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Penelope Garcia doesn’t buy it.
Sure, she isn’t a profiler and isn’t trained in behavioral analysis like the rest of the team, but she knew data like it was her firstborn and birthed it into the universe.
And there was a baffling shortage of data that would allow a reasonable hypothesis that Dr. Spencer Reid stood a chance with Jennifer Jareau.
Don’t get her wrong, Penelope loved Spencer, like an annoying baby brother you’d want to trip every time he brings out a rehearsed spiel of statistics and facts about trains. Whether it be her lack of a psychology degree or her terrible eyesight, she just could not see what the rest of the team could imagine between him and JJ. Never mind JJ being out of his league — Spencer wasn’t even playing the same game. The attraction between them seemed more like an urban legend, like Santa Claus or a salary raise.
But just a week ago, Spencer had earned himself another title: not another PhD, but as Lila Archer’s weekend personal bodyguard.
As media liaison, JJ was on a metaphorical whack-a-mole mission to quell the outlandish headlines as soon as they came out. When she left LA, she worried the media coverage would alert their unsub. But as she saw the tabloids, she began to worry about Spencer’s reputation.
Being the patron saint of technology and guard dog against data breaches defaulted Penelope to the task of cleaning up after Dr. Reid’s little field trip to Hollywood. She was grateful for JJ’s work on the tabloids and magazines: click after click after click, Penelope was further convinced that this closet Jack Skellington cosplayer held no light to the BAU’s designated court-side reporter and true crime’s sweetheart.
But as Penelope Garcia passed JJ, in her glorious blonde and blue-eyed perfection, standing at Reid’s vacant desk and skimming a delicate manicured finger across an open magazine, she hesitated. With eagle eye precision reserved for a military sniper, Penelope zoomed in on a worried furrow on JJ’s left eyebrow.
“What plagues you, goddess?” she asked, the absence of snark in her tone startling JJ.
JJ glanced up at Penelope, offering her an absent and polite smile. “Hey, Pen.”
“Whatcha got there?” Penelope nodded curtly to the glossy papers as she strode towards the desk. JJ’s hand instinctively dragged the magazine further from Penelope’s line of sight, which cranked up her suspicion. JJ, sensing that she had ‘guilty’ plastered across her face, attempted to disarm Penelope with her deer-in-the-headlights eyes.
Penelope smirked, a cocky eyebrow peeking from beneath thick-rimmed glasses. “Don’t look at me with those eyes, Jennifer Jareau, you can’t keep exploiting my love for little forest critters like this.”
JJ pouted in resignation. “Fine,” she said, nonchalantly handing the magazine over to Penelope’s open hand. “I hit my knee against Spence’s drawer and found it jammed in, so I… dislodged it. ”
“A MYSTERY MAN IN LILA’S LIFE?” Read the headline in obnoxiously big red letters. On the cover was a gorgeous bombshell blonde in a lime green cardigan, tenderly nuzzling a familiar bony hand on her shoulder. Said skeletal hand belonged to a lanky Spencer Reid, looking away in a striped gray polo that hung too loose on his shoulders.
Penelope’s instinct was to laugh — to cackle at the awkwardness emanating from every molecule of Spencer’s willowy frame — and weaponize the publicity as artillery for her endless teasing when Reid comes back to the office. But JJ was unusually quiet, too focused on hiding the clenching of her jaw to be aware of the little wrinkle in her brow. Penelope, now uncertain of how to act, swallowed back her laughter and looked expectantly at JJ.
“I thought we cleaned up well,” she remarked, raising her eyebrows in resignation.
“A tabloid or two must’ve slipped past,” Penelope stated, watching JJ through the corner of her eye.
JJ nodded dismissively. “I just didn’t think that Spence would have kept a souvenir.”
Penelope glanced sidelong at her friend, the nearly imperceptible hurt in JJ’s voice snagging at her heartstrings. This was a stark change from the JJ who was sorting through magazines with her last week, or as Penelope put it: “cleaning up any implicating evidence of Junior G man getting down and dirty”.
Penelope recalled how JJ’s voice looped around her words, bemused and confused, as she read aloud noteworthy headlines: “Check this one out: ‘How’d a 3.14 score a 10?’ They got pretty creative with that one.”
Last week, Penelope’s den resembled a high school sleepover as JJ sat criss-cross on the floor, reaching out intermittently for the popcorn bowl on her desk. They flipped through pages of Hollywood A-listers and who they were dating, what workout and diet regimens they were on, and completely unscientific and un-evidence based quizzes (“What ingredient in granola best fits your personality?”) and articles (“Top 10 Signs that You like Him More than He Likes You, and Top 5 Ways to Turn That Around”). Occasionally, they would come across an article about Lila and Spencer, and JJ would have to contact the magazine firm and demand that they take it down due to an ongoing investigation. Other than that, they agreed that that had been the most fun they had on an official assignment.
Last week seemed like a world away as Penelope watched JJ deep in thought. JJ forced herself to blink, eyes glassy as she stared at Reid’s face on the cover.
“Are you a fan?” JJ asked, breaking the silence.
“Of Lila Archer?” Penelope asked. “I mean, she’s an upcoming starlet with small roles in small shows. Gorgeous, blonde, sparkling eyes, great body — Hollywood, but they’re as generic as they can get, you know?”
JJ slowly raised her eyebrows and absently combed through her own blonde hair.
