fic- like the desert tonight
Jul. 3rd, 2008 10:54 pm![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
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nickngregTitle: like the desert tonight
Rating: PG-13 for swears
Warnings: Swearing and angst
Summary: “He’s gonna be okay,” he whispers again, and he’s convincing himself as much as he is her.
Spoilers: Set directly after “Grave Danger”, references to “Play With Fire”
A/N: Wow, this whole “summer vacation” thing is actually beneficial to my fic writing! As you can tell, I love writing Greg and his interaction with women and how they can relate to his relationship with Nick. One of these days, I swear, I’ll write a fic with just the boys. Also, I got Greg’s birthday from Wikipedia, but it might be wrong.
Disclaimer: Everything belongs to its respectful owner. I am making no profit off of this whatsoever.
Dedication: To the ever-wonderful Shauna who fully supports my Deep Love of The Love who Nicky’s niece is named after and who asked for Greg meeting Nick’s family, post-“Grave Danger” fic, Greg playing cards with someone, the characters listening to Elliott Smith, someone finding their “naughty box”, Greg not liking Tarantino and, of course, Nick/Greg. This one is for you, bb.
I.
Shauna Winters fumbles with the keys to the apartment her uncle gave her. “Fuck,” she hisses. “Goddamnit. How fucking paranoid is he?” After much struggling, swearing and a bit of kicking, she manages to unlock the three deadbolts and starts on the doorknob.
When she finally gets the knob unlocked, she opens the door and walks in. She’s two steps in the apartment when a glass comes flying out of nowhere and breaks just inches away from her head. “Jesus fucking Christ!” she screams, covering her head with her hands.
“Freeze!”
Shaking a little, Shauna feels around in her purse and finds her wallet to give to him, but not before she hears a gun cock. Oh, fuck. You’ve got to be fucking joking. “I’m not… I’m Shauna Winters, Nicholas Stokes’s niece,” she stammers, looking up at her assailant. “Please, don’t hurt me. I’m here for my uncle-”
“You’re Nicky’s niece?” the person- male, she determines- asks her.
“Yes,” she whispers, straightening a little and eyeing the man. He can’t be much older than her. He has messy, spiky hair, rumpled from sleep and he’s wearing a black Joy Division T-shirt and electric green boxers hanging low on slim hips. If Shauna weren’t about to faint from shock and sheer exhaustion, she might have made a pass at him. “I’m just here to get stuff for him. To take to him in the hospital.”
The man puts down the handgun. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you.”
Shauna raises one eyebrow, confidence returning. “I think that was exactly your intention,” she states and smiles when he laughs.
“Greg Sanders,” he says, offering her his hand. “I work with your uncle.”
“Shauna Winters.” She gives his hand a firm shake. Oh, yeah, he was definitely hot. Wide, brown eyes, white smile and a long, lean but sculpted body. “So, are you house-sitting while Nick’s in the hospital?”
For a moment, Greg pauses. Then: “No, actually. We live together.”
“Oh, you’re roommates?” Shauna asks. “Two guys who have the same work schedule trying to make ends meet? That’s cool.” It might have been cooler had her uncle’s fucking crazy roommate hadn’t pulled a gun on her, but she’ll let that slide. Her grandmother told her that everyone was paranoid now. “Um, I just have to get some shit for my uncle, then I’ll be out of here. My grandmother gave me a key; I’ll only be a minute.” With that, she walks out of the room, looking around the apartment. She can’t tell which stuff is Nick’s. “Where’s his bedroom?” she asks.
“Straight down the hall.”
She nods and walks into the bedroom. The bed is messy, recently slept in. She frowns. “Were you sleeping in his bed?” Turning on the lights, she walks to the closet and purses her lips. She can’t tell what’s her uncle’s and what’s his friend’s. There are multi-patterned shirts, Hawaiian shirts, band shirts, button-downs, T-shirts, a few leather jackets, everything. “Hey, Greg? Wanna come help me sort this shit out?”
Silently, Greg helps her pick out a few T-shirts and some sweatshirts and folds them carefully, putting them in a neat pile on the clean floor. “So, how long’ve you and Nick known each other?” Shauna asks, standing up.
“About six years,” Greg answers quietly, then his eyes widen when she reaches for a blue box on the top shelf of the closet. “No, no, Shauna, don’t-”
“Is there anything in here worth- what the Hell?” Her dark eyes go wide and her mouth drops open a little when she looks inside. Porno movies, dildos, vibrators, fuzzy handcuffs, nipple clamps, lubricants, leashes and other assorted sex toys stare up at her. There’s an awkward pause as Shauna gawks at the box and Greg gawks at her and then they gawk at each other before Greg mumbles something and Shauna starts giggling. “Oh, my… Oh, my God! I’m sorry, I really am, I just…” She breaks off and starts laughing so hard that she snorts and tears roll down her face. “Who- who’s box is this?” she manages to gasp out.
Greg sighs. “Mine and Nick’s,” he mutters.
“You share toys?” Shauna begins, but then something dawns on her. “Oh, oh, I see. Oh, my God, I’m so sorry.”
He shrugs. “’s okay. I mean, it’s just- it’s just a part of life, isn’t it?” Still, he looks uncomfortable and he squirms a little.
