He saw it in her eyes before he ever heard her speak.

She sat at her desk, hunched just slightly, fingers frozen over the keys like she was trying to remember how to breathe. Spencer Reid knew that stillness. It was the kind born of too many nights alone, of waiting for someone who never came back. A mirror. That’s what she was. Not the polished kind that flatters—but the honest one that shows every crack you try to hide.

He’d been abandoned too. By Gideon, by his father, by the belief that if you were smart enough, you could protect everyone. She was just better at pretending it didn’t affect her.

“You okay?” he asked, voice quiet, eyes not leaving the paperwork in front of him.

She hesitated. Then: “Yeah. Just tired.”

Lie. They both lied like it was breathing. He didn’t call her out. Cowards, both of them. Cowards who carried their pain like it was their fault.

Later, when the bullpen was nearly empty and the overhead lights dimmed, she stood by his desk and whispered, “I hate when people leave.”

He looked up slowly. “Me too.”

That was it. No therapy, no deep dive into scars. Just shared silence, the kind only two abandoned people could understand. Two cowards, learning how to stand still in the same place long enough not to run.

He didn’t touch her. Didn’t need to. They were already holding each other’s truth without ever laying a hand.