Clueless by Betty Bokor
David/Morgan. David and Morgan have been friends for a while. Perhaps one of them is willing to make some changes...
Spoilers: All the episodes up to today.
Disclaimer: The CSI: Crime Scene Investigation original characters belong to Alliance Atlantis Communications, CBS Paramount Network Television, and Jerry Bruckheimer Television. This was written strictly for the purpose of entertainment. No attempt at copyright infringement has been made.

Clueless

Chapter 1

David saw her walk away from his lab and sighed. What was he thinking? How had his feelings become so undone? He was not sure at what point he had started seeing Morgan as more than just a friend, but it was obvious that the feeling was not reciprocal. He had accepted it, but he had not moved on. Yet.

In any case, having to work with her everyday did not make it easier. The last weeks had been especially challenging, either because she was oblivious to his feelings or because she did not care. He could not decide which was true.

Some days they would spend long hours in the lab together, trying to solve one puzzle or another while flirting shamelessly and, other days, she would ignore him completely and end her day having a beer with Greg or going home without even saying goodbye. And it tore him apart.

He could not deny he enjoyed the flirting and the friendly banter, but it never went beyond that. And, even though they spent time together outside work, it was not always their choice; many times they were simply their mutual choice to survive Conrad or Olivia's social events.

Now, facing the perspective of a three-day weekend alone in his apartment –again–, he felt he had to do something drastic. Of course, he could not make his feelings known to her. Though that would have been the logic thing to do, he chose not to because he did not want to ruin their working relationship. As soon as she rejected him, being alongside each other would become uncomfortable and it would probably end up with one of them having to leave the job. Possibly himself.

The funny thing was that he never doubted that she would rebuff his love.

Truthfully, his life had become a mess and it was not something new; it had been brewing for a while.

Perhaps, moving back to the town where his mother lived had not been the best idea, but, after leaving Los Angeles, it had seemed like the easiest next step. A move not too far, into an already established home where everything was done for him. No cooking, no cleaning, no worrying about anything. It was almost like being a teenager again and, honestly, he had actually enjoyed that freedom.

Until Wendy. He had really, really liked Wendy. He had started imagining a future with her. A normal future, with his own home, a wife, even kids –because he truly did not dislike them as much as he tried to make others believe. However, that future had dissolved like sugar in water when she had left. He knew she cared about him as much as he cared for her, but she had chosen her career over him. And what bothered him the most was that she could have fought for that career right there where she was, with him, but she had taken the easy way out, just like he had done with Elisabetta.

It still hurt. It still made him resent Henry somehow.

Then, everything had gone from bad to worse fast. First, his mother had demanded to meet the "office girlfriend" he had been talking about for almost a year. He had used Wendy –or Wendy's ghost, to be more accurate– to get out of countless social obligations his mother had tried to drag him into. He had also used her as an excuse to move out of his mother's house. Frankly, Wendy had been the main reason to do it, but, after her departure, he had felt no hurry to go back home to his mother's.

Nevertheless, Mother had demanded to meet to girl and he had caved. The whole mess that had ensued had only made his life more miserable and led him straight into Elisabetta's arms. After Mandy had openly mocked him and Morgan had pitied him, he had still been forced to tell his mother the truth. Though she had appreciated his bravery during the kidnapping and even his honesty about his passion for his job, a drastic change had become necessary.

Away from the lab, he had left his "Hodges" act behind and he had enjoyed himself much more. Elisabetta had seen the real David, the one he rarely let out, the one he had finally allowed Morgan to see a few times… but, by then, it had been too late.

Sometimes he thought that Morgan –more than his love for his career– had been the real reason behind his broken engagement to Elisabetta. He could not deny that she had gotten into his head since the very moment of that unexpected kiss at the hospital. Why did she have to do that to him? She had already –jokingly– proposed that they dated and he had been clear about the impossibility of that. He had not told her about his fiancée, but he had been unequivocal; his life had changed during his trip to Italy and they could not date.