Shauna returns his shrug. “If it makes you feel any better, I might be from Texas, but I’m a democrat, I’m pro-choice, one of my best friends is gay and I don’t give a flying fuck if you and my uncle are fucking or not. I always wondered about him, anyway.”
“Really?” Greg asks, and she can see him visibly relax.
“Oh, yeah. See, my aunt had this very single and very attractive friend that she really wanted Nick to hook up with, right? And, I mean, this woman was gorgeous. Looked like Monica Bellucci. Anyway they went on, like, three dates and I know that they fucked, ‘cos I later heard her say that he wouldn’t be able to find her G-spot if he had a fucking map.” Shauna grins. “Besides, and don’t think I’m hitting on you, but you’re hot and I saw the DVD collection and it looks like you have some nice choices in movies, so I approve.”
Greg cocks his head. “You approve of me because I’m attractive and I have good taste in movies?”
“Pretty much. Although, I’d have to figure out what music you listen to before I can give you a full pass to my uncle’s ass.”
There’s another pause before Greg snorts and Shauna grins. “Okay, I’m going to go shower. My music’s over there-” he points at the wall, “-along with my books. You can browse, see if you fully approve, then we’ll pack some stuff for Nick and I’ll go to the hospital with you, okay?”
“Deal.”
II.
Greg’s not really sure what he should think of Shauna. She’s hot, he’ll give her that, and she looks more like a California girl than a Texas one. Granted, he’s not sure what Texas girls should look like. He’s not sure all of them wore tight red T-shirts that revealed a strip of tanned stomach with a belly-button piercing, baggy jeans a size too big that manage to both hug their ass and give them a sexy, just-rolled-out-of-bed look, black sneakers and red nail polish, but if they do, he would move to Texas in a heartbeat.
That is, if he were into girls.
Shauna has large, warm brown eyes like Nick’s and a tan and her long brown hair falls over one shoulder in a messy braid and she looks like a female Nick.
“Let me drive you,” she says when he gets out of the shower, toweling off his dark blonde hair. “And I give you an A plus, Sanders, and a free pass to my uncle’s ass. I wouldn’t have thought someone who was into Black Flag, Manson, Hole, Rage Against the Machine, Radiohead, Elliott Smith, Garbage and all the great seventies music like the Velvet Underground, Pink Floyd, Queen and the Who would want to date someone whose music taste is pretty much limited to Dolly Parton, Patsy Cline and Garth Brooks and the other shitty stuff my uncle listens to.”
Greg can’t help but grin at her. “What music do you like?”
“Hm,” Shauna answers and shrugs. “I like ‘angry chick’ music. You know, like L7, Sleater-Kinney, Bikini Kill, Patti Smith, and pretty much all the other stuff you like.” She grins. “And I noticed you have excellent taste in books and movies. You like Tarantino?”
“He’s okay,” Greg answers. “He’s too over-hyped, though. I like Pulp Fiction for the plot and its dialogue and Kill Bill because Uma Thurman is hot, but I don’t really like how he tortures his characters. I mean, cutting off a dude’s ear? Not really cool.”
Shauna grins at him. “Do you ever see crazy shit like that?”
“Sometimes,” Greg says. “Come on. Let’s get out of here.”
They climb into her dark blue, worn-down VW Bug and when she starts the car, loud music blasts and Greg doesn’t jump, because that happens every time he turns on his car. “Sorry! Sorry,” she exclaims, but Greg just snorts.
“It’s okay,” he tells her and she grins, turning it down. The CD is “Version 2.0” by Garbage, one of Greg’s favorites when he was in college and he laughs when she starts singing along with “I Think I’m Paranoid” and he joins in. When “You Look So Fine” comes on, he says, “How old are you?”
She shoots a sideways grin at him. “That’s very forward of you,” she comments. “A gentleman never asks that. How old are you?”
“Thirty-one,” Greg answers smoothly.
“You’re full of shit, right?”
“No. I turned thirty-one on May fifth.”
Shauna turns on her blinker. “I’m twenty-five.”
“Wow. You and Nick are only about seven years apart,” Greg murmurs.
“Yeah, well, my mom is fifteen years older than him and she had me when she was twenty-two and he was seven. So we were more like brother and sister growing up than uncle and niece. That’s why he’s just Nick to me, not Uncle Nicky like he is to some of my other cousins or my brothers and sisters.” She frowns a little. “It’s hard to think of him as my uncle, really.” She looks nervous and Greg doesn’t know why.
After a few minutes of silence from them, she pulls into the Desert Palms hospital parking lot. When she shuts off the car, Greg climbs out and then looks at her. Shauna’s frozen to her seat, almost scared to get out. “You okay?” he asks.
“Not really. I’m… my grandma already went in and said he was in critical condition. What if he dies?”
And she’s just scratched open a wound Greg’s put a Band-Aid over and he touches her shoulder, forcing down his own feelings of terror and worry and anxiety. “He’ll be fine, okay? Don’t worry.”
“I can’t help it.”
III.
“How’s he doing?” Greg asks a tall black man with amazing green eyes.
The man sighs. “He’s still asleep. He’s been stabilized, though.”
