Title: Graveside
Authors: Deb and Andrea
Rating: PG
Spoilers: "Lost Son." Note that this was written from spoilers before the actual episode aired.
Summary: Life is too short.
Twenty-seven years. He'd watched and waited and listened beside the scores of tombstones blanketing these grounds for twenty-seven years.
His first day on the job, he had been hired as a gravedigger—merely a young, lean body with a strong back and muscular arms attached to calloused hands that all too quickly grew accustomed to wielding an old rusty shovel with indifference, even disinterest.
Time had marched on, day after day, each one longer than the last; but soon, Sam Collins found he had worked this cemetery for five years, his previous disinterest having slowly given way to insatiable curiosity carried over from his childhood.
He always worked alone, but Sam didn't mind—it gave a man time to think, to plan, to remember. He passed the long hours in the sun tending to weeds and decaying memorials by reading the markers and watching the visitors come and go. With every passing year, his work grew into a calling, his lot in life transforming into his privilege. Now, he spoke to the dead and the living alike as he went about his tasks. They were his charges and his friends. He learned about the deceased by reading their engraved marble place markers, but he learned about the living by watching them, and occasionally, by overhearing their laments at the graves.
There was Mrs. Murphy, her long-suffering husband gone all these many years—Sam's first grave—she still visited from time to time, although that wretched Alzheimer's had taken its toll, so the visits were fewer and farther between.
And Mr. and Mrs. Castillo. They lost their only son in a house fire. Every week, the father would come and read Dr. Seuss books to his son. It always brought a tear to Sam's eye. After the Castillos moved away last year, Sam couldn't bear the thought of no one reading to little Jose any more, so he started doing it himself—only he recited the box scores—after all, every little boy loves baseball.
Oh, and who could forget Mr. Del Rubio? His oldest and dearest friend in the world lay at rest here, and he came back every year on the anniversary toting some 'libation' as he called it and toasted his buddy in grand style, brown bag notwithstanding.
But, of all the people he had encountered over the years, the most memorable had to be the pretty little blonde lady and the stoical red-headed man who took turns standing beside the newest grave in Sam's care, Speedle, he thought his name was—that cop killed in the line of duty last month.
Like clockwork those two came, she every Monday, the day her friend died, she said, and he, every Friday, to close out each workweek with the missing member of his team.
'If only they were here at the same time,' Sam mused. Then they would see, they would know they share the same truth. Life is too short. "Speed," as Sam heard them call him, was proof of that.
Timothy Michael Speedle
06/24/1973 – 09/20/2004
Calleigh traced the deeply-carved letters on the tombstone. She had never even known his full name until his death, and for a moment, she blamed herself for never asking. That thought was immediately chased out by the question of what Speed himself would have wanted on his tombstone. She was sure he had never thought of himself by his full name, any more than the rest of the team had. Had he ever even considered his tombstone? So young. Too young. The stone was cold and impersonal, and Calleigh pulled away from it suddenly and knelt, touching the ground instead, trying vainly to get closer to him so he could hear.
"Tim, I needed to tell you I'm sorry." Kneeling came easily to her, something she did every day at crime scenes, and Calleigh twisted one knee deliberately to make herself uncomfortable. She shouldn't be comfortable kneeling at a coworker's grave. Her body needed to join her mind in self-accusing protest. "I just wanted you to know I didn't mean it. That day, when I got the call, and I. . . " Her voice trailed off. Speed, if he was here, was as silent as ever, but the remembrance hurt her own ears, even if not his.
That day. That call. She remembered the case file number on the bullet she had been examining, a ridiculously small detail indelibly burned into her mind in the eternal microsecond between hearing and comprehension. There had been a shootout. Officer down. No further details, but the location was enough to send the information racing through the CSI network like a wildfire. Horatio and Speed had gone to the jewelry shop to follow a lead, and something had gone horribly, perhaps fatally wrong. The case file number moved out of her field of vision as Calleigh's body took control without direction from her frozen mind. She bolted out the door toward the elevator, only dimly aware of the pain as her foot knocked against the doorway when she turned too sharply into the hall. The number was still there in her mind's eye, but somehow the victim's name next to it had changed. Horatio Caine. No, dear God, no, not Horatio. Nothing could have happened to him. It was all a nightmare, and she would wake up any minute with the only reality the slowly fading echo of her pounding heartbeat. She hadn't woken up, though. She had run into Eric at the elevator. He was just as upset but more functional, and he drove them to the hospital. The whole drive, Calleigh stared sightlessly at the windshield, only seeing the file with his name and the bullet that had torn into his flesh impersonally relegated to her microscope. A life condensed to two impersonal words: Case closed. No! Her mind shrieked the protesting denial, but the image remained.