Unfortunately, she had kissed him anyway and that little kiss had planted some kind of malevolent seed that had grown to obfuscate his reasoning. Nevertheless, no matter how many times every detail of that kiss came back to haunt him, she was not going to become the one he couldn't live without. He was going to live without her just fine. He just needed to do something about it before it was too late for everything else in his life.

As he drove to his mother's for another breakfast with her, he tried to figure out his options.

From her bedroom window, Olivia saw David park his car down the street. She had invited him to breakfast because she was tired of seeing him alone and had decided to find a solution to his problem.

She wondered if people at the lab ever saw beyond his mask. Through her relationship with Ecklie, she had learned a lot about how his coworkers behaved toward David. She knew that they often treated him with mockery and condescension, but she also knew that it was mostly his fault. He had created such a perfect character that now they could not see what lay behind, and she was going to fix that, too.

Because David was brilliant. They had told her early on that he had a very high IQ and he had proven it over the years. Conrad had acknowledged that, in many occasions, David had been the one to break a case. She had heard that his discovery of the bleach constant during the Miniature Killer case had been a stroke of genius. David had dismissed it, but she had noticed his pride when he had told her about Grissom's simple "Good job, Hodges." Then, over and over, she had heard him joke about his intelligence in a way that could only make other people think he was nothing but an arrogant jerk.

Olivia also knew that David was hard working, responsible, and trustworthy and that the only reason he stayed at that lab was because he got the chance to do the job he wanted to do. He was where he wanted to be and he had even missed his chance at happiness with Elisabetta because of that.

Well, as a matter of fact, that last bit did not make her very unhappy at all. She had not liked the Italian beauty in the least. At the beginning, she had thought Elisabetta had romanced David as a means to obtain a green card or simply because of his family money. Then, after finding out that her family had as much or more money than hers, she had been obliged to admit the possibility that there could be true affection between the two, but, still, she did not like her. It scared her that David could want to move away from her again. She was getting old and, though she did not like showing it to him, she enjoyed having him close.

At any rate, thankfully, she was gone and not coming back.

Why couldn't David choose someone local, someone like Morgan, for example? Olivia had been very happy with his choice while –briefly– believing he was in a relationship with her. But he was going to have trouble finding a good wife if he kept playing that annoying guy he had created in high school.

She had asked him once why he had started behaving that way and he had confessed that it was a way to protect himself. When your family is rich, you don't see yourself as particularly attractive –as any regular teenager– and you get called "a good catch," it makes it hard to trust people around you. Systematically annoying others made it easier. Then, if anyone was capable of seeing beyond the mask, perhaps there was hope.

After a while he had began enjoying his new personality. Among other perks, it gave him an excuse to boldly say what he really thought. Yet, even at his most sardonic, what he usually told people around him were just facts others refused to say out loud or even acknowledge. He was not usually criticized for telling the truth, but for the act of telling such truth when the rest of the world would have preferred to keep it quiet or had not even seen it yet. She had heard Nicholas –Nick?– tell the story of how he had felt mortified when David had expressed out loud his concern over how Langston's Dirty Harry style antics could reflect badly on their team, only to admit, later on, that such antics had really messed many careers at the lab.

But now, it was her turn to speak openly. She was going to fix his life. She had found the perfect woman for him. She could not ask for more: the daughter of her best friend, recently divorced, with no children, well educated, refined, with her own money and a high paying job. They had known each other since they were children; they had even dated for a while when they were teenagers. She did not need anything from David and he did not need anything from her. They could make a perfect couple.

And he was here, right about to have breakfast with her and hear everything about it.

On Monday evening, Morgan drove to work feeling a little concerned. The last time she had spoken with David on Thursday he had looked at her in a way that had made her uncomfortable. At the time she had not been able not decipher what was behind his look, but it had really bothered her.

The scene had come back to her mind many times during the weekend and, after hours of analysis, she had concluded that he had shown disappointment. She had discarded many other options before reaching that conclusion, but, at this point, she was fairly certain. When re-imagining the moment, she could almost hear him mumble a "never mind." He had not said it; but she had seen it in his eyes.