Greg bites his lower lip. “He hasn’t torn out another IV, has he?”
“Not that I know of. Who’s that?” He points at Shauna and she gives a shaky smile.
“Hi. I’m Shauna Winters, Nick’s niece. I’m here with my grandparents and the rest of my family.” She looks around and sees her uncle’s coworkers, all of them tall and hardened by years of seeing the things she thought you only saw on TV; homicides, suicides, maim, rape, torture, everything she had nightmares about. Compared to them, she feels small and insignificant before Greg introduces her.
“Hi, guys, this is Shauna. She’s Nick’s niece,” he says, his voice quiet but it breaks the silence.
They look at her and slowly introduce themselves. The strawberry blonde is Catherine Willows; the short, stocky man is Detective Jim Brass; the beautiful and intense brunette is Sara Sidle; the older man with a white beard is Doctor Robbins; the black man is Warrick Brown; the tall and slim blonde is Sofia Curtis, and the man with grey hair and wise, kind eyes is the famous Gil Grissom, the one her uncle told stories about.
After sitting in a hard metal chair with Sara on one side and Greg on the other for almost an hour, Shauna sees a nurse and leaps to her feet. “Hi, can I see Nick Stokes?” she asks.
“No, miss, I’m sorry. He’s in critical condition and can’t take visitors at the moment,” the nurse answers, and Shauna flares.
“I’m his niece!” she snaps. “I need to see him! I came all the way here from Texas and I want to see my uncle!” Sometimes she wished she had the same control over her temper that Nick was so famous for, but right now, she could bring herself to give a shit. “Look, he almost died. And if he fucking dies in there and I haven’t gotten to see him just because he’s in critical condition, I’ll fucking sue you!” Harsh, angry words fell out of her mouth and she’s not even sure of what she’s saying. The lack of sleep is getting to her and so was the fact that she was depressed and stressed and she just drove for about ten fucking hours with only herself to talk to and the first person she met when she got here was her inconsolable grandmother and the second was her terrified grandfather and the third was her uncle’s boyfriend and he pulled a fucking gun on her, and maybe it’s not an excuse, but she can feel two pairs of hands on her arms and another hand stroking her hair and she knows she fucked up, big time.
Warrick holds her back and Greg has a firm grip on her upper arm while Sara calms her down with gentle words. “Maybe you should take her back to Nick’s place,” Warrick offers.
“I’m not a kid, you know!” Shauna barks. “I’m perfectly capable of taking care of myself. Where’s my grandmother?”
“She’s in a hotel, Shauna,” Grissom tells her gently, “With your grandfather. Your uncle was conscious a few hours ago and he said that you could stay at his house if you’d like. Do you want to shower, get some sleep and come back?”
She looks at the floor and mutters, “Fine.”
“I’ll take you there,” Greg tells her. “Okay?”
She lets Greg drive her car, something she never lets anyone do, but she’s too tired to do anything, especially drive. “Sorry. I guess I got kinda crazy at the hospital,” she mutters.
“That’s an understatement,” Greg tells her, but he’s smiling a little, so she knows he doesn’t think she’s totally insane. “It’s okay. You should have seen Nick when I was in the hospital.”
“Why were you in the hospital?” Shauna asks.
Greg shrugs. “I got blown up,” he says, like it’s the most casual thing ever and it happened every day.
“What did he do?”
“He almost took out a male nurse trying to get to see me, even though I was in surgery.”
Shauna stares at him. “Really?” At his nod, she amends, “That’s probably the most amazing thing I’ve heard all day.”
IV.
Greg is pretty positive that if he were into girls as much as he was into Nick, which was a lot, he would most certainly date Nick’s niece. She carried her own bags into the apartment, didn’t shove his stuff out of the closet to make room for her clothes, asked politely if she could use the shower and volunteered to sleep on the couch, even though he told her that she was a woman and the woman got the bed.
He sits on the couch, where he put leopard-print sheets on the cushions, along with a few pillows and blankets and listens to the shower running and her singing a song that he doesn’t really know but wishes he did; she’s the only living boy in New York, she gets her news from the weather report and half the time she’s gone and she doesn’t know where.
Fifteen minutes later, she emerges from the steamy room wearing a black tank top and flannel pajama bottoms. “Nice sheets,” she says dryly and she wrings out her hair.
“I offered you the bed,” Greg mutters, a little put out because she insulted the sheets. He thought they were nice.
She half-smiles and suddenly she looks so much like Nick that he wants to kiss her. “No, it’s fine.” A moment later, she’s settled on the couch with the covers pulled up to her chin and yawns. “Tell me about Nicky. How is he now? I haven’t seen him in a while. We talk on the phone but-” she yawns again- “It’s not the same, you know? How is he?”
Greg smiles. “He’s good,” he tells her. “Aside from, you know, that whole incident.” He finds it so easy to talk to this girl because he doesn’t feel like he has to hide anything from her. Her eyes are wide and unassuming and she looks like she doesn’t judge. After this week, he’ll never see her again, so he tells her everything about Nick- how much he loves him and adores him, how Nick’s now a level three CSI. He tells her about Grissom and Warrick and Sara and Catherine and Brass and Sofia and Hodges and Archie and when he gets to the part when he passed his field test, she’s sound asleep on the couch. She sleeps on her stomach, just like Nick. One arm falls over the edge of the cushions, her knuckles graze the carpeting and her mouth is open, just a little.
