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Reid makes his way into the bullpen, tightening the scarf around his neck. It's handmade by Garcia, knitted out of a special fabric that doesn't set his nerves on edge. It's very soft, and he needs that more than ever today.
"Hey there, pretty boy!" Morgan calls from his desk, offering a hand up in wave. "You enjoy your time off?"
Nervously, he tightens his hands on the strap of his messenger bag. "Yeah," he mumbles softly, pausing where he stands. "It was great." The words cause his throat to burn, and he resists gulping. That makes it worse.
Morgan's grin dims a little at the hoarseness in Reid's voice. "You okay?"
"Me?" Reid asks, tempering his voice to display the right amount of incredulity. "Why wouldn't I be?"
Morgan's curious eyes travel across him, asking silent questions that Reid will not be answering. Quickly, Reid scurries the rest of the way to his desk.
"So," Morgan starts, twisting his chair around to regard Reid, "What'd you and your mom get up to?"
Reid drops his bag to the floor beside his seat, quietly hoping that Morgan will drop it. "Not much." The same burning sensation lights up his throat. "Just hanging out, you know?"
"Hmm." Morgan taps the pen in his hand restlessly against the desk, eyebrows drawn together in consternation. "That all?"
Instinctively, Reid gulps, and the fire that licks up his throat causes a wince to dart across his face. Morgan's eyes narrow.
"Reid!" JJ calls, face lighting up in a smile across the bullpen. She spies the genius sitting at his desk, fresh from vacation and immediately crosses the foyer to him. "You're back. How's your mom?"
She opens her arms wide, pulling him out of the chair and into an embrace. He schools his face to remain carefully impassive, even as his body aches.
"She's good." He pats her back gently, unable even now to resist the warmth of her hug. Her fingers splay out across his back. "The doctors, they um, had to up her medications." He trips over the words, and his gaze has to move away from Morgan's ever-suspicious eyes.
JJ finally pulls back, patting his cheek gently with one hand. "We missed you, Spence."
Her arm catches on the scarf around his neck, and he feels the fabric tug. Adrenaline curses through his body, and he recoils away, hands traveling up to secure the scarf.
She throws her hands up instantly, offering him space. Her face crinkles in worry.
"Kid?" Morgan asks, now on his feet. They both eye him in such an intently seeking way that he feels his body flinch.
"It's nothing," he assures quickly. "I'm fine."
The last thing he wants to do is worry his team, to bother them with things that aren't that important, that aren't even that bad-
"Sure," JJ replies sarcastically, irritation painting her features. "Don't lie to me, Spence." She plants her hands on her hips, full of motherly perturbation.
"Spit it out, Reid," Morgan orders, sharing a worried look with JJ.
"It's-It's not a big deal," Reid tries again, cheeks turning red with embarrassment. "I don't want to bother you guys-"
"Oookay," JJ draws, that same irritation clear in her voice. "That could never happen, okay?" Her eyes betray her worry, and she places a tentative hand on his arm. "Now, what's up?"
Reid gazes around the bullpen, thankful to find it empty. This is embarrassing enough without the additive prying eyes of Emily and Rossi, let alone Garcia.
"It's really not bad," he starts out by reassuring. "It looks bad, but it isn't?" Even as he says it, the words singe his aching throat.
JJ stiffens, mouth pressing into a thin line. Beside her, Morgan crosses his arms in front of his chest.
Slowly, in a painstakingly embarrassing motion, he begins to unwind the handmade scarf from his neck. Even as soft as the fabric is, it still pulls tortuously against his neck.
JJ gasps as he unwinds the fabric, her eyes going wide and her hand traveling to cover her tightly pressed lips. "Spence," she breaths, unable to tear her gaze away from the bruising splattered across his neck.
"Kid." Morgan's tone betrays the same surprise, and he takes an immediate step forward. His mouth falls open in shock. "What happened?"
Reid feels like a petulant child, cowering beneath the gaze of two disappointed parents. His fingers anxiously begin to twiddle, a nervous tick.
