First fic - under the wire
May. 19th, 2005 03:16 am![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
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nickngregTitle: Denver
Author: acroarcs
Pairing: Nick/Greg
Rating: Tame (PG, I guess)
Setting: Late season 5
Disclaimer: I don't own CSI or its characters.
Notes: This is the first fic I've written, and I thought I ought to get it in before tonight's season finale, just in case. Unbetaed, but would like betaing in the future if I manage to write more fics.
“Can you believe it?” Sara asked as she and Greg walked into the locker room. “All the way out there for nothing.”
Greg laughed. “Well, I wouldn’t call it nothing. We did get to put on those jumpsuits and dangle from a helicopter.” He opened his locker and started taking off his vest to put it away. Cool as the jumpsuit was, it and the harness had seriously messed up his clothes and he wanted to change.
Sara just smirked as she sat down on the bench to loosen her shoelaces. “I don’t know,” she said. “The first time’s nice, but after a while the novelty wears off a bit. Too bad no one could tell the body was a mannequin from the top of the cliff.”
“Well, not our problem now,” Greg said. “No life, no murder; no murder, no crime; no crime, no CSIs.” He made a big show of pulling a new shirt from the locker as he delivered the end of his speech. The little flourish caught the shirt on an envelope, which fell to the floor at Sara’s feet.
She stopped working with her shoes long enough to pick it up. “Denver Police Department?” she asked, glancing up at Greg.
Greg looked over at Sara in surprise, then at the empty spot in his locker, then the envelope in Sara’s hand. He started reaching for the envelope. “Yeah, I haven’t opened it, it’s…”
Sara’s gaze followed Greg’s back to the envelope. “Well, no wonder, since it’s not yours. How long have you been stealing Nick’s mail?”
“Well, you see…” Greg stammered. The hand not reaching at the envelope went to the back of his head as he tried to figure out an explanation. The fingers started scratching at an itch he didn’t actually have.
“And from his home, no less. Greg, that’s…” She stopped as she looked up at him again. Greg stopped mid-scratch, his breath caught as he watched her look him over. He probably looked like a nervous wreck.
“Breakfast?” she asked.
He let his breath go. “Yeah,” he said quietly, taking the envelope as she offered it to him.
***
The waitress had just put coffee on the table and taken their orders when Greg started talking. It was an effort to control the conversation. He’d seen how Sara had been working on something in her mind all during the drive over and when they sat down, and now she was about to start in on him after the silence she'd broken only by offering to drive. So he cut her off.
“First of all, you can’t tell anyone,” he said.
Sara poured some cream into her coffee. “Tell anyone what? That you’ve been to Nick’s house?” She took a sip of coffee, but it was obvious she was only doing it to hide a smile.
“Sara, this isn’t a laughing matter,” Greg said tightly. “But there are two things. First, you can’t tell anyone what I say right now. And second, you have to ask me.”
“What?” She was definitely amused, and a small laugh made her look like she was about to drop the mug in her hands. “Ask you what?”
“Look, he and I made a deal,” Greg said. The pit in his stomach was also telling him he was breaking that deal, but he told it to go away. “So I can tell you, but you have to ask first.”
She put the coffee down and looked him in the eye. “Greg, are you… This is pretty awkward.” Now she looked less amused and more unhappy.
“No kidding,” Greg said, keeping any trace of humor out of his voice. “Ask the damn question already.”
“Fine,” she said. “Are you and Nick… sleeping… together?” Her voice went up as she asked, and she was definitely not keeping eye contact anymore. She wasn’t even looking at him.
“Okay,” Greg said lightly. “Now we can talk.” He took some of the coffee himself, even though it tasted like crap. Sara’s eyes returned to him, so he gave her a big smile. She smiled in return, and this time it wasn’t in amusement, just happiness.
They just looked at each other for a moment, neither saying a thing until Sara broke the silence with “So? Are you going to talk, or was that ‘can’ just about your capability to talk? How long has this been going on?”
“This?” Greg asked. “A few months. Since Grissom said I should find myself a replacement in the lab. The celebration went a little wild.” He smiled and leaned in over the table, dropping his voice at the same time. “But it’s really only been serious since Ecklie screwed up everyone’s shifts.”
“I had no idea,” Sara said.
Greg sighed. “That was the point. Nick doesn’t want anyone to know about him, so he said that as long as we worked together we could only just screw around. At first. I talked him out of some of that.”
Sara rewarded him with a smile. “But after he got moved to swing shift, you didn’t work together anymore.”