He leaves her like that for about four hours as he tidies up the apartment which means that he moves stuff so it’s not in the center of the floor, feeds their fish, changes his clothes, makes a pot of coffee and settles down to read a book.
At about eight o’clock, he hears Shauna groan loudly and then a loud thud coupled with several swears. Greg walks into the living room and sees her tangled up in the blankets as she tried to climb off the couch. “Goddamnit, where the hell am I?” she asks.
“You’re at your Uncle Nick’s apartment,” Greg tells her pertly.
She groans again. “Jesus. I feel like shit. Do you have anything to drink? Like alcohol?” She winces when her head pounds and Greg makes her a scotch and soda that’s mostly scotch. She drains it before slamming the glass down on the table. Her lower lip quivers a little. “Is he gonna be okay?” she asks before she starts to cry.
“Yeah,” Greg whispers, sitting down next to her. He puts his arm over her shoulders and, God, he doesn’t know how to comfort women very well. He rubs her back and lets her cry into his chest. “He’s one of my best friends. He’s so sweet and polite. A real gentleman. And- and if he dies, what am I going to do? What are you going to do?”
Greg kisses the top of her head. “He’s not going to die.”
“My grandma told me you found him with a gun in his mouth. And he put it there.”
Greg’s blood freezes, chunks of ice floating through his veins as he continues to hold onto her. “He’s gonna be okay,” he whispers again, and he’s convincing himself as much as he is her.
Twenty minutes later, she’s dressed and he’s driving them to the hospital. Shauna’s still tired and resting her head against the window and “Wicked Ways” blasts through the speakers. Shirley Manson’s voice is soothing as he pulls into a parking spot. “It’s raining,” Shauna mutters.
“Yeah,” Greg answers, climbing out of her car and walking around to the other side, opens her door for her.
“Thanks,” Shauna mutters, taking his hand. Her hand is large and calloused like Nick’s and it feels oddly comforting, holding it.
This time, the nurse lets them see Nick (Shauna apologizes profusely to her and the woman seems a little taken aback) and Shauna squeezes Greg’s hand when they enter. Greg hates hospitals. They’re too white, clean, sterile and they smell like disinfectant masking the stench of piss.
Shauna lets out a choked sob when she sees Nick.
It looks like there are a million machines hooked up to Nick, dozens of IVs stuck in his arms, a tube up his nose and Greg can barely see his chest rising and falling with every breath. “He looks dead,” Shauna squeaks.
Greg lets out a breath. “He’s fine, Shauna. He’s gonna be okay.”
V.
They sit for a two and a half hours before Nick wakes up. They don’t run out of things to talk about, but they’re both thankful that Shauna keeps a pack of cards in her bag because the tension is too thick. They could cut a knife with it. So instead, they sit and play seventeen rounds of poker, betting the matches that Shauna also keeps in her purse and Greg wins each time. “Oh, that was just fucking cheating,” Shauna snaps after the ninth win.
“No, that’s just fucking Vegas, baby.” Greg grins widely at her.
For a while, they can forget that they’re in a hospital, that Nick is lying there, almost a vegetable and they can enjoy each other’s company. They don’t talk about Nick. They don’t talk that much, really, except to swear occasionally in Shauna’s case or in Greg’s, gloat. The matches are strike-anywhere and Greg soon shows off his skill at lighting them on his zipper, teeth or fingernail. Shauna is almost positive that isn’t allowed in hospitals, but she doesn’t mind.
Then, they hear Nick stirring and they race to his bedside. “Nicky,” Greg whispers in such a tender voice that it startles Shauna and his wide eyes become puppy-dog eyes, large and caring and beautiful.
He blinks at Greg and smiles before he sees Shauna. “Caroline,” he breathes.
Greg stares at her. “Caroline?” he repeats.
“Yeah,” Shauna winces. “It’s my middle name. He likes it because of that shitty song.”
Nick lifts his hand and touches her arm. “It’s pretty,” he protests weakly with a small grin. “How’re you doing?” he asks them.
Greg grins. “Well, your niece here broke into our apartment, swore a lot, gave me a ‘pass on your ass’, yelled at a nurse, insulted my leopard-print bedding, passed out on our couch and drank all our scotch.”
Snorting, Shauna butts in. “And your lover here? Threatened me at gunpoint, threw a glass at my head, greeted me in his boxers and a flimsy T-shirt, gave me said scotch and showed me your little ‘naughty box’. I never would have guessed that you’d be that kinky, Nicky.”
Nick goes bright red and Greg lowers his eyes and starts picking at a hole in his jeans, but Shauna just looks at them both, smiling. “So, uh, I guess you found out…” Nick begins.
“And guess what, Uncle Nicky? I don’t give a shit who you fuck. Besides,” she adds, leaning in to whisper in his ear, “I approve.”
the end
Also, for the morbidly interested, here are the two songs Greg and Shauna listen to on the drive.
