Reid was already home when you got back, although he didn't look like he'd been there long. His bag is on the floor by your front door and he's standing behind your breakfast bar, leaning on his forearms over the counter. You toss your keys in the bowl by the door and throw down your bag next to his.

"Hey." You say, a bit uncertain.

He finally speaks.

"What did the nurses have to say about the baby?"

"They checked the heartbeat at the hospital. Totally healthy."

He breathed a sigh of relief. Once the reassurance sets in, he begins again.

"What were you thinking?" He doesn't look angry, but tired and scared.

You raise your eyebrows at him as you start to take your shoes off.

He continues. "You're not supposed to be doing dangerous fieldwork. In the U.S., 1,300 people die a year from hypothermia, and 4,000 more die from drowning! You could have gone into shock, or hit a rock, or-"

You straighten up, now frozen in place. "What else should I have done? Stood and watch the father of my child drown?" tears burn at the brim of your eyes.

"Instead of jumping into an unfamiliar river at night with a killer? Yeah, you should have." At this point, the two of you are fast approaching full-on shouting across your kitchen.

"That is not what we signed up for. You weren't the only one at risk, there was an innocent man in there! Our job is to help innocent people."

"You weren't the only one at risk either." His voice is still raised, but now deadly calm.

You walk into the kitchen. "Don't act like I'm ignorant. I know what's at risk. We both do. Isn't this why we went into this together? So we could keep our jobs and have a life?"

"Keeping your job doesn't meaning risking a miscarriage."

"How many times has Hotch put his life on the line, when he has a child at home? How many times has an unsub because obsessed with us and our personal lives? Putting our loved ones at risk has always been a part of this job. It's not fair, but we do it anyway. This job is about justice for everyone but ourselves. We have to be selfish to be selfless. It's always, always been like this. Just because this is the first time you've experienced it doesn't make it any less real."

It's a low blow, bringing up his family life. You knew you'd regret saying it before you even finished speaking.

"At least I've got somebody to care about, whether she's admitted or not."

You had that coming. You always dodged questions about family with a simple "we're not close", but everybody knew there was more to the story. You were friends with your last team, but not enough to do more than exchange casual texts.

You have plenty more to say in defense of your actions last night, but it all seems trite compared to where the conversation was at now.

You sniffle a bit. The two of you are spiraling out of the realm of productive communication at an alarming rate.

"We're not doing this." You say with all the authority you can muster. "We aren't the kind of people that just snipe at each other. The important part is that we are all safe right now. We can talk about how that case went down, but right now I need a little time. You can stay here, or don't- do whatever."

You grab your bag and start to take it to your bedroom when he calls out your name.

"I can call and make an appointment with your OB, if you'd like. Just to be safe."

It's a peace offering, and one you gladly take. You swallow against the thick feeling in your throat and nod.

You weren't kidding when you said you needed time. You loved your team, but being surrounded by so many people for so long was draining. You haul your go-bag into your bedroom and toss it onto your bed. You strip the second you get into your bathroom, desperate for a shower. A sideways glance at the mirror and you can see the beginnings of your bump. And that's all it really takes to break you.

The tears start rolling and you do a decent job staying quiet until you crank your shower. Muffled under the noise of the water, you break out into open sobs. You get onto the floor of the shower- well aware of how pathetic you look. The cool tile feels good against your skin and the rinse of the water is soothing. Neither of those sensations do anything to stop your tears.

The temptation to spiral and berate yourself for being an idiot and getting yourself into this mess in the first place is temping. But it's too late to regret anything. More than that, to declare your baby a mistake because you had one hard day is far too drastic.

Instead, you let your body cry it out while you focus on all the things you've been counseled to. Your inner dialogue says "Your feelings are valid! Emotions are not facts! You don't have to act just because you're upset!" but it comes out like there's a gun to that inner voice's head.

When the water becomes burning hot, you bring yourself to sit up and turn the dial down. You wash your face and your hair before standing to clean the rest of your body. Finally up and done crying, you finish up and wrap yourself in a towel.

As you riffle through your closet, you can hear Reid banging around out in the living room. You shouldn't be surprised by a psychological profiler's interpersonal skills, but Reid had a way of surprising you. Maybe it was just the fact that any of your past boyfriends would have stormed off after an argument, but you were a bit misty eyed thinking about the fact that he was a good enough guy to recognize that you both were taking out your stress on each other and take a break from the argument. Not that Reid was a boyfriend, but still. Most guys your age would treat an argument like a break up and refuse to interact with until you had to be the one to apologize.