“And I told him he had to pick between his secrecy and me. There’d be little interaction between us at work, so it’d be safer for him anyway. We ended up on a compromise.”
“You’d only tell people if they asked,” Sara said.
“And I have to try not to let on what’s happening,” Greg added. “In return, I got Nick to try to have some sort of normal relationship. You know, outside the whole secrecy thing. It’s a bit hard for him, but I cut him some slack every once in a while. Sometimes, I am all about the compromise.”
“So where does Denver fit into all of this?” Sara asked.
“I don’t know,” Greg said. “And that’s what worries me.”
***
He quietly let himself into Nick’s house. Nick had given him a key when he’d changed shifts, but the hurried way he’d given it to Greg at the end of his last night shift suggested that Nick had already had the key made and the change just spurred him to give it to Greg as quickly as possible. The smile from the key in his right hand faded, though, when he remembered the envelope in his left.
The house was silent, and Nick was probably asleep. Greg slipped off his jacket, hanging it carefully on the rack near the door next to Nick’s before padding off to the bedroom. And he’d been right, Nick was asleep. He lay on his side, his mouth hanging slightly open, and that meant he’d been talking in his sleep. The only time he wasn’t in control of himself.
Greg sat in a chair, looking over the envelope for what felt like the thousandth time. It was still from Denver, and it was still addressed to Nick. Greg’s mind clicked through chemicals, trying to find one that would let him open and close Nick’s envelope without leaving any evidence. To find out what it meant, to find out which possibility it was. Was there a conference in Denver he hadn’t heard about? Were they headhunting? Were they mailing Nick something out of the blue, or had he… had he contacted them first? He forced the thought back out of his head, just like he’d been doing all night, except for when the helicopter ride had distracted him.
“Greg,” Nick said quietly.
“What?” Greg asked sharply, shaken out of his head. He looked over at the bed. Nick had apparently been asleep when he‘d spoken, but the sudden noise had made him restless and his eyes opened drowsily.
“Greg,” he said again. This time with a smile, and this time awake. “Come over here.” He motioned lazily with one arm.
Greg stayed in the chair, feeling his mouth twist in a sickly smile, his eyes torn between his hands and Nick.
“Greg,” Nick said again, more insistently. That meant he was waking up. He pushed the blanket off of himself and stood. Greg’s eyes found themselves firmly fixed on Nick as he walked over in his boxers.
“Hey,” Nick said as he leaned in for a kiss. And Greg let himself go in the kiss - it was soft and slow and full of the solid love that was Nick, the love that he was determined to not think about crumbling, the love that he felt evaporating as Nick’s hands moved from his shoulders to his arms, and from his arms to his hands, and from his hands to that damn envelope he was still holding.
“What do you have here?” he asked.
“It’s yours,” Greg said, his mind racing. “It was in the mail yesterday afternoon and I saw it and it just freaked me out…”
Nick put a finger to Greg’s lips. “This has you worked up?” He took the envelope from Greg’s hands and glanced over it before dropping it on the floor and drawing Greg towards the bed. He sat down on the side, pulling Greg down against him with one arm that he kept wrapped around Greg’s shoulders. “I was a little disappointed when there was no money for the promotion,” he said. “And in the end I didn’t care, but at the moment… I put out a couple of resumes. I didn’t say anything because it was before… well, just before.”
“Denver, Nick?”
“It’s just a place, Greg,” Nick said. “And you know that I’m not going anywhere without you now.”
“Nick, no one’s going to want a newly trained lab tech-turned-CSI level one anywhere.”
Nick smiled. Greg could feel the shift in his facial muscles from the way they were leaning against each other. “And that’s why I don’t think I’ll be leaving Las Vegas anytime soon.” And then Greg was smiling, too.
Nick started undoing the buttons of Greg’s shirt matter-of-factly, as if it were a simple problem that Greg was still wearing the shirt and removing it was the simple solution. “Nick,” Greg said, taking the other man’s hands in his own for a moment. “There’s one other thing.”
“It can’t be that important,” Nick said, moving for the buttons again.
“Sara knows.”
Nick froze for a moment, the shortest possible moment, then continued as if nothing had happened. His hesitation had been obvious, but Nick put on a smile and said, “Like I said, not that important,” as he finished off the buttons.
Author: acroarcs
Pairing: Nick/Greg
Rating: Tame (PG, I guess)
Setting: Late season 5
Disclaimer: I don't own CSI or its characters.
Notes: This is the first fic I've written, and I thought I ought to get it in before tonight's season finale, just in case. Unbetaed, but would like betaing in the future if I manage to write more fics.