I Think I'm Paranoid
You Look So Fine
Rating: PG-13 for swears
Warnings: Swearing and angst
Summary: “He’s gonna be okay,” he whispers again, and he’s convincing himself as much as he is her.
Spoilers: Set directly after “Grave Danger”, references to “Play With Fire”
A/N: Wow, this whole “summer vacation” thing is actually beneficial to my fic writing! As you can tell, I love writing Greg and his interaction with women and how they can relate to his relationship with Nick. One of these days, I swear, I’ll write a fic with just the boys. Also, I got Greg’s birthday from Wikipedia, but it might be wrong.
Disclaimer: Everything belongs to its respectful owner. I am making no profit off of this whatsoever.
Dedication: To the ever-wonderful Shauna who fully supports my Deep Love of The Love who Nicky’s niece is named after and who asked for Greg meeting Nick’s family, post-“Grave Danger” fic, Greg playing cards with someone, the characters listening to Elliott Smith, someone finding their “naughty box”, Greg not liking Tarantino and, of course, Nick/Greg. This one is for you, bb.
I.
Shauna Winters fumbles with the keys to the apartment her uncle gave her. “Fuck,” she hisses. “Goddamnit. How fucking paranoid is he?” After much struggling, swearing and a bit of kicking, she manages to unlock the three deadbolts and starts on the doorknob.
When she finally gets the knob unlocked, she opens the door and walks in. She’s two steps in the apartment when a glass comes flying out of nowhere and breaks just inches away from her head. “Jesus fucking Christ!” she screams, covering her head with her hands.
“Freeze!”
Shaking a little, Shauna feels around in her purse and finds her wallet to give to him, but not before she hears a gun cock. Oh, fuck. You’ve got to be fucking joking. “I’m not… I’m Shauna Winters, Nicholas Stokes’s niece,” she stammers, looking up at her assailant. “Please, don’t hurt me. I’m here for my uncle-”
“You’re Nicky’s niece?” the person- male, she determines- asks her.
“Yes,” she whispers, straightening a little and eyeing the man. He can’t be much older than her. He has messy, spiky hair, rumpled from sleep and he’s wearing a black Joy Division T-shirt and electric green boxers hanging low on slim hips. If Shauna weren’t about to faint from shock and sheer exhaustion, she might have made a pass at him. “I’m just here to get stuff for him. To take to him in the hospital.”
The man puts down the handgun. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you.”
Shauna raises one eyebrow, confidence returning. “I think that was exactly your intention,” she states and smiles when he laughs.
“Greg Sanders,” he says, offering her his hand. “I work with your uncle.”
“Shauna Winters.” She gives his hand a firm shake. Oh, yeah, he was definitely hot. Wide, brown eyes, white smile and a long, lean but sculpted body. “So, are you house-sitting while Nick’s in the hospital?”
For a moment, Greg pauses. Then: “No, actually. We live together.”
“Oh, you’re roommates?” Shauna asks. “Two guys who have the same work schedule trying to make ends meet? That’s cool.” It might have been cooler had her uncle’s fucking crazy roommate hadn’t pulled a gun on her, but she’ll let that slide. Her grandmother told her that everyone was paranoid now. “Um, I just have to get some shit for my uncle, then I’ll be out of here. My grandmother gave me a key; I’ll only be a minute.” With that, she walks out of the room, looking around the apartment. She can’t tell which stuff is Nick’s. “Where’s his bedroom?” she asks.
“Straight down the hall.”
She nods and walks into the bedroom. The bed is messy, recently slept in. She frowns. “Were you sleeping in his bed?” Turning on the lights, she walks to the closet and purses her lips. She can’t tell what’s her uncle’s and what’s his friend’s. There are multi-patterned shirts, Hawaiian shirts, band shirts, button-downs, T-shirts, a few leather jackets, everything. “Hey, Greg? Wanna come help me sort this shit out?”
Silently, Greg helps her pick out a few T-shirts and some sweatshirts and folds them carefully, putting them in a neat pile on the clean floor. “So, how long’ve you and Nick known each other?” Shauna asks, standing up.
“About six years,” Greg answers quietly, then his eyes widen when she reaches for a blue box on the top shelf of the closet. “No, no, Shauna, don’t-”
“Is there anything in here worth- what the Hell?” Her dark eyes go wide and her mouth drops open a little when she looks inside. Porno movies, dildos, vibrators, fuzzy handcuffs, nipple clamps, lubricants, leashes and other assorted sex toys stare up at her. There’s an awkward pause as Shauna gawks at the box and Greg gawks at her and then they gawk at each other before Greg mumbles something and Shauna starts giggling. “Oh, my… Oh, my God! I’m sorry, I really am, I just…” She breaks off and starts laughing so hard that she snorts and tears roll down her face. “Who- who’s box is this?” she manages to gasp out.
Greg sighs. “Mine and Nick’s,” he mutters.
“You share toys?” Shauna begins, but then something dawns on her. “Oh, oh, I see. Oh, my God, I’m so sorry.”
He shrugs. “’s okay. I mean, it’s just- it’s just a part of life, isn’t it?” Still, he looks uncomfortable and he squirms a little.
