smiled to myself, wondering what happened to this poor woman that she felt the desire to watch us exit the restaurant together. We walked toward the parking lot in silence.

“Thank you again,” Reid said to me. There was an undertone that implied he was thanking me for more than just the food.

I gave him a half smile. “Of course. Thank you for agreeing to go out with me.”

He nodded, but before he turned away, I caught him with one last question.

“Just out of curiosity, how much of that did you already know?”

He looked at me, confusion apparent on his face. “None of it.”

“Really? The team didn’t tell you anything?” It was my turn to be confused.

“Well they tried, but it didn’t feel right. I figured whatever it was, you’d tell me on your own terms. I wouldn’t have wanted them sharing things with you that I wasn’t ready to have you know about me yet. I owed you the same courtesy.” With that, he turned around and continued on to his car. I was bewildered by his gentlemanly manners, especially since they held up in a situation regarding a criminal he loathed. Or at least he used to loathe.

That thought made me smile.

“Goodnight, Spencer,” I called over as he was getting into his vehicle.

“Goodnight, Aundreya.”

I returned home, able to fall asleep feeling better about my life than I had in awhile.