Only it hadn't been Horatio. She still remembered the crashing relief as she caught sight of him in Emergency, shaken, pale, with blood on his shirt that was not his own, but upright and unharmed. She launched herself at him, hugging him in fierce relief, and the expression in his eyes suddenly brought home the reality. For the first time since the call, she thought of Speed, and the startled guilt swept over her along with genuine fear for her friend and coworker, the combined flood overwhelming her. She broke down into sobs then, and Horatio held her silently, offering his support but no reassurance. He had no reassurance he could give.
Calleigh forced her voice into sound. She had to say this aloud, had to try to explain to him, even if she didn't understand it herself. "Tim, I didn't mean it. It's not that I wanted it to be you. I just didn't think of anything but Horatio for the first bit. I can't believe I didn't think of you, too. I'm sorry, okay? I don't know why it happened. Shock or something. I wasn't thinking straight." She trailed off again, picturing him listening to her, the darkly sardonic expression and slightly raised eyebrow making obvious his unspoken thought. "Don't be thinking that. You're wrong, you know. There's nothing there. There never could be anything there." Speed was wrong; her feelings for Horatio were purely professional. There wasn't a hope of anything else, after all. He had Yelina. He only needed Calleigh as a ballistics expert. The memory of his arms around her in the ER kept coming back, though. Even in the horror and the fear for Speed at that point, being held by him felt so right.
And she was thinking about Horatio again, kneeling at Speed's grave but unable to keep her mind solely on him even during her apology. What kind of a friend was she? Calleigh forced a knee viciously into the ground, using the pain to focus herself, not caring what it did to her slacks. "Tim, I'm sorry, okay? I wish it hadn't been either of you. It still seems so wrong at CSI. Everybody's quieter than usual, and I keep expecting to suddenly see you or hear your voice. Horatio's hired a new trace expert – he had to, you know – but nobody will ever take your place." She kissed her hand and then placed it palm down on the ground, trying to send the kiss through the barrier to him. "I'll miss you, Speed." The words ran out. He had never been impressed by words anyway, but she hoped the feeling reached him. She did miss him. She wished she had been at the jewelry store instead. She was a better shot, and they might have all been safe that way. Everything would have been all right. The echoing emptiness of CSI would have been filled, and this confused guilt wouldn't be gnawing through her sleep at nights. Suddenly aware of fatigue, she stood, feeling slightly better for the apology but still confused. Why had she reacted so strangely that day? She stared down at the grave for a few more minutes. "I'm sorry," she repeated one final time, then spun and walked away.
Calleigh had parked some distance away, needing the walk, refusing to make her apology at his grave convenient for herself. As she headed back toward her car now, the peaceful finality of the place slowly washed over her spirit, carrying some of the tension away despite her confusion. Cemeteries exist in their own time, suspended between life and eternity, and it was oddly soothing to read the stones, to wander among these monuments to love and loss. She did not notice the gravedigger hovering in the background, tracking her movements with concerned understanding. Surrounded by death, she could also read a celebration of life. "Beloved husband." "Loving father." "Faithful friend." Now and then there was a memorial to a child, a shorter span between the dates, a shorter life snuffed out before its time. One stone especially caught her eye, drawing her magnetically off her route. There was a toy truck affixed into the top of the stone, a dump truck, permanently frozen there with wheels that would never turn again. "Our son," read the heartbreaking, simple epitaph. He had been four years old. That life had been even briefer than Speed's. Why? Why had this child died? Why had Speed died? The last thought brought another along with it in double harness, as it had since that first day. Why had her initial reaction been just focused on Horatio?