Shauna returns his shrug. “If it makes you feel any better, I might be from Texas, but I’m a democrat, I’m pro-choice, one of my best friends is gay and I don’t give a flying fuck if you and my uncle are fucking or not. I always wondered about him, anyway.”
“Really?” Greg asks, and she can see him visibly relax.
“Oh, yeah. See, my aunt had this very single and very attractive friend that she really wanted Nick to hook up with, right? And, I mean, this woman was gorgeous. Looked like Monica Bellucci. Anyway they went on, like, three dates and I know that they fucked, ‘cos I later heard her say that he wouldn’t be able to find her G-spot if he had a fucking map.” Shauna grins. “Besides, and don’t think I’m hitting on you, but you’re hot and I saw the DVD collection and it looks like you have some nice choices in movies, so I approve.”
Greg cocks his head. “You approve of me because I’m attractive and I have good taste in movies?”
“Pretty much. Although, I’d have to figure out what music you listen to before I can give you a full pass to my uncle’s ass.”
There’s another pause before Greg snorts and Shauna grins. “Okay, I’m going to go shower. My music’s over there-” he points at the wall, “-along with my books. You can browse, see if you fully approve, then we’ll pack some stuff for Nick and I’ll go to the hospital with you, okay?”
“Deal.”
II.
Greg’s not really sure what he should think of Shauna. She’s hot, he’ll give her that, and she looks more like a California girl than a Texas one. Granted, he’s not sure what Texas girls should look like. He’s not sure all of them wore tight red T-shirts that revealed a strip of tanned stomach with a belly-button piercing, baggy jeans a size too big that manage to both hug their ass and give them a sexy, just-rolled-out-of-bed look, black sneakers and red nail polish, but if they do, he would move to Texas in a heartbeat.
That is, if he were into girls.
Shauna has large, warm brown eyes like Nick’s and a tan and her long brown hair falls over one shoulder in a messy braid and she looks like a female Nick.
“Let me drive you,” she says when he gets out of the shower, toweling off his dark blonde hair. “And I give you an A plus, Sanders, and a free pass to my uncle’s ass. I wouldn’t have thought someone who was into Black Flag, Manson, Hole, Rage Against the Machine, Radiohead, Elliott Smith, Garbage and all the great seventies music like the Velvet Underground, Pink Floyd, Queen and the Who would want to date someone whose music taste is pretty much limited to Dolly Parton, Patsy Cline and Garth Brooks and the other shitty stuff my uncle listens to.”
Greg can’t help but grin at her. “What music do you like?”
“Hm,” Shauna answers and shrugs. “I like ‘angry chick’ music. You know, like L7, Sleater-Kinney, Bikini Kill, Patti Smith, and pretty much all the other stuff you like.” She grins. “And I noticed you have excellent taste in books and movies. You like Tarantino?”
“He’s okay,” Greg answers. “He’s too over-hyped, though. I like Pulp Fiction for the plot and its dialogue and Kill Bill because Uma Thurman is hot, but I don’t really like how he tortures his characters. I mean, cutting off a dude’s ear? Not really cool.”
Shauna grins at him. “Do you ever see crazy shit like that?”
“Sometimes,” Greg says. “Come on. Let’s get out of here.”
They climb into her dark blue, worn-down VW Bug and when she starts the car, loud music blasts and Greg doesn’t jump, because that happens every time he turns on his car. “Sorry! Sorry,” she exclaims, but Greg just snorts.
“It’s okay,” he tells her and she grins, turning it down. The CD is “Version 2.0” by Garbage, one of Greg’s favorites when he was in college and he laughs when she starts singing along with “I Think I’m Paranoid” and he joins in. When “You Look So Fine” comes on, he says, “How old are you?”
She shoots a sideways grin at him. “That’s very forward of you,” she comments. “A gentleman never asks that. How old are you?”
“Thirty-one,” Greg answers smoothly.
“You’re full of shit, right?”
“No. I turned thirty-one on May fifth.”
Shauna turns on her blinker. “I’m twenty-five.”
“Wow. You and Nick are only about seven years apart,” Greg murmurs.
“Yeah, well, my mom is fifteen years older than him and she had me when she was twenty-two and he was seven. So we were more like brother and sister growing up than uncle and niece. That’s why he’s just Nick to me, not Uncle Nicky like he is to some of my other cousins or my brothers and sisters.” She frowns a little. “It’s hard to think of him as my uncle, really.” She looks nervous and Greg doesn’t know why.
After a few minutes of silence from them, she pulls into the Desert Palms hospital parking lot. When she shuts off the car, Greg climbs out and then looks at her. Shauna’s frozen to her seat, almost scared to get out. “You okay?” he asks.
“Not really. I’m… my grandma already went in and said he was in critical condition. What if he dies?”
And she’s just scratched open a wound Greg’s put a Band-Aid over and he touches her shoulder, forcing down his own feelings of terror and worry and anxiety. “He’ll be fine, okay? Don’t worry.”
“I can’t help it.”
III.
“How’s he doing?” Greg asks a tall black man with amazing green eyes.
The man sighs. “He’s still asleep. He’s been stabilized, though.”
Greg bites his lower lip. “He hasn’t torn out another IV, has he?”
