✓ | sick of losing soulmates [SPENCER REID]

13.3

13.3
( one day later. )

☆ ★ ☆

spencer

The following morning, Spencer is the first to wake.

Even before he opens his eyes, his brain lingering in that place just between dreams and reality, he can sense the promise in the air — the presence of another person, taking up the side of the bed that usually remains cold and unoccupied. There's the sound of steady, even breathing in the silence, and he smiles.

His eyes blink open slowly.

They'd left the curtains open overnight and now sunlight filters easily into his warm bedroom, making him squint. Bathed in sunlight, Iris, one arm draped across his chest, lies on her side just beside him, and Spencer has to shift a little so that they're eye-level, sticking to his side of the bed for a moment or two just to witness her. She's fast asleep, exhausted from the night before and completely at peace; her face is clear and somehow still flushed with colour, eyelashes gently resting on her cheeks.

Spencer takes the hand that rests on his bare chest and feels her fingers move in his, linking around his knuckles. Making him smile, Iris makes a soft hum of satisfaction and stirs, one eye blinking open.

"Hello," he says, a whisper, as a smile tugs up the corners of his mouth.

When she closes her eyes once more, he shifts again, letting her wake up slowly as he indulges himself in drifting his hands across her hips and up the side of her ribcage, just softly enough to tickle her.

"Stop," she mumbles, mouth crooking into a grin, voice thick with sleep. "Tickles."

"Just making sure you're real," he whispers.

She rolls onto her stomach, face still tilted toward him, half buried in all his pillows. He traces his fingertips down the slope of her back, maybe a little teasingly, just wanting her to wake up, and she does, now, brown eyes meeting his. The sight she's greeted with surely is one reserved just for her: a dreamy smile and messy hair and flushed, shaven skin.

"Morning, sexy."

Spencer lets out a loud laugh. Iris giggles into his pillows, face all smushed up and only one eye opened, watching him as he chuckles and then, eventually, settles into a normal smile.

"You feel okay?" he asks eventually, tucking a loose strand of dark hair behind her ear and noticing she's got a piercing at the top that he's never noticed or seen her wearing anything in. It's just a dot against her skin — easily mistaken for a freckle, if you're not up close.