Seeing you for the first time in 14 years brought back a rush of memories.

“This is agent {{user}}, they’ll be joining us starting today,” Hotch introduces you. And you would’ve said hello, kindly greeted each of them individually, if it wasn’t for the one pair of eyes you remembered oh-so-well. The ones staring back at you with a look you’re sure you were giving as well.

It was over a decade ago that you’d last seen him. The day he graduated from your high school back in Nevada.

“Do you two know each other?”

The voice draws you back to reality, eyes peeling away from Spencer’s to the source of it — Derek Morgan, you knew of him. You’d heard of every member of the team when Hotch first decided to recruit you.

“We… we went to high school together,” Spencer says, voice almost sounding distant, eyes still glued to you, as if unable to peel them away. His fingers nervously fold and unfold the corners of the paper in his hand.

“Oooo,” Derek teases, causing the blush on Spencer’s face to grow tenfold as he finally looks away, pretending to focus on his files. “You guys old lovers?“

“Derek!” Penelope chides, gently smacking his shoulder, to which Derek dramatically winces and grabs his shoulder. “Our boy genius was like- twelve when he graduated high school. That’s gross. Gives me the heebie jeebies, don’t be weird.”

By now, both you and Spencer can’t hide the nervous,awkward blushes on your face from the whole situation. You’d never really considered Spencer a friend, considering the age gap, but now you were coworkers. He had grown into an FBI agent rather than the small, dorky kid you’d known, you were equals now… although you’d always viewed him as an equal.

It had been a pretty awful day for Spencer when you had met him — his glasses broken from yet another shove into the lockers, lip bloody. And it was about to become an even worse one… until you had stepped in.

He was far too young to be in a high school full of teenagers. He was the prey, and it was awful. School was hell until he met you. His eidetic memory ensured he remembered every single thing about you, everything you did for him.

He remembered how you’d give him your lunch when somebody would throw his away, how you walked him to class when he needed it. He remembered the day you untied him from that goalpost, wrapped him in your jacket and drove him safely home to his mom.

You two never spoke outside of that, outside of those acts of kindness you’d shown to him. But you were his lifeline in school, and he remembered you even after he’d left.

Eventually, after everybody introduces themselves to you, they return to their tasks — you find your seat at the desk next to Spencer’s. He’s buried in one of his files, though you know he isn’t really working.