“Not that I know of. Who’s that?” He points at Shauna and she gives a shaky smile.
“Hi. I’m Shauna Winters, Nick’s niece. I’m here with my grandparents and the rest of my family.” She looks around and sees her uncle’s coworkers, all of them tall and hardened by years of seeing the things she thought you only saw on TV; homicides, suicides, maim, rape, torture, everything she had nightmares about. Compared to them, she feels small and insignificant before Greg introduces her.
“Hi, guys, this is Shauna. She’s Nick’s niece,” he says, his voice quiet but it breaks the silence.
They look at her and slowly introduce themselves. The strawberry blonde is Catherine Willows; the short, stocky man is Detective Jim Brass; the beautiful and intense brunette is Sara Sidle; the older man with a white beard is Doctor Robbins; the black man is Warrick Brown; the tall and slim blonde is Sofia Curtis, and the man with grey hair and wise, kind eyes is the famous Gil Grissom, the one her uncle told stories about.
After sitting in a hard metal chair with Sara on one side and Greg on the other for almost an hour, Shauna sees a nurse and leaps to her feet. “Hi, can I see Nick Stokes?” she asks.
“No, miss, I’m sorry. He’s in critical condition and can’t take visitors at the moment,” the nurse answers, and Shauna flares.
“I’m his niece!” she snaps. “I need to see him! I came all the way here from Texas and I want to see my uncle!” Sometimes she wished she had the same control over her temper that Nick was so famous for, but right now, she could bring herself to give a shit. “Look, he almost died. And if he fucking dies in there and I haven’t gotten to see him just because he’s in critical condition, I’ll fucking sue you!” Harsh, angry words fell out of her mouth and she’s not even sure of what she’s saying. The lack of sleep is getting to her and so was the fact that she was depressed and stressed and she just drove for about ten fucking hours with only herself to talk to and the first person she met when she got here was her inconsolable grandmother and the second was her terrified grandfather and the third was her uncle’s boyfriend and he pulled a fucking gun on her, and maybe it’s not an excuse, but she can feel two pairs of hands on her arms and another hand stroking her hair and she knows she fucked up, big time.
Warrick holds her back and Greg has a firm grip on her upper arm while Sara calms her down with gentle words. “Maybe you should take her back to Nick’s place,” Warrick offers.
“I’m not a kid, you know!” Shauna barks. “I’m perfectly capable of taking care of myself. Where’s my grandmother?”
“She’s in a hotel, Shauna,” Grissom tells her gently, “With your grandfather. Your uncle was conscious a few hours ago and he said that you could stay at his house if you’d like. Do you want to shower, get some sleep and come back?”
She looks at the floor and mutters, “Fine.”
“I’ll take you there,” Greg tells her. “Okay?”
She lets Greg drive her car, something she never lets anyone do, but she’s too tired to do anything, especially drive. “Sorry. I guess I got kinda crazy at the hospital,” she mutters.
“That’s an understatement,” Greg tells her, but he’s smiling a little, so she knows he doesn’t think she’s totally insane. “It’s okay. You should have seen Nick when I was in the hospital.”
“Why were you in the hospital?” Shauna asks.
Greg shrugs. “I got blown up,” he says, like it’s the most casual thing ever and it happened every day.
“What did he do?”
“He almost took out a male nurse trying to get to see me, even though I was in surgery.”
Shauna stares at him. “Really?” At his nod, she amends, “That’s probably the most amazing thing I’ve heard all day.”
IV.
Greg is pretty positive that if he were into girls as much as he was into Nick, which was a lot, he would most certainly date Nick’s niece. She carried her own bags into the apartment, didn’t shove his stuff out of the closet to make room for her clothes, asked politely if she could use the shower and volunteered to sleep on the couch, even though he told her that she was a woman and the woman got the bed.
He sits on the couch, where he put leopard-print sheets on the cushions, along with a few pillows and blankets and listens to the shower running and her singing a song that he doesn’t really know but wishes he did; she’s the only living boy in New York, she gets her news from the weather report and half the time she’s gone and she doesn’t know where.
Fifteen minutes later, she emerges from the steamy room wearing a black tank top and flannel pajama bottoms. “Nice sheets,” she says dryly and she wrings out her hair.
“I offered you the bed,” Greg mutters, a little put out because she insulted the sheets. He thought they were nice.
She half-smiles and suddenly she looks so much like Nick that he wants to kiss her. “No, it’s fine.” A moment later, she’s settled on the couch with the covers pulled up to her chin and yawns. “Tell me about Nicky. How is he now? I haven’t seen him in a while. We talk on the phone but-” she yawns again- “It’s not the same, you know? How is he?”
Greg smiles. “He’s good,” he tells her. “Aside from, you know, that whole incident.” He finds it so easy to talk to this girl because he doesn’t feel like he has to hide anything from her. Her eyes are wide and unassuming and she looks like she doesn’t judge. After this week, he’ll never see her again, so he tells her everything about Nick- how much he loves him and adores him, how Nick’s now a level three CSI. He tells her about Grissom and Warrick and Sara and Catherine and Brass and Sofia and Hodges and Archie and when he gets to the part when he passed his field test, she’s sound asleep on the couch. She sleeps on her stomach, just like Nick. One arm falls over the edge of the cushions, her knuckles graze the carpeting and her mouth is open, just a little.