Calleigh paused to run a hand over the polished, hard, cold granite of a stone. "Wife, mother, and friend – she enriched her world." Her hand paused unconsciously over the word wife as a tingle shot down her spine. The sensation was almost like Horatio was here. He had never been able to approach her unawares, even cat-footed as he was; her soul resounded to his presence. But why on earth would Horatio be at the cemetery right now? She'd never encountered him here before on her Monday afternoon ritual visits. She turned, carefully casual, and spotted the Hummer on one of the small cemetery roads, trekking slowly, almost reluctantly toward its destination. Horatio, typically, went straight for his goal, parking as close to Speed's grave as he could get, but he hesitated as he got out of the Hummer. His eyes were riveted on Speed's grave, and he did not see Calleigh. He was wearing his sunglasses, safely hiding his eyes from the world, but the set of his shoulders and the droop of his head spoke for them. Not merely grief but guilt. Massive, crushing, unbearable guilt. She recognized that feeling, had had many intimate conversations with it herself lately. How had she missed it in him before? His own selflessness, damn the man, always putting others first. Horatio had been so focused on the team at work, trying to help all of them, that his own feelings were set aside. Here, though, he thought he was alone, and the drawbridge into his emotions fell open with weary resignation, offering a clear pathway to a tortured soul. Without others around him to focus on, he did not have the energy to hold it closed. Calleigh crept a little closer. Grief she could understand, but what could Horatio possibly have to condemn himself for? His own actions at the jewelry shop had been heroic, and there was no way he could have saved Speed. Reluctant but still graceful, Horatio walked to the grave. Distracted from her own confusion by his obvious turmoil, she slipped carefully from tombstone to tombstone, approaching him surreptitiously, never noticing her own shadow holding himself carefully a few stones behind. Horatio never looked to the side. From him, Speed's grave received the full, intense, focused attention their fallen coworker deserved.
Horatio made himself touch the stone. Yet another monument of guilt had been raised in the cemetery of his life, markers of people close to him he had not been able to save. His parents. Raymond. Al. Speed. He removed the sunglasses, hanging them carefully around his neck. Somehow, you cannot hide behind barriers when talking to the dead. He knelt and did not notice himself how routine the action was. His mind was too wracked to notice his body's ease. His low voice, slightly thickened, still carried clearly to Calleigh's listening ears. "Speed, I'm sorry. I'm sorry I couldn't save you that day." He hesitated, and his suddenly restless fingers picked up a clod of dirt and crumpled it, watching it sift back down, leaving him empty-handed. Calleigh leaned forward slightly. She knew this was eavesdropping, but she couldn't help it. Concern for Horatio had overwhelmed everything else from the moment she saw him exit the Hummer. She had to know what was wrong, for his sake, and he would never tell her knowingly. If he even knew she was here, he would retreat and raise the barriers again. She heard his indrawn breath and saw his shoulders square as he launched into self-recrimination. He was getting down to the heart of the matter now. "I know I'm not usually here today, but I had to talk to you. I'm sorry about the funeral. She just looked so vulnerable there standing next to me, and it hit me right then that it could have been her. I sent her back to the lab and picked you to go to the jewelry shop, but if I had chosen differently, if she had been with me, she could have died. I could have lost her. And I was glad she was still alive." The tears spilled over his voice and ran unashamedly down his face now. "I stood there at your funeral, and for a moment, I was just thinking I was glad it wasn't her. I didn't mean it, Speed. I'm not glad you're dead. I don't know what came over me." Horatio stared at the ground and spread his hands, touching it, digging his fingers into the not-yet-compacted earth. "I'd undo all of it if I could. I'd go alone. Then it would have been just me, if anyone. I wouldn't have lost you, and I wouldn't have risked losing her." He paused for a moment. "I can't even stop thinking about her at your grave. I could have lost her, and I was relieved I hadn't. At your funeral. What kind of a friend am I?"
"A better one than I am." Calleigh's legs propelled her out from behind a tall tombstone before her mind could stop them. On second thought, her mind didn't want to stop them. Her own turmoil was forgotten. She had to go to him, help him somehow.
Horatio tensed up, startled, and came to his feet abruptly, but he looked away from her, not toward her, as she approached. "I didn't realize you were here."
"I know. Horatio, you have nothing to berate yourself for. You didn't let Speed down. At least you were thinking of him while he was dying." She reached out and touched his face softly, as if it were fragile, turning it gently to face hers. "You haven't let him down half as much as I have."
"What do you mean? You weren't even there at the shop, Calleigh. Thank God." The last two words slipped out as a much softer appendix to his statement, but he could not suppress them.
"When I got that call, Horatio, I was absolutely frantic. I didn't know what had happened or how serious it was. But I was thinking of you. I didn't even think of Speed until I knew you were safe. Horatio Caine, don't you ever say that you wish it had been you instead. I wish it hadn't been anybody, but I couldn't stand the thought of losing you." She suddenly was overwhelmed by tears herself. It was her turn to try to look away, shielding her vulnerability, and his turn to grasp her ever so gently and turn her to face him.
"Calleigh, don't punish yourself. People react strangely under stress. You do things you don't mean." The drawbridge was firmly closed again. Horatio was once more trying to comfort others, ignoring himself.
Anger suddenly ignited the dry fuel of the stress of the last few weeks, and her eyes showed the flames. "I did mean it. That's the problem. I almost lost you, and that terrified me, and I meant every single second of it. I still wake up shaking at night from dreams where you die. Why should you have that much effect on me when there's nothing really there?"