“Can you believe it?” Sara asked as she and Greg walked into the locker room. “All the way out there for nothing.”
Greg laughed. “Well, I wouldn’t call it nothing. We did get to put on those jumpsuits and dangle from a helicopter.” He opened his locker and started taking off his vest to put it away. Cool as the jumpsuit was, it and the harness had seriously messed up his clothes and he wanted to change.
Sara just smirked as she sat down on the bench to loosen her shoelaces. “I don’t know,” she said. “The first time’s nice, but after a while the novelty wears off a bit. Too bad no one could tell the body was a mannequin from the top of the cliff.”
“Well, not our problem now,” Greg said. “No life, no murder; no murder, no crime; no crime, no CSIs.” He made a big show of pulling a new shirt from the locker as he delivered the end of his speech. The little flourish caught the shirt on an envelope, which fell to the floor at Sara’s feet.
She stopped working with her shoes long enough to pick it up. “Denver Police Department?” she asked, glancing up at Greg.
Greg looked over at Sara in surprise, then at the empty spot in his locker, then the envelope in Sara’s hand. He started reaching for the envelope. “Yeah, I haven’t opened it, it’s…”
Sara’s gaze followed Greg’s back to the envelope. “Well, no wonder, since it’s not yours. How long have you been stealing Nick’s mail?”
“Well, you see…” Greg stammered. The hand not reaching at the envelope went to the back of his head as he tried to figure out an explanation. The fingers started scratching at an itch he didn’t actually have.
“And from his home, no less. Greg, that’s…” She stopped as she looked up at him again. Greg stopped mid-scratch, his breath caught as he watched her look him over. He probably looked like a nervous wreck.
“Breakfast?” she asked.
He let his breath go. “Yeah,” he said quietly, taking the envelope as she offered it to him.
***
The waitress had just put coffee on the table and taken their orders when Greg started talking. It was an effort to control the conversation. He’d seen how Sara had been working on something in her mind all during the drive over and when they sat down, and now she was about to start in on him after the silence she'd broken only by offering to drive. So he cut her off.
“First of all, you can’t tell anyone,” he said.
Sara poured some cream into her coffee. “Tell anyone what? That you’ve been to Nick’s house?” She took a sip of coffee, but it was obvious she was only doing it to hide a smile.
“Sara, this isn’t a laughing matter,” Greg said tightly. “But there are two things. First, you can’t tell anyone what I say right now. And second, you have to ask me.”
“What?” She was definitely amused, and a small laugh made her look like she was about to drop the mug in her hands. “Ask you what?”
“Look, he and I made a deal,” Greg said. The pit in his stomach was also telling him he was breaking that deal, but he told it to go away. “So I can tell you, but you have to ask first.”
She put the coffee down and looked him in the eye. “Greg, are you… This is pretty awkward.” Now she looked less amused and more unhappy.
“No kidding,” Greg said, keeping any trace of humor out of his voice. “Ask the damn question already.”
“Fine,” she said. “Are you and Nick… sleeping… together?” Her voice went up as she asked, and she was definitely not keeping eye contact anymore. She wasn’t even looking at him.
“Okay,” Greg said lightly. “Now we can talk.” He took some of the coffee himself, even though it tasted like crap. Sara’s eyes returned to him, so he gave her a big smile. She smiled in return, and this time it wasn’t in amusement, just happiness.
They just looked at each other for a moment, neither saying a thing until Sara broke the silence with “So? Are you going to talk, or was that ‘can’ just about your capability to talk? How long has this been going on?”
“This?” Greg asked. “A few months. Since Grissom said I should find myself a replacement in the lab. The celebration went a little wild.” He smiled and leaned in over the table, dropping his voice at the same time. “But it’s really only been serious since Ecklie screwed up everyone’s shifts.”
“I had no idea,” Sara said.
Greg sighed. “That was the point. Nick doesn’t want anyone to know about him, so he said that as long as we worked together we could only just screw around. At first. I talked him out of some of that.”
Sara rewarded him with a smile. “But after he got moved to swing shift, you didn’t work together anymore.”
“And I told him he had to pick between his secrecy and me. There’d be little interaction between us at work, so it’d be safer for him anyway. We ended up on a compromise.”
“You’d only tell people if they asked,” Sara said.
“And I have to try not to let on what’s happening,” Greg added. “In return, I got Nick to try to have some sort of normal relationship. You know, outside the whole secrecy thing. It’s a bit hard for him, but I cut him some slack every once in a while. Sometimes, I am all about the compromise.”