He leaves her like that for about four hours as he tidies up the apartment which means that he moves stuff so it’s not in the center of the floor, feeds their fish, changes his clothes, makes a pot of coffee and settles down to read a book.
At about eight o’clock, he hears Shauna groan loudly and then a loud thud coupled with several swears. Greg walks into the living room and sees her tangled up in the blankets as she tried to climb off the couch. “Goddamnit, where the hell am I?” she asks.
“You’re at your Uncle Nick’s apartment,” Greg tells her pertly.
She groans again. “Jesus. I feel like shit. Do you have anything to drink? Like alcohol?” She winces when her head pounds and Greg makes her a scotch and soda that’s mostly scotch. She drains it before slamming the glass down on the table. Her lower lip quivers a little. “Is he gonna be okay?” she asks before she starts to cry.
“Yeah,” Greg whispers, sitting down next to her. He puts his arm over her shoulders and, God, he doesn’t know how to comfort women very well. He rubs her back and lets her cry into his chest. “He’s one of my best friends. He’s so sweet and polite. A real gentleman. And- and if he dies, what am I going to do? What are you going to do?”
Greg kisses the top of her head. “He’s not going to die.”
“My grandma told me you found him with a gun in his mouth. And he put it there.”
Greg’s blood freezes, chunks of ice floating through his veins as he continues to hold onto her. “He’s gonna be okay,” he whispers again, and he’s convincing himself as much as he is her.
Twenty minutes later, she’s dressed and he’s driving them to the hospital. Shauna’s still tired and resting her head against the window and “Wicked Ways” blasts through the speakers. Shirley Manson’s voice is soothing as he pulls into a parking spot. “It’s raining,” Shauna mutters.
“Yeah,” Greg answers, climbing out of her car and walking around to the other side, opens her door for her.
“Thanks,” Shauna mutters, taking his hand. Her hand is large and calloused like Nick’s and it feels oddly comforting, holding it.
This time, the nurse lets them see Nick (Shauna apologizes profusely to her and the woman seems a little taken aback) and Shauna squeezes Greg’s hand when they enter. Greg hates hospitals. They’re too white, clean, sterile and they smell like disinfectant masking the stench of piss.
Shauna lets out a choked sob when she sees Nick.
It looks like there are a million machines hooked up to Nick, dozens of IVs stuck in his arms, a tube up his nose and Greg can barely see his chest rising and falling with every breath. “He looks dead,” Shauna squeaks.
Greg lets out a breath. “He’s fine, Shauna. He’s gonna be okay.”
V.
They sit for a two and a half hours before Nick wakes up. They don’t run out of things to talk about, but they’re both thankful that Shauna keeps a pack of cards in her bag because the tension is too thick. They could cut a knife with it. So instead, they sit and play seventeen rounds of poker, betting the matches that Shauna also keeps in her purse and Greg wins each time. “Oh, that was just fucking cheating,” Shauna snaps after the ninth win.
“No, that’s just fucking Vegas, baby.” Greg grins widely at her.
For a while, they can forget that they’re in a hospital, that Nick is lying there, almost a vegetable and they can enjoy each other’s company. They don’t talk about Nick. They don’t talk that much, really, except to swear occasionally in Shauna’s case or in Greg’s, gloat. The matches are strike-anywhere and Greg soon shows off his skill at lighting them on his zipper, teeth or fingernail. Shauna is almost positive that isn’t allowed in hospitals, but she doesn’t mind.
Then, they hear Nick stirring and they race to his bedside. “Nicky,” Greg whispers in such a tender voice that it startles Shauna and his wide eyes become puppy-dog eyes, large and caring and beautiful.
He blinks at Greg and smiles before he sees Shauna. “Caroline,” he breathes.
Greg stares at her. “Caroline?” he repeats.
“Yeah,” Shauna winces. “It’s my middle name. He likes it because of that shitty song.”
Nick lifts his hand and touches her arm. “It’s pretty,” he protests weakly with a small grin. “How’re you doing?” he asks them.
Greg grins. “Well, your niece here broke into our apartment, swore a lot, gave me a ‘pass on your ass’, yelled at a nurse, insulted my leopard-print bedding, passed out on our couch and drank all our scotch.”
Snorting, Shauna butts in. “And your lover here? Threatened me at gunpoint, threw a glass at my head, greeted me in his boxers and a flimsy T-shirt, gave me said scotch and showed me your little ‘naughty box’. I never would have guessed that you’d be that kinky, Nicky.”
Nick goes bright red and Greg lowers his eyes and starts picking at a hole in his jeans, but Shauna just looks at them both, smiling. “So, uh, I guess you found out…” Nick begins.
“And guess what, Uncle Nicky? I don’t give a shit who you fuck. Besides,” she adds, leaning in to whisper in his ear, “I approve.”
Also, for the morbidly interested, here are the two songs Greg and Shauna listen to on the drive.
I Think I'm Paranoid
You Look So Fine
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Date: 2008-07-04 11:12 pm (UTC)Thanks for the story,
Meisaal
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