leftinbasketforfbi | A prerequisite for being in the BAU is the utter refusal to listen to doctors.

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A prerequisite for being in the BAU is the utter refusal to listen to doctors.

Reid wasn't exactly mad. He was more resigned. He had known that Rossi would probably leave before the doctors okay'd his departure, but he was still somewhat frustrated by the stubborn Italian. Would it kill the man to just take care of himself? (He wondered if that was how Hotch felt every time one of them were gravely wounded and then showed up to work two days afterwards.)

Reid drove up Rossi's driveway, but he had to pause at the wheel after he stopped, swallowing hard. The last time he had done this, he had ended up having to shoot a man and keep Rossi from bleeding out before paramedics arrived.

He took a deep breath, then opened the car door, stepping out and shutting it behind him. It wouldn't help anyone if he dwelt on that experience.

Reid knocked on Rossi's front door. Even if Rossi wouldn't take care of himself, Reid could make sure he was alright.

(Continued from here.)

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He stretched so that his legs were straight out in front of him, crossing his feet at the ankles, and leaned back more completely against the sofa cushions. The movement, slight though it was, was yet another step in the right direction. He'd kept a hold of his hand, but now he moved it so it was on his lap, covered by both hands now, their fingers intertwined.

By now, he'd given up entirely on paying attention to the movie. His focus was entirely on Reid. The tips of his fingers brushed back and forth across the palm of his hand. Unsurprisingly, his skin was soft, and he found himself wanting to touch and explore more of it. His fingers moved to his wrist next, lingering over the pulse point.

Reid's pulse was fast. His stomach fluttered. Rossi's skin was rough compared to his own, but that wasn't saying much.

He closed his eyes, dedicating his sizable intellect to analyzing the touch. The creases in Rossi's palms. The steady pulse in his thumb. The gentle ghosting his fingers did against his own hand and wrist. He didn't know hand-holding could be so intense. It made his face flush.

Carefully, his fingers started moving too, tracing the creases in Rossi's hands. Automatically, Reid's mind went to the significance of hands, humanity's most basic tools and one of the biggest collections of nerves in the body. His finger's found what palm readers would call Rossi's heart line. Then his head line. Then his life line. He traced them, his mind examining the significance behind the creases. Intellectualizing the rush he was feeling from the slight touch.

Rossi had his own appreciation for hands, though his was rooted in the power of touch to bind, connect, tether two people to each other. It was such a simple act, twining fingers together, but there was nothing simple about the emotions it beget. Holding someone's hand very often led to a desire for claiming their heart as well. Many people had held his hands through the years, but never like this, never had they been studied like this before. It was pleasant, to say the least. He let Reid explore, examine, giving him room and silence enough to consider it, what it meant and how he felt.

His own pulse was beating a bit more rapidly, too, something which Reid was sure to detect.

As Reid's fingers ghosted down his palm to his wrist, he could feel the quicker heartbeat. It made his breathing get heavier. He remembered one of his few romantic partners once telling him the effect his careful touches had. If Rossi was going to make his heart beat faster, he decided to do the same.

He focused on Rossi's hands. Earth hands, characterized by broad palms, deep-running lines, and long fingers. He ran his finger down Rossi's fate line, then traced the curves of the sun line, the girdle of Venus, the Mercury line, tracing the crosses and hatched pattern in his skin. He felt the soft spots, the callouses, the tiny ridges and spirals.

Then, almost without thinking, he pulled one of Rossi's hands up, brushing his lips carefully against his wrist, his breath blowing against the older agent's carefully examined palm.

His breathing became a little more uneven; shallow, long breaths held tightly in his chest while Reid studied his hand the same way an artist might observe a work of art, noticing all of the flaws and perfections, memorizing every detail, to be conjured up any given moment after this one had ended.

His lips were soft, too, and he wondered (not for the first time) how they would feel against his own. He wouldn't wait and wonder much longer, but he also didn't want disrupt Reid's entrancing exploration.

Reid's fingers brushed against Rossi's knuckles as they moved to the back of his hand, and he started to retrace the lines with his lips. He ghosted his lips along the fate line, then heart line, then head line, then life line. The creases, unique only to Rossi, were memorized, examined, interpreted.