"It just looks bad," he assures quickly, unable to meet their eyes.
"Looks bad?" Morgan asks, slackened with shock. "Who did that to you?"
"Have you been checked out?" JJ demands. "You- you need medical attention."
She makes towards the phone, intention clear in her body language.
"Don't!" Reid blocks her, shielding his desk from the worried agents. "Don't. I've been checked out. You don't need to call anyone."
JJ doesn't step back, shock planting her feet in front of him. A hand reaches up, longing to touch the pain written across his neck and erase it, but his instinctual flinch has her pulling back. "What happened, Spence?" She asks, voice light as a falling feather.
"Does Hotch know?" Morgan questions heatedly. The shock under his skin is being replaced with righteous anger, and he bubbles with the unreleased lava of rage.
"No." Reid swallows thickly, grimacing. "It won't impact my work here. I assure you that this won't affect my ability-"
"Stop." JJ holds up a hand, silencing him. Her voice is gruff, full of emotion. "Just, stop. We don't care about that. We care about you. What the hell happened?"
He wants to melt out of his skin and pool onto the floor, as improbable as that desire is.
"It wasn't her fault," he begs, and JJ's eyes light in understanding. She has to screw them shut as the context of the sentence washes over her.
"Is that why they had to increase her meds?" She asked softly, and she finally crosses the barrier between them, letting her fingers find the soft skin of his cheek.
"Your mom?" Morgan spits out after a moment, catching the meaning of Reid's words only a sparse moment after JJ. His dark eyes grow wide.
Restlessly, Reid's fingers dance softly across the violet covered marks painting his throat. "She doesn't realize," he explains gently. "She was having an episode, and she didn't recognize me. She thought I was someone else, that's all. She'd never actually hurt me-"
"Okay." JJ calms his dancing fingers, clutching them in her own.
"That's not right, Reid." Morgan struggles to temper his own cascading emotions. "How long-"
Reid knows where that question is heading, and he heeds it off quickly. That's a rabbit hole far too deep to fall into. "She's doing much better on Haloperidol now that it's been upped in dosage."
"Reid," JJ begins, using the kind of voice you'd employ on a frightened deer, "I know she's your mom, and I know that she loves you-"
Morgan scoffs next to her, and Reid's loyalty kicks up. He shoots Derek a dark look. "She's sick, okay?"
"But, this is trauma." JJ refuses to release his hands, and she moves her head to catch his wandering eyes. "You know that right?"
"I'm fine." He offers the words to both Morgan and JJ, hopeful to placate them in this misguided quest of justice. "I don't want to talk about it, please?"
JJ softens at the edges. "Spence-"
"How often does this happen, kid?" Morgan demands. He's taken up anxiously pacing, the shoes on his feet threatening to wear a hole in the carpet. "How does she even feel-"
"She never remembers," Reid quickly interjects. It's an acquittal; how can Diana Reid possibly be guilty of hurting him if she never even recalls it?
Morgan pauses, screwing his eyes shut. "Kid, that- that's not right."
"She's my mom," he counters softly. "She doesn't mean to. It's fine."
"It's not," JJ offers to the contrary, and he can see the rebuttal brewing in her expression-
"Boy Wonder!" Garcia calls excitedly from across the bullpen, emerging from her secret batcave.
His eyes open wide, and he fumbles desperately for the scarf to hide the mess of his neck. He doesn't want to bother Garcia, doesn't want to bring rain clouds to her constantly sunny exterior.
"Here." Morgan offers the soft scarf out to him, his expression conflicted. "Just- we need to talk about this, okay? Later?"
Reid snatches the scarf from Morgan's hand, noosing it around his neck moments before Garcia throws exuberant arms around him.
"Oh, Boy Genius, how we have missed you and that beautiful, beautiful brain of yours." Garcia smiles a magazine-worthy grin at him, bopping his nose gently with her index finger. "You must tell us all about your adventures-"
"Yeah," he croaks out amicably. "Of course."