The problem now was to figure out how she had disappointed him. She had no idea. How had she failed him? Was it something she did at work or something more personal? But personal how? He was still her best friend. She had meant it when she said it to Jacinta, the young victim she had been helping at the time. They spent a lot of time together, at work and out of work, and they got along very well. Whenever they had to attend some boring ceremony, or even go to a party they did not care about, it was easy to do it together. David had a great sense of humor and he was very observant; he could make her laugh during the most tedious situations.

Other times, they spent the afternoon in her apartment, watching a movie and eating take-out. He was easy-going and she did not have to pretend to be with him. He was not "a date"; he was a friend. She could wear flip-flops or tie her hair in a bun, or spend the day in an ugly T-shirt three sizes bigger than hers. He did not mind.

Finn was right. He was funny, charming, smart… a sweet guy.

But, what had she done to disappoint him?

As she got closer to work, she kept obsessing about it. Had she ever said something derogative about him? She tried to think, especially about the times before she faked being his girlfriend, before they became good friends. Because she had not really liked him at the beginning. Many had warned her about him and it had taken several "shared dates" with their parents to figure out he was different than she had thought.

She suddenly remembered one time when Finn had been asking her about her love life and she had been a little too strong in her denial about being with Hodges. She tried to think about it. That had been after their "dinner with mom"… Could he have heard her? Well, she had kissed him after that… He could not have been very hurt by her attitude –if he knew about it– considering that she had kissed him a few days later…

She almost ran a red light. She had kissed him. She had asked him to act as if it had never happened and he had done it so well that she had not thought about it again. Could that still be bothering him? Was he truly offended by it? He had to understand that she had not known about his girlfriend by then. And it had been an impulsive act in a moment of great vulnerability. After all, her father had just been shot in the chest…

It could not be that. There had to be something else and she would have to find out. She did not want to lose his friendship.

She arrived to the Lab's parking lot, parked in the back, and walked toward the main entrance. Soon she was joined by Finn who had parked closer.

"Had a good weekend?" Finn asked with a smile.

"Pretty uneventful. Cleaned the apartment, ate only take-out, spent a lot of time watching old movies…"

"Ah… the life of the single and unattached…"

Morgan smiled. "How's Mark doing?"

"Much better, thank you. Taking it easy. With the exception of cleaning the house, we did pretty much the same as you."

Morgan smiled again as they reached the bottom of the front stairs.

A few meters up the stairs was Hodges, almost running toward the doors with a big bag in one hand.

Morgan and Finn had just started climbing when a car drove fast up to the entrance and parked right behind them. They both turned to look at it and saw an expensive sports car idling while someone inside seemed to be looking for something. A few seconds later, a tall, elegant brunette got out of the car and looked up.

"David!" she called.

Hodges, who had almost reached the top, immediately turned and looked at the woman, surprised.

She raised her hand and showed him a wallet.

Hodges ran down the stairs ignoring Morgan and Finn as he passed by them, smiled at the brunette, and grabbed the wallet she was offering.

"Thanks! I will be needing this. See you for breakfast," he said in a low voice.

"I'll be all rested up," she answered with a smirk, gave him a quick kiss on the lips, got back in her car, and left as fast as she had gotten there.

Hodges ran back up pass Finn and Morgan with a quick "Good evening, ladies," and disappeared throught the entrance doors.

The two women stayed in place for a few more seconds, dumbfounded.

"Don't worry," Henry's voice said from behind them. "That happens to him all the time. Women just kiss him by surprise," he said with heavy sarcasm in his voice, but also in a joking tone. "First Wendy –pretty sure they didn't think I could see them– then Elisabetta and now… who was that? Athena or Aphrodite? What do you think?" He shook his head with resignation and climbed past them.

Finn smiled. "Way to go, Hodges!"

Morgan nodded. "Yeah, way to go," she said with little enthusiasm. She was so absorbed in her thoughts that she missed the knowing look Finn gave her.

Perhaps it was not disappointment what she had seen in Hodges eyes. Maybe she had made a mountain out of nothing at all. Probably Hodges did not even care about what she did or said. After all, she was only a friend.