wasted times- s.r

NINE

You return back to work after three days off to recuperate, and you were grateful for the distraction. Despite being home already for four days from the hospital, you still find difficulties sleeping at night, feeling the need to double-check your windows and doors constantly. You don't feel safe in there after everything that's happened. 

"We have a case," Garcia enters into the bullpen with a stack of files in her hands, everyone blindly following her to the roundtable room for the briefing. You take your usual seat at the table and glance over the file quickly, Reid already having read the entirety of it in a matter of seconds. 

"We've got a hostage situation in a local bank somewhere in Seattle, and we've been called on to help out. They've been in there for about six hours already and no communication has been made with the officers outside yet. Wheels up in thirty." Instead of exiting the room, Hotch walls over to you and Reid who are packing up your files, but he stops you.

"No need for that," you furrow your eyebrows, looking over at Reid for indication, but he's only just as confused as you are. "You're not going into the field. You'll both be staying here and helping Garcia."

"But I'm cleared, Hotch!" Reid justified. 

"I believe you were instructed to take it easy, and I think it's best if you both stay here and help, and that's an order." You choose not to argue with him, but Reid pushes his luck and stays behind to see if he can convince Hotch to let him go. You grab your files and beeline for Penelope's office, sitting in one of the chairs she already set up for you in there.

When Reid enters the small office, Garcia turns in her chair to face you both, a small smile on her face. "I'm going to ask that if you're going to fight with each other, that you do it out there," she pauses to point a finger at the door. "Because this," she gestures wildly to the room around her, "Is a happy space."

You both murmur your agreements and surprisingly managed to get through most of the day without bickering or fighting. The case lasts a little over twenty-four hours, and you're running on no sleep at all. You've been at the office for the entire time, helping Garcia review the security footage from inside the bank and assist the team remotely with the profile. Now that they were on your way back, you lazily make yourself a cup of coffee and add two extra sugar packets than you normally would brace yourself for the long night of paperwork ahead. 

 You purposely take your time with the decently sized file, not wanting to go home to your apartment. You offer to take a small stack from JJ so she can go home to Henry, which was part of your reasoning, anyway. Hotch is still in his office, which isn't surprising since he never really goes home, and Morgan and Rossi just left not too long ago, now leaving only you and Reid in the bullpen.

"Can I take some of your files?" You ask, noticing that you only have one left. He raises an eyebrow at you, narrowing his eyes in suspicion. "Why?"

You scoff, "I can't do something nice?"

"For me? Never." He makes a fair point, but you continue to stand your ground. "Why don't you want to go home?"

You cross your arms over your chest, a rookie mistake for a profiler because he now thinks you're getting defensive. "I do want to go home. I was just trying to be nice."

"No, you aren't. You finish your files a lot slower now, and you're never usually at the office this late, which tells me that you're prolonging going home. Why?"

You shrug, reaching over to his desk and making a grab for his files when he grips your wrist firmly, holding you in place. You try to wiggle out of his grip, but it only tightens. "Let me go," you seethe, using your other wrist to try and pry him off you, but he seizes it with his free hand.