"The nurse said they could make time for you this afternoon." Reid tells you when you walk into your kitchen to make a cup of devastatingly caffeine-free tea.

"How many times did you have to throw around the "FBI" card to get that?" you snort.

"The FBI part is very relevant in this case." he shoots back.

You can't help but grin a bit. "So you did use it."

"Only had to say it once." he counters, smiling back.

You finish making tea and lean your back against your counter while you wait for it to cool. It's as good a time as any for this.

"I don't regret going in after you. But you're right that I made a mistake- I never should have gone out on a search for an unsub. I should have let another officer go with you."

"I should have asked you to step back, anyways." he says, regret clear in his eyes.

"We're a team. Any other time and we would have made the perfect call. It's easy to slip back into habit under stress. I'm almost eleven weeks along- another week and a half and we can announce to the team. It'll get easier after that."

He comes to stand next to you and grabs your hand.

"When you went in with all that gear on, I really thought you were going to drown." you tell him in a small voice.

"You know clothes don't weigh you down in water, right?"

"I know how buoyancy works." you snort. "But once you get out of the water, you'd have exhausted yourself before you could have scaled that drop if you were wearing boots and a bulletproof vest that were wet. And I'm positive that if you fall into a river while exhausted, you'll eventually drown or crack your head open on a rock."

"Touche."

"I know I spooked you, but I called for backup before I got in. Plus- it would have taken an hour, if not more, for us to get hypothermia in that water. If nobody showed up, I could have climbed out and gotten help. In that case, we wouldn't have gotten out with no casualties, but you and I would survive."

Your reasoning puts him at ease for a moment, before he thinks to ask "what made you think the baby would be alright too?"

"Unless I was in the water long enough to get hypothermia or hit something on the way down, there shouldn't be any major risk. It's pretty tough to inflict enough physical trauma to cause a problem in a running river- you're too busy swimming. The unsub would only be able to drown the father because he was physically weakened." You adopt a lighter tone. "I'm a damn good swimmer, and the baby is too. All she does in there is swim anyways."

Your mistake registers.

"She?" he asks, hope creeping into his voice.

The look on his face is so sweet, you can't help but smile.

"The blood test they did can determine gender and I saw it when they sent me the paperwork after the nurse called me about the results on friday. I wasn't sure if you'd want to know yet."

He lights up. "Of course I want to know! We're having a daughter!" He leans in to hug you, picking you up off your feet.

a/n: baby girl reid is all good :) and we're closing in on announcing to the team 😳

Now let's talk stats for a minute

the death info reid uses at the start of the chapter is from the cdc (there's a lot of different figures thrown around for those, so i figured the cdc is a safe bet)

next, it is surprisingly hard to find water temperature data for rivers, but i managed it

using data from elk river in tennessee from march 2020, late march river temps are around 50-60 degrees fahrenheit, hovering at the higher end (https://waterdata.usgs.gov/nwis/dv?cb_00010=on&cb_00011=on&cb_00045=on&cb_00060=on&format=gif_default&site_no=03582000&referred_module=qw&period=&begin_date=2020-03-01&end_date=2020-03-31)

minnesota sea grant (part of NOAA) estimates a person can stay conscious for 1-2 hours in 50-60 degree water (http://www.seagrant.umn.edu/coastal_communities/hypothermia)

and finally a note on river safety lol- im not a professional so please dont listen to me but i have a decent amount of outdoor experience. if you fall into a river, try to float with your feet down stream and stay in a relaxed position (butt down, legs bent, head above water), use your feet to kick away from rocks because if you get torn up by one, your odds of survival aren't great. Try not to stick any of your body very far below the surface, in case there are rocks under the surface. pls dont accidentally wedge your foot in a rock and drown

clothing wont weigh you down while you're actually swimming, but it will when you get out of the water. If you ever get into a cold water scenario and somehow get to chose to keep or toss your clothing- you should probably keep it. It could trap some water close to your body and hold a bit of heat. more importantly, clothing can sometimes be made into flotation devices (i have never tried it but apparently pants are good for this???) but MOST IMPORTANTLY keep your shoes on, again for protection from rocks, some ppl have suggested that if you're going to be in the water briefly, strip so you have dry clothes to get into, but if you won't be able to get out of the water or back to your starting point, it doesn't really matter