Title: The Shortest Distance Between Two Points is Completely Irrational
By: theimpressionis
Pairing: Hotch/Reid
Rating: R
Series: 1) Hay mas tiempo que vida
Summary: Reid POV. This was a bit more angsty than I had originally intended. The tie returns!
Disclaimer: I own nothing.
Warning: kink

***

I'm relaxing in the coffee room, waiting for the briefing on our next case. I've already read the notes so far, but I'm not really thinking about the new case. Instead I'm thinking about geometry. More specifically, hyperbolic space. I've always found geometry fascinating, soothing. An attempt to turn a messy, paradoxical world into quantifiable, analytical order. But just as what fascinates me most about my profession; the psychology of human beings- and the deviation from those norms- is the deviation from euclidean geometry.

Hyperbolic geometry follows the basic rules of empirical geometry- the shortest distance between two points is a straight line- and spherical geometry- space has a constant positive curvature, where, unlike, euclidean geometry, those lines curve, and allow the line to eventually intersect itself. This creates "great circle routes" for planes and boats, important in my line of work. But I digress; I was thinking about hyperbolic geometry.

In hyperbolic geometry that slowly curving straight line is a *negative* curvature- a world that curves *away* from itself. A model for such an odd theory has since been demonstrated by Daina Taimina, a mathematician with excellent knitting skills. A cone comes to resembles an upside-down rose, a disk looks like a head of lettuce.

When it was discovered, most mathematicians, as you can imagine, were unimpressed with the theory's messy strange beauty. People don't like theories that challenge their basic view of the universe. If you've held the belief that the cold rational world of numbers can save the universe and discover there aren't any equations to explain certain phenonmena, especially phenomena you can see- as proved by Ms. Taimina- it can be upsetting.

It puts cracks into everything you've ever known. Someday they will find a plane where the laws of physics no longer count, a man will walk on water. Or you will lean over and kiss a married man on the mouth.

There are things I thought I would never do, somehow my statistics and facts could keep me safe, keep the messy world at bay. Keep childhood memories and nightmares neatly compartmentalized, so I could save others from their own waking nightmares. But I somehow forgot, in my study human nature and the things that makes us do the things we do- that these laws apply to myself. This kind of arrogance, this hubris, leaves me with no one to blame but myself.

So. I not only kissed a married man on the mouth, but I fucked him, in a dingy hotel room in Mexico. I've never done anything in half's, I don't know why it surprises me.

What did you think would happen?

The problem is that I truly didn't think anything *would* happen. The gift was just a gift, or so I told myself when I bought the tie. I just wasn't expecting *that* reaction. I wasn't expecting Hotch's face to flush, was totally unprepared to watch his eyes go dark and fill up with pupil. I *should* have known; anyone that tightly wound is bound to need some kind of release.

But then, no-one here would have predicted my reaction. Most of them here probably think I'm a virgin. I'm not, for either genders, thanks to Aaron. Most of my (mis)education came courtesy of a curvy physics major, intrigued enough by my ability to relate String Theory to the dark passion of Juana Ines de la Cruz to take me into her bed.

"Point to the end of my struggle/ and the twilight of eternal days at the low dark edge of life. . ."

Well, poetry wasn't the only thing she liked about me, and an interest in hydrodynamics wasn't the only thing she taught me. And just when did I start thinking of him as Aaron?

I'm getting off topic again. Aaron-Hotch, Hotch was the first man I have ever been with. It was so amazing I barely remember walking back to my hotel room. It's utterly vivid in my mind. Enough to make me shift a little, grateful for baggy pants.

But I can't get the image out of my mind. Hotch legs splayed wide, arms tied above his head, completely open, for *me*. I remember the way he smelled, the way his skin tasted. I bit him, hard enough to leave a mark. A bruise no more permanent than a sandcastle in the surf. Certainly not mine. But not his wife's either.

"Maybe we're just out on loan, and everybody is only their own" Sarah Harmer sings that.

Perhaps that's enough, all we truly need;

"Memory and time, maybe even love." Jean McNicol

I should feel guilty. I should wonder what I'm doing, instead of wondering when I can see him again, when I can get him alone. It feels inevitable, that Hotch would eventually find someone else, someone who could give him what he needed.

The question is if Hotch knows what he needs, and is willing to let me give it to him.

My answer comes in the form of Hotch strolling in (as well as he strolls) looking for Gideon, and I've never been so grateful that I don't drink coffee. Because he's *wearing* the tie. And I just about choke on my own tongue as it is. He doesn't look at me, not even a glance my way. Which is good, because I would have probably molested him right in front of Morgan and Garcia. I take a minute or two or, possibly six, to collect myself. I casually head to his office, I have no doubt he will be waiting.

Some neurologists believe that the brain stores information via hyperbolic geometry. I have vivid memories of kissing him, the slick heat of his skin, what it was like to be inside of him.

But as cognitive specialists will tell you: memory pales againts experience.

***

Next story in series - How Your Body Still Remembers Things You Told It To Forget.