Same Old Lang Syne-Ficlet
Jan. 17th, 2007 08:29 pm![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
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nickngregTitle: Same Old Lang Syne
Author:JLM121
Summary: We may be done with the past, but that doesn't mean the past is done with us.
Rating: PG
Author's notes: I really don't know how or why I did this. I set out to write smutty Greg/Nick New Year's fic, and I get a Nick character study with implied domesticity. The title is stolen from one of my most beloved cheesy seventies songs by Dan Fogelberg
“Nick Stokes?”
The voice brought back memories, nothing concrete at first, just images. The feel of worn Fraternity sweatshirts and football in the quad trying to impress the freshmen girls. The same girls who would be called names and rated mercilessly back at the house, but for a few days in autumn they were courted with flashes of white teeth and promises of upperclassmen appreciation.
“Is that you Nick?”
Another image. Frosted pink lip gloss smeared against his mouth, the waxy taste washed away with a beer. Someone his mother would approve of, but he would never bring home.
“Sherry?” The name at first had been a guess. There had been a lot of girls with names that ended with y at A&M. Sherrys, Marys, Kerrys, Katys, blondes, brunettes, a red headed Irish girl as exotic as an Indian princess.
“Nick Stokes. I haven’t seen you since. . . “
1991. Not his best year or his worst. He’d had a couple of so called girlfriends. He had been popular and his grades good. He’d never make it further than second string on the baseball team but that wasn’t why he went to college. He majored in criminal justice. He’d be a lawyer, or a Texas Ranger.
“Wow, I can’t believe Nick Stokes in Las Vegas. I never thought I would see you again.”
He had not come to Vegas to hide or be outrageous. He just wanted to be something different than he could be in Dallas. It’s something far more complex than his father’s idea of being “his own man”. He didn’t come to Vegas to be flamboyant or exotic. But he didn’t want to be the last of the Stokes children in Dallas, the one who didn’t marry, or just hadn’t found the right Kappa Kappa Gamma to settle down with.
“I saw your sister in Highland Park several weeks ago, you know our girls are in the same riding club.”
He’d never wanted suburbia, the kids, soccer practice and the SUV. Well, he ended up with the SUV. Who knew being a CSI involved carrying around so much crap. Kids wouldn’t be bad but he’d want them to be different not cookie cutters of himself or his siblings. He would want little eccentric kids, like Greg. He and Greg having kids isn’t something he can explain to a former A&M homecoming princess in the lobby of the Paris hotel.
“Which sister?” Three of his sisters have daughters in riding clubs in Highland Park. His brother’s boys play football. Only one sister is like him, in more ways than one.
This gets a laugh at a pat on his arm. It’s a friendly but flirtatious gesture that shows off the wedding ring set on her left hand. He wonders if her husband is here or she’s here with girlfriends trying to live out a tourism promotion. If he’s more than just someone she knows in a casino or she’s going to try to make him into an opportunity to relive glory days. That would be awkward and embarrassing for both of them, but anything else is cut off by a smack on the back of the head from Warrick.
“We do have a db on the third floor.”
“Yeah sorry, I got distracted. Sherry Reynolds.” He prays that’s the right last name or some approximation of it.
“It’s Harper now. You remember Rick.”
Rick Harper, a year older, wrestler who’d groped him on more than one occasion after initiation. For some reason that makes him smile even more.
“Warrick Brown, with the Crime Lab. And you’ll excuse us but we have something to attend to on the third floor.” Nick has to admit even when he’s almost rude Warrick can still make a lady smile.
“Sorry about this Sherry, it was good to see you again.” She doesn’t get much of a chance to say anything as he grabs his case and nearly jogs to the elevators to catch up with Warrick.
“Old girlfriend?” Warrick asks as the numbers descend and the door dings open.
“Something like that. I just got a flash of what it would be like though. You know. That ever happen to you?”
Warrick’s grin is crooked and almost evil. “A girl I would have died for in high school got arrested for welfare fraud. I bumped into her in booking.”
Nick’s nearly breathless with laughter more for Warrick’s expression than the woman’s circumstances.
“Weird isn’t it?” He finally asks when he gets his breath back
“Yeah, your own condensed version of It’s a Wonderful Life.”
“Would you do things differently?”
“Probably but who wouldn’t.” It’s an odd statement made in the middle of a hotel room with a dead guy who looks like the victim of a robbery gone wrong.
Nick thinks about it. There are a lot of things he wishes hadn’t happened, the guy in his attic, the being buried alive, Greg’s accident, Greg’s beating, things he’d stop if he could go back but other than that, he can’t see himself changing much. He doesn’t want to do dinner every Sunday with his parents with some blonde that makes a good impression. He doesn’t want to go to country club parties and sit listening to his brother talk about the degradation of property values. He likes Thai food for breakfast when the rest of the world is going to work. He likes waking up to a snoring somewhat younger man who still has a bit of California surf punk in him.
“Man, you going to process that lamp or propose to it?”
“Yeah, yeah, probably would turn me down anyway. What could I offer it that could compare to this?” Nick motions to the crime scene that surrounds them.
“You know there is snowball’s chance that we can get out of here before 2007.”
Nick checks his watch. Somehow they’ve pulled New Year’s Eve and it’s their third call and it’s not even close to midnight.