Horatio stared at her, startled into display of his feelings. "Nothing there? You think there's nothing there?"
Anger died as quickly as it had flared up. Calleigh was stunned by the depth of feeling in his eyes and voice, and she spoke quickly, urgently. "Is there?" She caught him by the arms, forcing him to stay facing her directly. "Tell me there's nothing at all there, Horatio. No spark, no potential. Nothing. Tell me so I can start to try to forget about what losing you would mean and only think of you as a friend."
The blue eyes slowly, tenderly traced every detail of her face. He couldn't look away now. "I can't," he said softly, and the admission fell like a kiss across her soul. She shivered in fear and delight combined. Unfortunately, Horatio didn't stop at that. "What about Hagen?"
It was Calleigh's turn to stare. "Are you serious? Can you actually see the two of us staying together? It was nothing, Horatio. I was trying to distract myself."
One corner of his mouth quirked slightly. "Did it work?"
"No," Calleigh admitted. "I realized I didn't want to be distracted." He smiled, and the smile instantly vanished as he remembered where they were.
"Distracted. I'm doing it again. I came here to apologize to Speed, and here I am again thinking of you."
"Horatio, you aren't shortchanging Speed. Thinking for one second at his funeral that it could have been me is a lot better than me thinking for thirty minutes that it could have been you." Again, he started to try to comfort her, and she cut off the reassurance. "You know what I think? I think Speed would be laughing at us both. He's probably up on a cloud somewhere amused by all this. He knows how much you cared about him as a friend, Horatio. You haven't let him down. If he could, he'd tell you so himself. You do make it hard to remember sometimes, but you're only human, Horatio. Don't blame yourself for not having full control of your feelings every second."
"On one condition." He paused, waiting to be prompted.
"What's that?"
"That you stop blaming yourself for the same thing. He knows that you cared about him, too."
Calleigh looked at the tombstone and suddenly did picture Speed on a cloud laughing at both of them, urging them on. "He would hate to have people crying at his grave. I'll try, okay? But you're agreeing to the same thing. Maybe we can help each other with it."
Horatio turned her face to him again. "Were you really that upset at the thought of losing me?"
"Absolutely shattered."
"That's how I felt at the funeral. Such a little decision, and you could have died without ever knowing"
"Without ever knowing what?" She wanted to hear the words.
"That I love you."
It was finally, irrevocably said.
Calleigh wrapped both arms around him, pulling him to her. The kiss started out exploratory and quickly became demanding, urgent. Horatio backed away after a minute, though. "This isn't right," he said.
"What?" She couldn't take another emotional flip-flop today. Her soul was already dizzy.
He read the thought and soothed it with his velour voice. "I don't mean us. That feels so right it scares me. But we did come to apologize to him. He deserves that." He turned back to the tombstone and touched it with one hand. "Goodbye, Tim. I'll miss you. I wish you were alive still, but you'll never totally be gone from CSI."
Calleigh touched the stone in turn. "Goodbye, Tim. I'm sorry. I'll never forget you." They stood for a few minutes in silence, remembering. Calleigh didn't even notice that she was crying again until Horatio reached over tenderly to wipe the tears away. Somehow, though, the grief was pure this time. Guilt had been replaced by regret. Horatio, next to her, looked much better, too, sad but no longer haunted. She knew when he was ready to leave, because her own feelings echoed his in the same instant. "Come on, Horatio. Why don't we go get coffee or something? We need to talk over some things."
He turned away with one final, regretful glance behind. "Like Yelina? It's complicated, Calleigh. She's my family, and I love her, but there's nothing more there, even though she wanted there to be. She's dating Stetler now, actually."
"Stetler?" Calleigh somehow couldn't picture the man on a date. Did IAB agents even have a social life?
"Yes." A worried frown crossed his face. "I don't trust him, Cal. I'm afraid he's just using her, but it's hard for me to tell her that. She wouldn't listen, anyway. She doesn't trust me anymore."
"What?" Calleigh slammed to a startled halt. "How could anybody not trust you?"
"Like I said, it's complicated. Let's take your suggestion and talk about it over coffee."
Calleigh filed that story to dissect later. "Actually, Handsome, I wasn't thinking about Yelina at all. We have better things to talk over first. Such as us."
He smiled, the warmth of it slowly thawing the frost of the last few weeks. "Such as us." They both walked to the Hummer, Calleigh's car forgotten. Behind them, tiny blades of grass were a green haze across the grave, stretching through the dirt toward new possibilities.