Chapter Text
"Did any of you see where the bathrooms are? I have been holding it for two hours…" Christina says, tugging at the hem of her itchy pantsuit.
"Down the hall, to the left." Victor tells her, pointing her in the direction of it. "Thank you, you're a lifesaver." She says quickly before leaving her three crewmates in the cafeteria of a fancy building in downtown Houston.
"My least favorite part about this job is all the formal political stuff we have to do…" Reid says, looking over the menu. "I agree, but they always have good food in places like this." Victor says with a smile.
"Jeremy, do you want anything?" Reid asks, looking past Victor to where Jeremy is leaning against the counter looking half asleep.
"Mmm?" Jeremy looks up. "Do you want lunch?" Victor asks, his voice a mix of amusement and concern. "Yeah, just get me a slice of pizza or something…" he mutters, rubbing a hand over his face.
"Pizza isn't on the menu, pick again." Reid says, reaching for his wallet. "Are you okay?" Victor asks Jeremy, rubbing his shoulder.
"Yeah, I'm fine…I just did not sleep last night. Katelyn was up all night getting sick." Reid frowns at that, "you feeling alright?"
"Oh, yeah, I'm good, I never get their bugs." Jeremy assures, although the bags under his eyes are not convincing. "Don't say that. You'll tempt fate…I've been there." Victor warns.
"Good, maybe I can get out of the rest of this. Make up a signal, I'll start dry heaving." Reid looks up to see Christina walking back over to them.
"Let's stop talking about vomit..." he says, remembering the conversation he and Christina had about her emetophobia over a glass of wine one night.
"Why?" Jeremy asks, following Reid's gaze. "Just shhh," Reid smiles at Christina. "What are we talking about?" She asks, looking between them with suspicion. "Jeremy's s-"
"Lunch. Jeremy doesn't know what to get, He's never been here before." Reid talks over Victor and gives him a nudge under the counter.
"Okay…well their fries are great, they have some pretty great subs too." Christina suggests with a kind smile.
—
"Hey, Reid…?" Reid looks up and immediately his eyes widen. "Uh oh."
Victor and Jeremy are both standing a few feet away from where Reid sits with the same look on their face. Reid can't exactly tell what the expression means, but the way they're standing makes him think he's in trouble.
"Is this an intervention?" He jokes, but he's a little nervous the answer is yes. "No…" Victor says carefully, taking a seat at the table across from Reid. "That's not a reassuring tone…"
"You just acted weird the other day…we wanted to ask you about it." Reid tries to think about when he might've been 'weird' but nothing comes to mind. "I'm not following."
"You shut our conversation about Jeremy's sick kid down…and then you continued to shut it down all the way back home." Victor explains and Reid sighs.
He tried to do something nice for Christina and ensure her day wasn't ruined by worrying about getting sick or someone getting sick around her. Now he's in a position where he's going to have to figure out a way to diffuse the situation without betraying Christina's trust.
"Yeah…uh, sorry, what does that have to do with…this?" He tries to play dumb to stall, if Christina comes back, they'll drop it.
"Reid…" Victor says, raising his eyebrows. "Okay," Reid sighs, putting his phone on the table. He looks around for Christina one last time.
"It's really not my place." Reid says with a slight laugh. "I told you it was about Christina." Jeremy mutters to Victor.
"Should we ask her then?" Victor asks Reid seriously. "No!" That would be worse. "Okay, okay…Christina shared something with me one night…like I said, it's not my place to disclose some of the more sensitive details…"
Jeremy and Victor exchange a few looks. "She has emetophobia." He blurts out, hoping the bigger word might end their questioning. "Fear of…?" Victor asks.
"Google it," Reid says, getting up. "I think Ashley's friend has that." Jeremy says as Reid walks away, before turning back to grab his forgotten phone.
"Don't tell her I told you that…she was kind of drunk when she told me…" Christina had definitely been sober enough that night to entrust him with this information, but he thinks maybe saying that could deter them from confronting her about it.
Seeing as Christina doesn't mention anything about it the next day, Reid assumes that his answers to their questions were to their satisfaction.
—
"Reid." Reid carefully turns his head slowly to see Jeremy and Victor approaching him together again. It's been a week since their previous conversation.
"We wanted to apologize…we kind of jumped to conclusions. We shouldn't have put you in that situation and we won't tell Christina that we know." Victor says sincerely. "Did you rehearse that?" Reid says because he can't help himself.
"Well…maybe." Jeremy admits, Victor elbows him. "It's alright, I was a little overbearing. Christina probably wouldn't have wanted me to do that…but she was having such a good day and I didn't want to risk that." Reid admits with a sigh.
"How bad is it, do you know?" Jeremy asks, Victor elbows him again. "That's not our place."
"I'm not actually sure…seems like it was worse when she was younger." They both nod. "We won't say anything to her." Jeremy assures.
"Thank you," Reid smiles.