Then he drew away, closing Rossi's hand and intertwining their fingers.

"I like your hands."

By now, the movie was all but forgotten.

He had no doubt that every groove and mark on his hand had been filed away for future reference, if necessary. It amused him to think how quickly Reid would notice if a new callous or blemish of any kind suddenly appeared, different from the memory he'd imprinted.

The declaration delighted him, and not just because of the confession itself, but what it meant in a broader sense.

With his free hand, he reached out to brush a strand of hair back from Reid's eyes, letting his index and middle finger trace down his cheek and the length of his jaw before landing by his mouth. And then his thumb stroked back and forth across his lower lip.

"I like this," he said. It meant so many things, though he was focused on Reid's lips at the moment.

Reid closed his eyes again, focusing on the touch on his skin, then on his mouth. His face flushed, his cheeks getting warmer against Rossi's hand. His lips parted, an instinctive response to the touches.

"I like this too," he breathed, resting his hands on his knees. It may have confused him, but he liked it. He liked touching and being touched by Rossi. He had never for a moment entertained the thought of his quiet infatuation with the man becoming anything real, but something felt... right. So right.

The way he rested his hands on his knees, coupled with the look in his eyes, felt like silent assent for Rossi to make a bolder move. They'd worked together so long, often in the field as unofficial partners, and that naturally fomented a deeper connection. He still couldn't pinpoint that exact moment when the feelings of friendship had morphed into affection, and love, but it seemed like a long time that he'd wondered what it would be like to do this, to touch him and kiss him and hold him. He wanted to give, to fill Reid with an abundance of love in those places where there had long been a drought.

"Sometimes I'd see you sleeping on the jet, and I'd wanna do this," he brushed another lock of hair back, stroking his forehead.

"And this," he confessed, closing the gap and kissing Reid on the mouth. The kiss was full of assurance, wisdom, but there was still a softness to it, an enticement for Reid to join him, and deepen it.

Reid's heart skipped a beat at the kiss. He reached out furtively, grasping Rossi in a way only a man utterly deprived of love and affection could. He was careful to avoid touching Rossi's stitches, and instead kept his hands around Rossi's chest.

He pressed forward in the kiss, curiously running his tongue along Rossi's lower lip. It had been a long time since he had kissed someone, but he could never forget how to do it. He had had the fortune of going out with a very talented girl while they were both working on PhD's in Chemistry, and she had taught him practically every strategy in the book. He was glad to have a chance to use the skill in some meaningful way--he wanted to show Rossi that he wanted this.

One hand wandered up, brushing Rossi's neck before settling with one palm cupping his cheek.

It was a pleasant surprise, the way he reciprocated with vigor and skill. It wasn't that he had believed Reid had no experience with this at all, he just wasn't sure how much. And as far as he knew, Reid had never been in any long-lasting relationship. That was, he vowed silently, until now.

There was no mistaking Reid's desire, or intent. His feelings were very clearly conveyed in the way he touched and kissed him. He waited until Reid's tongue made a second pass across his lower lip before opening his mouth further to him, letting his own tongue slip out to court his. With his free hand, he ran his fingers up the back of Reid's neck, into his hair, adding slight pressure and kneading his scalp a little.

Reid welcomed Rossi's tongue, his heart pounding in his ears. If he had had any doubts of what he wanted when he had sat down with Rossi, they were gone now. He wanted this, the consequences be damned.

Rossi's hand in his hair made him curl towards the touch. He ghosted his hands along Rossi's jaw, up the bones in his face to his hair. He doubted they would be able to do much more than this with Rossi's injuries--and even if Rossi wanted to, Reid would put a stop to it before the older agent managed to undo his stitches--but he was happy with this for the moment. He was completely content with Rossi's kisses.

It would be difficult to restrain himself, to not go further than just kissing, though he was also completely aware of how much he would pay for it if he didn't listen to his body and take it easy. The silver lining was that he had something to look forward to, when he finally was healed and the damn stitches could come out.