“Keep dreaming, Man, keep dreaming.”
Author:JLM121
Summary: We may be done with the past, but that doesn't mean the past is done with us.
Rating: PG
Author's notes: I really don't know how or why I did this. I set out to write smutty Greg/Nick New Year's fic, and I get a Nick character study with implied domesticity. The title is stolen from one of my most beloved cheesy seventies songs by Dan Fogelberg
“Nick Stokes?”
The voice brought back memories, nothing concrete at first, just images. The feel of worn Fraternity sweatshirts and football in the quad trying to impress the freshmen girls. The same girls who would be called names and rated mercilessly back at the house, but for a few days in autumn they were courted with flashes of white teeth and promises of upperclassmen appreciation.
“Is that you Nick?”
Another image. Frosted pink lip gloss smeared against his mouth, the waxy taste washed away with a beer. Someone his mother would approve of, but he would never bring home.
“Sherry?” The name at first had been a guess. There had been a lot of girls with names that ended with y at A&M. Sherrys, Marys, Kerrys, Katys, blondes, brunettes, a red headed Irish girl as exotic as an Indian princess.
“Nick Stokes. I haven’t seen you since. . . “
1991. Not his best year or his worst. He’d had a couple of so called girlfriends. He had been popular and his grades good. He’d never make it further than second string on the baseball team but that wasn’t why he went to college. He majored in criminal justice. He’d be a lawyer, or a Texas Ranger.
“Wow, I can’t believe Nick Stokes in Las Vegas. I never thought I would see you again.”
He had not come to Vegas to hide or be outrageous. He just wanted to be something different than he could be in Dallas. It’s something far more complex than his father’s idea of being “his own man”. He didn’t come to Vegas to be flamboyant or exotic. But he didn’t want to be the last of the Stokes children in Dallas, the one who didn’t marry, or just hadn’t found the right Kappa Kappa Gamma to settle down with.
“I saw your sister in Highland Park several weeks ago, you know our girls are in the same riding club.”
He’d never wanted suburbia, the kids, soccer practice and the SUV. Well, he ended up with the SUV. Who knew being a CSI involved carrying around so much crap. Kids wouldn’t be bad but he’d want them to be different not cookie cutters of himself or his siblings. He would want little eccentric kids, like Greg. He and Greg having kids isn’t something he can explain to a former A&M homecoming princess in the lobby of the Paris hotel.
“Which sister?” Three of his sisters have daughters in riding clubs in Highland Park. His brother’s boys play football. Only one sister is like him, in more ways than one.
This gets a laugh at a pat on his arm. It’s a friendly but flirtatious gesture that shows off the wedding ring set on her left hand. He wonders if her husband is here or she’s here with girlfriends trying to live out a tourism promotion. If he’s more than just someone she knows in a casino or she’s going to try to make him into an opportunity to relive glory days. That would be awkward and embarrassing for both of them, but anything else is cut off by a smack on the back of the head from Warrick.
“We do have a db on the third floor.”
“Yeah sorry, I got distracted. Sherry Reynolds.” He prays that’s the right last name or some approximation of it.
“It’s Harper now. You remember Rick.”
Rick Harper, a year older, wrestler who’d groped him on more than one occasion after initiation. For some reason that makes him smile even more.
“Warrick Brown, with the Crime Lab. And you’ll excuse us but we have something to attend to on the third floor.” Nick has to admit even when he’s almost rude Warrick can still make a lady smile.
“Sorry about this Sherry, it was good to see you again.” She doesn’t get much of a chance to say anything as he grabs his case and nearly jogs to the elevators to catch up with Warrick.
“Old girlfriend?” Warrick asks as the numbers descend and the door dings open.
“Something like that. I just got a flash of what it would be like though. You know. That ever happen to you?”
Warrick’s grin is crooked and almost evil. “A girl I would have died for in high school got arrested for welfare fraud. I bumped into her in booking.”
Nick’s nearly breathless with laughter more for Warrick’s expression than the woman’s circumstances.
“Weird isn’t it?” He finally asks when he gets his breath back
“Yeah, your own condensed version of It’s a Wonderful Life.”
“Would you do things differently?”
“Probably but who wouldn’t.” It’s an odd statement made in the middle of a hotel room with a dead guy who looks like the victim of a robbery gone wrong.
Nick thinks about it. There are a lot of things he wishes hadn’t happened, the guy in his attic, the being buried alive, Greg’s accident, Greg’s beating, things he’d stop if he could go back but other than that, he can’t see himself changing much. He doesn’t want to do dinner every Sunday with his parents with some blonde that makes a good impression. He doesn’t want to go to country club parties and sit listening to his brother talk about the degradation of property values. He likes Thai food for breakfast when the rest of the world is going to work. He likes waking up to a snoring somewhat younger man who still has a bit of California surf punk in him.
“Man, you going to process that lamp or propose to it?”
“Yeah, yeah, probably would turn me down anyway. What could I offer it that could compare to this?” Nick motions to the crime scene that surrounds them.
“You know there is snowball’s chance that we can get out of here before 2007.”
Nick checks his watch. Somehow they’ve pulled New Year’s Eve and it’s their third call and it’s not even close to midnight.
“Keep dreaming, Man, keep dreaming.”
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