“So where does Denver fit into all of this?” Sara asked.
“I don’t know,” Greg said. “And that’s what worries me.”
***
He quietly let himself into Nick’s house. Nick had given him a key when he’d changed shifts, but the hurried way he’d given it to Greg at the end of his last night shift suggested that Nick had already had the key made and the change just spurred him to give it to Greg as quickly as possible. The smile from the key in his right hand faded, though, when he remembered the envelope in his left.
The house was silent, and Nick was probably asleep. Greg slipped off his jacket, hanging it carefully on the rack near the door next to Nick’s before padding off to the bedroom. And he’d been right, Nick was asleep. He lay on his side, his mouth hanging slightly open, and that meant he’d been talking in his sleep. The only time he wasn’t in control of himself.
Greg sat in a chair, looking over the envelope for what felt like the thousandth time. It was still from Denver, and it was still addressed to Nick. Greg’s mind clicked through chemicals, trying to find one that would let him open and close Nick’s envelope without leaving any evidence. To find out what it meant, to find out which possibility it was. Was there a conference in Denver he hadn’t heard about? Were they headhunting? Were they mailing Nick something out of the blue, or had he… had he contacted them first? He forced the thought back out of his head, just like he’d been doing all night, except for when the helicopter ride had distracted him.
“Greg,” Nick said quietly.
“What?” Greg asked sharply, shaken out of his head. He looked over at the bed. Nick had apparently been asleep when he‘d spoken, but the sudden noise had made him restless and his eyes opened drowsily.
“Greg,” he said again. This time with a smile, and this time awake. “Come over here.” He motioned lazily with one arm.
Greg stayed in the chair, feeling his mouth twist in a sickly smile, his eyes torn between his hands and Nick.
“Greg,” Nick said again, more insistently. That meant he was waking up. He pushed the blanket off of himself and stood. Greg’s eyes found themselves firmly fixed on Nick as he walked over in his boxers.
“Hey,” Nick said as he leaned in for a kiss. And Greg let himself go in the kiss - it was soft and slow and full of the solid love that was Nick, the love that he was determined to not think about crumbling, the love that he felt evaporating as Nick’s hands moved from his shoulders to his arms, and from his arms to his hands, and from his hands to that damn envelope he was still holding.
“What do you have here?” he asked.
“It’s yours,” Greg said, his mind racing. “It was in the mail yesterday afternoon and I saw it and it just freaked me out…”
Nick put a finger to Greg’s lips. “This has you worked up?” He took the envelope from Greg’s hands and glanced over it before dropping it on the floor and drawing Greg towards the bed. He sat down on the side, pulling Greg down against him with one arm that he kept wrapped around Greg’s shoulders. “I was a little disappointed when there was no money for the promotion,” he said. “And in the end I didn’t care, but at the moment… I put out a couple of resumes. I didn’t say anything because it was before… well, just before.”
“Denver, Nick?”
“It’s just a place, Greg,” Nick said. “And you know that I’m not going anywhere without you now.”
“Nick, no one’s going to want a newly trained lab tech-turned-CSI level one anywhere.”
Nick smiled. Greg could feel the shift in his facial muscles from the way they were leaning against each other. “And that’s why I don’t think I’ll be leaving Las Vegas anytime soon.” And then Greg was smiling, too.
Nick started undoing the buttons of Greg’s shirt matter-of-factly, as if it were a simple problem that Greg was still wearing the shirt and removing it was the simple solution. “Nick,” Greg said, taking the other man’s hands in his own for a moment. “There’s one other thing.”
“It can’t be that important,” Nick said, moving for the buttons again.
“Sara knows.”
Nick froze for a moment, the shortest possible moment, then continued as if nothing had happened. His hesitation had been obvious, but Nick put on a smile and said, “Like I said, not that important,” as he finished off the buttons.
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Date: 2005-05-19 07:51 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-05-19 07:59 am (UTC)I'm thinking that you must write more:)
I'm just getting ready to post my own first csi fic (nick and greg of course)I just hope its as good as yours:)
I think I'm going to friend you - feel free to friend me back.
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Date: 2005-05-19 08:14 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-05-19 08:28 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-05-19 09:19 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-05-19 11:09 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-05-19 02:47 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-05-19 08:29 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-05-19 08:57 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-05-19 09:01 pm (UTC)~x~
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Date: 2005-05-19 11:05 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-05-20 02:54 am (UTC)Loved it!
Date: 2005-05-20 04:17 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-05-20 06:52 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-05-22 01:51 am (UTC)Very nice.
Thanks for sharing.