His fingers moved further up his scalp, then back down again to Reid's neckline. He repeated the motions, back and forth, back and forth. The rest of his focus lay in kissing Reid. Making out, as it was often called. He felt more right and secure in his decision to confess his feelings than he'd realized he could. After a moment, his lips drifted south, away from Reid's mouth, to mark his jawline, and then his neck, with the soft press of his mouth. He lingered against Reid's neck, breathing him in, nuzzling a little as he pulled away.

"I wanna do more than just kiss you, but it'll have to wait." Not just because of his injuries, of course. He smiled softly, though, brushing his thumb over Reid's ear.

Reid gasped softly as the kiss was broken and Rossi drifted down his neck. His pulse raced, pounding in his throat, and he couldn't help but smile ruefully when Rossi pulled away.

"Yeah. I don't know about you, but I didn't exactly like calling in the paramedics and I'd prefer to not have to do that again." His smile became more genuine and he reached up, holding Rossi's hand to his face. "Something to look forward to, right?"

The butterflies receded, becoming calm and warm. He felt safe. He very, very rarely felt safe.

"Once is enough," he said. They could both agree to that. It gave him time, as well, to plan the proper date he'd spoken of earlier: homemade pasta, a dessert Reid could appreciate, music, the same closeness they were experiencing now, only taken further. The prospect of what was to come was also a good incentive to take it easy, not try to push beyond his limits, lest he injure himself further and delay the recovery process.

He leaned back, pulling Reid closer, though careful not to aggravate his stitches.

"I've already got plans," he promised, with a smile.

Reid would really like that. A night of old-fashioned romance and intimacy, both emotional and physical. The kind of night he never thought would happen to an awkward guy like him.

Reid lay back next to him, tucking his head in the crook of Rossi's neck and keeping his hands well away from the older agent's stitches.

"Should I be scared?" he joked, barely noticing that they were halfway through the movie now.

At this point, the movie was more like white noise than anything to actually be paid attention to. He didn't feel the need to turn it off, though, because the background noise was nice, and they had the option of watching it again if they wanted, even if the movie was mostly over.

He reached out to intertwine their fingers again. "Terrified. I'm gonna make you eat food and listen to Sinatra." He wouldn't go into more detail than that; he wanted some of it to be a surprise.

Reid allowed Rossi to lace their fingers together, smiling. "Sounds like torture," he joked, resting his free hand on Rossi's chest.

He nuzzled Rossi's neck. He was excited and nervous at the same time, but somehow, Rossi's presence soothed him. He wasn't entirely sure how the older agent managed it, but he always got him to feel calm. Yet, out of curiosity... "How long have you been planning on telling me about this?"

"A week," he laughed. "Seeing you there when I woke up in the hospital -- I don't know, everything clicked. I wasn't gonna say anything while I was still walking around in that ugly gown, confined to a bed."

It was a conversation far too important to have in the hospital, of all places, and especially since he couldn't be entirely sure how the confession would be received. They both needed and deserved some privacy.

He turned his head a little, enough to kiss Reid's forehead.

"I'm glad I decided to stick with you in the hospital, then." He smiled, closing his eyes and savoring the feeling of safety and warmth. He had that feeling precious few times, so he enjoyed it when he did. "This makes me wish I had the guts to approach you a while ago."

He had never dreamed his feelings were returned, but in retrospect, it really shouldn't have taken a stalker nearly killing Rossi for either of them to decide on acting on their affection. (And even then, it had been Rossi acting on it; it still hadn't occurred to Reid to do it.)

When those feelings had first started to become recognizable as being more than friendship, he'd known even then that he would have to approach first. And while he hadn't known for sure whether or not Reid would reciprocate, there had been some subtle hints over time that led him to believe it wouldn't be the biggest mistake of his life to suddenly give those feelings life.

"So we'll make up for lost time," he shrugged a little, smiling and ruffling Reid's hair affectionately.

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A prerequisite for being in the BAU is the utter refusal to listen to doctors.

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/matching icons ftw!

Yay for matching icons!

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Maaaaan it was killing me that I couldn't tag this at work :3

Yay! You're back! 83

Yes! Too busy to take a lunch break today, I was dying. And that icon is so cute!