Penelope began to stammer, “I mean — not that there’s anything wrong with being blonde and gorgeous, I mean, you and me, we’re both—“ she caught her breath, “blonde and gorgeous, salt of the… earth…”
JJ smiled sheepishly. “Thanks, Pen.”
“I don’t understand, we wrapped the case up last week,” Penelope pulled out Reid’s chair and plopped down on it. “We missed one tabloid, JJ, I don’t think it’s worth questioning our capabilities over.”
JJ hooked her head. “It’s not that, Pen, we did our best in cleaning up after Spence’s little excursion.”
Last week, she would have bantered with the same amount of snark, laughing about how Spencer’s first Hollywood role would be as a lamp stand. But Penelope’s eyes grew wide at the uncharacteristic venom dripping from JJ’s voice as she uttered Spencer’s name. She hated to admit it, but she couldn’t read JJ’s expression. That psychology degree would be useful right about now.
“Are you a fan, JJ?”
JJ shrugged and leaned back on Reid’s desk. “Not particularly. But maybe Spence is.”
“Sugar, are you upset at Reid?” Penelope asked, her tone concerned.
JJ considered lying — after all, being in front of the camera had trained her to pacify an audience as she sugarcoated grisly reports about monsters at large. But Penelope was her friend, and the knots in her stomach made the bile rise to her throat. She could only swallow back the truth for so long.
“I just thought he was better than this,” JJ admitted, shoulders slumping as she hung her head, trying to avoid Penelope’s gaze.
“Use your words, Jayje,” Penelope urged gently.
“Spence is… different.” JJ started.
“Uh, yeah, an IQ Einstein would be afraid of, and a brain faster than a computer? JJ, catch up a little,” Penelope joked, winning herself a soft laugh from JJ.
“You know what I mean. Look, I know that he’s awkward and—“ JJ scoffed, “Definitely not a ladies’ man, but he’s earnest and kind. I get the appeal. I just didn’t think he’d be the type of person to, y’know… be so easily swept up in a whirlwind romance of sorts.”
“Jayje, Reid may be an absolute unidentified fumbling organism, but he is still just a man,” Penelope rationalized. “Four PhDs draw a blank up against Lola Archer. It’s not everyday that Reid gets noticed by a pretty girl.”
“I notice,” JJ uttered softly. Her eyes grew hot and she fixed her gaze at the ceiling, hoping and praying her mascara doesn’t run.
“Oh,” Penelope gasped. Suddenly, she understood what the rest of the team saw in JJ when Spencer was in the room. And she was witnessing firsthand what happens to JJ when threatened with the thought that she might lose him to another woman.
Oh.
“Well, I’m sure she was just coming on strong and Reid was just being nice.” Penelope tried to steer the conversation, panicking as she heard JJ sniffling.
“Isn’t that convenient that he’s not nice to everyone, but he’s nice to her.” JJ replied, dabbing at the corners of her eyes with her sleeve.
“And does that mean… does he laugh at my jokes just to be nice? Does he check in on me just to be nice?” JJ questioned. “Seems like I’m not the only one he’s nice to.”
Penelope stared at JJ, accepting her defeated attempts to comfort her friend. The thought that JJ might be jealous of Lila Archer over Dr. Spencer Reid hung fresh in the air, totaling Penelope’s once-invincible hard drive. She was left with no choice but to switch herself to silent mode and listen to JJ spiral.
“I didn’t want to make any assumptions,” JJ confessed, fumbling with her blazer. “I thought that Spence treated me… differently. He does this thing,” she smiled fondly to herself. “Where he tugs at my sleeve to get my attention. I know he hates, hates being touched, but he has never flinched when I come in for a hug. Never the first one to let go, either; just endures it for as long as I need it. He leans against me on the plane when we’re playing cards. Always made space for me, saves me a seat beside him in every room we’re in.”
Penelope watched as JJ seemed to shrink, the 5,000 kilowatt sunshine in her eyes dimming as she began to doubt what she meant to Spencer.
“Now I can’t help but wonder if he does the same for her.”
It broke her heart.
“JJ,” Penelope reached for her hand. “Sweetheart, you mean the absolute world to him. I’m sure the kiss was just a weekend thing for Spencer.”
JJ’s eyes narrowed. “The what was a weekend thing?”
Penelope froze. She could hear the thin ice cracking from underneath her feet.
“Pen,” JJ repeated. “What happened over the weekend?”
“L-Lila pulled Reid into the pool a-and she kissed him and—“
JJ’s face became unreadable. Her expression was marble-like, her eyes flashing frame after frame of the worst case scenarios bubbling up from her imagination. Her face had paled but Penelope could swear that there was steam blowing off from JJ.
There was a terrible high-pitched ringing in JJ’s ears that muffled out the sounds of familiar footsteps making their way to his desk.
“JJ?” Spencer uttered, clutching the strap of his messenger bag.
JJ pushed herself off the desk and stormed past him, shoving his shoulder and spinning him halfway like a revolving door.
“Wha-“ Spencer muttered.
“You’ve made such a mess, Spencer Reid!” JJ huffed as her high heels sped her out of the bullpen.
Spencer’s jaw dropped, his entire vocabulary erased in confusion and fear.
“What’s happening?” He asked.
“You’re a dead man, doctor Reid.” Penelope uttered.
From that day on, Penelope Garcia knew JJ didn’t have Reid under a spell.
She had him in a death grip.
Penelope bet her month’s salary on JJ confessing first.