Lies - Criminal Minds || Spencer Reid Fanfiction

23. Blue

"It is then he realises that certain things loom larger than forgiveness and reconciliation: memory, for one, and history, bloody history." ~ Omar Musa

The Daughter

I was still emotional about my dad and Beth's thoughtful gesture the following evening when I arrived back in New York.

The team had hit a wall of paper and I'd happily left them to it in order to spend that little bit of extra time with my family.

I never realised how much I'd missed being around my parents and Jack. When I was with them it was as though I was no longer the head of my own Unit living it up in NYC in my thirties.

But instead, I was their little girl, young and no older than eighteen.

But I liked it that way. Beth fussed over me and made sure I was eating enough while my dad warned me about men and the dangers of dating while in New York without my family "around to protect me" and then kissed my forehead goodnight.

They even checked in on me before they went to bed themselves.

It was overwhelming how much they cared for me, and I felt breathless and choked by my surprise at how I'd gone almost thirty years without having one parent at all; let alone two now.

Because I really did see Beth as a mum.

When I got back to my apartment I set the keys on the side table; punching in my alarm code and locking the door behind me; dumping my go-bag under the table and kicking my boots off by the coat-stand where I hung my suit jacket.

Sighing emphatically and tiredly to myself I padded through to my bedroom; hanging my gun-belt on the hook on the wall beside my bed and untucking my blouse from my suit trousers; smirking again at the fact that I'd lifted the wrong go-bag to take to the wedding in DC. Beth and my dad hadn't let me live that one down.

I flicked on the bedside lamp and immediately could sense that something was wrong.

Something was... off about the room.

I took a step back and turned towards the bed; knowing immediately it was something to do with there.

My breath hitched in my throat as I realised the two bedside tables had been rearranged. My alarm clock had been moved from the right night-stand where I stood, to the left one along with my glasses box, reading book, bottle of water and phone charger. On the right night-stand was now the main landline telephone and notepad.

My scatter cushions were also more arranged towards the left; rather than the right. And laid there, on my pillow which was now on the left instead of the right was a folded piece of paper.

Hurriedly I marched around the side of the bed to unfold the note with my nickname scrolled across the top.

My eyes were stinging as I peered at the beginning words, but were entirely blurred by the time I reached the end.

"Blue.

Blue. The colour of the sky. Infinite and complete, never-ending and beautiful. The possibility of countless days spent beneath it's blanket. The security of such a possibility. The knowledge that it'll always be there, never-ending and pure.

Blue. The colour of water. So effortlessly natural and ever-changing. The ability to be whatever it so wishes, the countless possibilities of size and volume. The knowledge that no matter how much or little of it there is, it'll always remain the same; pure, beautiful, sacred, natural, effortless.

Blue. The colour of diamonds. A natural entity yet so rare and wonderful and breathtaking. The ability to capture infinite colours in it's rays, yet never changing it's own colour. So precious and fragile that anyone to come across such beauty is overwhelmed by it's beauty and elegance and scarcity.